#like they assume you have a base level of knowledge that i never have?? like just explain it better and i will be able to learn

[corinneistherainbowsign]

it is awesome that me and my roommate and my coworker have all had iq tests it is so random (for me it was because my stepmom was a psychologist and she needed to train someone on how to conduct one and for them it was because the town they're from is polluted with lead and a research team came down to test the effects of lead pollution on children's intelligence) so we talk about it sometimes (it started at work where my coworker and i got on the subject of iq and found we have both been officially tested and we are both "technically geniuses" according to this metric) but both of us mentioned we were insecure growing up knowing the number because we aren't extraordinary geniuses like 170+ so we never disclosed our numbers until relatively recently (idek if we were given the same iq test i know the numbers are different between the different tests. idk which test i was given and idk which test he and my roommate were given) but regardless i have the higher number 😈 and he told my roommate my number and she was like omg we have the same iq!!! but he actually told her the wrong number and i am actually one singular point higher than her. me and her have discussed our personal intelligence analyses of the people we know and we have ranked everyone in our minds and our rankings are exactly the same except i think i'm the most intelligent and she thinks she is the most intelligent. like my ranking is 1) me 2) her 3) coworker 4) other roommate 5) our other friend and hers is the same except with her at the top and me as number two. all of this is just for fun because none of us actually subscribe to iq as an important metric (i am a college dropout and i work at a gas station for example and people i went to school with who i know were less "innately intelligent" than me are like in law school now so yknow. it doesn't necessarily predict success and "innate intelligence" does not outweigh hard work it just makes certain cognitive tasks easier for us regardless of what we do with that) and i admire my friends and peers who have strong work ethics so much because i think i am the laziest most "voluntarily" dysfunctional person on the planet. the most inspiring person i have ever known is my high school friend alivia i loved and love her so much and she would get mad in school because she would study for weeks for an exam and i wouldn't study at all (once i didn't even know we had an exam until a few hours before) and i would score higher than her but i think the fact that she cares and has a genuine drive to succeed is more important than any potential "innate intelligence". work ethic is so important... alas i have very little. my inspiration comes from a desire to help people i care about. like at my current job i want to work hard and get tasks done because i care about my coworkers and i don't want to slack and make work harder for them and my manager is actually awesome and i know she is going through a whole lot of personal shit and i want to at least make work less stressful for her. i do like working and being productive so it is fine but she gave me and my coworker a verbal warning a few weeks ago because she was watching cameras and just observing the store and realized we were not getting shit done like we should and i felt so bad so i have been working moderately hard instead of totally slacking lately. we work at a gas station it isn't hard yknow. idk what the point of this is i think it is nice to have my number in my head in some ways even though it was torturous in others when i was younger. i wanted to be like. albert einstein. i'm not. i'm corinne and that is awesome which i have realized with age. me and my coworker were talking a while ago (haters will call it an insecure cope) but we feel like we are in the sweet spot of iq where we can still connect meaningfully with the people around us despite being "more intelligent" (think about flowers for algernon... neither of us are at a point where we are so "above" everyone that we can't connect).

[dontwanderoff]

new sadness unlocked (received email from one of the other teachers letting me know interschool sports training starts tomorrow and i need to pick a sport and then learn that sport and then teach the basics of that sport first thing tomorrow morning)

[infinite-beginnings]

The line when Charles said, "Edwin's told me loads of stories about Hell," and him seeming to know he'd find a map in Edwin's book always hits me hard.

Now I acknowledge Charles might’ve been posturing to reassure the Night Nurse he could navigate Hell, but let's assume this fact was real.

Because that means that Edwin felt comfortable enough to talk about all of his trauma to Charles. He mentions Hell a lot in passing in front of the girls, but he never goes into specifics. However, it seems as if he actively told Charles quite a few details about Hell. I also noticed that Charles is very calm when he's going to find Edwin. Yes, he's studying the book a lot, but he is also navigating the space with a certain amount of confidence. I'm sure it's partially due to Charles' tendency to do things without thinking and project confidence. But also, it seems as if he might have at least a very basic level of knowledge or familiarity with the levels of Hell based on the stories Edwin told.

I think this is probably another reason why Edwin struggled to believe the fact that Charles had faced abuse in his past and never shared it with Edwin. Because Edwin was always up front and honest with Charles. He told him the very first time they'd met that he had just escaped Hell. I'm sure Edwin did not want to relive his memories of Hell, and maybe it took him decades to feel like he could share. But I bet when he started talking about it with Charles, he felt relief. Because sharing your trauma with someone who accepts you and loves you no matter what is always a relief after holding it in and pushing it down.

So I just imagine Edwin feeling that relief after sharing his stories from Hell and feeling closer and more bonded with Charles because of it...and then he finds out that Charles has this huge amount of trauma from his past that he has been keeping inside. It probably breaks Edwin's heart that he hadn't been able to offer Charles the same relief he'd felt.

And yes, Crystal mentioned that Charles was probably denying the trauma even to himself. We all know that Edwin knew something was off with Charles and that he was probably frustrated in himself because he hadn't been able to figure it out, but Crystal apparently had.

But I also think there might be another level to it. The boys have been solving cases for 30 years. I find it hard to believe that they never had another case involving abuse or at least someone with a controlling personality that would've reminded Charles of his father. Maybe Edwin thinks back to a couple of those cases and how Charles was acting strange and withdrawn during them and realized he'd missed a huge clue about how his friend was feeling.

All those years of sharing his stories from Hell and being comforted by Charles and Edwin hadn't been able to do the same. Edwin is definitely hurt that Charles didn't feel like he could confide in him and heartbroken to think about how much pain his friend was going through alone.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

first of all, this is all legit, and not bait, though i have a feeling it may come off that way, this did happen to me. please don't publish if tumblr sends it off anon.

i'm a lesbian with gender dysphoria, and while i haven't had much sexual experience, i would consider myself a stone top. in the last year and a half i began reading "terf"/radical feminist writings and reading "terf" tumblr blogs fairly actively, largely out of frustration with misogyny i was experiencing IRL. though i never engaged with the community i did stop identifying as genderfluid and started understanding my dysphoria as stemming from the trauma of being bullied by other girls for having a high-androgen DSD, and using different pronouns/transition thoughts as unhealthy coping mechanisms. i'm happy with this, but i also don't know if i'm attracted to women anymore.

i've always been attracted to women in a way that's stereotypically guy-like; i find feminine women very attractive and not so much fellow(?) butches, want to penetrate with a strap on, don't like bush much, cursory interest in BDSM/daddy kink. i read/watched het erotica and porn sometimes and identified with the man. what i read problematized pretty much every aspect of that- femininity as a cage, penetration as violence/straps as disidentification w the female body, infantilization of women, bdsm as abuse etc. also, desisting making me more conscious of dysphoria/knowledge of how extensive sexual dimorphism is putting me off both women with larger breasts and hips AND smaller breasts and hips/unrealistically masculine body types as well. so a lot of what turned me on before isn't arousing anymore, or i feel guilty about it, and i haven't been able to find butch4butch stuff which is much healthier very interesting.

i consider my sexuality healthier now on a political level but my ability to get aroused/jerk off has plummeted (used to be i could jork it sunrise to sunset) and thinking about being in a relationship w another woman makes me feel uneasy and weird, especially since a lot of what i read emphasized reciprocative cunnilingus/tribbing (which i don't like) as the healthiest sex options. i also think about both my dysphoria and my sexuality issues 100x more than i did before, even though i was promised the opposite (freedom from dysphoria and feeling happier as a lesbian), and it's stressing me out day-to-day. i'm aware based on your general ethos that you probably think i'm a terrible person right now, but i figured it'd be useful to seek the opinion of someone who radically disagrees with what i've read on what i could/should do next, since i admittedly miss being at peace with my sexuality.

thanks for reading.

hi there anon,

it's a bummer that you'd think I would assume you're a terrible person based on everything you've told me here. I generally try not to consider people terrible unless they're actively being shitheads or hurting other people, which doesn't sound at all like you're describing. from what you've told me, you've been up to your eyes in some information that's made you feel deeply uncomfortable in your sexuality and now you're seeking out a new perspective to help you make sense of that hurt. that describes most of the people who send me questions!

it's so striking to me that much of what you're describing is very reminiscent of what's recounted in The Persistent Desire, an anthology of writings on butch/femme identities edited by femme historian and archivist Joan Nestle that was released in 1992. in various essays and interviews countless butches and femmes recount their discomfort with the feminist turn against butch and femme identities that too place in the 70s, when both roles were declared problematic recreations of heterosexuality and summarily decried as politically "incorrect" for lesbians. it's shocking to me how much what you've described echoes these accounts experienced by lesbians half a century ago - the disowning of women who are "excessively" feminine or masculine, the demonizing of penetrative sex, general insistence that there are "correct" sex acts that every lesbian is supposed to enjoy, and the deep discomfort and insecurity that this causes among people who don't fit into the very rigid standards of proper lesbian identity set forth.

here's a link to a PDF, if that's interesting to you at all. it's very long, so feel free not to read it straight through; it's a great project to skim and an incredible way to get in touch with the lesbians who came before us. their accounts of their lives are so wildly different from the boundaries of "good" queer representation that feel so universal today; in discussing their own lives many of these women speak very bluntly about their experiences with abuse, drugs, sex work, and violence. it's a great glimpse into the lives and history of a lot of very ordinary lesbians just living their lives, and I'm very grateful it's been preserved.

now, as for what you're actually gonna do: hey. listen. first of all, if you haven't given up reading this stuff yet, you've gotta. you simply cannot keep internalizing stuff that makes you overanalyze your own sexuality so hard that you feel uncomfortable about being attracted to women. that's not "healthy," that's conversion therapy lite. there are other places to talk about feminism without being made to feel ashamed of yourself.

listen: there's nothing unhealthy about anything that you described about yourself. being a stone butch, being attracted to certain looks and aesthetics, watching porn, wanting to use a strap and roleplay during sex and not being interested in other sexual activities - all of those thing are completely normal and, yes, healthy. certainly healthier than feeling the need to repress your sexuality so hard that thinking about being with a woman doesn't feel right!

should we run through that list?

femininity as cage - sure, okay, femininity isn't for everyone, and there are parts of it that suck. that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with women who like to wear dresses or put on makeup or shave or whatever, or anyone who's attracted to those women. genuinely I cannot think of anything less interesting or important to feminist organizing than getting hung up about what people want to wear. it's clothes, dude. it's fucking clothes. pick a more important hill to die on, I implore you.

penetration is not the same thing as violence. there's just nothing to debate about that one; it's patently absurd to pretend that every act of penetrative sex is rape and you'd have to fundamentally misunderstand how consent works to believe that.

straps are not about "disidentification with the female body," they're about augmenting a sexual experience. a strap-on is not more problematic than a vibrator or a massage oils or a pillow used to prop up a body part. unless those are also bad? are those bad? are pillows disidentifying from the female body also? I'm not up to date on this.

straight up I don't even know which part of your whole deal the infantilization of women is supposed to address, but a thing that I've always found interesting about a lot of radical feminists who are deeply distrustful of sex is the way that many of them seem to assume that women can't be trusted to understand their own sexual desires and need to be taught what's appropriate. seems kind of condescending to me, personally.

BDSM isn't the same thing as abuse. abuse, crucially, is not a situation that people can safe word out of or negotiate the constraints of. it's kind of like how, you know, I purposefully pay people to shove needles in my skin when I want a tattoo, but I wouldn't be stoked about it if somebody just ran up to me in public and started stabbing me without any warning or conversation. context is crucial. there can certainly be abusive people within BDSM spaces, but that's true of people of literally every sexual proclivity on earth, and certainly not an innate feature of BDSM. it's just make believe, dude. it's dress up. it's sex LARPing.

also, psst, hey. that thing about being attracted to women in a "guy-like" way? no such thing. men are humans, dude; they experience attraction in as many different ways as anyone else. for every dude interested in the same stuff as you there are men yearning for hairy women, muscular women, masculine women, women who will dominate them, women who would rather be eaten out then penetrated, and so on. to say nothing of the men who aren't into women at all! and, as is obvious from your own experience, men don't have a monopoly on those kinds of feelings, anyway! there are no men or women feelings, dude; it's all just people having feelings and fighting for their lives trying to figure out what they're into to.

