#maybe it's because i've rewatched THAT scene dozens of times to the point where i've pretty much memorised his monologue word for word

[somewhatsentientspellbook]

Listen.

I've got a lot of feelings about the next season of The Legend of Vox Machina, and I'm 98% sure we know how it's going to end but just listen.

A Bards Lament

12 letters in that phrase. 12 episodes in a season.

The creators of TLOVM have the opportunity to do something very tragic with their episode titles in the coming season.

[legobiwan]

TotJ Rewatch: Ramblings (1 of 3)

After a long abstention from consuming anything Star Wars-related, I plopped down on my couch yesterday and decided it was time to dip my toes back into this arena, mostly for the purposes of writing.

And what better way to delve back into this universe than by starting with the Dooku episodes of Tales of the Jedi?

Boi, oh boi, had I forgotten how much I love this character.

And so without a thesis or much a point whatsoever, I'd like to ramble about a few dozen thoughts I had while yelling incoherently through this rewatch.

Episode 2, "Justice"

One of the overarching themes of Dooku's episodes is this unsettling notion of darkness. Even at the start of this episode, gone are the usual triumphant Star Wars themes are so familiar with - the militant and boisterous brass, the rising strings and woodwinds. Instead, this episode opens with somewhat dissonant string passages interspersed with with a subtle, almost glistening electronic tones that meld in and out of the sustained string notes.

There is no optimism whatsoever as Dooku and Qui-gon set down on what looks to be the charred husk of village.

The remainder of these episodes rarely lighten in tone. And I don't think the thrust here is that Dooku is the only Jedi to have encountered these unfortunate situations - suffering and devastation due to corrupt politicians in a Republic the Jedi is supposedly tasked with protecting. What I do think is that this is all meant to be seen through the lens of Dooku's increasing disillusion. That these scenes are bleak because that's what Dooku is focusing on, more and more, to the point where...well, we know what happens.

But anyway, to get back to the episode.

You have give props to the animation team here. The continuity with Qui-gon's older self having a tendency to show cleavage apparently stems from his youth, where it was even more exacerbated. (Aren't you cold, Qui-gon?) The best part of this is the contrast with Dooku and he (of course) very well put-together outfit.

Maybe teen!Qui-gon just went through too many growth spurts and the Jedi tailor threw up their hands in frustration. I do find it infinitely amusing that Dooku - Mr. Propriety himself - had two students (Rael and Qui-gon) who might as well have been wearing burlap sacks half the time. Never let it be said that Dooku didn't allow his charges to express themselves, even though I'm certain it vexed the hell out him.

What's fascinating about this episode is the absolute economy of dialogue. There's not much of it, letting the visuals of the ravaged village and Dooku's own tight-lipped anger carry much of the weight of the narrative. It's almost as if we're at a point with Dooku where he knows he's angry, he knows his base instincts are trending in a bad direction, but he's still trying so, so hard to be a Jedi and toe the line, to believe in the Order he brought up in, which I think is partially why Dooku is so reserved in this particular episode, minus the part where he tries to Force-choke a guy.

I love that Qui-gon is doing the majority of the talking here. There's no disapproval written on Dooku's face, no motion made for him to hold his tongue or know his place. It truly shows the level of trust Dooku has in his student (and the level of trust in himself as a teacher) and also the level of respect he has for Qui-gon (despite his sartorial missteps). I've said it before and I'll say it again. Dooku is a teacher, through and through. He trains Qui-gon and is devastated at his death. He trains Ventress and is unwillingly forced to abandon her. He trains Savage as if he were a dark Padawan. He's constantly making remarks to Obi-wan as to how he could improve. The man can't help himself. But Qui-gon was special to him, as we'll see in another few episodes.

One of the most fascinating layers of Dooku's character is his political idealism. I'll point it out in more detailed fashion when I recap the next episode, but young Dooku and Padmé Amidala have so much in common. And it's wild for Dooku, as someone who (both canonically and in the EU) was born into a noble family, was aware of his heritage, and by all accounts, maintained a level of haughty distance from most people exacerbated by a taste for the finer things in life.

And yet...and yet. This is a man who is unbelievably angry at the actions of a corrupt Senate. That a village could be treated and forgotten this way. Padmé is little different, as we see in TPM and throughout TCW. (You have to wonder what a political powerhouse those could have been if they had stood on the same side of the aisle at the same time).

When we think of Dooku, we think of a relentless man who would go to any length to see the Jedi destroyed. And later, he goes on to commit some true atrocities. But like many roads paved to hell, it begins with good intentions, even if they may be self-serving.

Is it noblesse oblige? Maybe there's a hint of that. Does Dooku really care about the little person? In a way, but I don't think that's his major motivating factor.

Dooku grew up with the Jedi. He loves the Jedi, or at least loved the Jedi. He was talented and became one of their best. And then he started to see the cracks in the foundation and began to question everything about the Jedi, everything about himself. So much of this, in my mind, stems from a sense of betrayal by an organization and ideal which he held so dear to his heart (not to mention his main teacher was the head of the whole shebang).

What do you do when the thing you identify with the most - the thing that is you identity - your passion, in a way, your first love - curdles into something unrecognizable? If Dooku loved the Jedi any less, he would have left. (And that touches on a whole other cultural aspect of the Jedi Order and a type of institutional pressure that I won't get into here). Well, in Dooku's case, you start by trying to reform it from the inside. By bucking authority and replacing cracked edifice with your own hewn stone. Until you can't anymore, until the weight is too much to bear and your grievances begin to spill and metastasize into something else altogether.

The funny thing is, I feel like the start of this confrontation would have gone the same with almost any other Jedi. I can't see, say, Mace Windu (and I choose him as he gets underserved flak for being rule-abiding to the point of inhumanity) just up and saying, "Oh yeah, dude, you're totally right. Let's fuck over these peasants."

