#no need for reconciliation or difficult conversations. only editing

[qiu-yan]

at first, the irritated reactions that fans of these writings provoked in jiang wanyin made the venture immediately worth it. sure, having lan wangji's own writing exposed to the public was embarrassing, and sure, whenever lan wangji overheard fans eagerly quoting particularly vivid passages from his writing, part of him wanted to curl up and die. but watching jiang wanyin's face turn a shade of purple fit to rival his robes when he overheard the same quoting made all of this entirely worth it. and, to make things even better, wei ying had published lan wangji's writings anonymously and (as editor-in-chief) had cleverly obscured all possible hints to the writer's identity in the text - thus, jiang wanyin did not even know who he should blame for his newfound misfortune.

so everything was good.

at first.

lan wangji, who liked to think of himself as a humble person unconcerned with worldly fame, was largely uninterested in managing this project; instead, responsibility for the editing and distribution of lan wangji's writings was claimed by wei ying. yet, as time went on and the popularity of this publication snowballed, lan wangji began to notice a worrying trend. wei ying, his editor-in-chief, was getting really into it. as in, disturbingly into it. as in, so disturbingly into it that he would spend hours upon hours holed up in lan wangji's jingshi going over lan wangji's writings. increasingly, all of wei wuxian's waking hours became occupied by the revision and refinement of these descriptions of jiang wanyin; when once wei ying filled the quiet of the cloud recesses with anything from chatter about his latest talisman experiments to jokes about eating lan wangji's rabbits, now he spoke of nothing but editing. how should he best describe the curl of jiang wanyin's sneer? how should he best capture the snort of jiang wanyin's rare laughter? did lan wangji's description of the way jiang wanyin's robes flowed behind him do the sight justice? the words lan wangji had chosen to describe the violet flash of jiang wanyin's eyes - were they the best possible words for such a stormy, striking visage?

when wei ying turned down their everyday in favor of prodding once more at lan wangji's word choice - word choice lan wangji had already put quite a lot of thought into, thank you very much - lan wangji knew that enough was enough.

the more things change, the more things stay the same. situations may change, but some constants remain immutable. what he realized now was exactly the same as what he realized over fifteen years ago, when wei ying and his obnoxious shidi first set foot into the cloud recesses: the purple slut from lotus pier had to go.

zhancheng to me is like this:

imagine a scenario in which jiang cheng actually does know quite a lot about lan wangji's tastes: his favorite and least favorite tea flavors, snacks, food, books, music, authors and artists, and so on.....except jiang cheng specifically sought out this information during the 13 year timeskip to make lan wangji miserable.

maybe lan wangji is just publicly A Bitch to him one too many times and jiang cheng finally decides he's had enough. so, for the next few months, jiang cheng spends an inordinate amount of time gradually sussing out everything he can learn about lan wangji's tastes. what kind of tea does he like? what kind of tea does he despise? which authors does he always read? what temperature does he prefer his room to be? what new trends in music does he find completely unbearable? when he passes through a region whose cuisine he hates, which restaurants does he find slightly less intolerable?

and then, the next time there's a discussion conference at lotus pier, jiang cheng weaponizes this knowledge. actually, the next time there's a public event anywhere wherein both jiang cheng and lan wangji are in attendance, jiang cheng weaponizes the fuck out of this knowledge. he makes sure that the tea lan wangji hates the most is served to everyone. he has his disciples buy all the local snacks he knows lan wangji has a preference for, just so lan wangji can't have any. he makes sure lan wangji's room and bed are heated to the exact temperature lan wangji finds just too hot to be comfortable. whenever lan wangji's favorite obscure author releases a new work that gusu lan doesn't think is cultivation-related enough to include in their library, jiang cheng has a bunch of his disciples swoop in and buy as many copies as possible, just so that it takes lan wangji a bit longer to get his hands on a volume. jiang cheng "leaks" to a few minor sect leaders the idea that lan wangji actually does like spicy food, and said minor sect leaders actually believe that information for a full year of hosted visits and public events.

this continues for all 13 years of the timeskip. of course, jiang cheng isn't outstandingly successful in actually making lan wangji miserable, because there are limits to what jiang cheng can actually achieve and what he's actually willing to spend enough time on; realistically, all he's accomplishing is causing lan wangji some minor irritations once in a while. but it's enough for jiang cheng to know that, every time lan wangji has to pass through yunmeng, he's absolutely miserable because jiang cheng has persuaded/paid every musician in the area to play the one song lan wangji hates the most.