I want to particularly talk about that last bit, where you mentioned not enjoying or wanting to engage in cunnilingus or tribbing. that's totally fine! people like different shit in all kinds of combinations - I'm personally a huge fan of getting eaten out and scratched up or bitten, but I don't do penetration and I've genuinely never met anyone who actually liked tribbing - and there are absolutely people out there who will, to paraphrase the poet Tinashe, perfectly match your freak.

(have you heard about the perpetual, critical shortage of tops that the queer community faces? you'd be a godsend, just saying.)

also, actually, hey I wanted to circle back to another thing as well: it's deeply alarming to me that whatever radfem stuff you've been reading has you feeling "put off" of women with wide hips and large breasts as well as women with small breasts and hips. what is wrong with either of those? both of those are just ways that women naturally look. women just look a wide variety of ways, and it's sad that that's upsetting you now. just thinking about this, conceptually, is giving me hives.

having been up to your eyes in all of this, I can definitely understand why you'd feel the urge to overanalyze you own gender and sexuality to the point of completely talking yourself out of identifying with anything that feels good for you. as I said, that's actually not healthy in any way, and as a sex educator I can't say that I think anyone genuinely invested in your well-being would want that for you.

entirely aside from their feelings on trans people, which I obviously disagree with pretty vehemently, one of the things about radfems that's most endlessly vexing to me is the insistence that such an extremely narrow range of sexual behaviors are appropriate. seems like a miserable way to live, and I sincerely hope you can detangle yourself from the morass of shame it's landed you in. you deserve better.

[starlightomatic]

ngl feel really really weird about the direction we've gone wrt internet safety for teens. when i was a kid it was hammered into us that we should never reveal our real names, our faces, or our ages on the internet. in fact it was extremely important not to reveal your age bc if you did, predators could target you.

now we've decided that the locus of potential sexual harm from adults is not predators who set out to target teens, but rather well-meaning adults who might accidentally let a minor see smut on their blog. so we make everyone broadcast their ages to everyone. which puts a target on the backs of teens who are now advertising to everyone that they're underage.

we also situate sexual harm of minors in "a minor saw sexual content!!" which, listen, im sorry to tell you this but teenagers have sex drives and want to see sexual content. a 16yo is not being harmed by reading a smut fic.

now i do understand why nsfw blogs don't allow minors to interact, bc the interaction constitutes an issue since that's on some level a teen and adult interacting sexually. but the issue is not that a teen saw something sexual, it's that you should not be having that interaction with them. still i am not convinced that that is riskier than giving predators knowledge of who to target.

i also worry what happens when all the well meaning people with best practices turn teens out of their spaces -- who does that end up leaving them with? i'm not saying the solution is to invite them in but there has to be some other, third option. i also think we need to understand the difference between a 17yo liking a sex-related shitpost on tumblr vs an actual intentionally predatory sexual interaction from an adult.

i don't think it's necessarily bad to set a boundary and not allow them to like the shitpost, but i don't like the idea that it was harmful for them to have even seen it. i think it's actually positive for teens to have exposure to adults who are talking about sexuality in consent-based, sex-positive, queer-informed ways to balance out all the shitty, sexist bioessentialist perspectives they're getting elsewhere.

also again, we should remember that the issue is sex-based interactions between teens and adults, NOT that teens are bad or wrong for being interested in sex and sexuality. if a really young teen is too interested in that it could be concerning but age-appropriate levels of sexuality are fine and good and i don't want kids to think they're wrong, dirty, or bad for experiencing sexuality.

i think there's a balance here where we need to make sure interactions are safe without diving headfirst into a spring-awakening-style world where we assume teens are too innocent and pure to know anything about sex which results in risky behavior, not practicing safe sex, and not understanding consent. and i get worried sometimes that the current culture around this leads us there.

i especially worry about this in regards to kink and bdsm because i don't know if there are any educational resources out there geared to teens. i do think it's a good idea to wait until you're 18 before doing anything hardcore or too intense, or even kink at all, but if they're going to anyway (and some will) i'd rather teens have a solid safety backing and knowledge as opposed to just acting on instinct because that can really be dangerous. and something i really worry about is people who turn 18 and immediately show up to play parties and start hooking up with people without having that background knowledge because they were prevented from accessing it before then, since it's so easy for abusers to exploit them. young adult women are already extremely vulnerable in those spaces.

i don't know what my exact solution to these issues is but i feel really concerned about where we're heading. i've been wanting to say something for a while but have been afraid that people would interpret this the wrong way. i'm sure some still will, but i hope this can at least start a conversation about these issues.

[azen13]

I’ve never been to a Starlight Pawnshop before…just look at all this stuff. Too bad I can’t buy everything in this store.

Wait a minute, who left this Chess Piece out by itself? No matter, I’ll gladly take it, even if I’ve never played a single game before in my life!

A Losing Game

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

Chess Pawn: A finely-carved chess pawn. If life is a chessboard, then so too are people pawns in other's games. Based on this pawn’s pristine condition, whoever controlled it loved it quite dearly.

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

CW: Yandere Themes, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Gaslighting

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

Jing Yuan is an accomplished man. As the General of the Xianzhou Luofu, he has accumulated a list of titles and achievements that could fill a thousand archives: master of foresight; skilled with a glaive; voted “Most Attractive Bachelor” of the Xianzhou Luofu five years in a row. And, of course, his prowess at Starchess.

Yes, Jing Yuan is very, very good at Starchess. One of the best in the entirety of the Xianzhou Alliance, if not in the entire galaxy. While his knowledge of opening lines could be considered weak for his level of gameplay, after he gets settled, he excels at slowly cutting off his opponent’s options, until reaching the endgame. 

In Starchess, the endgame is extremely important. A poorly-played endgame can lead to a crushing defeat, while quick thinking and clever maneuvering of pieces can allow a pawn to be promoted to a queen, which can then help propel a player to victory.

While Jing Yuan is good at Starchess, he is almost undefeatable in the endgame.

Until today.

The ring was perfect and understated, a band of solid gold engraved with delicate patterns. He knew everything about you from years of dismantling every thread of your being apart, and knew you didn’t care for things that were too gaudy and outwardly luxurious. The night was perfectly planned: a picnic beneath the starlit sky, constellations framing your face like a crown. He had hidden the ring at the bottom of the basket, beneath a beautiful meal of the finest the Luofu had to offer. And you were going to be there, boundless in beauty and grace, sharp as a sword and sweet as sugar.

Tonight, though, Jing Yuan tastes the sea on his lips.

How long has it been since he has cried? Centuries, he thinks, standing in the foyer of his home, the front door slightly ajar. A biting wind snaps its jaws at Jing Yuan through the opening, but he cannot feel it. He can hardly feel anything. 

The numbness spreads from his heart outwards as he moves, first forwards to shut the door. A brief glance outside, and he can still imagine you standing there. In better circumstances, you and him would have gone to Fyxestroll Gardens, and enjoyed a quiet night. He would have proposed. You would have accepted. Everything would be right in the world. But when Jing Yuan opened the door, what greeted him was the greatest misfortune he had ever faced.

You stood outside, jagged shadows stretching like scars across your face, your posture guarded, your face unreadable. At first, Jing Yuan assumed you just had a terrible day, perhaps because of your job, perhaps because of something else. But then you began to speak, poison spilling from your lips, killing both you and him. He knows this is a grave mistake, but you have already drowned in these lies.

As you walk away from him, Jing Yuan makes a vow to himself: he will not let you leave. No, not like this.

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

Without you by his side, safe and secure in his loving embrace, the General’s night is restless; as he tosses and turns, he replays the memories of hurt again and again in his mind, trying to wrap his head around your reasoning so he can dismantle it when he has you again. He may have unknowingly made a blunder, but he will still win this game, the most important game of his life.

Maybe a stop by the Alchemy Commission–your workplace–is necessary, no? Last time he heard, investigators are still clearing out spies from the Disciples of Sanctus Medicus hiding amongst its members. 

Jing Yuan takes a moment to check his schedule, a relaxed smile falling on his face. He still has several hours before his first meeting of the day. Enough time to bring you back home, where you belong. A brief flash of uncertainty courses through his body, like a chess player second-guessing their plan, before he steadies himself. This is for your benefit, he tells himself. With all the dangers on the Luofu, someone like you cannot simply remain unprotected. 

With a calm and patient gait, the General of the Luofu makes his way to the Alchemy Commission.

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

He scrutinizes the cramped halls of the building you work in carefully, noting a pawn here, a bishop there. All people, yet all pieces in the game of love, and the inevitable, complete conquering of your heart. Perhaps they are playing their own games, but they do not matter. In this game, they are Jing Yuan’s pieces to move. Before today, they may have been your pieces. But while the game of life and the game of chess share many similarities, they are not one in the same. Life’s board flips and moves, expands and shrinks. Pieces change allegiances, or disappear and reappear entirely.

The board is not on your side today. You don’t even notice Jing Yuan watching you from the hall, preparing your doom. Within moments, he strides in the room, his lazy gait and relaxed expression taking control over the room and its occupants–including you–in mere seconds. Shocked faces spread like lightning, from healer to healer, before striking yours. You stand in complete terror, as Jing Yuan claims you with a simple glance, before speaking in an authoritative tone, booming like thunder.

“Mx. L/N, you are hereby arrested.” Eyes that once melted with fondness when simply seeing your face now bore into you with frigid disgust.

You can’t help but flinch from the words, mouth agape and mind blank. After a moment, you manage to collect yourself, disregarding the stares of those around you. “Excuse me? What for?” You demand. 

Jing Yuan tilts his head, looking down at you. “Sedition against the Xianzhou Luofu through serving the Plagues Author and the Disciples of Sanctus Medicus,” he cites, taking a stride forward, arms snapping to lock your limbs behind your back like shackles. “You will be taken to the Seat of Divine Foresight and given a proper sentencing for your crimes.”

Try as you may, your shouts and screams of vehement denial do you no good as Jing Yuan walks you out. Streets pass you by like snapshots of a past life. You can see the tea shop where you and Jing Yuan went on your first date. His favorite restaurant to order takeout from. The balcony overlooking the Ambrosial Arbor where he first kissed you. Thousands upon thousands of moves, each and every one thought out to perfection. Countless gambits taken, small victories celebrated, and little defeats mourned. You had nearly defeated him. Or so you thought.

Eventually, you make it to the Seat of Divine Foresight, Jing Yuan’s arms still vice like in their hold, yet not tight enough to hurt. You try to follow the turns the General takes–a right, a left, another left, up a flight of stairs, right again–but your focus wanes.

You are not guilty of any crime.

At least, so you think. Because you committed a grave offense: breaking the weak, feeble heart of your lover.

A lifelong sentence is only fair, no?

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

“My dearest, why must you struggle?” Jing Yuan murmurs as he pulls you into a small room with only a table and two chairs. Pulling you away from the door, the General gently places you on the ground, and remains by the exit, cutting off any chance of escape you may have.

“Why must you falsely accuse me?” You retort, voice flickering with fire and burning bright, even amongst all the encroaching darkness.

Jing Yuan’s soft smile slowly dissipates into a frown, the shine in his eyes dimming away into nothingness. “Y/N, I have been nothing but patient with you. I have explained why I must protect you. You understood then. Why can’t you understand now?” Slowly, like he’s trying to comfort a skittish animal, Jing Yuan inches towards you, arms outstretched inviting you into his embrace. 

“Because you’re a psycho!” You hiss, stepping backwards. Despite your insult, the General does not anger. Instead, disappointment flashes across his face. He takes another step forward, effectively cornering you.