But where it gets interesting is when Dooku allows it to become a firefight. There's a long series of shots showing the fear of the villagers, the way Qui-gon looks around and is uncertain as to whether or not this is the right path.

Yes, Dooku, you do.

But. You're also willing (if not thrilled) for these people to become momentary collateral damage in an idealogical battle, as we see during the firefight exchange.

And the thing is...there's no easy answer here. It's not Republic vs. the Confederacy. It's not good versus evil. It's a lot more complicated than that, and Dooku isn't wrong in allowing the confrontation to happen. The Senator is corrupt. The Senator is willing to burn the village to the ground. The Jedi do (or should) serve the people of the Republic, first and foremost.

You can see why Dooku Force-choked the guy, in a way. He's still at a point where this collateral damage goes against everything he believes in, where he sees that the only option of restoring justice is through darkness, and he's willing to go there. For justice. For peace. (For himself).

The real hero here is Qui-gon, who is quick enough to realize number one, that his Master is going over the edge again (and given Qui-gon's response, I have zero reason to believe this was the first incident), and number two, that the Senator's son would be far more effective in persuading his father to abandon his terrible, awful plan of obliteration (although would his father have listened had Dooku not choked out of him first?)

As we know, Dooku is an aloof man. Touch is probably not one of his most-used emotional languages. I realize that in raising a child, even if they are ten to twelve years old when they come into your care, you probably have to have some comfort or at least tolerance of physical touch. But the fact that Qui-gon has no fear of Dooku and his possible reaction, that he instinctually takes him by the shoulder. I feel that with Dooku, so little can say so much, and to me, this is obvious proof of the solidity and trust in that relationship.

Part of the issue here is - Dooku's gambit works. Now, yes, he is absolutely correct in the exchange below that Qui-gon truly saved the day, but as I noted, it's not guaranteed the Senator would have listened to his son prior to having the life choked out of him. And what does Dooku received in response? Positive reinforcement. The village is being rebuilt. The Senator (for now) is reconsidering his actions. Brute force, in a way, worked, even if Dooku at the time was not fully in control of his own actions. And there's this weird negative/positive feedback loop where Dooku is rewarded for his actions, even if he knows his methods were less than savory, even his guilt eats at him, leading to the discussion below.

It's so interesting that Dooku is teetering on the edge during these years, but is always somehow brought back. It's really when he stops having a Padawan - that's one of the tipping points, where he has no counter-balance, has no one else to invest himself in, to learn from and, in some ways, live for. You almost have to wonder if some of Dooku's issues could have been solved by forcing another student on him after Qui-gon was knighted.

Next post on the docket: "Choices"

[aprillikesthings]

Now that I've spent a good day thinking about how hot it is when Catra is a terrible person corrupted by setting off a portal, I'm ready to go back to (re)watching her try to be Good lolol

well okay more than one day.

I mean I literally spent the last four? five? days listening to songs off The Downward Spiral over and over while thinking about Catra and practicing my makeup for my Catra cosplay and ordering more of the things I need for it; like literally just staring off into space at work between phone calls thinking about Catra

I'm totally a well-adjusted middle-aged adult, thanks for asking!

Shit where did I even leave off

Oh right

SO HEY if you're new here, I've been rewatching all of the 2018 She-Ra, and I started doing it for fic-writing reasons but predictably I have become deeply obsessed. Anyway these posts sometimes have a lot of asides and commentary and references to other stuff and dumb jokes among a ton of screenshots, also (and it feels odd saying it this close to the end of the show) it's a RE-watch, so there's often spoilers for later bits of the story, also I keep trying NOT to just describe the entire plots of the episodes but I keep failing lol

s5 ep7 Perils of Peekablue

Adora's trying to become She-Ra (without an immanent threat) and then Bow and Glimmer distract her, and then the door opens on Catra and

I literally did a YES YES YESSSS AHAHAH out loud bc this is the point at which Catra just starts OPENLY FLIRTING, as opposed to just uhhhh flirtatiously taunting I suppose lol

like you're SITTING IN HER LAP

Also while rewinding it to watch again I paused it at the most hilarious moment

look at Catra's FACE

help I can't stop laughing but also look at Bow's expression

Glimmer: omg I'm gonna get to see my dad Catra: *gets up and leaves*

But also I make this face when a cat leaves my lap before I wanted them to:

Anyway they're a day out from arriving at Etheria

Adora's trying so hard

BACK ON ETHERIA

YAY IT'S THIS ONE

the intro finally changed!! I can't get a good screenshot but now when Catra (with short hair) and Adora (in She-Ra's new get-up) are fighting they stop much faster and they're both smiling omgggg

and there she is!! with everyone else!!

okay I'm going to take way less screenshots etc of the underwater speakeasy thing because let's be honest: that part of the plot isn't what I'm here for lol

But yeah they're going to the speakeasy thing to get Prince Peekablue who can see to the edges of the galaxy and can maybe tell them where Adora and the others are because they don't know what happened

Oh also Spinarella is chipped and Netossa is realizing something is off/weird about her but doesn't know what

Oh hey! You used to work for Huntara in the Crimson Wastes

Sea Hawk has pissed off approximately half the people in the room it seems (by lighting their ships on fire at some point)

Scorpia and Perfuma are the cutest and I can absolutely see how they end up together

In my fic I originally had Adora talking to some kind of therapist but I wasn't sure they existed on Etheria, and last week I edited that bit so Adora is talking to these two (which makes the conversation more fun AND easier to write anyway)

Perfuma: "Scorpia. You should do things not because you're good at them, but because they make you happy." THAT IS ONE OF MY LIFE PHILOSOPHIES thank you Perfuma you're 100% correct and I tell people this ALL THE TIME

Mermista: "I might've set their boat on fire. Just to see what it felt like."