jin guangyao, of course, figures out what's going on immediately. but even loyalty to lan xichen isn't going to make him sacrifice potentially useful dirt by putting a stop to jiang cheng's asshole behavior himself, so instead he just decides to watch and wait. he also just finds it really funny. meanwhile, lan wangji, for all 13 of these years, never figures out what's going on. he never figures out why he can't ever find the lanling-style osmanthus cakes he hates slightly less than the rest of lanling cuisine whenever he passes through the area and runs into disciples from yunmeng jiang. when his favorite obscure author releases a new book, he gets in line at the indie bookstore in qinghe he went out of his way to visit, and just doesn't question why everyone in front of him is wearing purple.

postcanon, though....now lan wangji has one hell of a source of insider information (wei wuxian), so the turns are about to get fucking tabled.

[fuck-i-like-too-much-stuff]

I dont know if anyone is ready for this but these are my "Problems in We Are" post:

Disclaimer: if you have been on my blog or know me at all, you know that i love this series with my whole heart. But that being said, im nothing if not fair, and in all fairness, this series had its flaws. Less than most, but still there, these flaws do need to be addressed. My love for the series does not decrease, nor does it for the actors, characters, plots and settings.

QToey: Stagnancy that was Very Fixable.

I don't think many would disagree with me on the fact that Q and Toey's relationship became stagnant after the confession. Their moments could only be seen as Cute and their dynamic was definitely not explored any more. Another thing everyone would agree on is that we would have loved to see the ase/demisexual representation in these two characters. Had this been done, just one conversation around it, the whole plot and mood could have been shifted to a much more positive and progressive impact. Yeah the whole conversation would be a "difficult" one but Satang and Winny could have handled it.

The Lack of Focus on ChainPun

Look, I get it. There's a heirarchy of importance and ChainPun were definitely on a lower rung than the rest. I also am not against them getting together in the last minute of the last episode. But there were definitely times where there could have been a flashback scene for them, like all the others got. The only reason their relationship didnt become a background/2D narrative was because of Marc and Poon being brilliant actors. Had their efforts to make Chain and Pun important not made through the screen, there would be very little cheer for them and certainly no impact.

The First Few Episodes

Till the 5th episode, the direction and cinematography of this show was choppy as fuck. There were stills of absolutely irrelevant objects, sceneries or characters (in the moment) that could've been fixed with just a little bit of finesse in editing. It was fixed in the episodes that aired 5th and onwards, but it did almost make me drop the series (i get slightly OCD about these things)

Yet Another Almost Useless Female Character

Look me in the eyes and tell me that my girl Fai didnt deserve more. In the first couple of episodes she is shown to be integral to the group, a core member and close friend. And then poof she goes, only to appear when it is convenient to the plot. Yes we did have Aunt Pui as a prominent female character, but her role was that of a Guardian that is there in ever series, while the same series disposes every other female in it. Fai could have been given a role in the group, including the trips and outtings, and i shall die on that hill if i must.

Lastly, and surprisingly, the Way they handled Phum's parents

Till the last episode, i was big on Peem only encouraging reconciliation as he hoped for Phum to receive the love that he had himself received from his own parents. And yes, that does remain. But they could have gone without making Phum accept his father, or his father being this sweet guy who is "trying". Phum's dad is not sweet, he is not trying, he is not worthy of Phum or Fang's forgiveness. Though it was only implied and signifies just healing, i wish that the family dinner could've just meant Phum, Fang, Peem, Tan and maybe their brother, with if any, his partner, and a small intro of Peem to Phum's mom. But we shall work with what we have Ao3 and Fix Its.

With that, I end my saga and shall return to random thoughts as and when I have them and maybe a new chapter every now and then to the relic of a fic i have that no one reads lmao.

Thank you for reading and please do add on/leave your opinionss

[honeypirate]

Flower in the Sun

AU where Beni has a mom (I don’t know if he doesn’t I just know about his adoptive father/master)

Benimaru x Fem!Reader

Not edited don’t hate me for the many mistakes

5.5k words

You tried to focus on the celebration, tried to let go of all the stress you felt right now, but it was difficult considering you JUST moved here less than a year ago, opened your shop in town and lived above it, and now your whole apartment/shop was obliterated. back to basically square one for who knows how long.