With a quiet, hushed tone that echoes in the room like a hollow breeze, Jing Yuan’s arms find their way around your torso, pulling you tightly against him. Regardless of how much you struggle, you cannot escape Jing Yuan. “You don’t think that, love. You’re afraid. That’s okay. That’s why I’m here. To care for you. To protect you. To love you. Don’t you want that?” He asks quietly, letting you wear yourself out until you melt in his hands like putty, exhausted in every sense. A few moments of utter silence pass, before he speaks up again. “Why don’t we go home now? I have a surprise waiting for you.”

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

The moment you return home, Jing Yuan locks the door. To protect you from yourself, he says. Though that’s a condensed version of his actual words, which are far more persuasive, spinning you around in a whirlwind of logic and reasoning you can’t seem to keep up with.

Only a second later, the General is down on one knee, a ring in hand and a glint of fire in his eyes. For a moment, you think the look is a soft, gentle thing. But then you see it for what it is: a love so warped it cannot simply be called love anymore.

As much as you want to reject his proposal, to slap him across the face and attempt to spark another uprising against his smothering love, you know it would do you no good. He would only force the ring on your finger and crown you his spouse, whether you liked it or not.

Checkmate.

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

Hey have you broken down Marinette's crush on Adrien and the ways in which it

A) misrepresents how teen girls get crushes on people they actually know and

B) sets Marinette up to seem really weird in a way the show literally cannot address because the universe thinks it's fine?

I know you can't prevent people from misinterpreting your show, but i think at the point where a significant portion of your audience and people with secondhand knowledge think of your main character as a stalker, that's a breakdown of communication on the writers part.

I've mentioned it offhand a few times, but I can go into it in more depth because it is a pretty massive writing flaw for reasons we're about to get into.

Marinette is not written like a teenager with a crush on her friend. She's not even written like a stalker. She's written like a teenager with a celebrity crush or a crush on a fictional character. In fact, if you go read fics from when the show first started airing, then you'll find that a lot of people assumed that Marinette's crush came from before she met Adrien or that it was rooted in a love of his professional work. That she was a fan who suddenly got to meet her idol and didn't know how to handle that.

I completely understand why that read was so popular. It's the only thing that makes sense! I assumed that was the case, too, until we got to Origins and her crush suddenly went from "obvious celebrity crush" to "crush with actual depth that's just been badly written."

While I'm ace, most of my friends are not, so I am very familiar with the experience of teenage girls getting crushes. I'm also deeply familiar with the experience of teenage girls getting crushes on celebrities and fictional characters. I, unfortunately, also know quite a bit about stalking. The three experiences are wildly different. For now, let's focus on the first two.

Celebrity crushes and crushes on fictional characters are experiences rooted in fantasy. You can be as over the top as you want because you know that nothing will come of this. You can go to a concert and scream the cute boy's name or have his posters all over your walls or publicly squeal about him with your friends without caring if people overhear because you don't expect him to ever care or even learn about your behavior. You know that you will never actually date him. He's a dream. A fantasy. A thing that will never be. That's the fun of this kind of crush. There's freedom in it. (This isn't unique to hetero crushes, btw, this was just an example based on my lived experience.)

I have strong memories of my best friend acting like Marinette, but only when it came to fictional men. When she was crushing on guys that she actually knew? The experience was wildly different because it was real. This could actually be a thing. She's not the only woman that I can say that about, either. I had many friends who had a celebrity or fictional crush and none of them ever carried that behavior over to their "real world" crushes. The stakes with the "real world" crushes were far too high for that sort of freedom.

Writing Marinette like someone with a celebrity crush is a terrible call on multiple levels. The most obvious issue is that it makes her look unhinged and creepy. While I don't agree with this take, I'm not surprised that people label her a stalker because celebrity crush behavior feels really creepy when it's applied to a person that you actually know. Whenever stories do the thing where someone meets their celebrity crush and actually gets to know them, there's normally a noticeable shift in their behavior as the character mentally goes, "Oh shit, you're real now." They lose the freedom that came with this being a mere fantasy.

The other issue with this writing choice is that it makes Marinette's crush feel superficial. The show spends hours letting her fantasize and obsess over Adrien, but rarely lets her actually spend time with the poor guy! It's incredibly awkward writing. You could have Adrien be a celebrity that Marinette never met and a lot of the episodes wouldn't change. That's not a great choice if your goal is to write an actual romance. Romances generally let the romantic leads interact.

As creepy and awkward as Marinette's writing can be, I will stand by my statement that she's not a stalker. She's nowhere near that unhinged. She's not stealing Adrien's things or following him home every day or breaking into his private spaces because she knows that they have a "special connection". We're never once made to feel like she's making him uncomfortable or harassed. Those are the kinds of things that stalkers do. They're delusional and divorced from reality. Do any of you really believe that Marinette would keep pursuing Adrien if he told her to back off? Hopefully the answer is "no" and, if so, then she's really not written like a "true" stalker because true stalkers just get dangerous when you say "no." They don't respect things like firm boundaries or restraining orders.

Watching Adrien's public appearances isn't violating his privacy and that's mostly what Marinette does. The rare occasions where she follows him somewhere private mostly revolve around someone else doing something questionable first, making Marinette's actions less "I want to see Adrien" and more "I'm worried for Adrien's safety and I'm doing something questionable because of that". The first is the behavior of a stalker, the second is... well, I'm not going to call it good behavior, but it's certainly not straight up bad behavior because the show isn't treating these moments as wrong so it's less Marinette being wrong and more the writers making really questionable writing choice. I mean, one of her break-ins was literally forced on her and orchestrated by her friend group! (See: Gabriel Agreste)

In fact, most of Marinette's creepiest behaviors fall under the "questionable writing choice" category as they're often just very obvious jokes of questionable quality. For example, I've seen people freak out about her having Adrien's schedule and it's like, guys, you do realize that was literally impossible, right? She claimed it was his schedule for the next three years! Nathalie doesn't even have that! You don't schedule things that far in advance unless it's a major event. It's impossible to take this claim seriously if you think about it for five seconds.

If you wanted to treat this schedule claim seriously and have it match the show's tone, then you'd have to tone Marinette's claim down, too. It would go from having his schedule for the next three years to just being aware of what he does on a weekly basis because they're friends and in the same class and you just sort of learn this stuff if you pay attention. How does Marinette know that Adrien has fencing on Wednesday? Because he has fencing every Wednesday. That's how this stuff tends to work.

I don't blame anyone for disliking the way that Marinette's crush was written. I don't like it either! It leaves a lot to be desired! The show would have been much better if they scrapped using Marinette's crush as the main source of comedy, but then they would have had to let Marinette and Adrien become close and we can't have that because it breaks the formula. The simple truth of the matter is that Marinette is written the way she is as a stalling tactic, which the episode Simpleman straight up admits:

Marinette: What am I doing, honestly? The truth is, I'm scared that Adrien will reject me if I tell him how I feel about him. That's why I over complicate everything, so that moment never comes.

In this scene, Marinette is claiming that this is a her thing, but it's really more of a writing thing. Miraculous is a formula show. Part of the formula is the akuma/sentimonster of the week and part of the formula is Marinette trying and failing to confess her crush. The show makes this pretty obvious, but if you want a more official source that this is what's going on, then here you go:

[The writing director] sold the Miraculous series to broadcasters as a formula show.... [This is why] Marinette tries to confess her love for Adrien in every episode, but is unable to do so.

They made Marinette's failure to confess part of the weekly formula which means that there can never be any romantic progress, thus Marinette being written like a fan obsessed with her idol instead of a teenage girl with very real feelings for her kind sweet friend. The first makes for an easy formula, the second won't work in that model. It requires there to be progress and a planned endgame. I'm not against formula shows, but this is a terrible element to make part of the formula!

The same issue plagues Adrien, too. It's the main reason why Chat Noir can come across as overly pushy. He's not allowed to move on just like Marinette isn't allowed to confess her feelings because they're the endgame couple. But we keep pushing back the endgame by adding seasons and so it's all become a total mess with terrible pacing and awkward, unhealthy relationships dynamics that really aren't suited to the genres or audience that Miraculous is clearly aiming for.

[suzukiblu]

this is a question that is not meant to come off as judgemental, and if it does i apologise and you don’t have to answer

for you, or anyone out there in the world if they see this,

What is the appeal of (the?) Omegaverse?

Ive never quite gotten it? And it might be the big bold orange, blue and white letters spelling out aroace, or being european, younger than most people who are knowledgeable about that particular genre of content (still 18+) and while I did get on the internet at 11, I didn’t start reading fanfic until 14-15

this is a long and rambly ask so I just want to clarify, this is a genuine question I would like an answer to, no matter how short and sweet, or long and convoluted it may be

It's all good, I don't mind getting questions! And, like, I've written a LOT of omegaverse, so it's a thoroughly relevant question to this blog, haha.

. . . and this definitely wound up long and convoluted. So like, yeah, we are SO gonna need a read-more here, friend. 😅

Obviously everyone's gonna have their own reasons for liking the genre, but as another (much older, I'm assuming) aroace, for me the appeal is the opportunity to use the tag "Fantasy Gender Roles". Like, there's other stuff there, def, but "Fantasy Gender Roles" is my favorite part. Omegaverse is a game where the rules are made-up and the points don't matter, and you can interpret and re-interpret the involved sexes and genders however the heck you wanna, and in fact are ENCOURAGED to. I also really like certain tropes that are common to the genre, like pack dynamics and breeding kink and having babies and feral behavior and courting/courting rituals, I just really enjoy playing with and reading about all of those.

Also, the worldbuilding. I get to do ✨GENDER-BASED WORLDBUILDING✨.

And obvi, like, some people are just into omegaverse for the kink/porn factor, which is totally fair, but personally I am here for ✨GENDER-BASED WORLDBUILDING✨. And then also the kink/porn. Generally speaking a recurring comment I've gotten from a lot of readers is "I literally hate omegaverse but I love yours", so a lot of my stuff is allegedly a decent jumping-on point for the genre if you're looking for that. Like, I'm not the only person who writes omegaverse the way I do, obviously, just I'm a pretty accessible one who's written a LOT of it.

( and in the event you DO want any jumping-on omegaverse recs from my stuff, I'mma just pop a few of them from various fandoms here. no DC-related ones 'cuz I don't have any of those currently on AO3, only scattered in my WIP tags, but hopefully something helpful will be in here. )

original fic

to the victor go the spoils - human omega OMC/dragon [ GENDER NOT FOUND ] OMC; 16.7k; explicit Fantasy AU. This one includes porn but honestly the heart of it is just one of those fairy tales where the protagonist is somehow both incredibly genre-savvy in their story and yet still a total fucking idiot about other people's feelings, and especially considering it's original fic, it is honestly one of the most popular things I've ever posted, hah.

The dragon arrived early in the morning, and by noon the entire village was in a panic in the town hall. No one in the village knew anything about dragons, aside from what they’d heard in fairy tales and stories, and the plans for dealing with it were about that level of sophisticated.

“We’re not sacrificing a virgin to the dragon,” Viktor said in exasperation.

“Well what would YOU do?!” the mayor demanded.

“I’m going to go talk to it,” Viktor said reasonably, and got up from his seat and went to do just that.

.

Avatar: The Last Airbender

does the pain feel better when I'm around? - beta!Sokka/omega!Zuko, beta!Sokka/beta!Suki, past alpha!Mai/omega!Zuko, polyamory; 3k; teen Societal dynamics-focused fic. Zuko goes into heat at the Western Air Temple immediately after the Boiling Rock happens and goes off to den down alone and stay out of everyone's way without realizing that the local betas are gonna lose their ever-lovin' MINDS about that.

“Cool,” he says. “You realize we’ve been looking for you for, like, two HOURS, right?”

“Why?” Zuko asks, sounding confused, which is kind of sad.

“Because the world is full of people who wanna kill you and you didn’t bother telling anyone where you were going?” Sokka says. “Obviously?”

