#most of the characters have powers where they create or produce things with their bodies

[q8qwertyuiop8p]

I have a question.

What was Silco's objective? I understand that it was to intimidate Piltover without the need for a war and having their power removed from the underground city.

If this was so, why don't we see him mobilize in his plan to scare those above? Zaun's plot is advanced by Jinx's rash actions rather than by Silco's.

Was he waiting for a “moment”? Most argue that Silco became almost the same as those at the top when he assumed power, caring more for himself than for the nation of Zaun itself.

I don't agree with the last part, I feel like it disagrees with the character I remember from the first season. I guess I'll have to see it again.

The way I intetpreted it, Silco's objective is for the Undercity to have the same respect and opportunity as those above, rather than their chances snuffed out by Piltover's boot from the beginning. He believes that the only way this can be achieved is through severing ties with Piltover by any means necessary. Unlike Jinx he definitely does not desire vengeance like some say, but he is willing to destroy Piltover if that's what it comes to.

Silco and Vander tried fighting Piltover but the Zaunites were outmatched and massacred. So Silco knows that the Undercity is too weak on its own- but as we see with the cat and rat in the first episode, shimmer can give the weaker opponent the edge it needs to flip the tables. The issue is that shimmer is still in it's experimental stages and unbeknownst to Silco, Piltover is experimenting with hextech at the same time.

It takes time for him to settle down as Zaun's leader, build shimmer factories, produce shimmer, and create weapons. Then Piltover creates the atlas gauntlets and hexgates, and controls the flow of goods, once again giving them the edge before Zaun even has the chance to use shimmer against it.

We see in episode eight that the chemtanks are more than enough to destroy the enforcers, but it's too late. Piltover already has hex weapons that weren't even designed as weapons yet can decimate the chembarons, even when brandished by inexperienced fighters like Jayce. Jayce knows this too, and tells Silco that his people don't have a chance against topside, and he is probably right. Silco isn't willing to take the risk fighting against a superior enemy again because he already tried that in his youth and failed. If it weren't for the surprise invention of hextech that no one saw coming, the undercity would 100% be free by now. Even still, Silco never stopped trying to find ways to best Piltover, like Jinx's weapon and possibly Warwick.

I agree 100% with how you feel about the last part. Silco did not become like the councilors, the chembarons did. People just assume that because Silco works with them he must be like them, which is untrue. Silco shows obvious disdain towards them during the meeting because he senses their greed.

The chembarons tend to stay in the upper levels of Zaun, where things are brighter, the air is cleaner, and they can even grow many plant species. They also indulge in elaborate body modifications and worry more about saving their own skin (Finn wanting more trade, Smeech wanting to betray Jinx) than anything else

Compare this to Silco, who stays in the lower levels of Zaun and works in a modest office within the Last Drop, tolerating the noise for his employees. He doesn't have tattoos or prosthetics or fancy accessories, just presentable clothes he needs for meetings. He talks to Jinx and the chembarons, not about his own needs, but about his vision for Zaun's future.

Yes there are parallels between Silco and the council, such as how they view their citizens as expendable, but where were these people when Silco talked about how Finn had forgotten the cause? Or how he he has been softened by his decadent lifestyle? Or how, unlike Silco, the chembarons were so distanced from their people's suffering that they no longer had resistance to the grey?

If Silco cared more about himself than Zaun, he would not have fought tooth and claw for it, even when hextech came and all hope seemed lost. He definitely would not have been willing to give up shimmer, the source of his empire's revenue, in return for freedom. If he only cared for himself, he would have accepted the council seat Jayce offered and moved to Piltover for a better life.

[mtb-tv]

Sleepers Were Never Meant For Labor

Sleepers can't be THAT efficient. Not more efficient than regular robots on factory lines or more advanced futuristic drones. They're practically a money pit, if you ask me. 1 out of 10 Sleepers escape...lets say every year. Given the intuited size of Essen-Arp and all its locations (factories, mining colonies, refineries) where Sleepers are working...let's be charitable and say that two-hundred Sleepers escape every year. These Sleepers would also take Stabilizer with them, or find a way to source it on the outside, so that's stock of Stabilizer going missing and out of Essen-Arp's hands. Not only that, but then they have to spend more resources sending Hunters down after them. Essen-Arp created a whole new class of Sleepers just to perform as Hunters and nothing else.

Now consider this - during Sabine's questline in Citizen Sleeper 1, what do we learn what Essen-Arp is most known for? Bionics. Bio-synthetic medicines, and other such augments. That's what they copyright, that's what they produce and develop, that's their main export, THEIR market share. Why would they get into the business of Slavery all the sudden with a fledgling android program in the form of Sleepers?

I think Essen-Arp has a larger end goal here, they're working toward a...Final Solution, if you'll pardon the comparison.

Are you perhaps familiar with Warhammer 40k's Adeptus Mechanicus? The "Machine Cult" as they're often referred to. You don't need to know the specifics, but they're fanatical transhumanists who aspire to the "purity of the blessed Machine" they worship a Machine God, and its prophet called the "Omnissiah". They forsake their flesh with reckless abandon, replacing parts with superior augmetics.

Now consider: Sleeper frames are objectively superior to human bodies. Even with their "planned obsolescence" and constant degradation. That's just a prototype, it'll be patched out in later models. Sleeper frames can go days without eating a damn thing. They don't need to breathe. They're immune to disease. They need no water. They produce no waste. They can work in extreme and hostile environments that humans would need extensive protection to even go into. They can interface with machines in precise and unique ways. Multiple characters remark throughout both games that Sleepers can work longer and harder than humans with a more consistent output, and these are just Sleepers who have been on the run. Who have been running on fumes and spite for their creators; Imagine what a Sleeper in its prime could accomplish...

Sleeper technology is in its infancy. Unable to be fully exploited for its full worth. All the Sleepers that exist in the setting today are prototypes, test subjects, control units. There are legions of Essen-Arp scientists and engineers observing them, testing them constantly logging data, tweaking formulas, adjusting designs for the eventual Perfect Sleeper so that only the most wealthy and powerful could upload their minds into, and become Gods in the Machine

Anyway, theory over

[crunchcrunchteacakes]

The Power of the Mind: Speculating Yor’s Super Strength

This is going to be long post on how I think Yor’s strength works after reading the events of Chapter 85.

In the fandom the topic of Yor’s strength is a common topic with with two main conclusions. Yor’s is a test subject of Ostania’s super-soldier experiment projects or her strength is exaggerated for the sake of comic relief or an Anime trope. I attribute Yor’s Skills to her assassin training that began at a young age which become ingrained in the form off Muscle memory. It is developed through repetitive practice of specific skills or movements over time. When a skill is practiced repeatedly, the brain creates neural pathways that strengthen the connections between the brain and the relevant muscle groups, making the movements more efficient and precise. But know I think it is more, efficiency and precision is one thing but elevated amount of strength and speed is another.  Yor’s powers seem far-fetched in reality, After Chapter 85 I wanted to explore a speculative concept that suggests a connection between mindfulness meditation and the potential manifestation of super strength.

The reason I never associated Yor’s with any human experimentation was because super-soldiers are not in style with Ostania’s Human experimentation which focus on creating higher-intelligence subjects. Project Apple and Anya’s secret organization both produced subjects that are associated with neurology resulting in psychic super powers of precognition and telepathy, Super speed, endurance and strength just don't fit in their. Besides Ostania can always employ Blackbell industries to make mechanical suits armors that would achieve the same results. (Chapter 25).  

Anya, Bond and Yor’s power which I earlier separated on the basis of mind-body are not so distinct after all, the below panel provides a unique connection between checks on mental inhibitors and the manifestation of super strength in individuals.

The technical term for Yor’s strength is Hysterical Strength : In real-world scenarios, cases of "hysterical strength" have been reported where individuals have displayed astonishing feats of physical strength during life-threatening situations. It is believed that adrenaline release and the "fight or flight" response may temporarily override mental inhibitors, enabling individuals to access greater strength. It is also reported to be present during situations of altered states of consciousness. (Source)

An altered state of consciousness (ASC) refers to any mental state that differs significantly from a person's usual waking awareness. In these states, the individual's thoughts, perceptions, emotions, and sense of self may be altered or modified, leading to a different experience of reality. Altered states of consciousness can be induced by various factors, including meditation, Yoga, spacing out (Source). The practice disengaging yourself convoluted emotions of mind by not denying or burring them but to simply step and and observe them from a different perspective in mindfulness to foster inner peace and self awareness. This concept was first introduced to us by Mr. Green in Chapter 39.

(Mr. Green is definitely a member of Garden, but that is an topic for another day)

Yor is spaced out all the time, it’s like her personality trait, what we call ditzy and brain empty no thoughts, forgetful is literally her way of channeling her super strength. She is disengaged from her conscious mind. In this speculative narrative, she might temporarily enter altered states of consciousness where mental inhibitors are temporarily suspended or tweaked to channel her strength in any way she wants.. 

This means that Yor is in autopilot most of the time and her brain is at wakeful rest. No wonder her character was inspired by Little Briar Rose, a.k.a the Sleeping Beauty. This autopilot mode also made her seem more robot like to her colleagues who often say terms like “come back to earth Yor”. The autopilot mode also is an result of her training that has developed her muscle memory mentioned before, thus she has excellent mind-body coordination. We see her in the state of deep contemplation mostly when she is alone or outside the Forger family, Anya and Loid bring out Yor from this trance back to reality as seen in the clip below.

Honestly Thorn Princesses blank glazed eye feature should be every bit as popular as Twilights Sharp focused one.

This kind of contemplative state can be achieved by Yoga, and I am talking about the philosophy of Yoga that is part of the Indian and Buddhist cultures, not the western version of exercise. In yoga philosophy, it is believed that energy, or prana, flows through the body. When this energy is blocked or stagnant, it can lead to physical and mental discomfort. Yoga practices, including asanas and breathwork, aim to unblock and balance the flow of prana, promoting vitality and clarity of mind. The existence of inner energy reserves (e.g., prana, chi) that, when harnessed through meditation, can lead to enhanced physical abilities. Yeah Yor wasn’t lying here when she said she learned it through Yoga.

Fiona trained her body not her mind, we see her break her mental barriers but she achieved this because of hysteria a state of great emotional distress and not something that she could just tap into, thus it cost her 3 out of 4 limbs. Yor does it through mindfulness, it encourages observing thoughts and emotions as they arise without attaching judgments or becoming entangled in them. So even though she is enraged and distressed when harm comes to Anya she does not become entangled in her emotions and maintains control over her strength by not overtly harming herself or others. Emotions come and go they are part of what makes us human. What's important is not to give into them but to channel them into positive actions. And at the end this is what Wheeler and Fiona are unable to do. He lacks any emotions this can never attain true strength and she doesn’t reign in her emotions thus making herself vulnerable.

I will follow up on the nature Garden it’s relationship with Ostania and government in another post, but for this is how I think Yor’s powers work.

TL;DR: Yor strength is connected to neuroscience of mindfulness, her extraordinary strength results from her extreme control of her consciousness which she can tap into to tweak the mental blocks.

[localcryptidminako]

Genshin Delusions: Notes and theories

This is in two parts because I was sharing my notes as I researched and needed to do something, so its in two parts now ------ Delusions themselves: They are given to those loyal to the tsaritsa in the fatui ranks by the archon herself, most likely meaning that it does tie into what the person is like, as if the theory about archons hand out visions is true, she would know the requirements for them, or at least have noticed them over time. One important thing to note is that in german, visions are called "The Eye of God" and delusions are called "The Eye of the Devil" Arlecchino's delusion and vision: Arlecchino possesses both a pyro delusion (used in her boss fight and is featured in beta design leaks that are similar to the current design) and a pyro vision (used in regular gameplay), which is quite strange. Her vision appears to be dim/dulled compared to other visions, suggesting a deeper meaning (as i really dont think its a mistake, this is hoyo we're talking about). Her vision also has a snezhnaya casing, even though visions tend to reflect where the user got their vision, which might suggest that there is an aspect to the casing of visions of the persons aliegence. It is also confirmed that Arlecchino's curse caused her to have natural pyro abilities, which is even stranger so. The running theories are that she is using it to amplify her own power to further the fatui or maybe for personal gain, or (what i am personally leaning to) is that it relfects her personality and her instability. Many design elements of a character tend to relfect what they are like as people, so it might be a relfection of that

EDITS FROM AFTER A BIT MORE RESEARCH:

Arlecchino - another layer of depth is that in her voicelines, it actually states that she is from Khaenriah

Vision replacement theory - Another theory is that delusions replace visions when being used, but thats more wishy-washy

Childe's Foul Legacy Transformation - For the first two stages of his boss fight, he follows the same rule we have seen elsewhere, with someone only being able to use either a vision or a delusion, never both at the same time (as childe uses his vision in his first stage, and his electro delusion in his second stage), but in his third stage, the foul legacy transformation, he uses both. The running theory, and what I had come up with before, is that it may have something to do with the abyss. He gained the foul legacy through being stuck in the abyss, and so using that ability, that might be why he is able to use both at once, in fact, they are both seen on his person during that transformation.

