#like i loathe you and everything you stand for but i cant imagine anyone else standing by me

[odysseys-blood]

i love media where they make it sound like being partners is worse than a death sentence

[i-did]

what would make renee angry in your opinion?

I had a really hard time answering this one actually. I thought about it for a while and asked a lot of my friends to see if they had any ideas, and here's what I came up with:

1) A professor or TA who is super shitty to her

Just a really shitty teacher.

as she goes through college, she’s bound to run into some assholes, and I don’t think Renee has perfect grades in the past or present. her not knowing academic terminology and feeling out of place in the college setting would make a lot of sense for a lot of the foxes, and Renee is good on putting on a smile, but she still eventually gets that one professor or TA that scoffs at her questions and “doesn’t have time for the likes of her” and the constant complete dismissal digs painfully under her skin and brings out her anger.

2) People who are intensely rude to her despite her best efforts to be as kind as she can be

Renee is patient, but we all have our limit. similar to the one above, but Renee dealing with someone who is just rude all the time and she struggles to keep reminding herself “we all have bad days, I don’t know what they’re going though.” Renee working in a coffee shop and a woman bumping into Renee and spilling her coffee on herself, only to yell at Renee for an hour, ignoring all of Renee’s pleasant customer service smiles. said customer later on becoming a regular and repeating this behavior, cutting off people in parking lots and flipping them off, Renee being kind and trying to give her a free scone only for the woman to tell her she hates scones, Renee offering something else only for the woman to tell her to shut up. that shit wears you down, and Renee still dumping her kindness onto someone every time only for it to backfire or be dismissed would make her have to take a few deep breaths in the back room before deciding, fuck it, she's cut off from active kindness, now only passible neutrality and not being aggressive is enough. 

3) someone who refuses her help

her knowing she could really make a difference, but some people just don’t want help, and she feels helpless and angry. she's not angry at the person, but the situation of them not being ready to accept help or even able to accept help makes her so frustrated she would start to grind her teeth in her sleep. She understands how it is, how hard it can be to take the first step to change or giving up pride or whatever the hurtle may be, but that doesn’t make it any easier than her thinking in her head “just let me fucking help you!!! or anyone!!! just let anyone in to help you!!!! fuck!!!” inside her head. she knows not everyone needs help or saving, but some people do, and when they shove her back, unwilling and not ready for it over and over while she’s trying to save them, she gets frustrated that she can’t.... do anything. and just has to wait. but Renee can be patient, and she’s willing to wait. 

4) Someone actively trying to wear her down and get under her skin

okay so this isn’t something that happens often, the closest Renee has really come to it is with Andrew when he first was scoping her out. but– if someone was actively trying to aggravate her, laughing at everything she said and making fun of her, pulling at her looser strings and picking at her ticks, watching to see what brought out her reaction, they could eventually do it and get under her skin. i think she wouldn’t let herself blow up at them since thats what they want, but she would silently excuse herself from the situation to take a breather. no one really does this with her, and Andrew only does this to size her up and even still his interrogation isn’t the type of harassment i’m imagining. i mean like old school bullying, not locker shoving, but the middle school girl shit that leaves emotional scars. and them being older, they’re less afraid to show it and be more straight forward mean. people don’t really do this to her tho, its too much effort to get a reaction, and when they do, its never what they would have wanted, like crying, but instead is her smile falling and then finding a way to make them feel like shit. Renee is kind, but she also knows how to play on a similar level as them, not just with fists. i HC Renee as plus size, and fuck it is hard to be different in anyway as a kid. but childhood bullying was the least of her worries and these people dont see how deep her personal self assurance has grown and how she has learned to stand with her head held high and her face serine. her and dan are quite similar in this, but dan is much more active and direct while Renee is passive in her letting it glide over her, dan has even gotten annoyed on Renee’s behalf and then annoyed that Renee was not affected and why she didn’t fight more directly back. 

5) People who are overtly cruel and she struggles to sympathize with

okay so, you ever see someone so mean and rude for zero reason to someone else and you’re just like... what the fuck??? Renee doesn’t let others get to her really, but damn.... someone going after someone else in ways that are just so uncalled for and so harshly.... it gets to her. She once watched an episode of catfish where the catfisher laughed at the girl, uncaring that he crossed so many emotional lines and manipulated people without really any care. and she wanted to throw the remote and punch the tv right where the guys face was on the paused screen. nothing like someone just, kicking someone else while their down with no mercy, or making fun of someone behind their back and them not knowing, making fun of the deaf kids voice behind his back and he doesn’t see them doing it, and she’s like, man, Fuck. You. in her head. I don’t think she was like, always a nice person, in fact, i think Renee used to very much so not be the type to sit with the alone kid at lunch but instead ignore him and think “yea he’s weird, kinda ugly” without thinking much of it. But then she decided to change, and she took everything she thought it meant to be a good person, and became that. she started sitting with the alone kid, she started doing charities, she started to smile instead of punch, and she started going to church. and so when she sees cruelness she was once passive in the face of, maybe even active in, she uses kindness. Renee is she good at using taking the high road in such a graceful way it makes others feel bad. like when she tells Nicky calmly “thats not very nice” after he jokes about Seth dying in a car crash on his way from the airport book 1, and Nicky feels like shit. it feels like shit to get called out sometimes, and while its not her goal, she does know it is an effect of it. (i don’t think she’s mad at Nicky in that scene, but she did say something since she is there to protect hers and she redraws that line in that moment, especially without Allison or Seth there yet to say fuck you themselves.)