You sat by the edge of the celebration, chewing on your lip as you thought about your options. You’d have to move your shop back to the barn on the gardens you have outside of town but you didn’t get as much business that way.. plus you can’t really sleep there. You could move back in with your mother but she lived near company 3 and baked them a cake every sunday, your sisters family lived in the Shinjuku District but they were holy sol nuts and you really didn’t want to have to ask them of all people. So the barn was the only real option right now, no bed but at least it has a roof and a door with a lock. A voice cuts through your thoughts and you pay attention when you realize it belongs to Benimaru

‘If I wrecked your house last night feel free to stay at the guardhouse until it’s fixed. It won't take too long.” you felt a weight lift off your shoulders as you watched those without homes gather around him for details, you pick yourself up and walk over to the group so you could hear what to do.

At the guard house you are directed to a small room at the back since you were just one person and not a family. You didn't mind that it was a small space or that you were farther away from anyone else, you were just grateful you could stay in Asakusa and keep your business running. You are told that you can help yourself to breakfast in the morning and dinner will be served for everyone at night and you were given a few essential toiletries.

When you are certain that everyone else staying there had used the showers, you gave it some extra time so that the hot water will replenish before you made your way silently down the quiet halls of the guard house.

You walk past a door that was open, you glance as you walk by and see Benimaru help bandage Konro, the sight brought a small smile to your lips as you continued your course to the showers.

Their conversation after you passed went something like this

“Waka”

“I saw her”

“She's beautiful. You should..”

“No”

Konro sighs “if you don't, maybe I wilL”

“You’re such a pain in the ass”

Your shower was amazing, they really spared no expense on the quality of shampoo and conditioner. You were so glad to not smell like smoke anymore as you changed into a new set of clothes, they were too big and just a fire force soldier shirt and jumper, but you didn't care. They were clean and comfortable. You folded your dirty clothes into a small stack and carried it back to your room, making a mental note to run to the clothing store in the next few days.

The next morning you are up at dawn, walking through the still quiet hallways towards the kitchen. You get warm in the baggy jumpsuit so you undo it halfway and tie the arms around your waist before you open the doorway. Inside there is a long table with different foods set out and at the end is Benimaru and Konro. You bow to them “thank you for letting me stay” you say, your voice as quiet as the morning. “I’m sorry for destroying your home.” Benimaru says and you rise, a smile on your lips as you make your way farther into the room before kneeling down in front of the table across from Konro.

“You’re Y/N L/N who owns the herb and flower shop” Konro says, recognizing you now that you were up close. You nod and reach out, grabbing some bread “yes I am, although my shop will now be run from the gardens just outside of town until it is rebuilt. My herb garden was on top of my apartment building so some special herbs will be out of stock for a while” you laugh and rip a piece of bread and put it in your mouth. “There is a garden behind the guardhouse that is hardly used, feel free to plant whatever you like” Benimaru says and you blush before bowing your head “thank you very much Captain Shinmon.” He frowns and Konro chuckles under his breath “just call me Benimaru” he says and you nod “of course. Benimaru” you notice the sunrise outside and stand again “thank you again, for breakfast as well” you say with a bow before leaving the room, your unfinished bread in your hand to finish on your way to the gardens. you had to set up your new shop in the barn on the flower farm you made sure to leave as early as you could since that would take a while, good thing you had one employee to help you, your close friend Jo.

One eye like a bullseye and one like an X. you couldn’t look away from him even if you wanted to. Here he was, in your shop, pursuing the already made bouquets you had made that morning and the potted plants Jo had taken care of. You watched him talk to Jo for a second from your spot at the back counter, before resuming his shopping.

You could hear Jo next to you saying your name but it didn’t register that she was talking to you until she walked in front of your vision “huh?” you ask and she glares “huh?! I have been practically shouting at you for the past five minutes. Could you take your eyes off of the Captain for a second please?” your cheeks turn red as you look down sheepishly “sorry Jo” you whisper and she laughs at you then says “he’s actually looking for you, oh flower master” you gasp and look up into her eyes “WHAT?” you practically shout and then crouch down behind the counter when you see his head turn. Your coworker leans over the side and says “and he’s coming this way now. good job dummy” before she leaves “fuuuck” you whisper and panic, how are you going to okay this off? “didn’t know you hated me this much y/n. Is it because I destroyed your home?”