Sea Hawk:

lolol

YESSSS I love this scene

Perfuma makes a flower, throws it to Scorpia as she sings, and she blushes and tucks it into her hair, these two are so sweet and cute

oh god I forgot that when "Prince Peekablue" get stung by Scorpia they go through the last half-dozen shapeshifts before turning into a (passed-out) Double Trouble.

lolol instead of "cash cow" it's an insult to poor Catra

Anyway they have the info the Rebellion wanted!

Horde Prime is pissed and has blockaded the planet, also half the people at the speakeasy were chipped....and now so is Mermista, though nobody realizes that yet

But also the phrasing of "She-ra stole his little kitten away" is just amazing

But also the last they heard, Adora and Bow and Entrapta had left to rescue Glimmer, do they think Double Trouble is talking about Glimmer here or what

(which. they did. they just also went back for Catra.)

Netossa realizes her wife (and most of the people around them) are chipped D:

And a chipped Mermista is gonna drown them all

oh shit Micah is also chipped

Entrapta gets the comms working!

"The Rebellion's been compromised! Horde Prime has them! We lost, I'm so sorry! We lost them!" --and then the comms go to static

AND CREDITS!

[tarysande]

I can't remember if it was you or another Meta-Writer who touched (ha) on the subject of Lucifer and Physical Touch. I've been re-watching S2 and the stark difference between how he reacts to Mum's touches vs Chloe's vs his romantic partners is evident.

I know I’ve mentioned the subject, though I can’t remember off-hand if I dedicated a post to it (or just said I wanted to!).

I’ve been rewatching S2, too! 

The touch thing with Mum is … such a thing, and it’s established right from the moment he sees her again. She falls; he catches her (and they form a kind of reverse pieta, which is a neat image), but he still looks terrified because he doesn’t know why she’s there (and he’s scared of her, as he’s told Linda). It says something about Lucifer that he can’t just let her fall, though—no matter what’s between them, some part of him can’t reject her outright. 

This is a theme we come back to again and again throughout the season. He doesn’t want to take her back to Hell—so he figures out a loophole. He won’t let her get too close, though; some part of him doesn’t trust her and he doesn’t reach out to her. This is a huge defense mechanism–quite literally not letting her get close enough to hurt him physically, while letting down his guard enough emotionally and mentally—because that small rejected child inside him yearns for parental love and acceptance—that she can manipulate him using his huge emotional blindspot: Chloe.  

Mum’s manipulation—through the emotion and touch that Lucifer is lacking—starts right away, though. At the end of 2x02, she touches his hand; he removes her hand. But when she reveals the “truth” about why he was in Hell (and not killed by God—something we only ever have her word for, by the by, and which I don’t actually believe because of how obviously she’s pleased by her manipulation after Lucifer agrees not to send her back to Hell right away), she touches his arms and appeals to him with her tears and he, who is almost always shown having a soft spot for helping people (especially women) in trouble (Delilah, Chloe, etc.), lets her.

For the first few episodes of the season, Lucifer doesn’t pull away from Mum’s touch, but he doesn’t initiate it, either. He’s also visibly irritated every time she talks about humanity (she’s always dismissive) or Chloe or his job. Mum is really good at manipulating him except she doesn’t realize (or refuses to accept) how important the place and people are to him. If she’d flattered humanity instead of sneering at them, I think she might’ve won Lucifer over. 

In 2x05, there’s an absolutely HUGE, significant touch-moment after Lucifer’s killed Uriel. Mum gathers him in; he lets himself be gathered. More than that, he actually wraps both arms around her and clings (which we’ve basically never seen him do before). It’s a horrifying and gorgeous moment that shows so much without telling. 

But here’s something interesting: though the last image of 2x05 is Lucifer clinging to Mum, we see no interaction between Mum and Lucifer in 2x06. Worse, Lucifer is left to absolutely frigging tailspin into despair and a sniper-induced death wish while Mum turns her efforts to manipulating Amenadiel. All the Mum scenes in Monster focus on this. Her words are carefully chosen to point blame at God while making herself sympathetic. See how Amenadiel falls to her flattery; she tells him what he wants to hear. Essentially, she feels Lucifer is now on her side (with a huge side of guilt) so it’s time to move on to the next step of her plan. The use of juxtaposition in this part of the episode is brilliant. On the one hand, we have Amenadiel and Mum in the sunlit woods, Mum wrapping her two hands around Amenadiel’s one to symbolize their new alliance; on the other, Lucifer, visibly coming apart at the scenes playing sad music, hitting a sour note, and banishing everyone from his club, leaving him fully and entirely alone (as he’s already been banished from the case).

Mum doesn’t appear in 2x07—but we see a lot of Lucifer interacting with Chloe and Trixie, the found family that doesn’t want anything from him but his presence. There’s a really good contrast here, where the episode ends on a hug that is totally different from the one in 2x05. The light is shining bright; it’s daytime and there are no shadows. Chloe is the one who’s crying, but they are tears of gratitude because Lucifer has just said exactly what she needed to hear. Chloe is the one who clings to Lucifer; he hugs her back and there is tenderness and yes, the hint of love and the promise of a future—contrasted with Mum living in an unattainable past, and grief, and guilt. Even Lucifer’s “My apologies, Detective, I didn’t mean to hurt you,” is a direct contrast of how he felt he had no choice but to hurt Uriel (to keep Uriel from hurting her). 

2x08 is where Mum starts to misstep. First, she releases Azrael’s blade into the world, and Lucifer is angry. Then, she reveals her plans to “go home” and disparages Lucifer’s feelings about Earth being his home. In 2x09, though Lucifer doesn’t know it yet, she doubles down on what she wants instead of trying to understand what Lucifer wants: she tries to blow up Lux, she decides to blow up Chloe instead, she tries to get Linda to talk about Lucifer’s secrets. These are all unforgivable from Lucifer’s perspective, and she has no idea. Because she’s ultimately selfish—she wants her home, her sons, her power. She doesn’t actually care about what makes her son happy; she wants to use him as a weapon. (I’ve watched S2 about a dozen times by now; Mum distresses me more each time I watch it.) 