Another theory as to why Arlecchino uses a delusion in her boss fight but a vision in normal gameplay - Delusions are more powerful than visions, so she may be using it to be stronger during her fight, but the reason they aren't always used is because they have more repercussions

Personal idea on that topic - I believe that she may have gotten a pyro delusion either because she already had natural pyro abilities and she had a pyro vision, so she was simply more comfortable with pyro and would adjust easily, but another idea is that it may be because her body might not be able to handle another element. We see with delusions that vision wielders are naturally able to use a delusion of a different element, but due to Arlecchino's curse, she may be unable to use any other elemental power Quick note if anyone is confused on why most are able to use delusions well, but in inazuma it caused harm to everyone wielding them: Usually, time is taken to make delusions, they are crafted carefully and go through many tests, and are personally approved by the tsaritsa (from what I've gathered), so they are fairly stable.

The difference in Inazuma stems from why they were creating delusions in the first place. It was to help the fatui, but they were not made for the fatui. The goal in mass producing them was to give them out to the people of Inazuma, in order to bring the whole nation down. That was what they were trying to do, as seen with them handing them out and bribing the commisions, they were trying to take Inazuma down while remaining in a good light with the Raiden Shogun so that she wouldn't be able to stop them, as she was unaware of their plans and thought of them as good people.

Those delusions were created with harm in mind, so they mass produced them with little regard for safety and they did not quality check them, as the intent was for harm to come to anyone trying to use them. They were purposefully made to be unsafe and to kill those using them, unlike delusions used by the fatui. It was all with the plan to take down Inazuma from behind the scenes to benefit the fatui

[tobiasdrake]

Do you feel like ranking DBZ movie villains by how interested you would be in a movie that reinvents them for the current canon/state of the franchise, like what Broly got?

Alternatively, by how interested you would be if you could write the movie, without having to worry about how you expect Toei would actually write the characters in question.

#1 - Lord Slug. He and his movie suffer tremendously from the whole "Just rehashing Piccolo-Daimao" thing but the stuff they do add to the character is really interesting and fun.

He's an alien vampire who blots out the sun as part of his sinister plan to convert the Earth into a sports car he can drive around and look cool in. He's defeated by Goku drawing the energy of the sun into a Genki-Dama to erase his vampiric ass, which is an established obscure ability of the technique that no one has ever done anything with.

Kaio literally said with words from his mouth that Goku can use the sun to make a Genki-Dama. Goku had to make a desperate Genki-Dama once on a planet with three suns. And this has never, ever come up. Except against Namekian Dracula and his army of vampires.

This is the top of my list of things to formally canonize a "The Good Version" of.

2 - Turles. Tree of Might is also a film that had a lot of interesting elements about it. Turles's plot is underdeveloped because of the film following manga rehash rails so closely but, like Slug, the original stuff they did with him is fascinating.

Turles is presented as a foil to Goku. Where Goku has studied and mastered the divine arts of the gods, Turles somehow broke into the heavens and stole away with an item of immense power. He's a bandit who pillaged the heavens for power and then wreaked havoc on the mortal universe. How did he do that? That's so cool.

And it sets up a unique rivalry between him and Goku, pitting Goku's divine techniques against the incredible powers that Turles possesses but doesn't fully understand.

Also, like the Solar Genki-Dama, the part where Goku destroys the Tree of Might not by hitting it with an attack but by using the technique's genki-harvesting feature to pull all the world's stolen genki back out of the tree? Genuinely brilliant application of an obscure feature of the technique we don't really think about.

And and I just desperately want it to be canon that low-class Saiyans only have a handful of mass-produced faces and body types between them. That's the film's explanation for why Turles looks like Goku. It's because Goku is an assembly line Barbie doll you can buy off the shelf at Walmart, as opposed to the $50,000 custom-made luxury item that is Vegeta.

3 - Cooler: Cooler, I'm less enthusiastic about but there are ways that he can be interesting. I've speculated about some ways that they could go about adapting Cooler to DBS canon because he's always seemed, after Broly, to be the most likely candidate.

But honestly, Cooler's never really been that interesting to me. He's a knock-off Frieza in the same way Slug's a knock-off Piccolo but there isn't really anything unique I can point to and go, "EXCEPT there's this really interesting stuff that they could really push and make an interesting villain out of." He's... just Frieza with the serial numbers filed off.

Even my pitches for Cooler basically just amount to, "Create a new character who is Frieza's brother and name him Cooler."

Alright. So, from here we get into characters I'm not disinterested in necessarily but I don't think could really work.

4 - Androids 13, 14, and 15. These three can only interestingly fit into a very specific span of time. Popping out during the week build-up to the Cell Games is basically the perfect placement for them, because the Cell arc is the only time when "Oh no, EVEN MORE evil Androids by Dr. Gero!" really works as a story.

I like them. They're fun, and they could be even moreso if given a chance. But their window of opportunity is slim. Canonizing them would make more sense as an interquel than a sequel. And we don't really need an interquel for them, because that movie already exists and is called "Extreme Battle!! The Three Great Super Saiyans".

5 - Dr. Wheelo. Similarly, Dr. Wheelo has already been pretty thoroughly cannibalized by Dr. Gero and Zamasu. "Super-old mad scientist Dr. Brain-in-a-Jar and his bio-android minions plot to steal Goku's body" is a story that would feel like it's rehashing material we already have, even though he fucking came first.

And here we go with the ones I'm just not interested in at all.

6 - Garlic Jr. Basically the only thing interesting about him is "How do we defeat a guy who's immortal?" But the answer to that question is always bullshit. "He opens the Negative Zone and defeats himself." "Goku has a pager in his pocket he can just use to call God and ask him to please delete this plot from the story." "Do the thing to make him not immortal anymore and then it's not a problem."

There's the Mafuba but at this point that just feels cheap. There's not really a way to have the characters walk up and hit the villain with a technique they've all known about for decades and could have done at any moment, but to keep it in reserve as an eleventh hour THERE IS NO OTHER OPTION desperation play even though they could have just done it at any point in the fight.

Characters keeping the winning play in their back pocket for no other reason than to make the fight more dramatic is exactly the kind of thing that I go off on modern Dragon Ball for.

So. Yeah. The answer to "How do we defeat the immortal villain?" is that there is no good answer and we shouldn't write characters into that situation. This character's one and only utility is to force the movie to end stupidly.

(Honestly, Gomah is probably the closest to a good version of Garlic Jr. you could ever get.)

7 - Janemba. Janemba isn't really a character. He's a vehicle to facilitate the idea of villains from Hell breaking out and starting a commotion. That's all he is. It's an idea that Toei liked so much they did it three separate times: Once for the Anoyoichi Budokai filler arc, once for Fusion Reborn, and once for the Super Android 17 arc of GT.

But my beef with it is twofold. First. Like. The mythology of Dragon Ball is set up specifically to disallow plots like this. Villains don't keep their bodies when they die. They become a powerless soul like all the other powerless souls. Keeping your body is a rare and special privilege, and is the only way to retain your power.

This cannot happen.

The other issue is that it's boring. The escalating powerscale of Dragon Ball means that yesterday's titanic threat isn't that big of a deal tomorrow. The way this always works out is like. "Oh no, Raditz and Nappa are back! But also Gohan's like 87 quintillion times more powerful than them so he just flicks them both in the head and they explode and die instantly."

Reclimbing old mountains isn't as fun in practice as it sounds on paper. Oh no, what if Goku had to fight Tambourine again? How could Super Saiyan Blue Goku ever manage to defeat Tambourine?

And without that element... there's just nothing else to Janemba as a threat. He is the least interesting thing that happens in his movie. A vehicle to facilitate a plot that's now been done to death and hasn't been good a single time, and a fusion that is no longer bold new territory to tread.

8 - Bojack. The only interesting thing that happens in Bojack's movie is a martial arts tournament that Bojack isn't even involved with. Like Janemba, there isn't really a lot to Bojack and his crew. They're just... some villains. In the wide world of Dragon Ball villains, here are some more of them.

And finally, closing out this list with an honorable mention.

N/A - Hirudegarn. I actually don't remember this movie so I can't say how interesting it would be to create a canon version of Tapion and Hirudegarn.

[justadeadreaper]

❇COD Plague! AU

The downfall of humanity... plagues. For how long has the world suffered at the hands of the submicroscopic agents of death and cancer? Mutating the body to overwhelm every cell to produce another corpse to be thrown to a pit filled with a mound of bodies all suffering the same macabre fate as they rot amidst the earth. All for their Mistress who urges them on to continue their ravaging across all of humanity, just following her mantra and her undying will.

Consume... Consume the body, consume the cells. Eat your way through its walls, eat your way through each and everyone one until there is none left that have not felt our hunger.

Conquer... Infect. Infect the host. Override their engines, twist and turn and manipulate their nature, subjugate them to my every whim and thought until my reign overwhelms them all.

Multiply... Force them to make more of us. Make more of us. Split and squirm and overwhelm the cell. Millions upon billions upon trillions until it bursts. Then repeat until we have multiplied to the point that there is no more of the host but only us.

Destroy... Destroy anything that is left over. Use what you have to pick away at the body even if it is bit by bit. Destroy its will, make it weak, make it desperate. Take and destroy until they are withering away into the wind. Destroy all their will until they have nothing left to live for but only wish for the sweet relief of death 

Kill... 

Kill. Them. All.

With the will that she commanded her agents spread and spread until it destroyed all it could. Humans huddled in fear at what she did, praying to whatever God they had to save them from the same fate as the mounting bodies that mounted outside their villages in the burning heaps to try and save others from the very same fate that tried to take them all. But, apart from fear, how did humans react in other ways?

A common way was to make a figure of this plague. No one could tell you the why as no one knew. Every person had a different reason for giving these diseases physical figures for all to see so no one reason could be accepted. Some say it was to humanise the disease, to put it on the level of humans so that it would not be as feared as it was. Others said it was to comprehend the disease as no natural thing could be behind the disease and they could not believe that their Gods would do such a thing to them so they had to create a figure, a representation to do so. Then again the physical forms could have just been made for forms of entertainment such as poetry and paintings where it could be appreciated and show the true tragedy that would otherwise not be known. Although shock was another reason proposed by others as it would show as to why you should fear such a thing as most had features that would occur in humans if they ever did catch it, to show how powerful it was, how it could change you beyond an unimaginable degree.

They just did not realise that by making his physical representations that if enough people believed in them that they would become real. And that is where our dear COD characters come in as now they are not stuck as mere mortals in the military to kill people but they are the diseases. Across different time periods and different countries with different amounts of victims to their cruel goal, they are twisted forms of themselves as now they represent the diseases and everyone’s fears.

Like my last AU, this is an AU that anyone can use but this is just the foundation and base and the basic rules to it so people can build from it and have a starting point to expand from. All I ask is to use the tag I made for the AU, for you to credit me for the AU, and credit me for using my version of the character, apart from that go wild and have fun with this AU, if you have any questions please ask as no question is a dumb question.

[naamahdarling]

I'm creating a Eldritch horror story and I'm trying to base it off my own fears. Following that same logic, what kind of cosmic horror would you make?

I was raised with Lovecraft stories (paraphrased at first) as bedtime stories, so I sort of have eldritch/cosmic horror in my blood. I really really really love it.

The Magnus Archives hit it so far out of the park that any sort of eldritch powers fiction I create after this is now going to have to reckon with its presence in the genre. I...do not feel I personally have anything to add to that specific sort of angle after what they produced. Genuinely. Which doesn't mean I won't create, just that I'm aware that whatever I do isn't going to expand or encapsulate the genre the way TMA did.

I really like anthology horror in general, where related works are grouped by a theme, and the whole "witness statements" format that was a prominent part of TMA (and plenty of others) is VERY appealing to me as a fan of real-world weird occurrences, creepypasta, and personal stories of paranormal events, so the sort of thing I would be most likely to create would be a series of accounts or events relating to the same horrible subject.

I have decided that doing it as Magnus Archives fsnfiction would work just fine. Zero of the same characters showing up. Just witness statements. I actually have several written but I want to finish out the suite of Fears with one for each.

The other thing that really appeals to me is the idea that the monstrous and eldritch can be welcome, especially the influence of it on our bodies, but also in terms of the power that being truly feared gives uz. That the terrible chsnges that happen to you can be, somehow, revelatory and identity-affirming. That's a very trans/disabled/etc. theme.

What about the existential horror you would feel as you become LESS monstrous? That the thing that sets you apart and maybe hurts you but also makes you very powerful is suddenly leaving you. Now you are becoming just like the people that your pride in your monstrousness was intended to spite. How, then, can we be monstrous, be OURSELVES, when no-one can see our monstrousness? When we no longer have access to the Secrets and the Horrors and the Powers and the Knowledge, when that which is Other and Unknowable and Terrifying has left us, what do we do?

What if what most would consider "healing" actually destroyed something in the core of us? What if you grew back a wounded part of yourself and it grew back wrong" is an idea mined often enough in cosmic horror to be recognizable. What if growing back "wrong" meant growing back "normal?"

So I would very much enjoy writing a story where the angle was not "healing is scary to those who have been harmed, but it is ultimately for the best UwU" but "being forced to change to align with what others think is good and healthy until you AGREE WITH THEM is the REAL horror." Something I think most queer/trans people and most disabled people will instinctively grasp.