“Oh.” Zuko falls silent. Sokka glances moonwards in supplication. Yue save him from dumb, dumb firebenders.

every act of communication is a miracle of translation - alpha!Mai/omega!Zuko; 5.7k; teen Post-series fic where Mai and Zuko are about to spend their first cycle together and they're both really awkward about working out how it should go. Not actually a sequel to "does the pain feel better when I'm around?", but you could definitely draw a relationship between 'em.

They leave the office, Mai pretending that all her senses aren’t full of Zuko’s warm, spicy scent, and he keeps looking worried. She wonders if it’s THIS he’s worried about, now that she’s thinking about it. They agreed they’d share their next cycles together, but again, they haven’t really talked about it.

They can talk about it now, Mai thinks.

Unfortunately, that means now they actually have to talk about it.

.

Overwatch

even if I do I don't, even if I could I won't - omega!Genji/beta!the-character-who-was-at-the-time-I-wrote-this-fic-known-as-McCree; 5.1k; explicit Blackwatch-era fic where Genji did not fill out his heat partner designation forms and "Fuck or Suffer Unspecified Health Consequences" is gonna make that a problem. Worldbuilding, assisted negotiation, a touch of workplace-influenced pack dynamics, and porn.

“Yeah, you’re hilarious, kid,” Gabe says. “Get back to work. And Shimada, call your heat partner and we’ll see you next week.”

Shimada’s shoulders tense. Gabe . . . pauses.

“Shimada,” he says slowly. “PLEASE tell me you have a heat partner on base.”

“I have a heat partner on base,” Shimada lies. Gabe and Jesse both stare at him, then Gabe calls up his file, takes one look at it, and starts cursing.

don't, don't, don't let's start (I've got a weak heart) - alpha!Genji/omega!the-character-who-was-at-the-time-I-wrote-this-fic-known-as-McCree; 17.3k; explicit Blackwatch-era fic about Genji and the character formerly known as McCree dealing with their complicated feelings about each other and also the cybernetics and trauma and physical disabilities that are fucking up their sex life, including ED.

“You busy?” he asks. Genji stares at him in bemusement, which is fair. Genji’s only ever busy when they’re on a mission or he’s in the middle of an upgrade. “Dumb question. My heat’s coming on, wanna do me a favor?”

“What favor?” Genji asks, still looking mystified. Jesse tries not to laugh at him.

“The obvious one,” he says meaningfully, tipping his hat back and raising his eyebrows at him. Genji looks no less mystified for a moment, then startles. “THERE we go."

.

Marvel Cinematic Universe

come hang (let's go out with a bang) - omega!Darcy Lewis/omega!Johnny Storm; 5k; teen Darcy almost dies again, tries to figure out which omega buys the courting gifts in an omega/omega relationship, and has her first date with a super-hot superhero.

“Was there traffic?” Jane asks.

“I have a date with Johnny Storm,” Darcy says.

“What?” Jane says.

“Oh, and I almost died again,” Darcy says, pulling out Jane’s papers for her. “But that’s kind of secondary.”

“WHAT?!”

pack up, don't stray (oh say say say) - alpha!Natasha + polyamory; 3.4k; teen Natasha collects a harem pack and Captain America is fucking difficult about it.

Natasha is an alpha on a mission, and that mission is simple and clear.

I said you're holding back, she said shut up and dance with me - alpha!Peggy/omega!Steve/omega!Bucky; 10.3k; mature Alternate timeline where Steve and Bucky don't "die" and they all run away from the States to get married and start a family. Illegal adoption and biokids and lowkey pack dynamics involving figuring out how to fold pups into their lives, oh my!! And also, they all get to dance.

“One alpha mating two omegas? Really, Steve?” Peggy asks, mouth quirking wryly. “What WOULD the newsreels say?”

“We’ll go to France,” Steve says. “No one will care in France.”

“I do love France,” she muses.

oh don't you dare hold back, just keep your eyes on me - alpha!Darcy/omega!Bucky, polyamory; 187.4k; explicit MY MAGNUM OPUS, MY WHITE WHALE, THE LITERAL REASON OMEGAVERSE TOOK OVER HALF MY BLOG FOR HALF MY STINT IN MCU FANDOM. I wanted a goddamn female alpha and I wanted that female alpha to be Darcy Lewis, and Bucky was my fave blorbo at the time so the inevitable happened. The inevitable happened for three and a half years and 187,430 words, to be more precise.

Darcy is thirty feet out of Stark-cum-Avengers Tower when she starts craving cinnamon rolls--the sticky-sweet iced-up old-fashioned kind, yummy and messy and dripping gooshy icing all over your mouth and hands and down your yuuuup, yup, that is a super, super fertile omega that she is smelling, holy SHIT is it ever.

“Jesus Christ,” she groans in frustration, then follows her alpha instincts (and, more easily and importantly, her NOSE) to go track them down. They’re in the middle of New York City; middle of the day or not, not checking on somebody who smells like THAT is, like, the ultimate dick move.

.

OKAY SELF THAT'S ENOUGH LINKS, WE MOVE ON NOW, haha.

I will also say, if you're interested in, like, gender-exploratory AU concepts, apiary genders might be more your thing and more easily accessible for you? It's a MUCH newer thing than omegaverse and really only has a few fics around, some of which are linked in the "inspired by" of that AO3 primer linked above, but the concept is a bit more strongly "hive"-based than a lot of omegaverse is "pack"-based, and also there's no physical differences from baseline. I've got a WIP or two going about apiary myself, actually, but I haven't gotten too far into them yet, alas. The only one I've posted anything from is this one Superbat one.

[elementroar]

A.B.A is an experimental clone of the real Dr. Paracelsus (fan-theory)

(I made the distinction in the title but to be clear - I mean Paracelsus her creator, not Paracelsus we all know and love but the one A.B.A renamed him after. To differentiate, I'm referring to them as Dr. Paracelsus)

So, this might not be common knowledge watching Guilty Gear from the outside, but there's actually two Asukas currently 'active' in STRIVE - the original Asuka R. Kreutz and his clone Asuka R♯. In fact, it's the clone that's the main playable character, and the arcade mode is from the clone's perspective as he is his own character separate from the real Asuka.

Asuka R# was created based on Asuka admiring the construction of the Valentine sisters, and the "Frasco specimen" and creating his own clone based on that research. The 'Frasco specimen' is currently assumed to be referring to A.B.A (and was potentially a teaser for A.B.A's eventual inclusion into the game at that point in time).

Asuka (R#): No? Well, I beg to differ. Otherwise… I might never learn why you created me. Asuka: …Um, well… About that. The Valentine sisters, formed by the Universal Will, were perfect beings. I hadn’t seen such immaculate synthetic life since the Frasco specimen. Asuka (R#): So you wanted to try it for yourself. At least you're honest... if ethically bankrupt. Asuka: Let me guess... Do you resent me? Asuka (R#): No need to worry about that. Unless you resent yourself. Now, why don’t we kill a little more time?

What if I tell you there aren't just multiple examples of artificial lifeforms like A.B.A that are all clones of someone, but even in the current official Guilty Gear World entry for 'Homunculus', it's explicitly mentioned there are multiple homunculi in the world and that A.B.A could have 'siblings'?

All the Valentine sisters are clones of the original Aria Hale. So everyone here is technically, on some level, genetically the same person:

And R# is also a near identical clone of Asuka, down to possessing the same memories and experiences but programmed by Asuka to be more socially active than he really is, and also to lack a moral compass (which doesn't seem like a good idea but ok).

So if A.B.A is a similar experiment to the two examples we know, then it follows she is likely an experiment into synthetic clones as well.

And then there's the official entry under "Homunculus" in the offiical Guilty Gear World database (link goes to the online wiki copy of the entry).

That's right, there's confirmation there's multiple homunculi out there, with it explicitly hinted that A.B.A is simply the only one to appear in the games "so far". And either they are going to be unique homunculi, or possibly 'clones' of/like A.B.A that vary like the Valentine sisters do.

And this may be a superficial design coincidence, but original Asuka's eyes are golden while his clone R#'s eyes are green, and quite a similar if not the exact same shade as A.B.A's

But note that the original Aria's eye color was green, and her four clones all have very different eye colors (Elphelt's seems close but hers is actually light blue). It prolly does mean that even when making a near-identical clone like Asuka did with R#, the clone's eye color being different is one of the main differences that appear.

And this leads back to my previous theory that Dr. Paracelsus could be revealed to actually be a woman, and that A.B.A is her genetic clone. As the name 'Paracelsus' is actually a made-up name that's a portmanteau of the words 'para' (meaning 'beyond') and the name 'Celsus' and just meant 'beyond Celsus' and was the historical alchemist's way of dissing another alchemist called Celsus. So there's no inherent gender related to the name 'Paracelsus', and can be a nickname for a woman alchemist/scientist.

This would also help explain all the perfectly sized shorts that A.B.A found around Frasco in the first place to wear. They could belong to her 'mother' who would be exactly the same size as her.

I'm rooting for a future introduction of an older woman scientist that gets to be revealed as A.B.A's creator, because I think the visual would be so cool. Cos her 'mother' would be her but aged normally. And can you imagine if Dr. Paracelsus treats Paracelsus as her son-in-law!?

[arogustus]

Splatband Analysis - Squid Squad + Diss-Pair

(Disclaimer: This analysis in based on what I get out of looking into the character descriptions we have of the splatband characters. If you disagree with what I say, that is fine, we are all beheld to our opinions. Just don’t be a jerk about it.)

The Squad of Squid (and that one urchin). Squid Squad was the first splatband, with the two super cool songs that dominated the music scene, one of which is an emblematic part of Turf War gameplay. They’re also the band with the juiciest drama out of all the splatbands. Plagiarism, violence and relationship drama. This band has it all, so let’s see what all that was!

Also Warabi is here too I guess. They’re just one octopus, so it’s easy to jam them in here.

The Band

Squid Squad was Inkopolis’ hottest act back in the first Splatoon, and evidently have been playing for a decent while before they gained notoriety in Turf Wars with their latest album, Fresh Kids. They don’t make many public appearances due to their popularity causing them to get constantly mobbed by fans. Despite that, their success hides their amateurish nature, as outside of Ikkan, none of the band members know much about making music, practically winging it when it comes to their stuff, though definitely with a lot of passion for it. 

Internally, the band seemed to be rife with discord between band members that got bad enough the bassist eventually up and left, though not before one final concert on Starfish Mainstage. After that, silence for everyone but Quinn, who later pops up in Diss-Pair in Splatoon 2. According to Booyah Base, the others were focusing on their solo careers. But they did come back as Front Roe, although now actively distancing themselves from their past, to the point of not even performing any of their old songs. They want a fresh start, and want the world to see them for their talent and not for their fame. Though it’s fair to say the failure of Squid Squad is probably still fresh in their hearts.

Ichiya

Oh, Ichiya. Who knew the guy who looks like a fish gasping for air out of water would be at the center of so much drama. Let’s start with the information we learned most recently. That is, that he’s not an Inkopolis native, but actually from the Splatlands! We don’t know what made him move over to Inkopolis, Beika is pretty vague about the circumstances, but he seems to have adapted pretty well to the local culture. His relationship to Beika itself is its own mystery. All we have to go over is that the two were close enough that they had shared knowledge of Now or Never. Maybe he used to be a part of C-Side before Inkopolis? Maybe the two were close friends, or dating? No one is willing to give a straight answer. According to Splatune 3, he and Front Roe have made no comment on the matter, though people assume they are outraged. Note the keyword “assume”, here, that’s just what the public thinks.

He’s described as selfish, with the temperament of a prodigy and rockstar charm that draws people to him. The trademarks of someone who’s letting fame get to their heads it seems, though not immediately noticeable considering the charm thing. He probably seems cooler when seen from a distance, but you realize his negatives once you get to know him. This aspect seems to have faded for Front Roe, considering their current distancing from their past fame is kinda antithetical to his personality in Squid Squad. He’s hiding his identity (poorly) alongside the others, so something must have changed.