At the sit-in, Mum manipulates him again by feeding him a little truth and then saying exactly what he wants to hear: “I disagree with you whole-heartedly about wanting to stay here (true), but a mother doesn’t have to agree with her son in order to support him. So, what is it exactly I’m supposed to ‘sit-in’ (what he wants to hear).” Lucifer’s whole face changes and he replies, “Mum, you’re actually being a good Mum,” and he offers her his arm. Meanwhile, he has no idea she’s actively trying to destroy everything he loves to get what she wants.

Her actions in 2x10 do a lot of damage to Lucifer’s already reluctant trust. She admits she was going to kill Chloe; she disparages Chloe in the courtroom; she uses his honor about not lying against him. It’s like a How To Turn Lucifer Against You Forever playbook. And this episode gives us another absolutely gorgeous juxtaposition, this time in contrast to the juxtaposition in 2x06. This time, instead of alone and self-loathing in his club, Lucifer is with Chloe—the beginning of something, banter, warm firelight, wine, burgers and fries, truth, a hand-clasp, and near-kissing—contrasted with Mum and Amenadiel in her dark office, full-on scheming, having learned nothing, and again, doubling-down on using Lucifer’s weaknesses to turn him into the weapon she wants (the flaming sword; the rage against God; the rebellious boy).

By 2x11, Lucifer “just wants [Mum] gone.” but, once again, she employs the tactic of telling him what he wants to hear (that Chloe impressed her; that she’s beginning to see what Lucifer sees in her; that he just has to prove his worth to her) and using touch (grabbing his hand in both of hers) to manipulate him. Then, knowing that Lucifer will be listening through the one-way glass, she lays it on even thicker. (How heartbreaking is his smile when he thinks she’s being genuine?)

2x12, of course, is heartbreaking because Mum is using Lucifer’s feelings and her knowledge about Chloe as a miracle to … destroy her son. She wants him heartbroken so he’ll leave his “home” and play his part in her plans. (It always strikes me here that, although Lucifer lives his life paranoid of “playing a role” in his Dad’s plans or being a pawn of his Father’s—it’s Mum who unrepentantly uses him as a pawn in her game of chess.) Maze, when she realizes that Lucifer is happy—truly happy—for maybe the first time ever, immediately wants to protect him because she actually cares about him. Mum, however, pushes on. Lucifer’s reaction to her reaching out to touch him this time, though, is to sweep up his own hand and prevent her, with a sharp, “Don’t.” I think it’s telling here that the only time we’ve seen this kind of sharp, precise, knife-like movement from Lucifer is when he’s fighting someone. It’s a combat motion; it’s a defensive act.

2x13 encapsulates all the facets of their relationship, really. She doesn’t want to help him for the sake of “an insignificant human’s life”—proving that she still doesn’t understand the depth and importance of his feelings. She loves him enough to go to Hell to save him; I believe that’s the truest moment of love she ever shows him. It’s also why I believe he lets her have a universe of her own at the end instead of hating her enough to kill her. He grabs Mum and pulls her from her Hell—they’re both sobbing and both fighting and it’s so real and raw. But then, afterward, when Chloe is safe, he again defends himself from her touch using the short, sharp, cutting movements reminiscent of his fighting style. 

Her admission that she’s been manipulating and using him since the start is heartbreaking; it’s his worst fears come true. At the heart of Lucifer Morningstar is a terror of being lied to (so he doesn’t lie), manipulated (as his father did and may continue to do), used. And here, his Mum, whom he’s been trying not to trust and failing at time and again as she says the right things over and over (because he wants that love, he wants that reassurance, he wants someone to touch him without wanting anything in return, he wants to be good—seen as good—by those who brought him into existence, he wants to be forgiven) is telling him the unvarnished, knife-in-the-back truth: she is everything he fears most. He was right to be afraid when he sat trembling in a chair opposite Amenadiel; he was right to be afraid when he sat trembling on a couch opposite Linda.

It wasn’t a physical attack, though; it wasn’t like being smited and pushed into a Fall, no. It was so much worse. It was his own mother using his weaknesses against him and watching him bleed out because she needed to use the shell that would be left.

[cursed-byesexual]

I posted 715 times in 2021

32 posts created (4%)

683 posts reblogged (96%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 21.3 posts.

I added 154 tags in 2021

#supernatural - 28 posts

#spn - 28 posts

#destiel - 21 posts

#dean winchester - 16 posts

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Longest Tag: 63 characters

#cat owner all ask themselves this question at one point i think

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Okay, I know at this point destiel going canon in another language is neither surprising nor a big deal but I'd just like to say some stuff about the german dub of 15x18 which aired yesterday. German is my first language, I watched most of the show in German before I rewatched it in English, and I have some thoughts™

First of all, I was absolutely praying for something like "yo ati Cas", which sadly didn't happen, but BUT there are two drastically different ways to tell someone you love them in german.

The first one being "Ich hab dich lieb" or countless variations thereof which is what parents say to a child and sometimes friends will say it to one another. However, the implications of familial love in this are so strong that friends rarely use it. It would be more common to say "you are important to me" or something like that.

In my opinion, it would take a life or death situation to make adult friends say that to one another. (Which is kinda sad but not the point) It would have been perfectly fine, by which I mean heartbreaking, if they had used a variation of that phrase in that scene. But they didn't.

The second one, which they used in this episode, is "ich liebe dich" which very simply translates to "I love you". However, in German, this is about as direct as it gets. Because of the other option of expressing familial love, nobody would use this phrase for familial love. It's explicit. Had they wanted to make a point about familial love they would have translated it differently. Maybe this helps combat the gaslighting we've all gone through.

Because it's not unheard of that shows translate this phrase incorrectly, I also made a friend who is not involved in the fandom watch the scene and asked her if it was platonic or romantic. Because I need validation and for someone to tell me that I'm not actually going insane.