6) Injustice and systems of oppression

for these i feel she gets more frustrated, overwhelmed, and sometimes resigned. she knows how dark and shitty the world is, but she stays up at night with her hand on her heart as she breathes deep, thinking about how... utterly fucked everything is. its pretty easy for me to HC that Renee is politically far left and has seen the dark side to lack of resources and systemic issues that are just... so overwhelming she doesn’t even know what she does as just one person. world pollution, corruption, class divide, flint water crisis, the homeless crisis, the prison system, functioning segregation in school systems, just... it all. she’s had nights after volunteering where she thinks “i did something, i did.” and she has days where she realizes “...i’m doing nothing, in the end... its all for nothing, there’s just too much.” just a bad day where she sits there, thinking about how much is wrong and wont be fixed and how ‘doomed’ things are, how broken, and she doesn’t feel at a loss, but rather this deep anger that comes from who she was before. 

7) herself. 

Her being unable to live up to her own standards. she still thinks mean things, she has mean and cruel urges, and when she has them, she remembers that she’s still a bad person trying very hard to be a good one, and she thinks she’s still a bad person at her core. she’s not self loathing with it, but she does think to herself “i’m a hypocrite.” and sits with that thought for a minute. sparring with Andrew has helped her, to balance the two sides of her in a way that feels both self indulgent and honest to her path forward. but sometimes while sitting in that church pew, she thinks of her dead mother, her dead step father, those she turned in without batting an eye, stabbing in the back to save herself, and she thinks “i should feel something.” but she doesn’t, she wasn’t sorry then and she’s not sorry now. and she thinks, “the others call Andrew a monster, and they don’t realize that i’m one too.” and she tries to muster up something deep inside her, but she cant. and it can frustrate her, how after all these actions, all those hours of beach clean up and homeless shelters and building houses in some other country and going around clapping her hands to the songs, but she’s still the person she is deep down. and it gets to her. i think her having a conversation with Neil one day, on what it means to be a real person, is she pretending who she is? is she her thoughts or her actions? which is the real her? and Neil saying, it’s all of it. every facet of the self is still the self, he is Nathaniel and Neil and Abram and every other person he has been and will be. we change but we are also always ourselves, and her actions are just as true as her thoughts. 

[praesidiumsystem-blog]

tw c*csa

im standing in the middle of a gravel road, it’s a dead end. my extended family lives here in the woods, half an hour drive from civilization. my cousins are playing in the with road some of the neighbour girls that live down the street, i’m 6 years old. i’m wearing a striped shirt i really like, with frills at the bottom. 

she runs up to me and shoves my arm and runs away shrieking and laughing “you have cooties!” this is a game of tag, which i am no good at. in hindsight i wonder if the “cooties” tag game was a reference to avoiding people who have STDs. i wonder what “cooties” are, but based on the context i figure it must not be good, because everyone’s running away from me before i’ve even started chasing back. her name is n*cole ev*rett. she’s 8. i’ll see her every summer vacation until i turn 12 or so. she’ll be my best friend away from my best friend, both of which will abuse me. she will be the lesser of two evils.

she stays the night with me at my aunts house, i stay the night with her at her parents house. she has one older sister and one younger sister, the latter of which is adopted and is very socially awkward. my cousins sleep in a pair of bunk beds. josh on the top, me on the bottom, porsche on the top of the other bunk, and mack on the bottom. they will all bully me and make me hate myself before i turn 10. we start playing things like truth or dare. no one ever suggests a dare because everyone knows this game is for revealing who you have a crush on. no one wants to tell. the noise of the box fan in the doorway lulls me to sleep night after night, it’s too hot to breathe. my stomach churns with anxiety. i don’t like anyone. i am afraid. i am afraid of everyone.

we stay up too late giggling and get in trouble a hundred times. they separate us a hundred times, and we sulk a hundred times. she’s funny and she makes me so happy. she kisses me with cherry chapstick on, the pressure of someone else’s lips strange on mine at 6 years old. no one knows, and she knows i wont tell, because she knows im afraid of everyone. she doesnt want me to be afraid of her.

summers pass. her parents are never home at night because they’re both overnight p*lice officers, and they sleep all day, krista and autumn are always out with their friends. she rubs her hands up under my shirt and brushes over my chest. my heart is in my throat.and i feel sick with anxiety and i don’t know what to call anxiety yet so my head swims and im terrified. i feel uncomfortable because i dont think you’re supposed to touch other people there. she rubs my stomach and moves her hand between my legs and feels around. she kisses me again with cherry chapstick, pushing her warm wet tongue between my lips.i would be frozen with fear if i werent shaking so much. she tells me not to be afraid, its just practice. practice for what, i cant imagine at 10 years old, but she wants to help me. she’s funny and makes me so happy. i try to stay inside my body but i know this isnt right. i say nothing. she knows i wont tell, because she knows im afraid of everyone. she doesnt want me to be afraid of her.

another school year passes, another summer comes. she tells me to touch her, too. it’s just practice. she moves my hand over her chest until i learn to do it on my own. she pushes my hand between her legs until i learn to do it on my own. she tells me im improving. despite the terror churning in my belly that someone will come in, or her parents will wake up, and they’ll call me disgusting and tell me its my fault and tell my mother im doing bad things, i feel like i want to keep improving at whatever it is im supposed to be getting better at. night, after night, after night, summer after summer after summer, i want to get better. i want to be told that the fear is worth it.