On the topic of being a prodigy, Ichiya can’t read!.. Music. He doesn’t know how to read music, I assume his other reading levels are normal. This is shocking since he’s the one who writes the band's music. He’s just getting by with flashy guitar riffs. This is actually reflected in the music itself. I’ve seen plenty of musicians react videos of Splattack that point out how relatively simple and easy to learn and perform the song is. I wonder if this applies to other bands. At the very least Ikkan saw this potential and wanted to mentor him, but considering how that went (the two’s arguments got bad enough they got in a live shootout with each other), it’s fair to say he wasn’t receptive to that gesture. 

Namida

Namida is the crazy girl of the team. We don’t get an idea as to how other than the bunch of nicknames she gets people to call her. The examples we got are “Mida-Chan”, "Master Namida", "Naminami", and "Girl from Planet Namik". Mida-Chan and Naminami sound like casual nicknames you’d get a friend to call you, while Girl from Planet Namik makes her sound eccentric and out of this world. Master Namida gives the feeling of wanting to be looked up to, probably a nickname used whenever someone asks her something. Am I reading too deep into these random nicknames? Yes, that’s the whole point of this analysis.

One minor thing is that she has knowledge in jazz theory. Seems she was studying jazz in particular before joining Squid Squad. Maybe she likes Ink Theory? At the very least she’s noted to be pretty skilled. Her lore is pretty sparse, all things considered.

Murasaki

Murasaki is next. The youngest member of the band, as the original Squid Research Lab tweet describes him as a youngster, and he’s called wild child due to his drumming skills. Not that he actually knows much about drumming, he’s like Ichiya in that he relies a lot on raw talent. Uncanny sense of rhythm, but not a lot of technique. He’s passionate, though, considering he cries during his drum solos. Energetic and emotional, especially once he gets going on the drum kit. The Squid Research Lab also describes him as “rough around the edges”. He must have been a prickly (hehe) kid, but one with a good heart. 

We do get to hear about him in Splatune 3’s section for Front Roe. He’s hanging out in bars now, and gives a cryptic answer to the question of whether Ikkan would ever collab with Front Roe (I’ll go into that in Ikkan’s section). He’s probably just throwing off the interviewer for the sake of the band's privacy.

Small but funny thing, Squid Squad actually starred in a small, four panel gag comic once, picture below. Definitely the best treatment a Splatband has ever gotten before Splatoon 3. Considering it’s a gag comic, it’s hard to say if this is how Murasaki is treated by his fanbase. But uh, if it is, I think he’s got reasons to be a little prickly.

Ikkan

The other center of drama that also looks like a dying fish. Look at how much he and Ichiya have in common. He’s the oldest member of the band, and evidently the most experienced and responsible as well. Always arrives early before anyone else, and leaves the stage after everyone else. Even wanted to try and mentor Ichiya to help him actually learn music. Funny that he thought Squid Squad was just a passing fad in the grand scheme of things. Maybe he cared more than he let on? If you remember the Ink Theory valentine’s artwork

and look at his bass case, you can see he still has Squid Squad stickers slapped on them. And then there’s the whole thing with Front Roe’s other song, Sandy Side Up, which appears to feature vocals of both him and Warabi. The fact that both sides are being deliberately vague about a reunion does give the potential that it is a reunion, but there is no concrete answer.

Personality wise, beyond that dedication and passion for music, he’s not a very emotive person. That dead fish stare is apparently his default look, and he doesn’t move around a lot while performing. Still, when Ichiya shot him with a gun, he shot back with his own (what the fuck), and then he stopped showing up to rehearsals and eventually left the band entirely. His response to being asked a question he doesn’t want to answer (would he ever reunite with Squid Squad?) was to say “that’s a good question”, and then he just left the room and never returned.  

According to Splatune, Ikkan (back in Squid Squad) actually stayed at a celebration party for one of their live shows up until the very end. Hard to say if it means he’s a secret party animal, or just felt obligated to stay. The latter tracks better with his personality in my opinion, as we know his response to an uncomfortable social situation is to just nope the fuck out. He also arrived at the studio before everyone else like always after the party, showcasing that diligence we know and love about him.

Now, as we all know, he did come back in a new band for Splatoon 2, Diss-Pair, having found an Octoling twink overseas who he befriended. It’s through here that we get a bit more insight about his reasons for leaving Squid Squad. Specifically he disliked the lack of tension, and them just being yes-men to whatever he said. Considering their overall inexperience, Squid Squad didn’t have much in terms of discussion over the songwriting process. But he did find it with Warabi, at least. Their first meeting was mistaken for an argument, and they have this balanced dynamic of pointing out each other's flaws while still trusting each other enough to not even have to look at each other during performances. He really respects the octoling.

Warabi

Diss-Pair’s other half, and an octoling that has been living on the surface for quite some time it seems. Now, I don’t mean offense, but I don’t much care for the “Warabi is an Octarian” headcanon. A lot of the info we’re given of them pretty heavily imply they were born on the surface. Their parents are famous actors, they had a musical education for gifted kids, they visit up to twenty countries a year on their tours before Diss-Pair. All of it just screams surface octopus. Marina does state she’s friends with them, along with Paul, who’s heavily implied to be an Octarian octoling. Maybe they’re friends because she’s an octoling DJ in a city notoriously lacking in the species overall? At least one thing we don’t know is where they are from, as Ikkan met them overseas. But yeah, surface octopus. 

Anyway, onto the octopus, they’re a DJ, specifically a Beatsmith with a strong focus on EDM style stuff. Their interest didn’t start early though, having come after growing up surrounded by music genres from around the world through their actor parents, complete with classical music education. Electronic music came to them in their teenage years, which seems to be their main deal. No details on their exact relationship with their parents, but at the very least it seems they indulge them in their love of music, so the relationship might be positive. They’re apparently very demanding as a performer, with demands that seem all over the place, but that belies a clever and intelligent person. An eccentric artist it seems, probably someone who asks people to serve a bowl full of only red M&M’s, but who actually knows their shit. And considering they’re meant to be a mismatch with the stoic, unemotive Ikkan, it’s likely they’re much more lively and energetic compared to him just to make the contrast between the two clearer. Despite those differences and the arguments they seem to have, they get along and greatly respect Ikkan.

It’s nice for Ikkan that he found someone who he considers an equal.

---

I wonder what we'll learn about Front Roe once the Side Order artbook is released (nothing like it has been announced, but come on, it has to be coming). Will the Beika/Ichiya drama reach its tipping point? Will Namida get more crazy nicknames? Will Ikkan be there and somehow answer nothing? It's all I care about, really, I'd settle for just buying the splatband pages of the artbook.

[cosmerelists]

Cosmere Characters! You just spilled wine on your favorite shirt--what will you do??

Navani: I will politely excuse myself and go change, of course. Why--what else would someone do?

Steris: First, I would not panic. Next, I would utter one of the jokes I had prepared in advance in case of a party faux-pas, chosen based on my level of acquaintance and relative social ranking to the witnesses. Post-joke, I would excuse myself to the washroom, use the small bottle of detergent I keep in my bag at all times, and see if the outfit can be salvaged. If not, then I would change the smallest total percentage of my outfit as possible while still removing the offending stain. Then, I can return to the party and use the re-entry-after-a-faux-pas joke, and move on.

Wayne: Can I just suck it out of my shirt?

Steris: ...

Wayne: What? Waste of good wine, that is!

Zahel: Leave it. Maybe then people will think I am some sort of messy drunk and FINALLY leave me alone.

Azure: Dab it with a napkin, deal with it later. I generally have more important things going on. 

Noro (whispering): Highmarshal Azure is always so cool!!

Lightsong: I’d pretend it was on purpose to see if I can make dumping wine on your front a trend--after all, a god did it.

Blushweaver: Oh no, I guess my shirt will simply have to come off.

Szeth: I am used to being stained.

Szeth: Usually it’s blood, though. Not wine.

Nightblood: Yeah! Just cover the wine with the blood of evil-doers!

Szeth: That is not quite what I was saying, sword-nimi. 

Moash: If you spend your days breaking rocks and killing gods, you don’t have to worry about trivial things like spilled wine.

Moash: And who has a favorite shirt, anyway? 

Elend: I assume this is at a party, in which case, by holding a book protectively before me at all times, no one will notice!

Vin: Foolproof, really.

Elend: I know!

Elhokar: I would simply say that the wine was poisoned.

Elhokar: Not that anyone ever BELIEVES me!

Jasnah: I have not spilled wine since I was five, but I suppose that if it happened, I could simply soulcast it to smoke.

Veil: I mean--is it even really a party if you haven’t gotten sloppy drunk enough to spill?

Siri: I assume I would be immediately mobbed by servants, stripped and changed, and then that outfit would be ritually burned.

Siri: You know, a normal day.

Adolin: Oh! Oh! I know this!

Adolin: You can use vinegar to remove the stain and then wash the clothes as normal.

Shallan: Time to bury that once-favorite shirt deep, deep underground where it will never see the light of day.

Kaladin: Oooh--that’s smart. The knowledge may torment you forever, but at least it won’t bother anyone else!

Shallan: What torment? It’s buried. It’s gone. I’ve already forgotten.

Kaladin: Wow. That’s so cool--I wish I could do that.

Adolin: WHAT ARE YOU TWO TALKING ABOUT?!

[scarletskiesinthepaths]

can you talk about kuchel and levi pls i loved your last post abt levi

Hi, thank you so much for your question! I'm really excited because this is the first time I've received an ask like this :) Thank you as well for your kind words on my post!

Off the top of my head, I'll lay out some of my thoughts in general about Levi and Kuchel and some of the speculations I have regarding the circumstances they were in together:

Kuchel seemed to be a victim of sex trafficking. She fled to the Underground City to escape persecution, but prior to that, we can assume that she lived a relatively sheltered and privileged life, as the Ackermans served and protected the King. Because of this, it is unlikely she would have had the skills or knowledge to defend herself once reaching the Underground, so I'm assuming she was preyed upon—especially since it doesn't seem like she ever awakened her own Ackerman powers. We also know that human trafficking is common underground, given Mikasa's backstory and some of the "Bad Boy" panels that have been released.

Given that Kuchel became pregnant with Levi by one of her patrons while working as a prostitute, Levi is essentially the product of rape; Kuchel's occupation was more akin to forced labor and sexual slavery than it was willful employment. I'm certain the circumstances of his birth were never lost on Levi, as I'm sure he witnessed his mother being forced to have sex on a highly frequent basis due to their living arrangements.

To elaborate, I'm fairly certain Kuchel and Levi lived in the brothel she worked at. When Kenny went to search for Kuchel's address, the man he spoke with referred to her as "Olympia" (her prostitute name). That man was also aware of her health status in reference to her ability to see clients, so I'm assuming he was the brothel owner. Building upon Levi witnessing the sexual violence toward his mother by her clients, the reason I think this is the case is because I doubt Kuchel would have felt secure in having Levi leave the room. Given the danger of their situation and how hostile of an environment the Underground is, Kuchel would have wanted to ensure Levi's safety from kidnappers by keeping him in her presence. From what we see of the room Levi was in when Kenny found him, there was only one relatively small bed and a paltry amount of furniture. Not many places for Levi to hide, unfortunately.

The likelihood that Kuchel had postpartum depression (PPD) is quite high, as certain psychosocial circumstances increase the risk factors for developing PPD: stressful life events during the pregnancy, unplanned pregnancy, food insecurity, violence against women, low socioeconomic status, low social support, single marital status, sexual abuse history, and more. All of these aforementioned factors apply to Kuchel. It is exceedingly unlikely Kuchel would have had access to treatment for any PPD she may have had as well. Furthermore, it is well-known that PPD can adversely impact the maternal-infant relationship, particularly untreated PPD. This would have affected not only Kuchel's ability to attend to her own needs, but also Levi's needs.