She immediately said romantic, and this is a straight girl, straight enough that she legit forgot that I came out to her for five years. (which resulted in us looking like that spiderman meme when I made a joke about being gay and thereby accidentally outed myself a second time.)

So yeah, had they wanted to make a point about platonic or familial love they would have translated it differently, especially with the context the entire speech beforehand gives, it's undoubtedly romantic.

62 notes • Posted 2021-03-22 14:36:31 GMT

#4

Headcanon that John Winchester is only in Heaven so that Dean can punch the crap out of him whenever he feels like it. You know, as ~therapy~

63 notes • Posted 2021-01-14 18:59:10 GMT

#3

Destiel headcanon that Chuck messed with Dean's head like Naomi did with Castiel. Like, Dean actually fell in love with Cas dozens of times but he can't remember because Chuck kept erasing the strongest of his emotions. Never too much because that would be obvious but just enough that Dean remained in his control.

Let's say Dean subconsciously caught on and didn't try to voice them anymore because he'd rather keep them and never tell than forget what Cas really means to him.

Don't mind me, I've made myself sad again

77 notes • Posted 2021-01-11 20:23:55 GMT

#2

So this is the life. One day you're reading your father's journal for the first time. You are 24 years old and he is gone. There is a passage where he talks about how he had already been happily married when he was your age, how he knew you would never be because his mission comes before your life.

You tell yourself it's alright, at least you have a reason to see your little brother again, you have a car and a mission and what else do you need? Your father wasn't really there even when he was, but now he's gone and you're free. But your brother is miserable and you feel so guilty for your freedom. What is a soldier without someone's orders to follow?

But your brother doesn't need you to be a soldier, so slowly you start to be yourself again instead, after almost forgetting what that even means. Apparently, it means burdens and pain and a never-ending job but it also means open roads, good music you can play as loudly as you like, and easy quips between you and your brother. You can taste freedom but it's never quite yours. You stay busy, ensuring strangers have what can never be yours and it's your type of normal.

But you never stop feeling like a soldier, waiting for an order from a father who has abandoned you. Every page in that diary is a reminder of your failures but you force yourself to read it all, again, and again, and again. After all, pain has always been the only constant in your life.

Years pass and you know you're living in a dead man's image, always seeking revenge or making amends or fixing unfixable mistakes, always living in the past. But in the end, there is always your brother, the car, a gun, and some monster to kill. So you endure it. As long as you're suppressing all your emotions it's not even half bad. He would have wanted this for you and maybe you don't deserve better. After all, his diary is very insistent on your failures, almost as insistent as he was.

So you're 28 and you're carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders. You went to hell and came back, literally. You're more broken than ever before and somehow just the same. Because again all you can think is that you failed your duties as a soldier and the guilt is your constant companion but you know how to hide it. Technically you're older than 28 but that hardly matters, you never lived a life right for your age anyways.

At least now you have an excuse, a reason to be broken. Not that that fixes anything, the world is doomed because of you and you can't help but think that you should have known you'd be the cause of it. Nothing good comes of what you do, you the soldier who needs orders as much as he despises them.

Yet somehow you're alive when you shouldn't be. You got another chance to see your brother, your car, your gun, live your life right this time. Do better. Be better. It's still a shitty life but it's yours and you're still a soldier only now you have a calling again. An Angel has put his trust in you and you know you don't deserve it but you want it anyways.

:readmore:

You weren't dead because you were in hell, you were dead because your brother couldn't need you anymore and your father could give you no orders, so you gave up and that was what killed you.

Before you know it, your mission mingles with the taste of freedom that shouldn't be yours. Somehow it's easier to take orders from an Angel than from your father. It's less personal at first, and then so much, much, more personal.

You remember the first case you ever took on alone, you were 17. You did what was expected of you, but it didn't leave you cold as it would now. You hadn't chosen that case like you haven't chosen your current calling.

Never before did you feel the urge to pray, you had no reason to believe in a world that had given you nothing and demanded everything. Your father didn't believe either but then again, you are starting to think that he wasn't right about everything, that there were things he didn't know. Now praying comes to you more naturally than it should after a lifetime of doubt but there is only one Angel you pray to.

The ghosts of those two nuns would never find peace, in life, their only crime had been existing. Yet your father made it clear that that's what it was, a crime. They seemed innocent to you but you weren't supposed to think. You knew what it meant then and you know it now. You don't get why that case keeps popping in your head whenever you look at him though.

Your belated doubt in your father feels like falling from faith. Every step a betrayal to the person you were supposed to be. You know what he would say to you if he were here, and somehow having it in your head is worse than hearing him say it. You try not to trust this Angel. You try to keep control over your brother for his own good. You fail at both and are forced to recognize it to be better that way. You are not alone. With them, you are stronger, but you can't lose the feeling that in not shouldering this burden alone you are a disappointment.

You haven't made a decision he would have approved off in a long time, but he isn't here. You pretend you don't know that he wouldn't approve. He doesn't know what you have faced and would have recoiled in horror if he did. Somehow you miss the simplicity he had forced on you while resenting him for it all the same. You wish you could follow one last order without questioning it and at the same time you wish you had questioned all of his orders.

You remember that case again, how their bones burned, and a part of you with them. You were 17 and it was the only time you questioned one of your father's rules. You never figured out how he knew, but you were filled with dread and shame just the same. It's the same feeling that comes over you now, every time you long to ask this strange Angel to stay but you are far from admitting that to yourself.

They stay on your mind. You think your father wanted you to know that your crime too, was to exist. Should you be like them, you needed to burn, like them. Your Angel tells you that Heaven isn't concerned with who people love and somehow that makes it better. You don't care for heaven, but you care for him, so as long as he believes what he told you, you allow yourself some doubt.