she moves away. i don’t get to say goodbye. year after year passes, a hollow forming slowly in my stomach like a black hole, eating away at the edges of my mind. did it really happen? was i making a big deal out of nothing? is that something everyone does? is everyone else not afraid when they do it? i cant ask. i cant risk my mother finding out i did something bad, she’ll hit me. i dont want to be hit.  in fact, i dont want to be touched at all, ever again. long pants it is. long jackets in summer it is. i try to stay inside my body. im empty.

year after year, again and again, more doubt seeps in, slowly dripping into my memories, obscuring them. maybe it wasnt that bad and im overreacting. maybe itll pay off somehow, even though no one  else has initiated that kind of thing with me all this time. pants turn into the same pair of jeans i wear every day for 3 years. my grey sweater becomes my safe space, so much so that my friends always draw me wearing it. some part of me feels like i’m naked all the time, no matter how much i’m wearing. people can see the shape of my body and its so, so ugly, couldnt be uglier. i cant hide nearly as much as i want to. i cant stop being in the body i have as much as i want to. it was so long ago, it shouldnt matter to me anymore, i try to stop worrying about it. relief by forgetting almost comes. 

she moves back. i’m in high school, still wearing jeans, even to bed, but sporting tshirts these days. my grandmother says i should go say hello. the same sickness churns in my stomach, i dont think i can see her again, but there’s so many questions i want answered. i knock, the floor of the trailer is still warped. the wallpaper is the same. her parents are still cops and are still gone 12 hours of the day. i sit on her floor and she flops onto her bed, turning on the t.v. she starts telling me about all the relationships she’s had and the boys she’s fucked. everything in her room seems to have cherries on it. she still smells like cherry chapstick. my mouth is bone dry and i cant look at her. 

we’re sitting on my cousins trampoline, the same night, a cherry lollipop in her mouth. i ask her, if she remembers, What We Did, before. this is the only question i manage to ask. a long beat of silence, my heart slowly suffocating me sitting still in my throat, hammering hard. “yeah,” she says, “i’m sorry” i anticipate all of the anxiety and fear and self loathing to disappear into the aether because she’s sorry, i cant believe it, ive wanted this for so long,but my heart sinks back into my chest, and down into my stomach, and out my feet, into the earth, into the core of the earth, melting into the core. “thank you,” i say. i don’t feel better. i don’t feel better at all. i never see her again. 

a year or two later, i’m in my moms car that i’m driving, and i hear a song start on the radio. it sounds like a boy singing, but for some reason the theme is about kissing a girl and it being a really weird thing to do, and i figure a woman must be singing. the chorus starts, “the taste of her cherry chapstick” sinks into my ears and melts inside my skull, im swimming, swimming. “you’re my experimental game”, my body is copying itself, there’s me in the driver seat, me in the middle ,me in the passenger seat, me outside the car, repeating, repeating. everywhere i go afterward this pop sensation seems to be playing. i figure there must be a thousand of me by now, creeping outside my body, getting further and further from the epicenter of my pain.

“i kissed a girl”, or rather, a girl kissed me, and i didnt like it. why didnt i like it? maybe im broken after all.

[thassalia]

Asks for the fanfic author: 18 and 46 if I could

18. Favorite pairing to write

Ever? That’s a tough one. I wrote eighty bazillion words of Farscape fic. So much fic. And I love John Crichton and Aeryn Sun. I love them so much. I love that they were able to negotiate a life together. That we saw them grow together, be unhealthy and healthy together, become better people because of each other’s influence.  And I loved writing that.  Writing the complexity of that pairing made me a better writer.

But there’s something equally glorious about writing Bruce Banner and Natasha Romanoff because while A relationship of some sort is MCU cannon, it’s complicated and tentative, and there’s also so much...space to play with. So there’s also the fantastic meta conversations around them to have, the worlds and scenes to build, the variations on their relationship, on their stories.  It’s freeing. 

Plus, I love them so, so much.

Plus, plus, and more importantly, writing them with @handypolymath is literally the best.

46. Share a scene from an unfinished fic

This is from the 99% finished camping fic I’m completing for WIP Big Bang. It’s mid-story.

***

Bruce had turned out his reading light once the shuffling began. But it didn’t sound like bears or raccoons, so once he heard the muffled, “Motherfucker,” that signaled Steve tripping over something in the dark, he just waited out the hijinks.

The quiet snick of his own tent unzipping should have been more of a surprise. He lets Natasha get all the way inside before he snags her ankle.

She stays silent, just flicks on her flashlight to shine in his eyes. He shields them with his free hand. 

“Don’t you think it’s a mistake to wake me up in the middle of the night?” His voice is a low rumble, throatier than he’d hoped.  

“You weren’t really asleep.”

Bruce grunts, doesn’t say anything else. She sits on her haunches, leaving him to move his hand or practically fondle her ass. He doesn’t move, waits her out.  It’s the story of the evening. The tent feels close and crowded in the dark, full of the warm scent of her skin. That she’s a few days past a bath just makes her a little muskier. Earthy. The smoke from the fire and the clean scent of dirt and night air are heady perfumes. He’d like to pant with the scent and feel of her, move his hand, slide it up her calf, her thigh.

Fondle her ass on purpose.

He clears his throat instead, and she finally moves the light from his eyes, resting it on the floor of the tent so that they’re mostly in the dark again.  Point, Natasha.

“So, what the hell is happening out there?”