But I would like to extend that to specifically survivors of trauma, who can feel the sickening pressure of being told at every turn that their role now is to work to "get over" and "recover" from something the world did to them when others' definition of "recovery" (a return to normal, or the ability to re-engage with what traumatized them) can feel immediately, viscerally wrong. A denial of the injured state of the self, a shifting of the responsibility onto the traumatized person and away from external change and justice and restoration. A huge force you don't understand trying to change you or warping things around you? That's cosmic horror, baby. The force trying to change you is just "We need you to stop being different now." And you don't understand why you should want to.

I'm wrestling with this right now in therapy and getting almost nowhere by the standards by which most people define "recovery" because I refuse to see why on earth I should be the one to change or why my hate/anger is a problem I should solve to make things easier in the future for the same kind of people who hurt me.

At my core what I most want is for them to be absolutely terrified of me.

So there's a lot to work with there.

[thryth-gaming]

Escalating Curses in Monster of the Week

So, a little bit ago I wrote a thing where I created five different takes on a pop-culture vampire. In the course of this, I ended up thinking about how to address some of the curses you can get for the Monstrous playbook. Some of the traditional curses can sometimes get in the way of fun, this is a to-taste matter so it will vary from one person to another.

Mainly I'm thinking about things like the traditional vampire weakness to daylight which runs into a problem if only one character is limited by that curse. On the other hand, there's curses like vulnerability which can sometimes be a bit on the bland side as on the surface they're only about taking extra damage. Then it occurred to me that the escalation the book says happens as Luck is spent is key to using these.

First things first

I'm going to go over several theoreticals here that cover the entire range of how much Luck the character has left. However, it's probably best not to preplan this out too hard. Have a talk with the player ahead of time about general direction of how they want things to go, but don't determine details until they spend that Luck. Best to keep the discovery fresh and you might have neat idea that occurs to you later on when the Luck is spent.

In general talk over all the options with the hunter as well as the team in general. Curses like Pure Drive bring up the touchy subjects of lust and rage, which may touch on personal traumas. And Feed is about needing to eat people which is disturbing to most people. Even in a fictional instance..

Pervasive Curse

A pervasive curse in this context is one that is present most of the time in most places. The best example I have of this is the traditional vampire weakness to daylight as the world spends half of its time in daytime. If one of your characters can't walk out into the daylight without bursting into fire, then it's going to severely limit how the team cooperates.

Either you're going to do a lot of split time situations moving back and forth between the vampire and the team mates, or you're going to spend most of your time at night. In one circumstance the players spend significant time not sharing scenes with each other. Granted, it is standard practice to split the party in MotW, but it feels a bit meh to always be doing so for the same reason and could produce irritation when it's always the same player provoking the need. In the other case, if you're always doing stuff at night, the curse doesn't apply very often, which means it starts to fade into the background and stop impacting the game, making things less fun.

But the escalation with Luck is the key here. Don't start right away at daylight burns instead consider this advancement of things. Using how much Luck the Monstrous has left.

7: Supernatural impact. Daylight only causes a -1 ongoing if the vampire tries to use their monstrous supernatural powers*. Daylight only causes damage when focused through weapons**.

6: So bright. The daylight -1 ongoing now affects perception and searches (not just vision because you're distracted). You cannot remove Unstable.

5: Feel weak. You now suffer -1 ongoing to even mortal magic and any strenuous physical activity. Powers that destabilize the body*** cost 1 harm to use as sunlight passes through the skin.

4: It hurts. You now suffer -1 ongoing to keep your emotions in check. You mark Unstable as long as you stay in daylight.

3: It burns. You now suffer -1 ongoing to everything in daylight. For this and each further step, the Keeper is encouraged to use less and less leeway for when to trigger the Unstable the vampire gets in daylight as of Luck 4.

The footnotes:

* This includes Unholy Strength and Unnatural Appeal if they choose to use Weird for KSA or Manipulate. If they use magic available to mortals they might get around this.

** Talismans channeling the spiritual essence of daylight, UV lights, or both depending on your particular mythology.

*** The two big ones here are Incorporeal and Shapeshifter. Basically changing to a bat momentarily strips the protections you have from skin or clothes.

You can instead use Luck to determine how easy it is limit exposure such as the following:

7: Parasol

6: Light cloud cover.

5: Clothes covering most of the body.

4: Thick Overcast.

3: Covering all skin and wearing goggles.

2: Indoors

1: Blacked out windows.

0: Windowless room.

You can even mix these options together. For example say a vampire a Luck 5 can use a parasol to prevent being marked Unstable immediately and the -1 to strenuous activity, but still suffers the reduction of her perceptions and innate abilities.

One Note Curses

This is the silver bullet. Where the curse really only seems to have a very simple narrative impact. Honestly, this might be what the player wants instead of having more unpredictable curses. That's fine. In this case, start thinking of the Luck determining how likely the vulnerability is going to make an appearance.

However, you might still use expanded application. Perhaps the werewolf meets someone wearing a silver necklace and they very clearly fingering it while making smug expressions at the hunter. This could be a case of this person trying to intimidate the hunter by letting them know that they're aware of what the hunter is and that they're ready for them. This could be a reason to give a -1 ongoing or at least push for an Act Under Pressure roll.

I'll also point to the scene from Dracula Untold where the last fight happens in a tent filled up with silver coins making it hard for Dracula to even see straight. Another option might be that silver can be used as the basis for an enchantment that actively inhibits werewolves (or vampires as seen above).

Morality Impacting Curses

Curses like Feed and Pure Drive can all have implications about the Monstrous being pushed into performing tasks that they (and possibly the player) would not normally do. This is a case where you do want to ongoing discussion with the hunter about their lines and veils.

Generally, players that take this curse are going to take it knowing the risks. But they might still not want to see their character kill children, innocents, or allies. However if the player knows that you agreed not to kill past their lines, the character doesn't know that person they vaguely remember murdering was a mugger or domestic abuser. If someone that meets a line angers someone with Pure Drive (Rage) then they'll have enough presence of mind to leave until they find someone or something that the player is fine with being destroyed.

They'll still have to deal with the aftermath of such things. Like other monster hunters or police, for instance.

Even once you've set your lines, some escalation is going to occur. Don't go straight to murder, vigilante or otherwise, but build up to it. Let's start with a version of Feed that is definitely something lethal: hearts. Again, following how much Luck is left.

7: You can buy hearts from the butchers and cook them.

6: You can't cook the hearts anymore.

5: It needs to be a human heart or you must kill the animal yourself.

4: It takes more animals to equal one human heart.

3: It needs to be a sapient heart or a supernatural one.

2: You need to feed more often or larger numbers. Or from more powerful monsters.

1: You need to frequently gorge on large numbers. Or hunt even more powerful creatures.

0: The hunger never goes away.

As a note, starvation might be an option with Feed. Talk to your hunter and decide what the consequences for not feeding are. Does the hunter starve to death? Or do they just go feral and seek food without thought? I'll point to the horror anime Shiki where one of the vampires is very willing to let herself starve to death rather than hurt any humans.

Something like a Big Magic ritual might also be used to create something that will feed a monster. Also the Good Monsters playbook provides an asset that allows a Monstrous a facility that manages their curse for them. In one of my theoreticals, a lamia had a horrific alchemical tree that grew human hearts. In this case, they will become dependent upon that one source of their necessary object of consumption. It might be destroyed, poisoned, or they might have to spend an extended amount of time away from it.

Now on to Pure Drive. Note I would always allow an Act Under Pressure to opt for a lesser consequence... or accept a good work around from a player.

7: You have enough control that when you slip it's relatively minor but still disruptive. You'll likely even find a way to fit it into your hunting or other current goal.

6-5: It gets more disruptive. Either you'll have to do something more intense and harder to shoehorn into they're current goals, go out of their way to satisfy the urge, or you'll do something minor to someone you don't mean.

4: The urge starts putting you into danger.

3-1: Fulfilling the urge makes you increasingly reckless and disregard more morality.

0: The Keeper can bring the Curse up without any other provocation.

Corollary

Dark Master, Obligation, and Duty will run into similar issues as Pure Drive and Feed as the hunter has an outside force occasionally influence. For example, consider the link above under Feed one of the other characters in that theoretical group was a mothlady who had a duty as an oracle which she manages by running a psychic hotline. However, as her luck goes down, she may start getting visions about random people she meets on the street. Then she might be struck by an urge to tell what she sees to these people. Finally, she might receive a vision of something major and drawn to the place it would happen and spend effort trying to warn everyone there.

With Dark Master, you might not be directly influenced or even commanded by the master, but they might see you as their minion anyway. They might present as a frequent nemesis interferring in your plans, demanding service, or even trying to kill you for disobedience.

With Obligation, you're going to be faced with increasingly more dangerous past deals you've made. Starting with an agreement not to interfere with what happens in a certain place all way up to having given at one point in your past a carte blanche favor that has now come due.

Discuss whether the hunter is under any mental or metaphysical influence with these curses. The mothlady was, one of the vampires in the vampire post linked at the start wasn't. If they're not forced to obey, then the aftermath of the deal, command, or duty is where things will come out.

Adding more Curses

You might also look to the hunter's Breed as the curse rather than just the individual symptoms. In this case start adding on other effects that fit. For example, perhaps the werewolf also starts developing an aversion to wolfsbane or vampire starts picking up OCD behaviors. This is probably the most touchy since there's probably every reason the hunter didn't choose other weaknesses in place of the one they chose. If they are good with this, tie it in to the original such as how wolfsbane is still a vulnerability. But you can expand it to things like a physical changes that betray their true nature. Pointed ears, lack of reflection, extra hairy... a sense of something sparkling in the air like fairy dust. Etc.

One final thing: note that getting rid of their curse does not necessarily mean they get rid of their powers.

[paragonrobits]

i had a bit of an idea when I saw some posts about that one terrible Disco Elysium take where someone said the game would have been better if it was about a lesbian witch in the Alps in a cozy/cottagecore setting, which i've seen sparked off discussions on how cozy and wholesome visuals (especially those that refuse to acknowledge how their homesteading fantasy doesn't address colonialism or past crimes done against indigenous peoples, and especially those that get HOSTILE over it) and it gave me an idea:

an antagonistic faction based around the cozy and wholesome cottagecore aesthetic, specifically in terms of how they clash with my primary character groups, who are by definition a bunch of weirdos; gross and deliberately rebelling against tyrants (to the extent of probably having trophies of body parts taken from slain villains) and being obnoxiously weird and offputting on purpose, reveling in rebelling against norms and restrictions because its fun, and therefore clashing with this type of enemy at a fundamental level?

the idea of living entirely on your own, or with a small group of friends and family, is more tenable in my settings; in real life you NEED some kind of organization at least at a local level to provide you with everything you need, making the homesteading fantasy not logistically sound, but here that kind of lifestyle IS possible. Everyone can instinctively use magical abilities, and it is more than possible to directly conjure up stuff you might need, though this requires rare magical substances normally found through great works of wild magic as a kind of reusable resource... or from the bodies of other magically powerful beings and monsters.

So a hypothetical group dedicated to the idea of living cozy lifestyles free from what they consider the unpleasant barbarity of the world they know (or fleeing disastrous or tyrannical regimes) may survive by cultivating magical disasters on purpose to reap the rewards, by hunting monsters of sufficient power to get those resources, or killing other magical beings to harvest their body parts. This last point can be used to combine the basic concept for a particularly unflattering take on the basic concept by conflating them with the 'spooky family of cannibals in the woods' style of horror, contrasted by the people doing this having a big fixation on elegance and wholesomeness.

off the top of my head a few ideas for this group might have:

They're a decentralized group that barely qualifies as a faction, being a large number of groups who have taken territory and rule of it as small fiefdoms. They tend to be at most small families and groups of friends, though disagreements cause them to split apart (and have a lot of bad blood and feuds between them, which can be a story hook as their schemes and plots cause problems for other people who in turn come to take retribution or make them knock it off). In general its a few people, often in romantic relationships for the whole 'living on a homestead with my wife' kind of thing.

They share common aesthetic interests and philosophies, mostly fixated on wholesomeness and cuteness. They see themselves as harmless, cute and sweet, and dislike things they see as gross, monstrous or rough. (Which describes many of my characters.) They will probably aid each other if required, but they're not a group in a traditional sense.

So how do they provide a threat? They are all well-versed in enough magical skills to produce figments: living imaginary friends and constructs generated from emotions and ideas invested into a semi-autonomous thing. These beings are not sapient, functionally being magic chatbots, and they can be created in just about any form and with some basic magical powers built in. Normally they maintain themsleves with a bit of investment, allowing people to make a LOT of them, entire armies, over a long enough period. So these homesteaders have created huge groups of workers, guardians and yesmen to do the hard work of actual farming, assuming they're not just generating fancy feasts from thin air and play-acting at the pastoral life.

This means that they can command quite powerful armies of monsters in whatever form they can imagine, based on their own personal interests, so they're likely to be fae-themed walking trees and the like, rather than anything you can really converse with. They're just powerful enough to be a problem, but not smart enough to deal with complex situations and therefore likely to go hostile or attack other people considered to be intruding upon them, making it VERY likely that they will start expanding that territory without realizing that's what they're doing.

This can also include these homesteaders driving off neighbors on purpose, resenting the intrusion (as they think of it), and anyone doing... say, dungeon exploration, or examining ruins, is likely to set them off. This faction is likely to be EXTREMELY territorial, even if they have no real interest in conquest; they're spiteful, self-centered and have a victim complex, meaning that long term feuds with people who run afoul of them is quite likely. Their emphasis on coziness also is a source of hostility; they require their neighbors to be STRICTLY regulated to keep things nice and uncomplicated, and they will drive off anyone introducing undesirable elements into their territory.