Somehow you now finally trust your brother, you see what he saw, you can finally tell that it was your father who was wrong, that his orders were cruel, that you can be good without being what he wanted you to be. He didn't know of Angels, he would have tried to kill them if he did. But there is one Angel in your life who is better than all the others, you know you'll never kill him come what may. Take what your father would have wanted you to do with you to the grave.

But you've been to hell and back and you always have one more problem to deal with.

One day between two cases you're on the road, in your car, with your brother, and everything is normal. Only that there is an Angel on the backseat and he is staring out the window at the nightly landscape of a city and somehow that's normal too. He is older than the city or the ground it was built on, he has seen more than all people currently living on the planet combined, and yet he chose to be there, with you, on the road. And you know you don't deserve him but you've come too far to question it now.

Occasionally you find yourself praying and you have stopped wondering why. Sometimes you catch yourself thinking you're praying when really there is just a single name on your lips. You know why, but you pretend like you don't. So long as he wants to stay with you, you are happy to let him.

Fate is against you though, against the both of you. You get separated time and time again and you keep thinking that you should stay away for his sake but the world dwindles whenever you do. You need him and it scares you but you can't admit that because nothing is supposed to scare you. Fighting with him by your side becomes second nature, saving each other time and time again like it's the most normal thing there is, and in a way it is because when his life is at stake you won't lose time asking questions. He brings out the best and the worst in you and accepts all of it.

You are still broken but now there is an Angel with you. An Angel who is losing his faith in his father, God, in a way that is jarringly familiar for you. There is something about that kind of betrayal and terror that only fathers can inspire. The guilt that it filled you with, the emptiness that replaced it.

Only that, ironically, the thing that made you find faith again, maybe for the first time, was the Angel who lost his. He tells you he is beginning to doubt and in the most wonderful contradiction, that is what makes you believe in miracles for the first time in your life. The joy doesn't last because now he is looking to you for direction even though all your choices keep leading to misery.

He is family now, inexplicably tied to you, probably from the moment he pulled you out of hell. Only that now you can see it, how real he is, how good, and how he matters so much more than the image of a dead man. You can't tell him though, you've learned if you name a good thing it'll leave you.

He is an Angel and you are the broken shell of a human but your pieces have begun to mend thanks to him. At your most destroyed, you found faith and the will to go on, thanks to him. He saved you when he pulled you out of hell, but he also saved you when he gave you a reason to keep going and an inclination

of what faith could feel like.

You know you'll never believe in heaven even though you know it exists, but he was always worth your prayers and for some reason, he thinks you are worth listening to. It's wonderful insanity, the countless people who believe in heaven and you who can't believe despite knowing it exists. Because heaven is here, as long as he is with you.

And that's the problem. The most awe-inspiring presence in your life, your source of hope, your reason to go on, is a man. An Angel, yes, but also a man. He doesn't belong here and he belongs nowhere more than here.

Sometimes you wonder, he has rebuilt you entirely, how is it possible that he can stand you? He's seen the inside of your head and yet he is still here. That makes you feel better than it should. Your own father could hardly stand you and yet this Angel who knows you far better than he ever did has decided to stay, he has no obligation toward you, and yet he stays. It's intoxicating, dizzying, addicting. It's too much.

He is always there and yet there is nothing that can keep him for long, the only moments he allows himself to linger are when he's talking to you, and it's starting to go to your head. It's irritating at first but the irritation quickly turns into fondness as the moments in which he stays grow ever longer.

Before you know it he is more constant than absent, no longer a mystery. You think you know him, even if not as well as he knows you, which never fails to send a shiver through you. You long for him to stay and it shocks you that you're even capable of feeling that way. You can't tell him to stay so you try to show him but it always goes wrong. You know what your father would say, you can see the disappointment in his eyes just as clear as the worry in your brothers'.

So you chase the prayers out of your mind because you know the consequences, know what your father would say, know that your Angel would never listen to one of your prayers again if he knew. Yet he is always there when you ask for him and the knowledge alone is driving you insane. You wonder how much he knows but he is unreadable. a

You've lost him more times than you can count, you've lost yourself each time too. There is a sparkle in his eyes whenever you welcome him back because you can't stay apart, not even through death. You can see the life you want in his eyes because it's him you want. Once you picked up the habit, you never stopped praying, always to him, no matter how distant he seemed. Each prayer is followed by waves of guilt.

There is still a job to be done and it's grating on you, you know that you can never be free and the anger helps you fight. Worse than that, life is cruel to your Angel and he is still your reason to keep fighting but sometimes he is also your reason to stop when your anger is getting the best of you.

Years pass and you can't imagine life without him. You thought you'd die an alcoholic fallen to insanity and revenge, now you hardly drink and insanity doesn't bother you anymore. Sanity in a life like yours was just a lack of knowledge after all. You've lost track of how often you died or how old you are supposed to be. You have fought everything in the book and you'd do it all again. You find happiness in small moments like shared bottles of beer after a job well done or conversations with your brother that don't revolve around the end of the world.

Especially those moments when you're hardly in the picture, listening to your brother and your Angel while they think you're asleep on a particularly long drive. Your two favorite people in existence get along just fine under normal circumstances and there is nothing that can quite match that happiness.

He has impressed you in more ways than you can count, in strength and skill but also in kindness and loyalty. You marvel at his very existence and hope he can't hear your thoughts of adoration as if your face doesn't betray them just as well.

In every reunion there is hope and your bond grows stronger, it's no longer this invisible thing that you can hide. Because after all, your Angel fell for you. He brought down heaven, for you. Everyone who knows you knows him too, knows you can't be separated, and they talk. You hear the whispers but you've stopped caring. Your father will never be the wiser as long as you just don't give in.

You suppress your feelings like you suppress everything because they're worse than failing an order or not receiving one in the first place. It's having an order and deliberately going against it. It's fighting yourself like you fought the ghosts of your very first case; alone and afraid. Every now and again your brother tries to comfort you just like he did then but you push him away now too. His knowing looks haunt you.