He just catches the edge of her smirk in the ambient light, can hear it in her voice. “Panty raid.”

“Hmm. I don’t know if I want to be involved or just be glad I’m flying solo in here.”

Natasha leans forward so she’s on hands and knees.

“No real panties, I don’t think, unless Stark has wifi wired into his.” She pauses. “I suppose that’s a possibility.”

Bruce hums, all plausible deniability. He’ll never tell.

She crawls closer. “Hill’s on the warpath, determined to find all our little hidden secrets.”

“Oh,” Bruce says.  “Like what?”

“You know. Modern conveniences. Cell phones, radios, tablets, vibrators.” 

“Aren’t those generally battery powered? Plus, I don’t think they transmit...out?” 

Her laugh is low and rich. It goes straight to his dick. Goddammit, he’d made a stand and he wasn’t wrong, but here in the dark where he can’t see her face it feels like a futile gesture.

“Weapons, too.  Hill really wants this to be summer camp, not training camp. Even with all our training.”

As she says this, she pats around next to him and finds the opening of his sleeping bag by feel. She tugs down the zipper, laying her flashlight up by his pillow.

“I’m cold,” she says.  

“I can’t imagine that’s true.”

She reaches forward, unerringly finding his neck, and her fingers are cool enough to send a shiver through him. At least he blames it on the temperature.

“Hill,” he prompts, “Contraband.”

She’s so close now that he could take her by the waist, pull her forward, pull her down.  Her weight would be delicious.

“It’s another game,” she says, “I think.  Cover.  But, I know Maria. She can have multiple agendas.”

 “Cover?”

 “She’s also trying to get away with something.”

 Bruce smiles in the dark. “Are you?”

 The bag lifts away from his body with a rush of cool air.

“Maybe,” she says. “Plus, I’ve got my own contraband that needs hiding.”  She holds up what looks like a roll of quarters.

"Are you planning to do laundry or break someone's jaw?"

"They're bites."

 "Are you asking me to hold for you?"

 "No," she’s clearly lying, but it’s a play.

 He takes them out of her hand delicately. "Am I going to electrocute myself?"

 "Dunno.  How sweaty are you?"

 "I don't want to answer that."

 “You’ll be fine.”

 “Fine,” he says. “But this is a bad idea.”

 “This is a great idea.”

 Then she wriggles into the sleeping bag with him.  He’s wearing sweatpants and an ancient t-shirt, but they don’t help. He can feel the heat of her thighs through the thin material of her leggings. This really is such a terrible idea.  He puts a hand on the back of her neck to help them adjust to the confined space as she squirms.

Heat is pulsing off her neck, and it’s not just the heat generated between them.

“You’re burning up.” He reaches for the flashlight, but she stops him.

“It’s nothing. Sunburn.  It’ll fade by morning.”

He spreads his hand out, fingers grazing her neck, gentle, not wanting to hurt. Trying to soothe. She rolls onto him a little, angling so that the bag accommodates them both, if barely.

It’s uncomfortable. It’s amazing. He’s stymied. This is an epically bad idea. The roll of bites digs into his back and her breasts pressing against his chest, her hand on his waist.  She breathes against him, a soft puff against his mouth and he’s not sure he can stop himself from kissing her.  

She moves a fraction closer, and he angles his head, and the corner of the tent flap lifts open and a nose peeks in.  

“Can I hide in here?”

Barton.

“No,” Natasha says.

 “Yes,” Bruce says, and she pinches his side.

 Clint flashes his light onto Bruce, eyebrow shooting to his forehead. “That looks cozy.”

“I’m cold,” Natasha says.

“Maybe you should come out of there,” he says, “I don’t want to be traumatized.”

“I’m not traumatizing anyone,” she says.

“Untrue, I’m already disturbed.”

“I might be traumatized,” Bruce says. “This sleeping bag isn’t meant for two.”

 “Traitor,” she says. “I should call Hill, tell her about your lamp.”

 But she doesn’t go anywhere, and he moves his hand from her neck to the small of her back, fiddling with the hem of her t-shirt, then finally slipping his fingers underneath to span her skin, canting her hips towards him.

 He’s hardening between them. It doesn’t belie what he’d said earlier, not exactly. Bruce knows he’s the definition of mixed signals right now.  His throat is so tight with desire, with loathing, with the effort of holding tight.

 She’s everything he could want, pressed against him, and that’s the problem. He can’t deny the desire anymore. It’s not just for the luscious flesh, but for the bright, sharp, burning presence inside it.  He can’t afford to give in to her playing, not when he wants something more. Something he really can’t ask for. She owes him nothing, and he owes her so very, very much.

 Nat wiggles again, like she’s testing something and he desperately wishes he could just give in, enjoy this glorious gift she seems to be offering.

 “Do it,” the part of him he most hates taunts. “Give in. Let her use you, and leave you longing for more that she has no intention of giving. Leaving you pathetic and needy.” Bruce turns his head, feels the silk of her hair against his cheek, turns away.  She softens against him, a deliberate signal. Oh god.

 It’s Clint, cross-legged and hunched, who keeps him in check. Not his presence, but the look on his face like if they were just fucking he’d lay back and mostly ignore it.  Instead there’s something almost fraternal on his stoic face, and while Bruce knows the two spies are close, he gets the feeling that look is more for him.

 It shames him.

 Bruce curls his fingers into a fist tight as he can. Natasha stills completely, but it’s an exercise. He releases his fist, finger by finger, breathes through it, relaxes again so that he’s palming her spine.