They can also serve as a warning of more organized, dire threats. Their magical powers are somewhat more complex than is common in the setting, so they may be from a more established and magically learned area that is no longer functional. This may be because they were scattered by a powerful, militarily ambitious faction that will prove to be a far more potent and direct threat, and encountering these homesteaders is a precursor to a far more dangerous peril.

They may also be a threat through the use of magic to terraform what they consider as unpleasant environments without regard for the ecological impact. My default group of characters tend to prefer swamps and wetlands for their territory, but these homesteaders dislike the stinking, insect-populated wetlands full of foul smells, bog mummies and rot, and have no interest for how their attempts to warp the swamps into forests will have terrible consequences for the land, motivating the characters to take an offense against them because the homesteaders magic is spreading, warping the environment and damaging their homes, and the homesteaders refuse to stop and won't even speak with outsiders.

(Also as I write this it occurs to me that there's some unpleasant similarities between what I'm describing and pre-civil war romanticizations of plantations, particularly that of chattel slavery, in the American South. In this case, these antagonists are making an imaginary society around them to maintain their lifestyles without any real concern for the effect on the world around them... or in particularly malevolent cases, they may attempt to warp the minds and wills of other people to force them into becoming a part of their fantasy and thus enslaving their minds, and viewing it as doing them a favor, because now they're part of something so CUTE and pleasant, and whatever rationalizations they want. This gives an obvious story hooks; these self-centered people are literally enslaving others and driving off anyone near them, so they need some good FACE PUNCHING NOW.)

[natlacentral]

Secret Auditions Where The Actors Had No Clue What They Were Auditioning For, And 22 Other Behind-The-Scenes Facts I Learned About "Avatar: The Last Airbender"

Albert Kim, executive producer and showrunner of Netflix's Avatar: The Last Airbender, has a massive task on his hands. After M. Night Shyamalan's live-action film left viewers disheartened, fans have been craving an adaptation that truly captures the heart of one of the most popular animated series in history. I was honored to speak with Albert, who was warm and welcoming, yet protective and passionate about his live-action adaptation. We spoke in depth about the differences between the animated series and his Netflix show, the motives behind those changes, and what was important to leave the same. 🚨 There are spoilers ahead for ATLA Season 1 🚨

1. Albert wanted to strike a balance between the episodic format of the animated show and his more serialized motives for the live-action adaptation.

"We always used the original as our guide for everything. It wasn't like we were creating a whole new story out of whole cloth, we were looking at all the stories of the the first season of the original, regardless of whether they were episodic, or led to a more serialized narrative. And then we kind of laid them out in front of us at the beginning of the season, and said, 'Which ones help us in getting from the beginning to the end of the season.' Because we knew we were trying to create a narrative thread that took us on a journey from the Southern Water Tribe to the Northern Water Tribe. And so once we had that framework in place, certain elements just started clicking into place. We could see something like Jet. Jet is a great character, who has all the right intentions, but has been driven into a bad place by the extremes of war. And then we could see a character like The Mechanist; same thing. Good character, good heart, but doing some bad things because of the war. And you know what? He would be in direct conflict with Jet. So let's bring them together. That meant taking them out of their original locations and then putting them somewhere like Omashu. It was a little bit of putting a puzzle together in that way. And as we did that we realized we could preserve the feeling of the original in those adventures. It was a challenge, and we had to walk a tightrope to do it. But that's the case with pretty much everything in the show."

2. Albert has been a fan of the original show for years, because his daughter would watch the animated series when she was a kid.

"I was a huge fan of the original ever since my daughter started watching it when she was a kid."

3. Albert used references from the animated series to change how the Avatar State would work in live-action.

"There's an episode in the second season, "Avatar Day," when Kyoshi inhabits [Aang's] body. It's a very short sequence in the original series, and slightly more for comedic effect. But we thought we could use that, and combine that with what we saw on the Roku episode. Roku also manifests through Aang, and we used that early on, because we needed the audience to understand what the Avatar State was and how powerful it was. In the second episode, we were traveling to Kyoshi Island, so we said, 'Why not use Kyoshi to do that?' We can't wait until we get to Roku's Temple to do that, so let's use Kyoshi. There's precedent for it in the original series, and we can adapt our rules for the Avatar State. There are little tweaks we made to the canon here and there to help us understand a little more of why this was important for [Aang]."

4. Albert spoke with Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko (the creators of the animated series) before embarking on his showrunner journey and was "bummed" when they exited the Netflix series. 

"When I got the call [to work on the series], I was really excited just for nothing else [other] than the opportunity to talk to Bryan and Mike, and kind of indulge my inner nerd about the show. Our first conversations, were me just asking a lot of Aang questions, and stuff like that. And, that was great. And then we got into the process of talking about what the show could be and the visions they had for it. And what I thought I could bring to the table as someone who hadn't been so intimately involved with the original, or the development process they had been involved with. I really enjoyed that process. I enjoyed collaborating with them and working with them. At around the time I had written the pilot episode, they had decided, for personal reasons, to leave the project. And I can't really speak to those reasons. They had been involved, obviously, for some time before I joined the project. And I was bummed about it, because I genuinely enjoyed working with them, talking to them, all of that. And I had hoped we could continue. But again, that was their personal decision."

5. Albert has never seen The Last Airbender film by M. Night Shyamalan 

"I haven't seen it and it just sort of fell through the cracks for me beforehand. And then when I started working on this project, I deliberately avoided it, because I didn't really want to have those images or the creative choices they made in my head. I wanted to be independent."

6. However, Albert was aware of the criticisms of Shyamalan's film.

"That's not to say I wasn't aware of the criticisms of [Shyamalan's film]. I knew what people didn't like about it. And I don't think we were reacting specifically to those criticisms, but a lot of the choices we were already organically making corrected a lot of that. For instance, I always knew that we were going to be casting all Asian and Indigenous for this. It wasn't in reaction to what Shyamalan did in this feature. That would have happened if the feature didn't even exist. I know how it appears in certain cases, it looks like we may have been doing something in reaction to what happened in [his] film, but I never saw it."

7. Michael Goi, who directed the first two episodes of Netflix's adaptation, is still trying to get Albert to watch Shyamalan's film.

"Michael, our director of the first two episodes, he keeps teasing me trying to get me to watch this movie. Now that we're all done, he keeps inviting me over to his house. He's going to put up a screening room so we can all watch together. I said, 'I've gone this long. I'm not gonna break the record now.'"

8. Although the animated series does not show the decimation of the Air Nomads, Albert felt it was "important" for him to include it in the Netflix show to set the stakes for the series.

"I felt it was important to see that event, which is discussed often in the original, but never seen because, for me, it sets the stakes for the world. It shows you what it is that Aang is trying to stop. And without actually understanding that viscerally, for new viewers as much as for the diehard fans, it was a little hard to go on the emotional journey with him. You have to know what he's facing. And what he's facing is this incredible attack. And when you watch it, you see both the power of the Fire Benders, as well as the struggle that the Air Nomads faced, as well as their destruction and the death. And when Aang gets to ask himself, 'How am I as a 12-year-old kid able to stop that,' you understand it a lot more. It'd feel a lot more abstract as a burden and responsibility for him if we hadn't witnessed that."

9. Albert also felt that starting the series with the Fire Nation attack on the Air Nomads narratively helped viewers understand that he wanted to expand and differentiate the feeling from the animated series.

"Narratively kicking off the show with [the Fire Nation attack] helped, in my mind, send the signal that this was not going to be a note for note translation of the original. We weren't going to tell the story in the exact same way, with the exact same scenes and the exact same dialogue. We were starting off in a different direction. And signaling that this is our version of Avatar: The Last Airbender."

10. Albert felt that including the Agni Kai between Zuko and Firelord Ozai, which was also not shown in the animated series, was needed to flesh out who Zuko is as a character.

"The Agni Kai is so important to Zuko's character, it really forms who he is. And that's the same in the animated series as well. They just didn't show it. And I can understand why, because it's very intense and emotional. And possibly a little too intense for say, a Nickelodeon audience. But for a Netflix serialized drama, which is intended to be for all ages of viewers from 10 to 80, it felt like it was appropriate to show that scene. To show exactly what it is that made Zuko into the person he is. That was something I always knew we were going to do. And I don't think anyone would argue that it isn't the linchpin to Zuko's character. Not showing it felt to me, a little bit irresponsible."

11. Tying Zuko's ship crew, and his intention of saving their lives, into the Agni Kai storyline was Albert's way of expanding on the original in a way that felt organic.

"That was a great example of our entire philosophy for this series, which is that we were drawing upon familiar elements from the original, but then pushing certain things a little bit further. Fans are gonna recognize a lot of the events and scenes in that episode from the original. But then we also extrapolated a little bit, and added elements that felt true to the spirit of the original, but hopefully adds a slightly new dimension. Making his crew the ones that he saved, it felt like it was right for the moment."

12. Changing the gender of Shu, and making the Omashu love story a tale of forbidden queer love felt "apt" to Albert.

"I remember even in the original when I was watching the tale of two lovers, I don't know why maybe I wasn't paying attention, I actually thought they were [both] women. And someone in the writers' room corrected me. So I said, 'Oh, well, it feels a little more right if they are women because it's supposed to be a forbidden romance.' Even in the original, there was a reason they couldn't be together. And they had to hide their love. Which ends tragically, but then leads to a piece of understanding. And for those reasons, it felt like making them both women actually was apt for this story."

13. When it came to casting, Albert wanted to make sure the actors were "ethnically and age-accurate."

"Our casting process was thorough. We saw a lot of great actors and great performers. We always knew it was going to be a challenge. Because we were all committed to making sure we were ethnically and age-accurate. We knew that we didn't want to cast a 20-year-old playing a 12-year-old, and we wanted to cast someone who was Asian. We always knew it was going to be tough."

14. The casting was done secretly, meaning none of the actors knew what they were auditioning for.

"It was even more challenging for them, because the casting process was conducted in top secret. They did not know they were auditioning for Avatar. And I had to write fake scenes for all of them. I think [the fake scenes] were about some math wiz applying to a private academy. Gordon, when he was auditioning, didn't know he was auditioning for anything."

15. There was never a doubt that Gordon Cormier should be cast as Aang, even after Albert auditioned several other actors for the role.

"When we saw people like Gordon, there was something about him that just captured the essence of the character. And we kept coming back to him even after we kept seeing other actors who were great. A lot of them were incredibly talented. But after every discussion I would have with the producers, we would always say something like, 'But what about Gordon.' And then we would come back to him, and we kept coming back to him. What we were looking for was a certain spark, a certain essence that said, 'This is who [Aang] is.' And that's what we kept seeing. It didn't matter what the scene was, it was just his personality, his overall character that was shining through. And I think you see that when you see the show. A lot of people I know are a little weary about our version of Aang. But when you watch it, and you see Gordon in his performance, I don't think there's any doubt. He doesn't even have to say a line of dialogue for him to be Aang. He could just give you a look, or a smile. And he's that way in person. He was like that on set every single day. I can't count the number of times crew members would come up to me and say, 'This kid is Aang.' Even when he's not on camera, he is Aang. Whether he was hopping on the back of a camera car, or running around with the other kids. We were incredibly happy that we found him, and all the others."

16. Although Sokka is less sexist at the beginning of the journey than his animated counterpart, Albert felt that they "preserved" his character growth in other ways.

"It wasn't a matter of, say, removing anything from his character. He still has a complex and nuanced journey. But in the process of going from an animated series, to a live-action, we knew that we wanted to portray his journey with a little more groundedness and subtlety. He starts out with attitudes that are the result of living in an isolated life and community. And yes, some of them are rooted in sexism. But he's not out there saying, 'Girls sew and guys hunt.' People have been reacting to comments without having seen the show. When you do watch it, I think it'll become clear that we've preserved Sokka's character, flaws and all. And he has a journey that's as complex as the one you saw in the original. It's just not a one-to-one."

17. Albert also felt that he had more room to build Sokka's character than his sister, Katara.

"Sokka was a character that there was a little more room to add to his character. Katara had trauma over her mother's death, and it's well told in the original. Sokka, we had to fill in the gaps a little bit more, especially for this first season. It was one of the things that struck us immediately. The question of imagining, if you're Sokka, and you're left alone by your father, to take care of your entire community at that young of an age. That's got to be a great burden. And what does that do to him, because his character is naturally lighthearted and funny, and a little bit goofy. But he's got this incredible responsibility to bear. And what does that do to someone? We play with that all season long until you get to the episode [with Koh]."

18. Bringing Azula into the first season as a main character, although that doesn't happen until the second season in the animated series, helped "dimensionalize" Zuko and his family.

"We had the benefit of hindsight, and we knew where the original series was going. And we knew what a great character both Ozai and Zula were going to be. And we wanted to pull a little of that into the first season just to balance out the storytelling a little bit. Creatively speaking, we wanted to use the characters of Azula and Ozai to help dimensionalize Zuko a little more, and then help us understand exactly how he became who he became outside of just the Agni Kai, and that traumatic event. Even though physically, Zuko and Azula are never together in the first season, it doesn't matter. You can still see how the dynamics of this family made him who he was, just like it made Azula who she was. In a way, the first season is a little bit of a prequel story for Azula because when she arrives in the cartoon in the second season, she's kind of fully formed as a character. Here we see a little more of her journey as to how she gets there."