One of the earliest, most deeply anchored rules within you, 'if you are like that, feel like that, you should burn'. And you can't even uphold that. So you bury it within you like you always do.

Sometimes you think he knows, you catch your Angel looking back, sometimes you catch a taste of what it could be like, sometimes it feels like a possibility so close to reality, reaching out once is all it would take. But you can't do that, can't corrupt an honest to god Angel of the lord. So you keep your distance and torture yourself with it but you know torture like an old friend and it's endurable. 

At least he is still there, and you are content. After years of pain, content feels dangerously close to bliss. It's more than you should have but you can't let go. More often than not, you know that he doesn't really want you and it makes it easier to bear, it hurts less than thinking you might have a chance. You get comfortable with what you can't have.

Along the way you let more people in your heart than you ever thought possible and most of them pay the price. You hate yourself more with each death and the deaths keep coming.

You call him a friend. Best friend. Family. But never yours. You'd burn the world for him and he doesn't even know it. He would burn the world for you and it is wrong how happy that makes you. But it's all blown out of proportion, he's an Angel, he doesn't know better than all or nothing, he doesn't know that he is doing more than a friend should. He doesn't know how he makes your heart flutter with each show of loyalty.

Your father's voice in your head has become background noise. You taught an Angel about free will, pretending like you weren't learning of it for the first time too and you still struggle to grasp how well it worked out.

In the end, you find yourself fighting to live rather than just survive, because of him.

Somehow you've found a home along the way. You have everything that was never supposed to be yours but it all comes with a catch. Your brother is there because he can't be anywhere else, your Angel is there but he isn't yours, you have a home now but it's also a war base. It's the most normal your life has ever been and you are still doing your job, it helps combat the guilt. You wouldn't have it any other way and some days you think your Angel and your brother agree.

The challenges don't stop coming but you settle in a sort of routine forged by unbreakable trust in your family. It's clearer to you than ever that you are no longer 24, your father is long gone, you have learned what freedom means and will fight tooth and nail to keep it.

Naturally, that is when it gets snatched away from you again. After you thought you had lost and regained, through hardship, everything that matters to you. Your story ends as it began, an absent father figure screwing you over in ways you only comprehend years down the road. After being thrown around time and time again you decided, no, not this time.

With everything you've learned through a lifetime of misery, you are prepared to do what it takes. Your brother and your Angel are with you, it's clearer than ever that they have suffered as you have. Normally you'd force them to safety but they have a right to this fight as much as you do so you grit your teeth through the worry and fight on. No longer a soldier, but so much more lethal in the desperation of a mortal man who has everything at stake.

For the first time you wish you had sorted out this thing between you and your Angel, but that would have taken the nerves only people without an apocalypse on their hands can spare. In the end, you'll die fighting with him and for him, whether he knows or not.

But brilliant and nonhuman as he is, he won't have it. So in the single most painful moment, he takes the choice away from you. He looks at you like he had expected you to say something first, hurt through years of silence. Your heart damn near fails because you can already feel the soul-deep sorrow settling over you. And he says to you everything you ever wanted to hear and never dared to hope for. And he says it to you as he dies.

This time you know you'll go mad. There is no coming back from the edge of that cliff but you'll make sure to drag the responsible down with you. You don't know what hurts worse, knowing you wasted a lifetime to cowardice or knowing he was waiting for you to do something while you ignorantly vowed never to bother him. That he wanted it too. Wanted you.

Your head is ringing with how wrong you were as you lean against that wall, sobbing. You're inconsolable and pathetic and you know it. You long for death almost as much as you long for him to come back or even just a chance to make it right, but you don't die. You have to pick yourself up in the end, you have to tell a child his father died, and you have to seek revenge. But you are not your father, this is your revenge, not the kids.

Memories you didn't know you had come back to you. Late nights with your Angel's head rested on your shoulder in a rare tranquility, hugs that lasted longer than you thought they had, last words that were tempered with, and goodbyes changed ever so slightly that their meaning would never be the same. You treasure it all even as it hurts enough to burn away your very essence.

You don't know who took them from you in the first place, if your own father had enough of a hold on your mind to destroy you for years to come or if the mightiest of absent fathers of them all had tempered with your mind on purpose. But they are back and you will never let them go.

You like to think he knew, it's what keeps you from falling over the edge too soon. You need more time to feel what you've done, to realize the full damage of your silence. The longer he is gone, the closer you get to your goal, your final kill, the more you see you never stood a chance but if it wasn't for you Angel you wouldn't even have come as far as you did. It is in his memory that you keep going.

You think of the child that you unwittingly adopted, of how your Angel would want you to watch out for the child, and you keep going. One last apology your Angel will never hear as you finally accept this child doomed to death as your own. You don't have the time but you want to be better than your father, you think the kid knows. You know the kid loved your Angel almost as much as you do. You will never think of him in past tense, you will never stop praying, you will never stop loving him and the realization hits you harder than any of your deaths. You love him and it's the first time you allow yourself to think it, you love him, and it's too late.

You can't help but wonder when your life became so complicated, and how it failed to feel complicated just so long as your Angel was there.

You win the fight, you had to, there was never another option, the memories are what carries you through it. Before you know better you are by the side of a foreign road and dread settles over you as the adrenalin wears off. It's over, you no longer have a cause, you have nothing to fight for, you won the ultimate fight and you're free and more miserable than you've been since hell. You're so broken that it's almost enough to convince you he will show up.

The kid is gone too but your brother is with you, somehow he isn't surprised about the grief you can no longer hide. No matter how bad things get, he understands you, but it's only a mild comfort. Your last responsibility is to keep it together for him but he hardly needs you anymore.

You're back on the road, with your brother and your car, and your gun, and even though you are free it's no longer enough. It will never be enough again.

Nothing in life was ever handed to you and you can't go on without him so you decide you won't. You have a choice to make, possibly your last choice.