 “Nat,” Clint says. “I think you’re good, if you wanna go back to your tent.”

“Go away Clint,” she says, then runs her nose along Bruce’s neck and that’s too much. Much too much.  He could have talked this out, but now, he’s too far gone. He needs space.  He tenses, stills, painfully aware that any stiffening on his part will signal something bigger for her. Warnings of his monster. They’ve been training for that very thing, after all.

 His limbs are rigid, fingers flat, no longer caressing her back.

 “Natasha,” he says, warning enough.

 “Oh,” she says, and her tone shifts. The softness disappears as her own limbs tense. Her knee angles, a potential weapon.

 “You need to go,” he says. He hates that Clint is seeing this.

 The lullaby protocols have been primarily between the two of them, bringing in the others only to familiarize them with signals and techniques, to test out situations and threats.  

 Clint is her backup. But he’s Bruce’s too.  And now he’s waiting, reading the tension.

 Spies.

 Fuck.  

 “Sorry,” she says to Bruce, moving off of him in one fluid motion.  He lets his hands fall to his side.  Turns his head.

 He doesn’t say anything, and she crouches at the edge of the tent closure for a moment.

 Clint murmurs her name, but she just slips out of the tent into the cool night air.

[mismasereti]

Disclaimer!!!The content I share is merely from my own experience, I am not a doctor nor a health professional providing medical advice,this is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment,. I am on a journey to promote mental health awareness , so let's leave it at that.

Incase anyone is wondering I'm on my manic phase right now hence my vigor for writing and for some reason I have perfect eyesight which was horrible during my depressive phase,I literally had to get glasses which I don't really need now ,im not sure if that has anything to do with bipolar disorder but if it's any consolation it freaks me out as well.

If you don’t know much about the implications of bipolar disorder it’s important for you to know that mania is not what it seems . It’s not a “super high” or being “extremely happy.” Mania is overwhelming, terrifying, and exhausting, mainly because you dread going back to the depressive episodes but also due to a few other issues. For instance my energy levels have increased to abnormal levels,I literally laugh at everything and I kid you not my self esteem is highly inflated, I oftenly feel overly irritable and experience rasing thoughts not to mention sleep difficulties and anxiety .I crave alcohol a little more than usual and just the other day I almost purchased Xanax over the counter which by the way is not on my prescription,let's just say I feel risky. My appetite right now is shit everything tastes like Cardboard,my decision making skills and memory have gone to the dogs,I could go on and on and fill you in on the greasy details of my newly acquired "strong desires"but let's leave it to imagination for the kids sake and talk about something more alarming!!

Two days ago I wrote a piece but just as I was going to press the share button I shyed away simply because I thought it was a bit too dark for my readers, which is quite ironic considering I've been preaching against shaming and creating stigma around mental illness. I guess it's true what they say we are our own worst enemy.Take for instance I loath body shaming yet each time I walk out or look at the mirror, I get soo insecure in my own skin,talk about preaching water and drinking wine.

Anyway,for a minute there I was proud that I had at least made some progress towards changing the public perception of mental health,turns out I'm the one who needed sensitizing ,I underestimated how equally bad self-stigma is, and I let it go unaddressed, now that I look back I realize how much harder it is to combat self-stigma. I have allowed myself to internalize the public’s negative perceptions of mental health which goes to prove that dealing with mental illness is a process that needs patience and determination,you need to be your own cheerleader before anyone else can cheer you on until you realize that you cant win.Forgive my directness but this life a pain in the ass you need to stand up for yourself most especially against yourself.Visualise your highest self and start showing up as her

[isaacathom]

one interesting thing i found in SB is that for its mythology, which is, Woof, the original bad guy was the fire god, not the dark one. so, passing forward to EC, Ryaris was the one who went rogue first, and then Dalace went down afterwards. And there’s the fact that the act which got her branded as a villain is specifically called a betrayal. of who?

my memory of most of the EC lore is fuzzy, but I know that Ryaris couldnt have betrayed, say, her direct elemental counterpart in the water goddess Caliyo, because she’s the one who, after the Second Event, broke Ryaris’ seal early. While that could just be a whole lot of forgiveness and an understanding of how their elements coexist, it’s more likely that Caliyo was not the one wronged by Ryaris’ actions originally. This is compared to what I later had down for EC, which is that Dalace had been bad from the word go and that Ryaris only became involved in the Second Event by trying to free her. fun!

So then the Q becomes what did Ryaris do, and who did she betray? The likely answer is she betrayed Losa, the goddess of Light. the reasons for doing so are, complicated? and have their routes in the way the elements all interact. cause the 4 standard elements are basically neutral towards eachother because while they can cancel eachother out short term, they have a ~relationship~ thats important. like, the air goddess Xen can blow out Ryaris’ flames, but her air is also responsible for flames growing in the first place, and the fires consume that air. You follow? But light and dark have a way more complicated relationship that leaves Dalace especially feeling wronged, because where light is present, dark cannot exist. dark cannot overpower light rawly, yknow? i have diagrams in my head which explain this sort of. point being, dark and light are not friend.

and that complexity extends to how the 4 elements interact w/ light and dark. Ryaris as a fire goddess mostly has vague beef with Losa, because fire creates light, doesn’t it? and light, when concentrated, can create fire. The two cannot destroy each other, their actions only fuel the other. so while in theory, on paper, theyre allies, in practice they set eachother off extremely easily. they just are not compatible personalities, their elemental dynamic personified.

which makes it easy to imagine that Ryaris, pissed off to no end by Losa’s holier than thou attitude, etc etc, decides to fuck with her. And thus, betrayal. An important aspect of this is that Ryaris was not sealed away by the gods alone, but also by a human on their side. that the conflict that spilled out from Ryaris’ actions impacted the human world in some way. So it was a very direct betrayal, going back on her word, doing what she was told not to do. Something that, even if some of her fellow gods thought the rule was bad, had to acknowledge that Ryaris had broken it. yknow. centrism. because the other gods don’t side with Ryaris. Even Dalace, who fucking loathes Losa, remains neutral. which she regrets, hence the Second Event.