19. Albert feels like the Zuko/Azula/Ozai relationship is representative of an Asian family dynamic. 

"And to me, it's very much an Asian story, not that it's limited only to Asian families. But that pressure to exceed the parental expectations. The sibling rivalry all feel, from my personal point of view, like an Asian story."

20. The actors went through an intense six-week boot camp to train for their fighting scenes

"We're incredibly fortunate in that both Dallas [Liu, Zuko] and Ian [Ousley, Sokka] came to us as incredibly accomplished martial artists. Both of them are world-class in their fields. They already knew what they were doing. And even with that, we put all four of them through a pretty intense boot camp before we even started shooting. It was about six weeks, where they trained with the stunt team every day, in order to learn all of the bending techniques."

21. Kiawentiio, who plays Katara, was more "tentative" at first about her action scenes but acclimated beautifully, which helped her character's progression on screen.

"For someone like Kiawentiio, who didn't have a background in martial arts, she started out a little more tentative, in terms of physical movements. But that worked for her character because Katara is not supposed to be an accomplished water bender at the beginning, and as the season progressed, and as Kiawentiio got better and better, Katara got better and better. It worked really well in terms of the progression of her character."

22. The massive action sequences were hard to pull off, and took a lot of set building and choreography.

"Some of the epic action sequences were challenging to do. Whether it's the escape from Pohuai, where we built an entire wall of that prison, and then also had bamboo ladders, and an army of stunt people going through all of that. It was tough. Also, the fights in the finale; the giant battle sequences between the Northern Water Tribe. For those we built a huge section of Agna Qel'a, with the bridge and the wall and scores of extras running through it, and fighting, that was incredibly challenging, as well. The Southern Air Temple fight in the very first episode was another epic undertaking. Those were all really challenging. We relied on the skills of the stunt teams and everyone involved to pull that off."

23. And lastly, Aang's first meeting and conversation with Zuko was the hardest scene to capture on an emotional scale for Albert.

"Emotionally speaking, certain scenes where I felt it was crucial to the season, and would be challenging for the performance [was filming] the scene between Zuko and Aang. The scene between Zuko and Aang, after the "Blue Spirit" episode, when they're hiding out together, away from the Fire Nation soldiers. The first bonding of them. I'll be honest, I was a little nervous going into that scene because I thought it was so important. It's the first time the two of them get to really talk. But once Gordon and Dallas started getting into it, all my weariness melted away because they were so good at it. They did the whole scene all the way through, and it was incredible to watch. But for me, if we didn't get that scene right, a lot of things wouldn't have worked for the season. Or, frankly, for the entire series. We needed to understand who these characters were, how they go from being enemies to having certain bonds, and how that sets the stage for everything else to come."

[illarian-rambling]

⚫️ for the OC ask game, for any character you’d like? Preferably one whose answer is a little morally ambiguous if you have any :)

⚫️ Black- When was a moment in your OC's life that they felt the most in control and secure? Was it gained through negative or positive means?

Morally ambiguous, huh? Well, I guess I get the chance to talk about that time Twenari almost became the BBEG of Honor's Outcasts >:)

(This will have spoilers, but I'll keep it vague)

So, at the end of book one, the quartet was in the Araunian desert reeling from an assassination attempt gone wrong. Izjik had just called on the power of End to kill their target and directly afterwards, she and Twenari had the clever idea of using Twenari’s magic to create body doubles of them in order to fake their own deaths and avoid the heat from the assassination. Pretty smart, except for the fact that by the time they left these perfect copies of their dead bodies there, Sepo and Djek had gotten worried and snuck back in to see if the ladies needed back up. I think you can see where this is going...

Suffice to say, Sepo took the sight of Izjik and Twenari dead on the ground very poorly and let his divine voice off its leash in one massive scream. This set quite the fire, but also nearly killed him because sirens really aren't supposed to channel the Voice without words to shape it. Djek dragged him out of the inferno and it was now that Izjik and Twenari returned after seeing the blaze in the distance. Everyone was very happy to see that they were all alive... except they weren't. By this time, Sepo had drowned on his own blood, and his heart had stopped.

Izjik went all but catatonic at this point. Djek directed Twenari to use her telekinesis to restart Sepo’s heart like a more exact form of CPR, but she just didn't have enough magical energy left.

However, there's this thing about the Araunian desert. People say it's 'poisonous', but in truth, it's home to a massive pool of rotting magic. More magical waste than ten thousand mages could produce in a lifetime. Enough to burn the world and everyone on it to cinders if properly channeled. Enough to make a new god or tear down an old one.

With no other option and despite the fact that the resulting sorcerer’s poison could easily kill her too, Twenari drew on this power and willed Sepo back to life. It was so easy. She wielded the power of a god, and when it came time to let it to, she couldn't.

For context, Twenari had escaped her mother’s clutches mere months ago. She was still being actively hunted by the woman. With that power in her hands, Twenari realized she could make it so no such injustices ever happened to people like her and her friends ever again. She realized that she could make it so people like Undeta were never born, she could make it so tyrants like the Silver Sovereign would never rise to power. She could make the world a utopia in the palm of her hand. She just needed to prune away the bad stuff first.

It was only when the pool of runoff magic started talking to her that Twenari realized what a slippery slope she was on. That if she instated herself as the mage-goddess of the world, then she'd be no better than Undeta, treating people like pawns and deciding who could live or die on a whim. She gave up the magic of Araun quickly before she could go back on her decision and passed out before she could reach out again.

Twenari doesn't really like to talk about this experience with her friends. She thinks being so tempted by it makes her like her mother deep down. And even if it frightens her, that moment will always be the only one where she felt truly in control of her life and destiny.

I think there's another universe out there where she didn't let go and Illaros is ruled by an immortal, omnipotent sorcerer-goddess who can see into everyone's mind, ready to strike them down for any evil thought, while the soul of whatever the Araunian runoff pool really is whispers in her ear. But it's not this universe, thankfully.

Thanks for the ask! This was a fun one - I always like talking about how Twenari balances massive amounts of power with morality :)

[autistic-gale-dekarios]

BG3 OC Lore: Hugo

Meet Hugo :) The first character I made in BG3 and still probably my fave. This post is all about him.

Basics

Full name: Hugo Lightquill (His chosen name -- he can't remember his birthname)

Race: High half-elf

Gender: M (trans) (he/him)

Birth date: 14 Flamerule 1451 DR (age ~41 during game events)

Class: Evocation Wizard

Background: Haunted One (Dark Urge)

Stats: 8 STR | 13 DEX | 15 CON | 17 INT | 12 WIS | 10 CHA

Moral alignment: NE (pre-game) / CN (early game) / NG (endgame)

Personality (MBTI, Enneagram): INFP, 6w5 ((self-insert spotted))

Neuro stuff: Autism, depression + anxiety, C-PTSD, dissociative amnesia

Sexuality: Gay

Romanced character: Gale (ship name: Weavequill)

Media

Tags: #oc: hugo (my posts about him); #hugo core (posts that are him coded)

Pinterest board

Character playlist

Weavequill playlist

A full rundown of his story is under the cut (CW for brief self-harm mention; spoilers for Dark Urge & general BG3 storyline)

Pre-game

Early life

Hugo was the only child of two high half-elves living in the Upper City of Baldur’s Gate. His father was a sorcerer and his mother was an apothecarist. He took an interest in arcane magic as a child and was encouraged by his parents to pursue it. He had a fairly sheltered upbringing, largely homeschooled by his father and private tutors.

Hugo was born and raised female, but from a young age he felt different. He struggled with many aspects of his identity and sense of self. By his early teens, he was suffering not only crippling gender dysphoria, but also intrusive thoughts of violence that seemingly came from nowhere. The dysphoria and the Urges were equally distressing to Hugo, and slowly became intertwined, inseparable -- the desire to remake himself, and the desire to unmake others.

Deeply confused by and ashamed of these feelings, Hugo never confided in anyone, and grew increasingly withdrawn throughout his teen years. Hugo didn't understand where the Urge came from, but he knew he had to conceal it at any cost. What few friendships he’d made as a youngster disintegrated, and he avoided getting close to people in an effort to protect himself from the world, and the world from himself.

Hugo began writing as a coping mechanism. He would bring a notebook wherever he went, write down his most shameful thoughts and feelings and urges, and hide them away. He would draw, too -- producing increasingly grotesque illustrations that came so automatically, it often felt like his hands had a mind of their own -- and he would terrify himself with some of the things he created.

For a time, pen and paper were his lifeline. But despite his best efforts to vent in this way, the Urges eventually proved too much, and Hugo sought more material ways to satisfy them. He started by hurting himself, then moved onto small animals -- mice, birds, anything to quiet the screaming in his head. It was getting harder to control his behaviour, and Hugo noticed he'd started losing himself sometimes -- blacking out and then coming to minutes later with little to no memory of what just happened.

To the rest of the world, Hugo was growing into a promising young wizard -- a bit of a weird kid, perhaps, but undeniably talented. At 18, he applied to Blackstaff Academy but didn't make the cut (to the disappointment of his father). Instead, Hugo pursued an apprenticeship in the literature department of Sorcerous Sundries. He was getting by, just about, but he felt like he was constantly hanging by a thread, and the slightest push could tip him over into the dark.

Cult of Bhaal

The final push came when Hugo was walking home from work one night. Sceleritas Fel approached him on the street and promised him everything he wanted. Sceleritas somehow knew all of Hugo's secrets, and spoke of a "powerful god" who could offer him a new body and a new life. He promised acceptance and belonging -- a place where Hugo wouldn’t have to hide who he was. Afraid and desperate and with little fight left in him at this point, Hugo followed Sceleritas to the Temple of Bhaal, and never returned home.

Hugo had known very little of Bhaal and his followers before this point, but he was re-educated quickly. He was told of his birthright and his "purpose" as the one true Bhaalspawn. He agreed to become the new leader of Bhaal's cult. In return, Bhaal resculpted Hugo’s body into a male form, and offered him a new name, which was to be respected without question within the Temple. Hugo felt truly himself and truly seen for the first time in his life. He believed this was proof of Bhaal’s love for him, and felt indebted to him.

With his new corporeal form, a sense of purpose, and nothing of sufficient value to return to outside, Hugo remained in the Temple, where he was groomed into a Bhaalist poster child, a merciless killer. Violence was rewarded, everything else stamped out; his magical abilities honed to enact the Dread Lord's will. Even in the depths of depravity, he retained his habit of writing -- he became known for writing and drawing in blood, even using it as quill ink. Hugo spent the next two decades as Bhaal’s Temple leader and, eventually, Bhaal’s Chosen.

During game

When Orin infected Hugo with the tadpole, the damage to his brain made him regress to an earlier state of consciousness. He lost not only his memories and much of his powers, but also the ruthless aggression that he’d learned from Bhaal. When he woke up on the nautiloid, he was his fragile younger self again -- alone, afraid, and tormented by shame and self-loathing.

Hugo began Act 1 with no moral compass, and tended to act in self-preservation above anything else. Meeting Gale and bonding over magic with him helped Hugo relearn what it meant to be good and rediscover those principles within himself.

Gale was Hugo’s first love and his first healthy sexual relationship. They were both grounding forces for the other: Gale’s gentleness was a foil for Hugo’s violence, and Hugo’s caution a foil for Gale’s hubris. Despite them both being wizards, their first time was decidedly free of magical enhancements. Hugo just wanted to be close to Gale, to feel loved in the purest and simplest way. They didn’t just bring out the best in one another, they saved each other from their respective catastrophic acts of self-destruction. (I Can Fix Him, He Can Fix Me, Fixing Him Will Fix Me, Fixing Me Will Fix Him, etc.)

Throughout game events, Hugo suffered incessant nightmares, flashbacks and hallucinations of the horrors he'd inflicted in his past. These were especially distressing early on, when he had no context for them. While he did his best to control himself, the bloodthirsty side of him would sometimes emerge. (He’d always get a little crazed in the heat of battle, which Gale found disconcerting and also kinda hot.)

After the revelation about Hugo’s past involvements with Gortash and the Absolute, Gale distanced himself from Hugo for a while, and Hugo fell deep into depression, convinced he had blown his only chance at finding real love. However, the two became close again toward the end of Act 3, when Hugo convinced Gale not to pursue godhood and Gale realised how much they really needed each other to not lose touch with themselves.

Aside from Gale, Hugo got along well with the rest of the party. He became especially close friends with Shadowheart, bonding over their similar experiences of being groomed into a cult, losing their memories and having to relearn how to be good.

As Hugo regained his powers and his memories, he felt more and more able to resist his Urge. After defeating Orin, he rejected Bhaal and went on to destroy the Absolute, saving Baldur’s Gate from the evil he had once created. Only then did the weight of Hugo’s guilt finally begin to lift.

After their victory, Hugo persuaded Gale to leave the Crown of Karsus where it fell, and with it any prospect of ascension. Walking away from their respective pasts, Hugo and Gale decided that their ordinary, mortal love was more powerful and valuable than anything their former gods could offer. <3

Post-game

Shortly after game events, Hugo and Gale got engaged and went back to Waterdeep. In a long letter to his parents, Hugo apologised for leaving all those years ago, came clean about who he was, and invited them to his wedding. They both attended.