Levi was dying from starvation when Kenny found him. I imagine Levi was stuck with his mother's decaying corpse for around a week, and one does not reach that level of starvation from going without food for a week. Simply from those panels alone, it is evident Levi had probably gone without sufficient access to food for months at a time. This demonstrates that Kuchel was having significant difficulties providing for Levi's basic needs. Based on this fact alone, Kuchel would not have had the capabilities and resources to provide Levi with higher-level needs, like the feelings of love and belonging that children need to thrive. I think Kuchel clearly loved and wanted Levi deeply, just based on the panel of her crying tears of happiness while holding Levi as an infant; however, the reality of her situation would have precluded her from properly relaying this love to Levi.

Let's take a look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs:

Basically, human needs are arranged in this hierarchy, with lower-level needs required for survival having to be satisfied before moving on to higher-level needs. Higher-level needs cannot be met if lower-level needs are not. The more one progresses through this hierarchy, the harder it is to continue to move through the hierarchy due to the practical and interpersonal barriers that inevitably occur. Physiological needs are the most important because no other needs can be satisfied unless those are met. Practically none of Levi's physiological needs were being met during his childhood:

We've established he had no food.

Given the poverty they were in and the nature of the Underground, a lack of clean drinking water makes sense.

The barest minimum of shelter was provided, given the small room they lived in. The shelter itself was inadequate and unsafe.

Levi was dressed in rags when Kenny found him, so we can extrapolate that he did not have much clothing.

Due to the lack of sunlight and the known effects on circadian rhythm, as well as Levi's known issues with insomnia during adulthood, consistent sleep was also an issue.

Clean air quality also seems like it'd be an issue Underground, given the lack of electricity. Torches and oil lamps probably contributed significantly to air pollution, along with the proper lack of air ventilation.

On a different note, we know from Kenny's conversation with the man who I assume was the brothel owner that Kuchel got sick from one of her clients. Of course, it's possible that Kuchel may have gotten some other sort of illness from her client, but given the occupational hazards of her labor, I'm assuming this was a sexually transmitted disease (STD). We already know Levi is extremely wary and concerned about disease when he's older to the point of being seen as a "clean freak"; it seems pretty easy to trace this concern to his experiences living underground. Given how Kuchel became sick, it's not a leap to think Levi might associate sex with disease, especially if he ever learned about the concept of STDs. Levi probably internalized some very negative messages and associations regarding sex from his childhood with his mother.

Anyway, those are some of the basic thoughts I have in my head regarding Kuchel and Levi's circumstances. I do have some more, so I would definitely love to write more posts at some point on this topic. Thanks again for reaching out!

[hassians-sernuk-boyfriend]

Hey I thought you might have more knowledge about this since you've romanced both Hassian and Reth already so I wanted to ask... I'm on level 3 romance with Reth and just got his pin. I haven't started a romance with anyone else. I'm level 4 friendship with Hassian, and when he saw my Reth pin he said "I see your heart belongs to another. I suppose I was foolish to think you'd reserve it exclusively for me." And I was like WHAT is he saying that he thought we were in a relationship already??? (Which I assumed could be because sometimes my dialogue gets bugged and villagers say things related to quests I haven't finished yet) But I checked the wiki and apparently that's his reaction to seeing a pin regardless of the player's status with him!? So if that's true, then does it basically confirm that Hassian canonically has a crush on the player character no matter what and is always secretly hoping for a relationship with them? But if we romance someone else then he gets sad and jealous and finally admits what he was too shy to say before, knowing now that he's too late? Big news if so. Really fits into the brooding tragic romantic tsundere personality that he hides underneath a cold exterior.

oh my god I did not know he did this even if you weren't in a relationship with him.

Realistic answer is: probably this is a bug

Character based babbling:

Okay so I rotate and chew on Hassian and his relationship with romance and traditional/alternative lifestyles So Much, especially bc he is one of the only characters to actively express jealousy in a world where polyamory is at least partially the norm.

continuing under the cut

To me, a big crucial part of his character that people forget is that he is from an ethnic minority group and he is Not from the culture that Kilima people refer to as "Majiri". We don't yet have a name for his people, but we know they are nomadic, bluer skinned, and have tighter curled hair, for instance. (Majiri I believe is the word for the whole species, but like the Ainu people in japan, I assume that when we're talking about culture, it's about the people whose language coined the word)

we know he's a hopeless romantic lad, and based on his friendship dialogue we know he fantasizes about "a hearth and someone to share it with" which is an adaptation of the majority culture of Majiri. Also within the culture we've seen, marriages and Long-Term relationships seem to be monogamous (booo) (let Eshe marry them both imo)

While pursuing Hassian, his romance quest involves him consulting Chayne for "Traditional Majiri Courtship Customs", which Chayne mentions are obsolete and Kinda Weird to follow, but this to me is, like, Extremely Interesting, because it marks one of the first, clear instances of Hassian putting in the earnest effort to integrate into the majority culture and he starts by doing earnest, wholehearted, misguided research. Because he's never done this before, but respect towards other's cultures is something he cares about a lot. (Because no one else has it for his?)

Hassian's jealousy might stem from the romance novels, normal irl-human emotions, or also a cultural difference that hasn't been addressed.

Majiri instances of romantic jealousy/monogamy we do know of: Delilah + Badruu + M.. Mavil? I can't remember, Eshe + Kenli + his sister, Sifuu (possibly through integration) + "moving on" from Taylin

He's a big stupid boy with a big dumb heart and he WANTS things and very clearly WANTS to be loved, but his tsunder ass has a lot of hurdles that make it hard for him to reach out, especially since integration means an inherent loss of his own ethnic identity as an immigrant into a culture that has been implied to shun his lifestyle.

[iliveforyouilongforyouvesuvia]

Is it ever explained in the game why the Mc doesn't have their memories post-resurrection?

Like they get the Fool’s body and the fool is like new beginnings and stuff ( I ASSMUE, Tell me if I'm wrong) , but is an actual explanation in the game? Like did they also have to give something up even though the didn't make the deal? Is it because they don't have their original body?

Spoil it for me idc I just wanna know

The Arcana Brainrot Essays: MC's Memories

Hi anon friend! I hope you don't mind the ramble that's about to proceed -

Not only is the magic system of the Arcana pretty vague, when it comes to MC inhabiting the Fool's body, we have six different canon routes and twelve different canon endings, all with different implications.

With MC not being present for the ritual that gets their body back, it's fairly safe to assume that MC is not bound by any deals at the time of the prologue (though there is plenty of space to argue otherwise, given how vague the details are). Many of the routes include other characters reckoning with the deals they made at the time, but MC's reckoning has more to do with the truth than anything else. The best explanation, and to my knowledge, the canon explanation we get across routes for MC's missing memories is "because of the resurrection." That's it.

Here's where I jump from canon stuff to the implications I picked up through the different routes, focusing on the how aspect:

Similar to what other creators have pointed out in the past, MC's amnesia bears a lot of similarities to amnesia caused by traumatic brain injuries or (in my opinion) trauma in general. Based off of the occasions where MC is able to recover their own memory of dying, it seems like in at least some routes, the memories are still in there. They're just suppressed by a mysterious something. Given how the memory loss is associated with strong headaches, how said headaches are triggered by attempts to remember or vivid references to the past, and how attempting to forcibly remember something has led to further damage in the past, MC does seem to be in the middle of a nonlinear healing journey. As several of the routes progress, we can even see MC being able to succeed at mental tasks with lower levels of difficulty when previously it would have resulted in a debilitating headache.

My personal conclusion from all of that is that MC's amnesia is the result of the sheer trauma of dying and then coming back. It's a mind boggling experience simply to process the facts of what happened - let alone the physical and emotional experience. The story picks up with MC having physically recovered enough to live independently, and continues with MC's mental and emotional growth into fully growing into themself (in the upright endings). In some routes, they're able to recall a memory of their own as the story progresses, in other routes, any knowledge MC receives of the past is from other perspectives. Which leads to one of the biggest questions: can MC get them all back?

Some of our best clues outside of MC's personal narrative are the two other characters involved with returning missing memories: Muriel and Julian. (Asra, we know, forgot the details of the ritual itself, but otherwise has all memories intact. Nadia's missing all memories since entering Vesuvia for the first time, but it's never clear how much she gets back.) Julian recovers his memories when he reverses his deal with the Hanged Man, choosing to live as a normal person again with MC so that he can piece together the answer to the Plague. In his case, all the memories come back at once, fully intact.

Muriel's situation is different. He doesn't have any memories missing, he just has the capacity to take away the memories of the people around him. At first, the method for returning those memories is a sensory trigger (myrrh), but as time goes on and the deal loses its effect, the memories seem to slowly return to the people around him. It's different from Julian suddenly having access to the full breadth of his memories again, but the overall effect is the same: the lack of memory is resolved to the point that "normal" functioning can resume.

So, what does that say about MC's case? In short - anything. It really is up to how you imagine your MC, their past, the specific dynamic they have with their specific LI, how their future progresses post canon, etc. There's canon examples of characters regaining their memories gradually over time, getting them all back at once as the result of a deal, or simply learning to move forward and embrace the chance to start anew. And these are just examples of the default apprentice - there are plenty of MCs with gorgeously fleshed out backgrounds whose stories are their own twist on canon, where none of this really applies!

In short, how MC interacts with their missing memories is largely dependent on who your MC is. As to why they're missing - it's written as being because of MC dying and coming back. Whether that's due to the nature of it being trauma/a traumatic brain injury, or whatever other reason you can think of, is up to you ^.^

Cheers friend!

brainrot

[whiskeynwriting]

i love ghost x bones ... will there be a part 3? ☺️

Not a part 3 but definitely a continuation of their relationship

In Plain Sight

Simon “Ghost” Riley x OFC “Bones” 

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Word Count: 4.6k 

Warnings: 18+ (minors DNI)

Established relationship, public sex (caught in the act), unprotected vaginal sex, size kink, tiny bits of violence, possessive Simon, spanking

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A/N: I. Loved. This.

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Simon “Ghost” Riley Masterlist

Join My Taglist!

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Hiding your relationship isn’t nearly as dull as you thought it’d be. You assumed this would be an easy thing, it’s not like you see the entire team at once, at least, not often. Plus, there aren’t that many people on base, so you figured it would be easy to sneak around. But it’s almost like, on a subconscious level, everybody knew. 

As soon as your relationship began, everyone was around more. The boys all started hanging out in the medical room, cracking jokes and smoking until it got late. When they went out, they’d stay at the bars until midnight at least, dragging Ghost along with them. Even returning from missions, they wouldn't leave Ghost be. In the medical room, in the barracks, in the washrooms, they were always by him. Like fucking flies, they were impossible to get rid of, as of late. 

It made things extremely difficult for you and Ghost, your relationship was really suffering from it. And what made it worse was that you didn’t even have a phone number to call or text. Everywhere you wanted to hug him, hold him, touch him, was occupied by his team. At times, you wondered if Ghost would just rather say fuck it, it was fun while it lasted. But you know that isn’t the case. Every time you pass him, he gives you a knowing glance, looking you over before lifting his attention to your eyes. He still came to see you occasionally, claiming to have pulled a muscle or something else superficial. But you’d have only seconds before the boys came in. Still, it was nice to know he was still there, that he still cared. 

“Ready for a long day, lass?”

Chuckling, you raise an eyebrow at him. “What do you mean, Johnny?”

He’s sweaty, the wetness dripping down the side of his forehead and making his shirt dark from the dampness. His breathing is off, too. They’d just come back from the interior gym. 

“Price is runnin’ us pretty hard today. We’ll be here late.” He sends you a wink, patting the table beside your desk. The one Ghost laid on when you’d patched up his stab wound. “And that means, you’ll be here late, too.” 

Rolling your eyes, you sigh. “Yeah, I’ll be here.”

“Maybe come to the pubs with us afterward?” It’s posed more so as a question than an overt offer, and it makes you grin. Sometimes, Soap was shy when he flirted. 

Nodding, you return with a gentle, “Maybe.”

You haven’t gone out with the team at all, let alone since you started fucking Ghost. But who knows, maybe you could tonight. You’re feeling extra desperate for him, lately. You just want to be around him, sit in his comforting presence. He makes you feel safe, cared for, warm. 