So Losa tells Ryaris not to do something, Ryaris decides fuck you asshole, I’m going to do that anyway and even more, and thus, Chaos. It could lean a vague prometheus angle, like that Losa in her ~divine wisdom~ decided to impose some restriction upon humans, and Ryaris broke it. cause Losa is a hell of an individual generally, consider she decided of her own accord that she was gonna be the ‘keeper of lost souls’, like she ust. decided that. without input. and without letting anyone else even go ‘actually id like to keep the ghosts of the people who lived in my world with me, or give them a choice’ nope! Losa knows best! She’s presumably the oldest, or second oldest depending on your opinion of whether the Void is ‘dark’ or just ‘blank’.

Ryaris isn’t the oldest, obvs, or even the oldest of the elemental quartet due to fire requiring fuel (which supposes that Xen is the oldest, followed by either Ryaris or Elra the earth goddess, or possibly even that Ryaris is flat out the youngest if it goes Xen>Elra>Caliyo>Ryaris, with earth requiring water to make the like, carbon fuel, right). but the fact her power creates light lends a degree of authority. She’s in a very unique position as a goddess in that respect, since she can technically create two elements. so even though she’s either the 1st or 3rd youngest, she has that going for her. it fuels smth in her. that ability to stand up to Losa and say ‘no, fuck you’.

Maybe it does even tie into the ghost thing, or the general inability for souls and mortals to change realms (excepting all souls going to Losa’s realm). Maybe Ryaris breaks that barrier down. Maybe she creates the first portals, opens those floodgates that even Losa can’t really close. Which is even a bit of, idk, sorta dramatic irony since her creating portals directly leads to a lot of things that bring about her defeat in the Third Event (specifically Skye being a Very Weird Light Boy, Will being a Very Weird Dark Boy, and Violet being her literal lost daughter, lmao). But its also neat because in SB the method of weakening the seals was to create portals, which sorta punctured holes in the space. whch is pretty neat.

so Losa makes a decision that mortals have to stay on their world only and that when they die theyre souls come to stay in hers. While this sorta annoys all of them (who died and made her queen, whats the point of all these worlds if they cant interact, etc), Ryaris is the one who decides to act. She visits Losa’s light world full of ghosts on false pretenses (delivering some wayward souls, perhaps), sneaks in somewhere, and basically burns a hole in the fabric of space to create a portal between light world and Earth. Ryaris’ reasoning for doing this is sorta weird, but any important part of it is that with the change Losa made, only two worlds have no native inhabitants - Ryaris’ fire world, and Dalace’s dark world. To be clear, Ryaris isn’t bitter, because she made a conscious decision to not put like, sophonts on the fire world. she likes the quiet. But Ryaris likes the idea of visitors, of creating a place where people can come to see her and stay for a short while. And Losa’s decided that she literally cannot do that, and that the only people who can visit her are runaway souls (rough crowd) and the other gods. And they’re busy! Busy people! Ryaris likes the idea of the freedom of movement, probably because as a fire goddess, fire likes to just. Expand. It’s great.

so she lies to losa’s face, creates a portal, and then allie fucking oops outta there. excellent. things escalate from there as mortals start following ryaris’ example and making portals, thats the floodgates. Then Losa and co go ham, a pseudo war starts, and then eventually Ryaris gets sealed in her realm and barred from using the portals out of it. but now portals are there, and losa’s pisssssed.

dalace remains neutral in the First Event because even though she hates Losa and is against her just, by default, she’s also not... really allies with Ryaris? The enemy of my enemy is my friend, sure, but Ryaris is, as said earlier, in a very unique elemental position in that her element, fire, creates light. Dalace hates light. and so, unable to reconcile her loathing of Losa with her dislike of Ryaris, she exits the conflict and probably mopes in the dark world for its duration. The other goddesses are either neutral or side with Losa. fun times! Caliyo likely sides with Losa, but even at the early stage she regrets it. However she’s actually unable to break the first seal because it was made using, im pretty sure a water mage? I don’t honestly know if I kept track of what elements Talae and Silver were, but they were i think water and air, respectively? idk. It might make more sense if Talae is air ad Silver is water, because then Caliyo as water goddess can sorta.. ‘revoke’ Silver’s part of the seal on Ryaris after take 2. yea. i think that works.

so then the idea is that while Caliyo feels guilty because she actually agrees with Ryaris and the elemental counterpart relationship is Fun, Dalace feels guilty because she ‘let Losa win’. and spends the next few centuries weakening Ryaris’ seal so that they can get revenge. And Ryaris is down for revenge! And down for support! So she teams up with Dalace, they break her out, and cause chaos again. This time there’s no principle behind it. its just flipping the bird at losa. so while the first time around its like, Losa+Caliyo+idk, Elra, vs Ryaris, second time its Losa+Caliyo+Elra+Xen vs Ryaris+Dalace. And they get beaten and both get sealed.