With the orb quelled, Gale returned to Blackstaff as a professor, with Hugo initially staying at home and helping Tara clean up Gale’s neglected tower. After a year in Waterdeep and with a shining commendation from Gale, Hugo secured a position on the Blackstaff faculty as a co-director of their magical archives, specialising in blood magic and evocation scrolls and tomes.

Hugo stayed friends with Shadowheart for many years, and she became like a surrogate sister to him. She came to visit him and Gale for dinner every so often, where they'd talk her ears off about their work while she fussed over Tara and only half-listened.

Hugo continued writing, and went on to publish a memoir and several text books on what he’d learnt from his dealings with Bhaal and the Absolute -- all of which took pride of place on Gale’s bookshelf.

Trivia

Hugo’s favourite colour is powder blue, his favourite season is spring, his favourite food is mushroom soup and his favourite animals are pigeons.

Hugo is a good cook and he and Gale regularly cook together.

Hugo is a nerd. He loves to learn and, once he comes out of his shell, he loves to talk about things he has learned (though he'll never compete with Gale's levels of infodumping).

Hugo has a soft spot for animals, perhaps partly out of remorse for hurting them in the past. Once he settled down with Gale he decided to stop eating animals, volunteered at a local stray shelter, and cooked vegetarian meals for Gale until he liked them too. He also conjured his first familiar -- a large black raven called Leopold.

Hugo is a very subby bottom and he has a praise kink

Characters that inspired Hugo include: me, Viktor Hargreeves (TUA), Frodo Baggins (LOTR), Donnie Darko, Father Paul (Midnight Mass), Will Byers (Stranger Things) and the Tin Man (The Wizard of Oz).

If you're still reading, thank you for being interested :') Feel free to send asks about Hugo (or any of my OCs!) because I will always welcome the opportunity to yap. I'll make similar posts for my other 3 tavs at some point soon.

[vacantgodling]

Hey hey! Okay so youre my newest followed writeblr, and i absolutely followed because of a post where you were talking about a WIP, i think you called it teardrops? Anyways, it tore my damn heart out and i DESPERATELY wanna hear more if you wanna talk about it?

FIRSTLY that makes me very very soft thank you so much for following cuz of that story its v special to me (despite talking about a thing i hate personally—the ocean LMAO)

but in this i also realized that i never actually talked about what the plot of teardrops is.... so this is as good an excuse as any.

SO, the full title of this wip is called teardrops of the gods.

it takes place in my big ol shared wip world in this country (doesn't have a name yet tho) & in the western sea <- that way lol

and the plot is as follows:

Ancient Sea Glass or Teardrops of the Gods are relics believed to have been shed by The Great Kraken, essentially the creator of the world in this island's mythos. Its body was split apart to create the land that people stand on and the sea glass is rumored to be the last remnants left of its ancient power. Pirates and adventurers have searched for the sea glass for ages because of its supernatural properties:

(1) If you take out your eye and replace it with sea glass, it allows you to control the whims of other's minds and bodies like puppets.

(2) If you wear as a ring on your hand you can control water and the ocean around you. Cities will crumble under your might.

(3) If you collect 5 and leave them under the light of The Wolf Moon, they will light the way to an underwater city which holds The Kraken's Heart and those who consume it gain immortality.

The location of teardrops themselves is a mystery. Few have solved the legendary riddle that conceals their location:

In the nail of the ocean under the sea Guided by the moon's light Beneath its flesh this bounty lies For those whose eyes are bright Should you manage to sneak beneath And its plunder yours in sight Beware your temples, oh brave sailor Lest you fall down and die

However... there has been one man and his crew that have managed it; the crew of the nefarious and bloodthirsty Captain Ghost Eye; and the key to how he did it lay within his son and our main character QUILL, who he abandoned at 14 to die amid the desert regions of a foreign land unknown. And unbeknownst to Ghost Eye, Quill survived, making it to (insert country here) and laying low, mingling with locals such as Cinnamon (Cinn) and Mz.

.... But the call of the sea is strong. And as Ghost Eye begins plundering down the coast, looking for him, Quill knows that he has to face his destiny.

so as a shorter summary with more details about Quill beloved (with a bit of spoilers):

Quill is a half-merman son of a Daughter of the Sea (a mermaid goddess and daughter of The Great Kraken) and the most fearsome pirate lord on the sea, Ghost Eye. the young goddess was captured and brutalized until she finally produced a child and perished giving birth to him. Quill was then raised by the pirate lord in squalor until at 14 they finally discovered the answer to the sea glass riddle and he was thrown overboard to retrieve the sea glass, or die. The fact that he's part merman is actually integral as to how he was able to snag just One sea glass, however, he had to return to the surface before he could regain more.

At the time, Ghost Eye only desired one sea glass to put in his eye, so he then marooned Quill to die in a desert (no access to water would kill him faster than a normal human) but he was saved when he was found by a caravan and he managed to make his way all the way up to coast where the story starts. unfortunately i haven't named the town or country yet Rip BUT we move. his nature makes him long for the call of the sea but he knows if his father learns that he is alive, he’ll either capture him again or try to kill him, so he ignores his nature for years… at least until finally word of his father's tearing down towns reaches his ears and quill realizes he can't hide anymore.

[jesuis-melodrama]

Excuse me please, I have a question that I would like to ask. What do you think the Gabriel Agreste brand would look like in real life, or just in general? I ask this because I'm a newbie when it comes to fashion and because I want the fic that i'm writing, Émerveiller, to tid bits of fashion in it. I want to really understand how to talk about Gabriel as a brand and fashion in in my fics. I want to write a Gabriel who does Haute Couture and not Fast Fashion. How I write him will be up for debate, but the part that I really don't want to get wrong is the fashion aspect. I say this because fashion itself is an integral part of Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir so for my Miraculous fic, I really want be close with my writing of Gabriel as the brand and other fashion oriented characters.

I ask this of you because when I read your fics you have seem to have a way with describing fashion that I really like. Especially when talking about the Gabriel brand or talking about the things that Lila and Adrien wear.

Sorry about asking this her, but I couldn't find the ask on your other blogs. You don't have to answer If you don't want to just wanted to get this out there.

Also this Regaluns_Imagination the who wrote Émerveiller if your wondering.

Thank You, Regalun.

Not, it's completely fine, I'm quite happy to answer any question related to fashion.

Opinion first: Miraculous Ladybug is a show centred on fashion, but I personally don't think it does so particularly well, because a lot of the fashion is abysmal and because fashionable character never get a chance to show their talent. Marinette, for example, makes one-off hats and honestly uninspiring unisex fashion lines and Gabriel, even though he owns a fashion maison, there's never any episodes devoted to his career. Adrien walks down the catwalk wearing the same suit in three seasons. Fashion isn't a focus in Miraculous Ladybug, it's a backdrop for the superhero business. In fact, I think fans are a lot more fashion-focused than the writers themselves, a lot of their designs do surpass canon.

Back onto topic: If you want to write haute couture, you should know that it's not just a fashion term to be thrown around, there's strict guidelines on what kind of fashion can be considered haute couture. The Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture is a French governing body who, alone, has the power to decide what can legally be sold as haute couture. Fashion houses has to follow strict rules such as:

Designs must be one-of-a-kind, and the buyer must attend up to five fittings.

An atelier that must employ at least 15 full-time staff.

50 original designs must be created during each biannual fashion season.

Not all luxury fashion is haute couture. Dior, CHANEL, and Fendi are haute couture. Bulgari, Loewe, and Acne Studio are not. A big thing about haute couture is that it must be one-of-a-kind. No buyer wants to spend around 25,000 euros on a dress only to realise someone else can wear it as well. All the dresses and suits you see on the MET Gala red carpet, for example, are haute couture made for that specific celebrity only. They now own the dress and its design, and no one else can ever wear something similar.

Haute couture is also, rightfully, accused of being Euro-centric. Because of its demands and Paris-based governmental body, most fashion houses considered haute couture are French, Italian, and Spanish. The only Asian haute couture designer I know is Yuima Nakazako.

Haute couture is different from prêt-à-porter, or ready-made fashion, where the clothes are mass-produced in general sizes such as small, medium, or large, and your favourite pair of Versace pink satin pumps can also be someone else's favourite pair of Versace pink satin pumps.

According to Thomas Astruc, Gabriel Agreste is as famous as Jean-Paul Gaultier, Yves Saint Laurent, or Michael Kors. But that statement doesn't give us an idea of how Gabriel designs, only what kind of fashion designer he's as famous as.

Personally Gabriel Agreste seems like the very classic Parisian, black-and-white chic to me. I also do think YSL when I see him, but only because Adrien would look amazing in Saint Laurent.

In a lot of my fics, Adrien wears YSL's legendary smoking jacket and Wyatt harness boots.

I hope this helps and let me know if you need any more help :).

[atomsphotography]

Tamar Burduli

Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you got into photography?

My driving character trait is curiosity and, by proxy, exploration. Inner and outer world exploration. Unsurprisingly, my profession is research. Of people and societies. I am most interested in feminist anthropology.

I don’t remember why I got drawn to taking photos but I remember begging my mom for any digital camera when I was 14-15. She got it for me which was huge because we were really poor. I was curious and tried so many things as a child and I don’t really remember or know exactly why photography was one of the very few I stuck with. The digital photos were of such poor quality and I would play with them in Photoshop and could do that for hours. Then around when I was around 20 a good friend gifted me a film camera and that’s when everything really started. I loved the limits of the film camera, where you had just a few levers and options and you had to make the best out of it. That you had to wait for it to be developed and anticipate what the results would look like which could be anything. There are still often cases where the film or the photograph ‘burns’ or just turns out blurry (I am myopic) or just bad, and that is a whole another exciting adventure for me as I start playing with the colors, figures, layers, and turn an allegedly bad, unusable, unlikeable thing into a surreal, beautiful one and both the process and the end result of all of it are so pleasurable, I cannot fathom.

What inspires you to create your art, and how do you approach the creative process?

I think it all started from escapism. Trying to find peace and focus, or focused peace of mind amidst the oppressive micro, meso, and macro environments that tended to put me down so much. I guess this is still the main theme and process for me, trying to find places where I feel the calmest and the wholest and take with me the fragments that produce this feeling (the feeling that feels like a place that is home).

Can you tell us about your favorite subjects to photograph, and why you're drawn to them?

My main theme from the genesis was nature. I did experiment with portraits for a bit and while those photographs are some of the most powerful and most favorite images I have made over the years, my heart, my mind and my body belongs to nature, the earth, the trees, the grass, the sky, the waters, the sun and the moon and all the living things in an out. All my summers and winters as a child I was spending in the mountains where the scenery was insanely beautiful. In summer in the city, I used to sleep on the balcony under the stars and the sky. And when I was at the most painful time in my life as an adult, nature was the only thing that was able to bring pieces of serenity to my mind. Every time I enter a forest, I instantly feel my body dissolving into it, I feel as one whole with it, serene and happy. All social constructs instantly shake off of me and I remain as pure me, one with nature, perfect solitude. Touching cold grass under my foot is one of the most favorite feelings of this lifetime, dissolving all my anxiety and hopelessness. Many times I have cried when seeing landscapes so striking that were just pinching my heart in the right places.

Can you walk us through your creative process, from idea to execution?

The only thing I do is try to travel as much as possible.

How do you stay inspired and motivated as a photographer, and what do you do when you're feeling creatively stuck?

The current human world is so devastating, killing everything beautiful on this earth and the earth itself too. I feel like each of us is forced to constantly look for something, anything that sets at least some of the negative impact of this limitless human greed off. So staying motivated to travel to nature, to find peace and shelter, and to try to capture and bring some of it back home, to concrete jungle, is easy, a default condition even.

If I am stuck, I just wait. I don’t force it. I trust the back of my mind to process whatever it needs to and to prompt me to pick up and do whatever comes next.

Flickr

Behance

Instagram

[bluewavesofchange]

Another leaf on the tree

I don't own Yugioh or it's characters

Prologue

When thinking of life and the many events and choices that have guided us to where we are, we always wonder what would have happened had things turned out differently…if we had chosen to stay home instead of going to that party where we met the love of our lives and end up married years later…if we had chosen to go to one college instead of the other…if we had just taken a second to throw a cup in the bin instead of letting it fall to the ground to be forgotten…we wonder if even the most insignificant events or decisions in our lives could’ve led to a different part in life, like a tree with all its branches flowing into different directions, each one having its own story to tell with its numerous leaves or lack thereof, a nest with newly hatched chicks or eggs waiting to greet the new world…

 

So what happens when a story we’ve already been through takes a different turn…when one fleeting glance leads to a change of heart, causing a domino effect that would affect the lives of many of our heroes…

 

Many have lived their lives with the obvious delusion that life is a spectacular and mesmerising thing to wonder through. Brought into this world as a small, fragile, yet beautiful infant who has a warm hearted, loving and beyond beautiful mother. Whose eyes are bejewelled with a light that scare away any evil in your precious little heart. And don't forget her humble smile, her lips curved into a perfect crescent moon that gives passage to softly spoken words such as 'I love you' in a voice that's calm and subtle, like the gentle breeze of an Autumn morning. And beside her is a father. A powerful yet meek man whose firm yet welcoming grip brought you up over the many years, a man who guided you over the unpredictable, treacherous and hard road of life. Always there to catch you when you stumble and break down. His unforgettable words, spoken in a humble tone but still coated in love...if only that were true for me...