This new knowledge excites you, though. With the boys coming up to the outdoor gym, not only will you be able to see Ghost in passing, but you’ll also be able to watch him. And you’ve never had the opportunity to watch him workout before. 

The main path to the outdoor area is through the medical room, so you’ll be able to see each one of them. Gaz comes up after Soap, not saying much. He never does, just gives you a small smile and nod. And then Alejandro, asking how you are, just to be polite. Price asks the same, hanging around a bit longer than the comrade before him. The captain seems genuinely interested in what you have to say, how you’re feeling, whether or not you’ve had a nice day. You find this incredibly sweet, and also comforting, knowing how much he cares. 

And then there’s Ghost. He purposely hung back in the group, wanting to get even the tiniest amount of alone time with you. When you hear his footsteps, you turn around, your body tingling with excitement. A wide smile makes its way across your face when you see him, that gloved hand now opening the door. 

His eyes are full of admiration as he looks at you, stepping forward with ease. With the boys out of the room, his hands naturally find your hips, his form towering above you. 

“Hey, B.” 

B, a nickname from your nickname. Something he came up with over these past few weeks. 

Grinning from ear to ear, you stare up at him, hands sliding over his chest. “Hey, baby.” 

A small, happy hum comes from his throat, bringing his forehead down to yours. He feels your palms slide over his shoulders, your fingers petting at him. “Miss me?” 

“Desperately.” You answer dramatically, rolling your eyes with a grin. But honestly, it’s true. 

Those thick fingers tighten on your hips, his low chuckle vibrating above his ribs. When he feels your hands on the back of his neck, one of his palms leaves. Rising to his face, he lifts the very edge of his mask, eyes darting up to the glass behind you. It displays the training course - he’s making sure no one can see. 

The kiss isn’t heated or firm, it’s a gentle yet passionate connection. Both of you sigh into it, bodies melting together. He pulls you close, pressing the firmness of his chest to your much softer one. 

“I’m sorry.” He says, releasing an aggravated breath. You only have time for this single kiss. “I’ve gotta go.”

“I know.” You’re nodding, though you can’t hide the disappointment on your face. But as your hands slide down, holding either side of his face, you whisper to him, “It’s okay.” 

Honestly, you’re not that disappointed when he goes. At least, not as disappointed as you usually are. It’s only because he’s remaining close. Just being near Simon brings you a sense of security and genuine happiness; Jesus, you’re really falling for him. 

To say he was a distraction from your afternoon tasks is an understatement. Sitting at your desk, it’s almost impossible to keep your eyes on the papers you’re currently filing. There are many aspects to the outdoor course, a track, an area for weights, rock climbing simulation, etc. The boys started out on the running path with Price shouting  the occasional command. After that, it seems like they’re able to do their own thing, as long as they’re still working. 

Simon’s eyes meet your own as he walks in your direction, toward the station closest to you. Smirking beneath his mask, he takes a seat on one the benches, eyeing the weight equipment surrounding him. Per usual, it’s not long before Soap joins him. He’s trying to talk to Ghost, but he shrugs him off, not saying much in response. You watch dreamily as he lays back on the bench, preparing for a round of bench presses. 

Every time he lifts the weights, his muscles flex - you can see them moving beneath his gray long sleeve. Jesus, he’s so big, so powerful. There are so many weights on either end and he’s lifting it like they’re nothing to him. Honestly, probably just to show off. 

He’s still sweaty from his run when Johnny nudges him, nodding to the pull-up bars. The broadness of Ghost’s shoulders jumps a little; he’s laughing. Whatever Soap said gets him to move, standing from his short time at the bench. Furrowing your eyes, you watch as they move, Soap’s hands immediately grabbing for the higher bar. Simon goes to grab the one next to him, but stops, glancing back at you. It makes your face run hot, a shy smirk crawling across your lips at being caught. But he finds it cute. 

Contemplating his next move, his fingers reach down, finding the edge of his shirt and lifting it from his torso. Your jaw drops when he does it, tossing the shirt onto the sweat-covered bench. With little to no cloud coverage in the sky, the sun shines down on him, glistening across his skin. You can’t believe it, you can’t believe how good he looks, how fucking fit he is. 

Cracking the window open just a pinch, you’re able to listen in on their conversation. 

“Showin’ off for the med. girl, huh, L’t?”

“For the last time, Johnny.” He sighs in that deep voice, approaching the bar. “She’s not some med. girl. She’s got a code name, use it.” 

“Yeah, yeah. Okay.”

Grunting, his fingers wrap around the metal, hauling the bulk of his body into the air. “She deserves our respect.” He says it when he lowers back down, a heavy sigh filtering through his lips.

You’re sure he doesn’t know the window is cracked, you were fairly quiet about it. And to know this is how he speaks about you when you’re not around or can’t hear genuinely flatters you. 

“Think she might come out with us tonight.” Johnny’s up on the bar now, too, the one next to Simon. 

“Yeah? What makes you think that?”

Soap’s heavy grunts and sighs fill the air now, too, their collective noises making you stir inside. It feels strangely, dumbly, primitive. Being so turned on by muscular men. But honestly, you can’t help it. They look fucking fantastic. 

“I invited her again.” Johnny responds, giving up after twenty-five reps. Ghost is still going. “She seemed more open to it.”

Simon doesn’t say anything, he just keeps going. Every single muscle in his torso, arms, and back, they’re all flexing, working to build their volume up to a higher capacity. It’s so impressive, seeing him like this, getting just a tiny glimpse at what he can really do.

“Anyways,” Soap sighs, grabbing a water bottle from the cooler. “Hope she comes, would love to get her a drink.”

Ghost had been ignoring Soap’s comments until that one hits the air. Dropping from the bar, Simon huffs out a breath, dusting his hands off while turning to face his friend.

“You fancy her, yeah?”

“Think she’s alright.” Soap is smirking now, almost bashfully. 

“You don’t think Price would have a problem with that?” Shifting his weight, he crosses his arms over the expanse of his chest, gaze becoming predatory. 

Soap shrugs. “I dunno, don’t think so. As long as it didn’t interfere with work. Why not?” 

If this is true, Ghost thinks, maybe we can make things public after all.

“You talkin’ about Bones again?” Alejandro walks up, reaching between the two men to get to the cooler, too. 

Jesus, is everyone after her?

“Yeah, she’s comin’ out tonight.” Johnny grins, rolling his eyes when Ghost grumbles a maybe under his breath. Winking, he pats his Lieutenant on the chest. “I’ll convince her.” 

That’s it.

Marching forward, he presses past Johnny, earning a disgruntled noise from his friend. Stepping back, he eyes the much longer man, raising a brow. “Ghost? Where are ya goin’?” 

Opening the door to the medical room, he shouts over his shoulder. “Pulled a muscle.”

You’re lighting up with excitement until Price’s voice floats across the yard. “I don’t think so.” Comes that booming voice. “Sparring match, now. Half you lads couldn’t hold your own on the last mission.” 

Fuck, rolling your eyes, you sigh. So close.

You figure this will be pretty entertaining, though. You’ve never seen the boys fight. Honestly, this is all new. 

Sparring takes place in the center of the field, quite a ways away from you. But you can still see clearly enough to see who’s who. Leaning forward in your chair, you listen as well as you can to figure out the rules. Basically, no cheap shots to the groin. Anything else is apparently fair game. 

“Soap,” Ghost is already ordering, “You and me.”

“I thought -” 

“Let’s go.” Stepping up, Ghost grunts quietly, cracking his neck.

Soap isn’t sure why Ghost is acting so confrontational. Usually, Price paired them up. But he figures, why the hell not? Stepping forward, he readies his stance, thinking he has a fighting chance. 

Simon just wants to get some anger out. He knows you’re his, even if they aren’t aware of it, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to hear them talk about you. He was happy you’d been declining Soap’s offers, and internally, he wanted to knock his jaw for even trying to make a move on you. 

Circling slowly, Soap is the first one to swing, Ghost dodging it and then punching his ribs quickly. It seems like Johnny’s on the attack, surprisingly, but Ghost remains calm, calculated. After missing two more strikes, Ghost lands on upper-cut. The way he’s moving makes the muscles in his torso twist and flex, his biceps bulging when he hits. You’re thinking about making an excuse for them to do this more often. 

It’s obvious who’s winning, but Ghost is starting to get into his head. He hasn’t felt your warmth in so many days now, it’s been more than a week since you slept in his bed. Maybe he can skip out on drinks tonight, opting to sneak you in instead. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Fuck, he can’t wait to hold you, snuggle you, wrap you in his arms and nuzzle into your sweet-smelling hair. He misses you, longs for you, every bit of you. And then, he turns his head, those warm eyes meeting your own from a few yards away. He holds your gaze, a small moment passing between the two of you. 

Just when you think the match will be done with, Johnny takes another stab. Ghost is so in his head with thoughts of you that he doesn’t notice, and doesn’t block it. Sharply, Johnny’s fist and Simon’s face connect, knocking Ghost’s large body to the side. He stumbles a bit, grunting. 

“Oh shit!” You shout in surprise, eyes going wide. 

“Fuckin’ hell, Johnny!” 

“Alright, alright. That’s enough for you two. Gaz, Alejandro, let’s go.” 

“Sorry, Ghost.” Soap is smiling while he shrugs. “Better luck next time.” 

“Ghost, go take a break.” Price orders, “I don’t need you to bruise.” It’s not like anyone will see it, but that’s not the point. He doesn’t want the pain to hinder him. 

Glady, he thinks, licking his lower lip.

As soon as you see him head your way, you’re on your feet, grabbing antiseptic wipes and an ice pack for him. It’s nothing serious but… it's Simon. Your Simon. And you’ve never seen him get hit like that.

“Hey, love.” Comes that deep grunt, the door opening and then shutting behind him.

“Hey, baby. Come sit.” Patting the table, you urge him over, but he just laughs. 

“It’s nothing serious, B.” 

“Well, I’m still going to clean it.” You say firmly, frowning. Reaching over, you grab his bicep, pulling him to the table. He obliges. “I didn’t like that.” You’re murmuring, lifting his mask and sliding the wipe over his cut lip. 

His shoulders scrunch up, then dip. “You know I’ve gotten stabbed right?” He chuckles, admiring your focused expression.

“Yeah, I had to stitch it up.” You remind him with a grin. Shaking your head, you then ask him, “What happened, anyway? Too busy thinking of me?”

“Actually, yeah.” 

“Oh, really?” Backing up, you throw away the wipe, handing him the ice pack you’d retrieved for him.

“Havin’ you around is kind of a big distraction.” Glancing down, he rolls his eyes. “And apparently not just for me.”

“What are you talking about?” 

“Do the boys always flirt with you?”

“Well, yeah. But I can’t really help that.”

A quick sigh is then forced out of his nose, rising to his feet and tossing the ice pack down. It lands on the table, and from your seat, you look at him, surprised. “Are you… mad at me?”

Turning, he reaches down, grabbing you by the arm and lifting you to your feet. His other hand finds your jaw, fingers brushing over your face. 

“I want you, B.” He’s looking down at you with those warm eyes, those deep hues of brown and caramel swirling. “Those assholes don’t know what they’re talking about.”

“Exactly.” You’re cooing softly to him, reaching up to hold his face, too. 

Simon’s eyes graze across your face, taking you in. It’s been a little bit since he’s been this close to you. “Don’t worry about them, baby.” You want to reassure him, too. Simon isn’t good with words, he shows his interest through actions. You, on the other hand, are good with words. And that just so happens to be one of Simon’s love languages. 

Leaning down, Simon molds his mouth to yours, the metallic taste of his blood leaking onto your lower lip. But you don’t care, honestly… it’s kind of sexy. Seeing him like this, all rugged and sweaty from working his body and muscles to their limit. From how sweaty he was when he first came up, you know their training inside must have been rigorous.

“Baby, they’re gonna see.” 