At this point Ryaris decides that while she stands by her original decision to create portals, she doesn’t stand by the attempt at revenge, and she accepts being sealed as a consequence. Dalace, of course, does not. After time passes, Caliyo comes to visit Ryaris and see hows she’s doing (with Caliyo having fully forgiven her for the first thing, bc that wasnt Caliyo’s problem), and after deciding she’s appropriately sorry for what she did with Dalace’s help, leaves and weakens the seal, and some time later Ryaris is able to leave, whereupon she decides to visit the world she tried to destroy in the guise of a mortal to see whats up, whereupon she falls in love with and later marries Evelyn Nis, and the Story Persisteth.

the reason they went for fucking over the central world (earth, i guess) rather than losa’s world directly was the fact that the two of the, Ryaris and Dalace, can’t fucking touch the place. Dalace can barely even go there, fucks sake, she cant destroy it. And if Ryaris tries, it won’t work, because of the fire makes light thing. So you settle for the next best thing - the neutral world none of the goddesses rule directly, but which Losa has a great deal of influence over, because Fuck Losa.

presumably dalace’s current plan is to be a bit sneakier, and rather than appearing and trying to destroy everything, she basically wants the trick all the people into destroying it themselves, through war and so on. and so a lot fo subterfuge, and stuff. which is WHY Ryaris kidnaps Chase and Akian D’Lore - she’s ransoming the shit out of Sparklr Fountain and provoking them into accusing all their neighbours and vague enemies of being responsible. Quartai’s probably on that list which is fun. Lot happening. :)

[viralhottopics]

Dr. Keith Ablow: Seventeen ways to improve your life in 2017

FILE —  (AP)

Last year, as 2016 debuted, I published, 16 ways to improve your life. The year before that, I published 15 ways to improve your life. You get the idea. The tradition continues this year, with the addition of number 17. Ive also added bits and pieces to some of the 16 items from last year, just to keep you on your toes.

New Years resolutions often lose their power so quickly and completely that they have become cliché. But there are real, easily achieved ways to positively impact your life beginning January 1.

Heres your cheat sheet of 17 for 2017. They arent in any particular order, so you can pick any one to start with. 

If you complete just five, youll notice a demonstrable improvement in your existence. But if you get through nine of them, you could remake your life.

1. Try to recall one dream you had as a kid whether it was being a poet or a rock drummer or a multimillionaire stock trader and take just a single step in that direction. So often, the ideas we had as children were good ones, and we abandoned them out of fear. The step in the direction of your childhood dream can be very modest signing up for a symposium on poetry, scheduling a single drum lesson, buying a DVD on stock trading. Even just telling two people about your quiet dream can move it forward.  Frozen dreams have a way of thawing out rapidly when you warm them just a tiny bit.

2. Think of your life story, going all the way back to infancy, as an autobiographical book that you can hold in your hands. Now, imagine which page or paragraph you are tempted to tear out and remove from the story. That page or paragraph might be the one that makes you feel profoundly sad or powerless or guilty or ashamed. Next, share it with someone who knows you well but has never heard about that event or phase in your life. Being willing to disclose the events in life we want to turn a blind eye to takes away the power those events have over us.

3. Give a meaningful gift to a friend of yours on a random day not his birthday or her anniversary or Christmas. Giving gifts on those days is fine, but that isnt the same as an unexpected, unscheduled gift. Those are the ones that feel riskier to give and have more power to bond you to others who receive them. And thats because theyre real and independent expressions of friendship, affection, admiration or love.

4. Send handwritten notes to three people you admire most in the world, no matter how powerful or famous, tell them sincerely exactly why you admire them and ask to meet for 10 minutes. Theres a real chance one of them will take you up on the offer. And that one meeting could change you, because great energy is contagious and being in the company of it can stay with you.

5. Give some amount (no matter how small) to the charity you care most about. Giving is a miracle, because it helps others while also telling your unconscious mind that yours is a life of abundance, not scarcity. And that invites more treasures into your existence.  Heres one I just gave to, which I happen to know is completely legit and does great work:  kulturecity.org.

6. Stop telling yourself you love people just because you grew up with them. This is a big one, but a really important one. Did your parents and siblings earn your love by unconditionally loving you as a child? If so, great. But if youve been wishing that had been the case and have felt unwilling to let the dream of having had unconditionally loving parents or siblings slip away, then loosen your grip. If the people you grew up with werent focused on helping you stay true to yourself, then admit it to yourself. You might stop unconsciously recruiting people just like them into your life.

7. Schedule an initial psychotherapy session. Psychotherapy is the gold standard way to begin to get to know yourself more deeply. In a world of distractions and depersonalization, it remains the technique most reliably focused on restoring your connection to your true self. Hopefully, that first session will convince you of the power of psychotherapy to change your life, and youll schedule more. No one with the financial ability to be in psychotherapy should deny himself or herself that transformational opportunity.

8. Get angry about something unfair, say so out loud and dont stand for it. Anger gets a really bad rap in our culture; its accused of everything from destroying people spiritually to causing heart attacks. But suppressed anger can be more toxic. When youre offended by something you hear about in the news or you see unfolding in your personal life, try saying so, in no uncertain terms, when youre asked about it or maybe even if you arent. For those of you who have been living lives of quiet frustration, letting yourselves be very direct and very mad about something that sincerely outrages you can start to crack the shell that has your most powerful self inside it.