 

I had the misfortune of being brought into the cruel, withering and cold piece of hell screaming, alone and afraid. The woman, who sadly carried me in her doomed body for 9 long months, was released from her mortal existence mere moments before I was pulled out of the warm, protective womb where I was created, into the hell that is called the world. The man, who was supposedly married to the now empty and lifeless woman, a man whom I was supposed to call father, a coward who left behind a small, vulnerable baby girl...he left her lying in the incubator...alone...nameless...unwanted...afraid...a nothing with no one to hold her as her terrified and glass shattering broken screams and cries echoed throughout the chilling white halls of the hospital that stood short amongst the square giants that formed the brightly lit city. Its crowded streets and busy roads, the load hooting of taxi's, the busy and singled minded people shouting their lungs out, dulled out the heart broken cries of the abandoned and neglected little girl...the broken cries of a confused and trembling little me...

 

...learning at only an hour old...

 

...what loneliness and brokenness really was...

 

The doctors said I was born a tiny baby, small enough to fit into a handbag like those barking rats the celebrities prance around with. I was born with skin whiter than the first snowflake of winter and smoother than a porcelain doll. Dark wavy curls covered my scalp, each gentle curl facing a different direction like a bunch of waddling penguins. Born with a small mouth, it was hard to believe that something so tiny could produce such an ear bursting sound. And the eyes...the kind, small and skinny nurse who had taken care of me, said she had never seen such eyes before...a deep blue shade that could have been mistaken for sapphires. These two orbs of beauty that held such innocence and purity...also held so much hurt and agony at such a tender age...already knowing that the world was a cruel place...that the spiked claws of darkness and despair would always try to snuff out the light of happiness and goodness...dragging away everything you have...until you are completely alone...like me...

 

I was left at an orphanage a week after I was born and given the name Lillian. The place was cold like everything else on this retched planet. The walls were covered in scarlet red wallpaper that was already peeling from years of clinging to the hollow wooden walls. The floors were puzzled over by brown and grey tiles, several being missing or cracked or shattered. The ceiling had more mold and stains on it than an ancient tree in the rain forest. The smell was terrible due to the other orphans never cleaning properly and the smell of rotten eggs and urine was always around us. We were stuffed into any room that had even a crumb of space, sleeping on rotten old mattresses that were donated who knows when, some not even fitting on the rusted metal bed frames that cradled them...but that's not even the worst part...

 

The worst part was the other kids I had to stay with. I don't think some of them had a single good bone in their bodies. The oldest kid was always the one in charge. And that was Markiato. He was 13, never was considered for adoption, not once because of what a jerk he was to everyone. He had filthy blond hair that I don't think was ever washed. He carried around an old baseball bat that he used to install fear in everyone. He was tanned or should I rather say he was sun burned with dark brown eyes that dug out your soul and filled you with terror whenever he glared at you. Not to mention he was basically a giant, tallest kid in the orphanage and leader of the "B.O.B", that stood for "Bad Orphan Boys". Creative, I know. They were a group of boys that followed him around like he was a fricking king. They did whatever he said and beat up anyone they didn't like. I guess they must have really hated me, because ever since I got there, I had been their punching bag. And you would have thought that the caretakers of the orphanage would have done something about this. Maybe they could have stopped the older kids from beating the crap out of us but no. Whenever someone went to go complain about getting hurt or their stuff being taken away, the care takers would just shove them away and told them to go play or that it was just part of growing up. Yeah, it’s part of growing up to have someone hit you in the stomach with a bat and then beat you as you fall to the ground...

 

...the only time we were somewhat safe was when they sent us to school...

 

...but even that place had its list of problems and horrors...

 

...if it wasn't the kids at the orphanage beating us up...

 

...it would be the kids at school...

 

But there was a time when my life at that hell hole was actually good. I was 9 years old when I first really experienced happiness. The day was like any other day, winter was coming to an end, the snow had started to melt some time ago and the weather was still extremely cold. The paper thin blankets that had more holes than Swiss cheese and smelled worse than a public bathroom at a train station was the only source of warmth we got.

I was sitting on the bench by the window between two bare and leafless bushes, starring down at the dead and dusty ground, hugging my faded lavender sweater tightly to keep warm. It's not that I ever minded the cold, but it helped me feel less lonely somehow. The sound of the creaking gate that stood at the front of the orphanage was heard and the other kids rushed towards it. This could only mean one of two things...new arrivals had come or someone was coming to adopt. It wasn't odd that we got new kids arriving a few times a week; it was the fact that there were so little of us leaving this horrible place. I guessed nobody really wanted kids these days. Sighing, I got up from my seat and headed to the gate with the others to see what was going on. I had already given up hope of getting adopted. Too many times had families come looking for a child and they would just look me over. Maybe there was something wrong with me...I really was unwanted...even around the orphanage everyone called me "Lonely Lilly"...cause nobody wanted to come near me and I was always seen sitting by myself...

 

As I reached the gate, the other kids had started heading back to the playground already, clearly disappointed. I guess that meant that no one was here to adopt. I saw the two boys that had arrived. The tall one had brown chestnut hair and sweet blue eyes. He wore a yellow button-up shirt with a blue pullover, plain black jeans and a pair of white sneakers. The smaller boy that stood beside him had raven black long messy hair and soft grey eyes. He wore a green button-up shirt, grey shorts and a pair of purple trainers with knee high socks. They didn't talk to anyone as one of the caretakers led them into the building to show them around and assign them a room. I headed back to the lonely little bench by the window, thinking of the two boys that had arrived. They were most likely brothers considering they both arrived at together and looked, well a little alike I guess. Were they abandoned like me or did their parents pass away? Or did their parents do something bad and now they have to stay here? Why did I even care? Not like it really mattered to me what the story was with each kid that came and went from this place. Most of the time, the others left me alone and that was just fine with me. I didn't need anyone and didn't want anyone...I was fine with being alone...because that's all I would ever be.

 

A few hours passed and I was still sitting in my usually place when Markiato and his gang of mindless idiots came to pester me. Markiato stood in front of the others, holding that stupid bat under his right arm as he sneered down at me, making me shudder.

 

"Well, well...if it isn't little lonely Lilly."

 

He said with a chuckle, I hugged myself defensively, not wanting to aggravate him in case he tried to smash my skull in with his wooded beating stick.

 

"What do you want Markiato?"

 

I stuttered as I stared down at the ground, not wanting to make eye contact with the mammoth in front of me.

 

"Just wanted to spend a little time with my favourite little loser..."

 

He kept grinning as he reached out to lift my chin, making me look right into those horrible eyes. I quickly hit his hand away and got up keeping my gaze away from the rest of the boys.

 

"Just go away Markiato..."

 

I spoke softly as I turned to quickly leave but found myself surrounded by the rest of his menacing gang. Looking around as fear started to build inside me as I could find no way out of the circle of boys surrounding me. Each one having a nasty smile on their unwashed faces. Markiato slowly approached me again, grabbing hold of my jersey collar and pulled me towards him. The smell of onion rings and fish leaked from his mouth as he smirked at me, his yellow teeth fitting precisely in the frame of his lips. Instantly I began to feel sick.

 

"Now why would I go away? We're just having some fun right? Besides you seemed so lonely sitting here all by yourself."

 

Snickering as he spoke, I tried to pull free from his iron grip but it was no use. He saw me struggle and the impending fear that was growing within me as I began to tremble. Shoving me hard onto the cold hard ground and dirtying my jersey in the process. My eyes filled with tears of pain and fear as I lifted myself up with my arms, shaking as I stared at the ground watching the shadows of the boys around me. Twirling the bat in his hand, I could see him looking around at the other boys...

 

"You know fellas...maybe we should put her out of her misery? Send her back to where she came from..."

 

He slowly circled me, still twirling the bat mockingly before reaching down, his empty crusty hand grabbing my hair and pulling me up. Letting out a cry of pain, I grabbed his wrist, trying to ease the sudden burst of pain on my scalp.

 

"Pl-please st-stop!"

 

I yelled at him before he threw me to the ground again, landing face first in the dirt and scrapping my cheek. I weakly tried to hold myself up again, my hair falling over my face as a tear ran down my cheek, listening to the other kids laughing and mock me...I wanted to die right there and then...I just couldn't take it anymore...I wanted it all to stop...I wanted it all to just...go...away...

 

Just as Markiato raised the bat over his head to strike me, I knew nobody would come help me...nobody cared about me...I closed my eyes...waiting for the pain to come...when...

 

..."Leave her alone!"...

 

I heard someone calling from a distance followed by the sound of someone running towards us. Slowly I opened my eyes, glancing up ever so slightly at who was coming. And I was astounded to see that the boy who had arrived a few hours ago, sprinting towards me with his brother not far behind him. Markiato and the other boys turned towards him as he stopped just a few feet in front of the circle of boys. The blond beast started chuckling,

 

"Well, well, what do we have here? Prince charming coming to save his pathetic excuse of a princess?"

 

The boys began to laugh as I just looked back down at the ground.

 

"I said leave her alone. Go back to playing king of the idiots you freak."

 

The yellow shirted boy said as he took another step forward, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. The others went silent, their expressions becoming shocked. What was he doing? Did he want to get himself killed? Markiato tightened the grip on his bat.

 

"What did you just call me runt?" he growled through his teeth.

 

The kid didn't even flinch or look scared of the towering bully in front of him.

 

"I called you a big fat freak..."

 

…and with that said, he slammed his fist into Markiato's stomach, causing the taller boy to fall over like an old oak tree being cut down. And dropping the baseball bat that he held in the process. The boys standing around me looked at the kid slightly frighten as he had just taken down their so called mighty leader. Quickly they ran away like a flock of pigeons flying away after being chase by a small child, leaving behind their fallen comrade.

 

The boy slowly approached me; I kept my gaze down, not really knowing what to do...

 

..."Hey are you ok?"...

 

...I looked up to see him kneeling in front of me, with his hand stretched out to me, offering to help me up. Still scared, I took his hand, not really knowing why I trusted this kid. He got up helping me up as I muttered softly, "I-I'm fine..." He noticed the scrape on my cheek, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and gently wiped away the dirt surrounding the wound. I whimpered softly, pulling back slightly at the contact of the fabric on my raw skin.

 

"Hey, it's ok. I'm not going to hurt you."

 

He said in a soft spoken voice as he smiled at me. He reached out a second time and this time I didn't pull away, letting him clean my cheek...

 

"Th-thank you...for saving me...even though you didn't have to..." I spoke shyly as I kept my gaze away from his.

 

"It's ok. I just don't like seeing people pick on those weaker than themselves."

 

He said with a smile. Blushing at the comment, I looked up, glaring at him slightly, "Are you saying I'm weak?"

 

He chuckled and kept smiling that stupid smile,

 

"No. I'm just saying I don't like seeing people getting bullied. Especially if it's a cute girl."

 

I could have sworn I saw him blush too, making me giggle for a bit before going silent again, realizing his hand was still on my cheek. He must have noticed this too as he quickly retracted his hand away from my face. It felt weird...to have someone care about you...it felt good...almost enough to make me smile...

 

..."So what's your name?" he asked...

 

...not many of the other kids in the orphanage really knew my name...besides those who picked on me...

 

..."Um...I'm L-Lillian..." I answered shyly...

 

"Lillian? That's a pretty name."

 

The small boy that stood behind his brother answered with a sweet smile,

 

"I'm Mokuba and this is my big brother Seto. Hey wanna be friends with us? My big brother can keep you safe from the kids who bully you..."

 

...friends...

 

...nobody had ever wanted to be friends with me...let alone wants be around me...

 

Before I could even answer him, Mokuba grabbed my hand and pulled me over to the red and yellow swing set, Seto following close behind us. We spent the afternoon playing together and many days after that. We became close, Seto taught me how to play chess, while Mokuba taught me how to be a kid. I was never kid actually. I mostly spent my days lost in thought instead of playing. I had friends for the first time in my petty little life and for the first time I could actually truly smile and laugh. They had welcomed me into their lives without a second thought and they accepted me for who I was and they cared about me, and soon I came to care about them just the same.

 

For the first time in a very long time I felt something warm with in my heart...I felt...happy in some way...I felt like maybe...just maybe there was hope for me. That maybe I wasn't meant to be alone forever. Mokuba and Seto had given me something much more than just their friendship...they had given me hope, hope that I had long since been forgotten. Hope that my life would become better; a hope that someday I would get adopted and would find a family that loved me and that would take care of me.

 

 

Almost a year has now passed since Seto and Mokuba had arrived at the orphanage and my world had changed. We became like a family and promised that we would always be together no matter what. I was no longer bullied and Markiato and his band of idiots left me alone. Things were going great and I was happy...sadly the day I had always dreaded came...the day Seto and Mokuba were taken away from me...the day they were adopted.

 

When news got out that the CEO of a big corporation was coming to visit the orphanage, Seto started coming up with a plan. It was odd seeing him this way...serious and almost never smiling. In the first few months that he and Mokuba were here, he seemed mostly happy, trying to keep a smile on his face for Mokuba's sake. However he started to change...it seemed that he was growing up too fast, but who could blame him. He had a little brother to take care of. Seto had once told me that the reason for him turning down so many families that wanted to adopt him was that he wouldn't leave without his brother and that he wanted to make sure that whoever adopted them was well off and would never suffer financially. So when word got out that Gozaburo Kaiba was coming to the orphanage, Seto started to finalise his plan. Since Gozaburo was not only well known for his title in the business industry, he was also well known for his skills in the game of chess, (not that anyone could match the skills of my...I mean...nevermind).