“I can’t take it anymore.” His eyes are still closed, mouth insistent with his hands wrapping around you. They squeeze your hips, his small moans making you melt into him. 

His back is facing the windows, completely hiding your smaller body. So, even if someone was looking, they probably wouldn’t see much. That is, until he turns you to face them.

“Simon,” A small gasp leaves your lips, wanting to feel more of his. “W-What are you doing?”

“Said I wanted you, didn’t I?” He’s leaning over you from behind, pressing your front onto the padded table he was just sitting on. His hands are still on your hips, his mouth just beside your ear, and he kisses it. 

“Right here?”

“Fuck,” Dropping his head, he places his hairline at the nape of your neck. His fingers are lining the hem of your pants as he says, “Yeah, sweetheart. Right here.” 

Lowering himself even further, he starts mouthing at your neck, ignoring the sting from his cut. The weight of him presses into you from behind, his forearms resting on either side of you as he cages you in with his body. 

“I’m supposed to be here with you, Price sent me. No one’ll notice I’m gone.” He’s trying to reassure you because Jesus fuck, he wants this. He wants you. 

“Mm…” A small smirk curls on the edge of your lip, feeling him grind into your ass. Lolling your head to the side, you let him kiss your neck, sighing from it. “Okay.”

“Yeah?” He asks hurriedly, groaning. “Yeah, baby?” 

“Yeah,” Now, you’re nodding, rubbing yourself back against him. 

Your insides heat up from the excitement of it, of possibly being caught. You’ve never done anything like this before, but Simon is right. Your chances of being seen are pretty low. The boys are all busy, and they won’t expect him to be back for a while. 

The brazenness of it all comes to life when Simon’s fingers move to your hips, pulling your pants down. He settles them around your mid-thigh, shoving his shorts down, too. 

“Fucking hell, I’ve missed this.” Staring down, he reaches for you, rubbing his fingers over your center. 

Lids dropping along with your head, you release a quiet and airy breath. So much of his skin is available for you to see and feel but you can’t do any of that, not with you still so covered. 

Simon’s hand flies up to his mouth, licking his digits before shoving them back down. He rubs you firmly, his tongue tingling with your taste. Rotating your hips back against him with a tiny moan, he shakes his head, loving the way you respond to him. And then he’s grabbing himself, lining up with your entrance. His head swipes through your sex, pulsing when he feels your wetness. And when he starts to slide in, he doesn’t look away, staring the entire time the two of you connect. 

“Simon,” Fingers reaching for the edge of the table, they curl around it, lungs inhaling a sharp breath. 

But he doesn’t respond, he just groans, wrapping his left arm around your midsection. He palms at your right breast, thumb rubbing your nipple through your shirt. His free hand then clings to your hip, the heavy intrusion of him seated inside when his pelvis meets your ass. 

“Oh my god…” 

“Good,” He grumbles out in that low, accented voice. “Taking it so easy.” 

It’s because you’re starting to get used to him. 

His forehead drops to your covered back, the very top of it. With a heavy breath, he moves his hips, just rotating them. The arm around your torso tightens, the fingers of his opposite hand digging into your hip. Every so lightly, he smacks it, and it makes you gasp.

“That’s it.” The way he says it tells you he’s grinning. “Make some noise for me.”

“Baby,” It comes out as a high whine, completely forgetting about the window you’d opened. 

“Oh…” That gives him the motivation to retract his hips before plunging back into you. 

Already, his pace is hurried, rocking your body against the medical table. Shifting his stance, he angles himself behind you, hitting you deep. Every thrust makes you whine, your little squeaks pleasing him greatly. 

Retracting his arm slightly, his hand travels down, pressing his palm over your lower belly. He’s grunting into your ear, body pressing you down with the weight of his chest on your back. Searching briefly, it doesn’t take long for him to find it, the slight jab of his tip against your inner skin. 

“You feel me?” Simon whispers gruffly, making your skin shiver. His voice seems rougher than ever before. “You feel me in your belly?” 

You’re gasping for him, walls contracting around his length. He doesn’t even pull out all the way before he’s inside you again. The pleasure of it all, of his body and words, overwhelms you, tears forming in the corners of your lids.

“Yes!” You wail out for him, pinching your tear-soaked eyes shut as you nod rapidly. 

“Feel me.” Ghost demands, reaching up and grabbing one of your hands. He then guides it down, his palm pressing your hand into your skin. Turning his head, he mouths at your ear, kissing it before whispering, “You feel that inside? 

You can; it’s the tip of him punching up against your inner skin, fucking himself into you until molded to him.

“Yes, Simon. Simon, I-”

And then his hand is leaving yours, chest heaving from his emotions and physical exertion. That same hand rises, fingers clasping around your neck. His quick movement and brute force prompt you to open your own, blown pupils widening. Palm flying up to hold onto him, squeezing his forearm in your tiny hand, you gasp. But he doesn’t squeeze, he just holds you, growling into your ear, “You’re mine.”

Helplessly, you whine, having craved this for days, for more than a week. And you’d think that after his workouts he’d be tired, but no. The mere idea of taking you forced adrenaline through his veins all over again.

“S-Simon!”

He’s pounding into you ruthlessly, chasing his own pleasure and knowing he’s giving you yours. More so than before, he lets his weight sink into you, hips jutting against your ass as he continues. 

“Feel good, B? Yeah?” Eyes rolling back into your head, you nod, moaning for him. It makes him smile breathlessly, the side profile of your expression. “Where do you want me, darling?”

Both of you had been right with your initial assumption, the boys are busy. But Soap, isn’t. You’d forgotten he was Ghost’s competitor, now taking a rest himself. And during that rest, he takes it upon himself to wander over, grabbing a bottle of water from the cooler. 

You’re too distracted by Simon’s body and words that you don’t even notice when Johnny comes over - but Ghost does. Of course, he does. Flashing his eyes up, they meet quite suddenly with his teammate’s, Johnny’s eyes widening in shock. His lips even part, pupils darting away immediately. 

Satisfied, Simon returns to you. “I asked you a question.” 

“On my ass,” You moan, and Johnny can hear you now. “Can you cum on my ass? Please?” That makes him throb; both of them, actually. 

And now, Soap gets it. From the way you’re talking, it’s clear to him that the two of you have done this before. 

Interesting, he thinks. She’s never asked that of me before.

It actually surprises him so much that he’s at a loss for words, lips parting as his eyes pinch shut. Quietly, he mumbles out a small, “Naughty.”

Something inside him snaps, a feeling in his chest breaking loose. It’s a sensation that’s raw and primal, a feeling of possessiveness and determination. He’s never felt this way about a woman before. 

Wrapping both arms around your midsection again, he grunts, hips stuttering as soon as your words allow them to. And then, he’s pulling out, bringing his dominant hand around. Leaning back, he jerks himself off over your ass, his chest heaving out desperate breaths. It flows through him, the absolute ecstasy of his high. He knew he wouldn’t last long, not when he hasn’t had you in more than a week. But honestly, you’re okay with that. For Ghost, you’re okay with anything. 

Chuckling breathlessly as he watches it, you can feel his body jerk behind you, the fronts of his thighs trembling against the backs of yours. And you can feel it, too, the stickiness of it washing your skin. It’s warm and thick and it makes you sigh. In a strange sense, you feel marked by him.

 “Sorry, princess.”

Reaching to the side, Simon grabs a towel sitting nearby. Glancing down, he uses it to wipe you off, gently running it over your skin while he sighs. And then, he’s tossing it in the laundry bin, palm coming down to smack your ass. It’s playful, now running his hand over your skin while he admires you. 

“Don’t be sorry, baby.” Turning your head to the side, he takes your que, leaning over your body again so he can kiss you. Whispering against his lips, you tell him, “I fucking missed you.” 

Johnny doesn’t look at you for the rest of the night, not even when you’re sitting right across from him. To your utter shock and genuine delight, Ghost invited you out with them. But you’re not appearing as a couple, not yet. Even after fucking in the med. room and now sitting beside each other, Simon going so far as to buy you a drink, no one suspects a thing. You’re hiding in plain sight. 

“Bones!” Alejandro’s accented voice shouts to you from across the bar. Looking up, you lock eyes, giving him your attention. “A drink?”

“That’s okay!” Waving him off, you then lift your cup. “Ghost already got me one!”

Alejandro then looks to Simon, who’s sitting right beside you, and raises a brow at him before turning away again. Exhaling slowly, contentedly, Simon leans back in his chair, settling his arm over the top of yours. He then turns his head, eyeing you. 

“What’s wrong, Simon?” Questioning him, you quickly take a sip, lips hovering on the rim of your glass. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

He shrugs, that deep chuckle wafting into the air. “Maybe, but she’s not that scary.”

“No?”

“Nah,” Shaking his head, he takes a swig from his beer, sighing. “Just makes me wanna bone.” 

“Will you two igits shut up?” Soap’s rubbing his forehead, groaning quietly. 

“What’s your problem?” Your question comes with a hefty amount of attitude, Simon’s hand finding your thigh and then rubbing it. He’s quietly shushing you. 

“Give him a break.” Simon chastises, and this makes Johnny look up. “He saw somethin’ he wasn’t supposed to see today.” 

“What do you mean?”

Simon just releases a breath, turning to look at you again. “He knows, B.” 

[ruhua-langblr]

how does duolingo suck?

I'm going to assume this is a genuine question in good faith!

In general, I do not think that DL is effective for achieving linguistic fluency. However, fluency is not everything and is not everyone's end goal! It can be a great introduction to many languages and get people fired up about starting to learn a new language—all which are good things. Before I address the recent problematic changes to the app that make it "suck", I want to be clear that even before it really wasn't that great. It had a good UI, constant expansion, and a very enthusiastic marketing team, but none of those are really important to actual language learning. Outside of popular European languages (Spanish/French/German) the quality is incredibly hit or miss. When I started learning Chinese I checked out DL and it was just not good! It's pretty common knowledge that DL is not good for learning non-latin based languages. Not to mention that the levels in those languages do not get you far. I was able to do speed runs of the Chinese course for fun early on in learning Chinese because it tops out at about HSK 3. (If you're unfamiliar with the HSK system, real Chinese "fluency" is HSK 6+ depending on if you're going by HSK 3.0 or not.)

The reason the post I made took off now is a combination of profit-driven decisions made by DL in the past year, culminating with laying off actual translators—a field I happen to be in!

The major decisions I'm referring to above are the following:

The "pausing" of the Welsh course and ending the partnership with the Welsh government. The National Centre for Learning Welsh did wish to continue the partnership, stating "Should Duolingo change its policy the centre would be happy to help with the work of developing the Welsh course,". Languages that offer business partnerships, like High Valyrian, don't get paused.

Removal of Forums and Sentence Discussions. Because DL never truly "teaches" you grammar, you are expected to pick it up from pattern association and repetition. This would work fine if languages weren't complex and notorious for having exceptions. These spaces were places for people to better understand the language, but that's not a profitable thing! It's more profitable to charge people to have an AI "explain" a sentence. Also people liked DL for the community aspects! Native speakers could answer your questions and you could joke about how wacky a sentence was.

Final nail in the coffin:

Pivot to AI and laying off translators. For the record, I don't think AI is innately evil. I think in moderation it can be helpful and if an app's upgraded tier is just AI chat then whatever. However, as a translator, I can tell you that it just doesn't work well. Having done post-editing of AI translations, it just sucks. It makes mistakes humans would never make and trying to unravel them is a pain. When I edit a human's translation, I can figure out what they were thinking and how they got it from the text. AI translations frequently just... skip parts that don't make sense to it. DL had already integrated AI into the app on a premium content basis, but now it's fully hit users that never asked for it. I've seen a lot of people talking about how their language is having mistakes now. People want to use DL to learn a language, and if the app is teaching them the language wrong that is a huge problem. It is unlikely that DL will be satisfied with this, but rather continue to replace as much of its workforce as possible with AI.

In short: Duolingo's first priority is bringing profits and shiny objects like AI to dangle in front of its shareholders. That is what makes Duolingo suck.