Either you follow him into death and are finally done with all the pain, or you seek even more impossible challenges, ask for even more hurt, and try to get him back. You've done the impossible before, giving up now after you got all your hope through him for so long would be an ultimate betrayal.

Even when he is dead, he is the reason you are alive. He is what changed the story, what turned the tide, what no final monster could predict, what you yourself still don't understand. It all pans down to what he sees in you, how he is willing to disobey all he ever knew for you, how he loves you. Nobody saw coming how he would love you to completion, least of all you.

Glancing at your little brother, you know there is only one choice for you, letting him down had never been an option and you're not sure if you're thinking about your Angel or the brother who would otherwise lose you again. It doesn't matter, you have made your choice.

Dying would be an easy out, and your life was never easy. A while ago you decided that you wanted to live, peace be damned, and your Angel deserves to live more than anyone. If he stays dead then you lost after all, and failure isn't an option.

It takes a long time but in the end, your brother and your son are with you as you retrieve your Angel. It nearly killed all of you,b but you are not the only one who owes the Angel, all of you soldier on with purpose, no matter what happens. You are restless and hardly dare to hope but he is so worth it all.

Another fight, more pain, both pale in comparison to what's at stake. You will get him back or die trying, you've never been so sure of anything. You're a soldier once more but willingly this time, this time it's for a cause you believe in.

When you see his face again it's the most religious experience of your lifetime. He meets your eyes with hesitation and a decade of suppressed emotions is strangulating you. You can't speak but you have so much to say and you are done allowing yourself to hide.

You kiss him and it's the truest thing you've ever done. You're alive and praying like never before that he wants it to. A second later he kisses you back and you have no intention of ever letting him go. All the grief and pain fall off of you and all that matters are his lips against yours. Finally, finally, finally.

You allow yourself to hold him pressed against you and he is holding onto you for dear life, mumbling your name in the crook of your neck and you still don't know what to say or what you did to deserve him but you think he gets it anyways. He sounds as disbelieving as you feel and it's perfect.

You don't even hear the startled but obviously delighted chuckle from your brother several steps behind you, nor do you see the blinding smile on your son's face, but right there, in that moment, you know you've won.

Before you know it you're 42, and you are happier than you've ever been and you think about your father's diary and all the things you weren't supposed to have but you can finally no longer hear his voice.

There is an Angel by your side as you watch tv and he is so much more real than the pages of some old diary. The world didn't want to make space for you, so you cut your place into it by force and it was well and truly worth the struggle.

You found a home in a place meant for war, a routine in a job that had none, love in a being that wasn't supposed to care, and trust in a brother you should have given up on according to your father. Everything in your life is a contradiction and it took so long, almost more strength than you had, but now you have it all.

Your Angel is leaning against your chest and you wonder how the purest happiness can be hidden so plainly in normalcy and all you need is the freedom to take it. You are happier than your father ever would have been had he lived. Your life and his life looked drastically different at 24, but you're here now where he was then in a way, but he isn't here and it's finally okay to just be.

You think to yourself, 'so this is the life' and one day, you're reading your father's journal for the last time. You are 42 years old and he is finally truly gone, no traces of him linger in your mind. Now you know, a soldier without order will always remain a soldier, but he will also be free.

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Edit: pls pls pls leave a comment!

2nd edit: it's on ao3 now!

Title: finding faith and losing hope

(If you have a better idea for a title please comment!!!)

Author: DropsOfJupiterOnARavenclaw

133 notes • Posted 2021-01-26 14:14:43 GMT

#1

There has to be a Supernatural fic from the pov of a conspiracy theorist on the winchesters trail who is losing his mind about the amount of times those guys died and simply showed up again a few months later. Kinda like the Episode with FBI agent Hendriksen but diving deeper into what he thinks is going on.

Or one of Sams friends from Stanford who started following the mysterious case of the Winchester Brothers through online mags because he knows Sam and can hardly believe its the same person those people write about.

Or even just the poor FBI agent who got their case after Hendriksen and doesnt know anything. He is on and off their case every other month but it keeps coming back to hunt him, he stopped toasting to their death after the third time they died. Imagine the confusion.

Just as an example for one side of the case notes;

Cas is with the them all the time, only that authorities think its Jimmy Novak, the accountant gone rogue/ gay which is another conspiracy in itself. Jimmys old friends and collegues would think that too, and rumor has it that he killed his family since they vanished mysteriously. (Irl we know Claire is fine and his wife got kidnapped and killed by a monster but the police don't)

Also, apparently he is convinced to be doing Gods will while leaving bloody murder scenes in his wake. As far as anybody knows, the Winchesters aren't religious and its puzzling that they put up with him at first. After years of relying on no one but each other these psychopathic brothers who are supposed to be as calculating as they are brutal and hot-headed have just decided to adopt a random guy who happens to think he's an angel? (At least that bit gets solved when a security camera catches Cas and Dean kissing)

The FBI is freaked out by him because he is unpredictable, loves the Winchesters, and knows how to stay under the radar. They still haven't been able to figure out how he got from one end of the country to the other in a time frame of three hours max. That was one of the first cases that makes them consider him part of the Winchester case and he leaves quite the impression right away. Dozens of confused agents check airport footage from all over the country and find nothing. The files for that case take up three rooms and five agents have retired immediately after being assigned the case and walking in there once.

And most of that right here was just focusing on Cas, there is so much more to him alone but consider the involvement of others like Charlie and Kevin who just add to the confusion, or Crowley who legally doesn't exist. And thats without any of the actual monster stuff, witness reports that have everyone convinced the winchesters are drugging people left and right, and the stuff the leviathan dopplegangers pulled.

I really want to read about their lifes from that perspective, think about how batshit it all sounds from that angle.

Imagine the whole thing as a buzzfeed unsolved episode

(Ooop this turned longer than it was supposed to)

If anybody knows a fic like that or writes one please tag me or leave a comment, I need this in my life

144 notes • Posted 2021-01-18 21:29:14 GMT

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