 

So the plan was that when Mr. Kaiba arrived, Seto would challenge him to a game of chess, in exchange if Seto won, then Gozaburo would have no choice but to adopt him and Mokuba, both of them becoming the children of one of the most powerful business tycoons in the country. Seto seemed so perfectly certain that his plan would work...however there was one thing he left out of the equation...he left out...me...

 

It was the day before Mr. Kaiba would be arrive and I would have to say goodbye to the only friends I ever had. I was sitting by myself on the swing set, a growing pain spreading in my heart. I held in my emotions as best I can, I didn't want to upset the two boys, especially when there was a chance that they could have a better life. But it still hurt...my only family was possibly going to leave and I would be where I was in the beginning...alone...but that wasn't the only reason why I was upset today. You see today was my birthday, I was turning 10 and you know what they say about orphans who are 10 or older...there's no chance of them being adopted. And not to mention, my birthday was a reminder that I was unwanted and would always be alone...Seto was a year younger than me and Mokuba was about 5 years old...

 

I was staring down at the ground when Seto came over and sat on the swing next to mine. It was obvious he had seen that I was looking rather down today. Not making any eye contact with him, I just wanted to be left alone...

 

"Well, Mokuba seems rather excited about tomorrow. I mean...both of us would have a chance to have a good life and we would never have to suffer again..."

 

I could feel him smiling as he spoke. His words cut me very deep with the mention of them leaving. I bit my lip, holding back the tears...

 

"That's great. I-I'm happy for you two..." I mumble trying not to show any signs of sadness. However, Seto knew me too well. He could easily pick up when I was upset and when I was happy. He could read me like a book. He turned towards me, the smile fading from his face,

 

"Hey, are you ok? You seem a little down."

 

I could hear the hint of concern in his voice as he spoke. I didn't answer; I didn't want to talk to him right now...like I said...I wanted to be alone. I could sense him processing what could be wrong, spending so much time with him and Mokuba had given us the ability to pick up when any of us were deep in thought and what they were feeling, we knew each other too well to have any secrets between us...and it was at that moment when I knew he figured it out, or I thought he did. His expression changed to that of someone who had forgotten something important...

 

..."Oh that's right, it's your birthday."

 

He smiled softly as he took my hand in his, "Is that why you're upset? You thought I forgot something as important as your birthday?"

 

He got up out of the swing and kneeled down in front of me, still holding my hand, trying to look at my face. I still tried hard to stay emotionless, but it was getting difficult with each passing second that he was near me. At the moment I hated him, I hated him for the way how he could make me open up, I hated him for the fact that he gave me happiness, I hated him for the way he made me feel and most of all, I hated him for wanting to leave me behind and steal away my happiness. I finally broke as a tear run down my cheek; this didn't go unnoticed by him.

 

"Did I say something wrong?" he asked concerned. I jerked my hand away and got up, "JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!" I yelled as I ran to my room, slamming the door behind me. I sat in the cold, dusty corner in the room and I hugged my knees to my chest and buried my face in my arms and cried. I cried and cried, not caring who heard me. I poured out my heart through my tears, I was broken and it was his fault. He gave me hope that I could be happy, that I would never have to be alone again; he gave me the feeling of what a family was. It was his entire fault; it was his fault for making me hurt so much. He broke my heart, he broke me. I hated him! I hated Seto and I would never forgive him for abandoning me just like my parents did...

 

I didn't hear the door opening as the sounds of my shattered cries deafened the sounds around me. I only saw the shadow of someone entering the room and it wasn't hard to tell who it was.

 

"G-go a-away S-Seto. I-I wanna b-be alone..." I stuttered in between my sobs.

 

I didn't notice the box he was carrying with him. Without saying anything he sat beside me, setting the box down and wrapped his arms around me, embracing me in a warm hug. As much as I hated him right now, he always knew just how to make me feel better. He rubbed my back in little circles, trying to soothe my pain. I didn't stop crying, I couldn't stop myself from letting out the past 10 years of pain I went through. I let out all the anger, all the hurt, and all the sadness, everything I held back for all those years. I wanted it all to just go away...I wanted to be alone...because that is where I would be by night fall tomorrow...and every other night there after...

 

..."You're upset because Mokuba and I are leaving tomorrow...am I right?"...

 

I looked up at him to see his eyes closed as he faced downwards. I didn't expect him to say anything. His eyes slowly opened and he turned his gaze towards me and I was met with those same sweet blue eyes I had seen the day he arrived at this place. Those beautiful blue eyes that held so much, but what I saw in those orbs now was sorrow...

 

"I know you think we are...well I'm abandoning you, but I'm keeping you safe. I know you think that me and Mokuba are leaving you behind but the thing is, I don't know what this guy is like and I can't take the risk of this guy being a creep and risk you getting hurt or worse..." he looked away sighing softly, "I care about you too much to risk your safety. Before we met, it was just me and Mokuba and it was easy to just have to take care of him. But to watch out for two people who are very close to my heart and-"

 

..."Seto stop..." I interrupted him. He looked back at me confused while I looked away,

 

"I get it. Your little brother comes first. And I don't want to be the one to hold you back from a good life." I turned back to him and smiled and wrapped my arms around him, "I was being selfish. And I'm sorry for getting upset with you." I pulled back and gazed up at him, the tears running down my cheeks were those of joy, "I should have never doubted you Seto. I was just scared of losing my two best friends..." he reached out to wipe away my tears as I spoke. 

 

It still hurt, but I guessed it would still be inevitable. They would eventually have to leave and I would be left behind...but it would be alright. I would be ok…somehow. Seto had taught me something about myself that I never knew...that I was strong and I knew how to survive on my own...and that made me smile at him, and he returned a smile.

 

He reached over for the box that he had brought, "When I went looking for Mokuba's toy aeroplane after the caretakers took it from him, I found this on one of the shelves in the closet where they keep the confiscated things..." he said as he handed the box to me.

 

I examined the box and noticed that my name was written on it. I was rather confused as I had never seen this box before. I slowly opened the box and took a look inside...

 

...My eyes widened, the things inside...a purse...silver female watch...a purple scarf and a necklace that held a beautiful blue jewel.

 

I picked up the purse and opened it; pulling out the only thing that was inside it, an old photo of a man and a woman, the necklace in the box hanging around the woman’s neck in the picture...could these have been my parents? It could be possible that the things in the box belonged to my mother...the things could have been left behind when my father ran off. Seto reached into the box, pulling out the necklace, "I believe this was your mothers...I thought that it wasn't fair that the caretakers kept this away from you for all these years. So..." he reached out and hung the necklace around my neck, "...I got this back for you. I guess it can be some sort of a birthday gift." He said chuckling. I dropped the box and wrapped my arms around him again, hugging him tightly as I cried again, "Thank you. Thank you so much Seto."

 

He just smiled as he hugged back, "You're welcome Lillian. And remember, whatever happens tomorrow...we'll always be together...in here," he said placing his hand on my heart, and I placed my hand over his as I smiled, knowing everything was gonna be ok...

 

The next day I stayed back and watched as the CEO of some big company arrived at the orphanage, giving out gifts to the other kids and posing for photos. The man carried a smile on his face but it didn’t match his eyes…there seemed to be something hidden behind them…they reminded me of Markiato, a cruelty for the suffering of others. I couldn’t help but wonder or rather worry that Seto was getting himself into trouble by tricking this man into adopting him and Mokuba…

 

I watched as my best friend confront the CEO, walking over as they headed into one of the play rooms where the games were kept and stood by one of the windows to watch them play chest…my hand wondering over to hold onto my mother’s necklace that I kept hidden under my sweater…

 

Normal POV…

 

Everything was going exactly as Seto had planned, Gozuburo had agreed to adopted him and Mokuba if he could beat the man in a chess game and the boy was one move away from claiming victory and secure a good life free of poverty and suffering for him and his little brother, the only important person in his life…well one of the most important people…the other person he would be leaving behind…

 

His hand froze over the piece he was about to move, noticing a familiar face out of the corner of his eye, shifting his gaze for just a moment and seeing the sad broken face of his best friend, the girl watching him with her big blue eyes.

 

The previous day she had told him that she would be ok with him and Mokuba leaving her behind…the both of them reassuring each other that they would always be together no matter where they would end up and he had been so sure of himself that this was the best course of action, the best chance of a future for him and Mokuba but…seeing her standing sent a sliver of doubt into his mind…she would be losing the only family she had while he and his brother would be gaining so much more. Seto and Mokuba had had a mother and father, a home, a good life before it was taken from them suddenly over a year ago…but Lillian had none of that. She told them how she was left abandoned at the hospital the day she was born and had only ever known loneliness and neglect till the brothers came into her life…

 

Seto knew the day his relatives dumped him and Mokuba at this hell hole that he would be solely responsible for his little brother and that he would be the only person he would ever take care of…but then he saw some punk about to beat a defensive girl with a bat and he had to do something…coming to her aid and saving her…and when she looked up at him and he saw those big bright blue eyes he felt something within him, something he couldn’t explain…even after a year he didn’t know what it was but he knew one thing…the thing he felt hurt at the thought of being away from her now and leaving her behind…

 

He turned his gaze back to the chess board…there were two possible moves…one that led to him winning and the other would lead to him losing…maybe if he waited just a bit longer the right family would come, one that would adopt all 3 of them and they would never be apart…

 

A small smile fell on Seto’s face as he made his choice, moving the piece into place…

 

Gozuburo couldn’t help but smirk as he made his last move, “Checkmate.” He knocked over Seto’s king and sat back with a smug look on his face, “I have to say you played better than most of the opponents I’ve faced but ultimately you weren’t good enough to defeat me. So it looks like you’ll be staying here boy.” The sting of losing hurt but he looked over at Lillian who was still standing outside the window, seeing a look of hope in her eyes that made him forget about giving up the chance at a life of wealth and privilege.

 

The boy shrugged as Mokuba who had been with him during the game came over and looked up at his big brother. Seto smiles at him and ruffles his hair before his face turns stern and he looks back at Gozuburo, “Oh well. I gave it my best. Thanks for the game. Come on Mokuba.” He turned to leave, his arm around his brothers shoulders to lead him out when the CEO grabs the small child’s arm and pulled him away from his brother, “Oh no. Don’t think you can just walk away without consequence.” The man stood up and towered over the two boys, “You need a lesson to teach you about arrogance and pride since you don’t have a grip on yours.”

 

Seto didn’t understand what he meant and didn’t like how the CEO was keeping a hold of his brother’s arm, the man smirking, “I think I will be adopting someone today, and your little brother is the perfect candidate to join my family.” Mokuba’s eyes widen and tried to get free but the man’s grip but his fingers were like iron around his arm.

 

Seto felt a wave of panic hit him, “Y-you can’t do that!” he tries to protest but Gozuburo laughs in his face, “I can do what I want boy and you need to learn what happens when you let your ego get the better of you.” He drags Mokuba to the door but Seto tries to stop him to no avail. The man growls as she shoves Mokuba away, the small boy landing on the floor with a wince. The CEO takes hold of Seto’s arm, the boy struggling as the man shoves him into the closet and shut the door, locking it.

 

Seto bangs his fist on the door, screaming to be let out and for his brother to be left alone but Gozuburo ignored him as he took Mokuba, forcing the small boy out of the room and too the office, the kid struggling to get free as tears start running down his face…

 

Lillian watched this all and wasn’t sure what to do. What was she to do? She saw how he manhandled the brothers without even breaking a sweat so what could she do? She could let Seto out of the closet but there was nothing they could do to stop the man from taking Mokuba…

 

She pulled her necklace out of her sweater and stared at the blue gem that hung from it…swallowing the lump in her throat she let it go and ran to the office…

 

 

Seto continued to bang his hands against the door, tears threatening to fall from his eyes. He had to get out of there and save his little brother but he was trapped, hyperventilating before the door is unlocked and opened, one of the older boys having heard the commotion from within the closet. Seto dashed out without even thanking the kid and ran to the front gate just in time to see Gozuburo’s limo driving off.

 

He was too late…

 

He runs into the road and stands there, watching the black car disappearing into the distance, falling to his knees as tears stream down his cheeks, slamming his fists into the road as he cries. He had lost his little brother and it was his own entire fault. How could he have been so stupid?

 

He clenched his eyes shut trying to stop the overwhelming emotions of disappointment and hatred in himself when he hears a soft voice calling out to him…

 

“Seto!”

 

He’s eyes fly open as he looks up and sees Mokuba standing by the gate of the orphanage, “Mokuba!” he doesn’t even think about how this was possible before stumbling to stand and runs over to his little brother, pulling him into arms and hugging him tightly, relieved that he was still there but…how?

 

He pulls back and was about to ask when he sees that Mokuba was holding something in his little hands, the younger boy sniffling as he slowly uncurls his fingers from object…the gold chain slipping off his palm, leaving behind the blue gem of the necklace that belonged to Lillian’s mother.

 

Seto’s heart sank as he carefully took it and stared at the jewel before looking up in the direction the limo had disappeared in…

 

Lillian was gone…