9. Take two minutes to think about life as a labyrinth. Mazes are built to frustrate people and get them lost. Theyre full of dead ends designed to make people give up and call for helicopters to pluck them out. Not so with labyrinths. Labyrinths may wind this way and that way. They may take you far from where you thought you were heading. But they always, always lead to the center. And thats what life is like. Keep walking, keep your faith and life will take you where you are supposed to go. The turn toward the center could be just a few steps away, when you least expect it.

10. Try praying, at least once. If you havent prayed ever or havent prayed lately, youll discover that the act of praying for what you care deeply about has the effect of reminding you what that thing or those things really are. It also has the effect of reminding you that there is a great power in the universe that you are a part of. Theres something interesting about praying; even people who say they dont believe in God are loathe to pray for the opposite of what they really want. How come? Is it because that, underneath all that cynicism, they actually do believe?

11. Read “Franny and Zooey” by J.D. Salinger, “The War of Art” by Steven Pressfield, Self Creation by the great psychologist George Weinberg (used copies available online), “Blue Dog” by George Rodrigue, or “Fear God and Take Your Own Part,” by Theodore Roosevelt (or, even better, all five). These five volumes have the power to transform people, and I keep handing them out to patients and friends (along with please forgive the narcissism my book, “Living the Truth”).  If youre really short on time or intention, just read the Afterword to a later edition of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, by Robert Pirsig.

12. Buy one piece of original art. It doesnt need to be expensive. It just needs to appeal to you. Why? Because art is the antidote to our sometimes sterile, technologically driven culture. It makes humanity go viral in a way that YouTube cant. It also confirms your connection to things that cant be measured like your personal vision of beauty.  A good alternative is to create a piece of art.  Just be sure to buy yourself the proper brushes or paints or glue or wood to create it.  That will be a signal to yourself that you value what you are manifesting.

13. Watch the movie “Miracle,” with Kurt Russell. This film about the 1980 U.S. Olympic mens hockey team defeating Russias team is so good, it can convince you to take on the next great challenge in your life. I dont know anyone who has watched it and been unaffected by it.  Also watch the closing argument by Paul Newman at the end of the film “The Verdict,” the scene of Sylvester Stallone and Talia Shire on the beach in “Rocky III,” the monologue by Al Pacino toward the end of the film “The Scent of a Woman” and any performance of God Bless the USA by Lee Greenwood.  They can help make you a better person.  No kidding.

14. Tell your romantic partner one thing you would find exciting that you have not yet told that person. In my experience as a therapist, Ive found that people can remain strangers to one another, in terms of passion, even after 10 or 20 years of marriage. We keep sexual secrets. Let one out. You can write it down and pass it to your partner as a note, like we did back in grade school, before cell phones.  You can text it using a confidential messaging app like Wickr.  See what happens. Take the risk.

15. Stand up for someone else. Youll have the opportunity in 2017. I promise. Maybe in your home. Maybe in your neighborhood. Maybe at work. Maybe online. Defending someone will reassure that person and empower you.

16. Take 17 minutes to pretend that you are speaking to yourself, from the heart, as though you are your own ideal parent.  You can do this out loud, if you have the stage presence, or silently.  An ideal parent is empathetic, but honest in assessing his child and giving that child advice.  Sit yourself down, get very quiet and, then, tell yourselfwith the same care you would summon for a son or daughtertwo things you really admire about yourself and one very limiting, very disappointing thing about yourself you really wish you would try to change, because it could limit the whole rest of your life.  That one thing should be so searingly on-target and so necessary that it has the power to make you angry, make you anxious, bring you to tears or bring you to your knees.  Focusing about twice as long (say, 10 minutes) on the admirable qualities is something youd do for your kid, to take the sting out of the next 7 minutes, so do that for yourself.  And keep in mind that 17 minutes is a long time. Youll be tempted to avoid it or shorten it. But, you shouldnt.

17.  If you are a parent, resolve to mimic a habit I stumbled upon, when my kids were younger.  It really helps me stay balanced during times that might, otherwise, cause me lots of stress.  Here it is:  Whenever I get a phone call or an email or a text from someone telling me a project of mine or a goal or a relationship has hit a rough patch, I tell myself, silently, Yeah, well this isnt like a pediatrician calling me. What I mean is that, short of bad news about a child of mine, coming from a pediatrician (or, if your kids are older, like mine, an internal medicine doctor), nothing can really rock me. Because all of us parents know exactly how much time we would have for what seem like the big problems of our day or our week, if the phone rang, and a doctor on the other end said something like, Can I ask where you are? Because Ive seen your son, and I have something serious to talk with you about.  Id like you to come in.  Id have no time for all my other so-called problems, and neither would you.  So, things are actually better than we actually realize, most all of the time.

So, there are your 17 keys to making 2017 a transformational year.  I give them to you with the certain knowledge that you still have, inside you, all the wonderful potential you did the very first day you were born.  You havent lost one bit of it.  Its all there, just waiting for you to discover it.

Dont delay. Start on the list January 1, and by this time next year, God willing, youll be ready for the 18 steps for 2018. Life is like that: a never-ending process of self-improvement.

Dr. Keith Ablow is a psychiatrist and member of the Fox News Medical A-Team. 

Read more: http://fxn.ws/2iBzmPc

from Dr. Keith Ablow: Seventeen ways to improve your life in 2017