You dip your head back to look up at his face which is now looking over at you as he leans over the counter. His facial expression was uninterested but he had curious eyes. His voice was monotone, like he had way more things to be doing than this mediocre errand. You pop to your feet, your face feeling like 100 degrees. “No!! I mean yes! I mean!Ugh” you sigh and close your eyes, stealing a moment before opening your eyes, a customer service smile and voice when you say “no, I dont hate you. Sorry i'm just a little flustered. How may i help you today?”

“I need some flowers and when you mentioned your garden at breakfast I thought I would come down. I need whatever says “i’m sorry for not coming to dinner for 5 months i still love you mom” you bite back a giggle as you think of his mom, a regular at your shop who would come just to talk “say no more, come with me and we will build you a perfect bouquet” he nods and you grab a flower basket and a knife, leading him out the side door into the garden.

“So these ones are blue hyacinths, they represent peace and truth” he hums before shaking his head “no” he says and you chuckle, leading him down a few rows before stopping again “these are called star of bethlehem, they mean reconciliation” he leans in close “i like these ones” he says and you smile “perfect” you say and reach out cutting a few and adding them to your basket before walking down a few more rows.

You spend half an hour looking around at the flowers and chatting easily. “So why haven't you been to dinner with your sweet mother? She comes in every once in a while and only has nothing but kind things to say about you” you ask while you finish the arrangement of star of bethlehem, yellow roses, white ivy flowers, spider mums, and lily of the valley. You spruced it up with some ivy greenery and the last of the rosemary and chamomile flowers in the shop, the seeds you’re going to plant back at the guard house were already in your bag in the back.

The bouquet you made was beautiful and you felt proud as you tied around a few ribbons “Just busy is all” he says and you hand the bouquet over “well, tell her y/n from the flower shop says hi” he nods “i will. thank you y/n” he says, his fingers brushing yours as he takes the flowers. “Will i see you at dinner?” he asks and you smile “wouldn't miss it” he nods “good Konro will stop asking me now” you chuckle, does that mean Konro likes you? You push the thought aside “have a good rest of your day, Benimaru” you say and he gives you a small smile “you as well” you notice the flush of pink on his neck as he exits the shop.

“Ohhh these are lovely! Are they from y/n’s garden??” Beni nods “she say’s hi by the way” his mom smiles and brings the flowers into the kitchen to grab a vase “that girl is so sweet, she always remembers FooFoo and if i bring her with she gives her treats.” Benimaru feels his heart warm as he crouches down to scratch the tiny head of the senior dog laying on the floor. “She moved her shop to her garden until it’s rebuilt” he says, remembering the way he felt her eyes on him in the store, the way her hair shown in the sunlight as she brought him around her garden, telling him about the means behind every flower he asked about, the way the conversation was easy. He found himself wanting to talk to her again, trying to find any reason to go back to your garden. “Benimaru!” his mom shouts and he looks up to her “sorry ma” he says and she just shakes her head with a smile “shes quite beautiful isnt she?” his mom says as she places the flowers in the vase “yeah” Beni says “she is”

When you get back to the guard house after work it’s already dark and quiet, you had a lot of work to do once you closed and it unfortunately made you miss dinner. You roll your shoulders as you take off your shoes by the back gate, picking them up as you walk into the back garden. You hum softly to yourself as you find a watering can and hose, filling it up halfway and bringing it with you over to the garden boxes filled with dry dirt. You chuckle at the sight “poor unfortunate neglected dirt, not for long tho” you whisper as you wet the soil, sure you could plant more things at your garden around your flowers but if you did both you'd have more supply when they were grown. Plus it was the perfect time to plant. You kneel by the garden box and mix up the soil so it was all wet and combined before planting the seeds. Unaware of the man on the back porch watching you as you went, a smile on his lips.

You snap your fingers and the hanging lanterns above you light, making your face glow as you look up and make eye contact with Benimaru, a smile on your lips when you notice his shocked expression. He recovers quick with a smile you can tell he’s trying to hide “you missed dinner” he states and you chuckle “I’m sorry to make you miss me” you say with a chuckle “Would you like to help me?” your voice was quiet but he heard it like it was right by his ear.

He stands from his spot and walks over to you, his feet making soft sounds when they hit the dirt. He kneels down next to you and you take his hands in yours, making him cup them, the dirt on your hands rubbing off on him. “Take some of these” you dump some seeds into his hands “and plant them in a row, a couple finger widths apart and a knuckle deep” he nods as he follows your orders, you start on another row and hum softly as you go.

“You’re a pyrokinetic” he says and you chuckle “kind of. I mean. I never had any training so I can’t fight or anything with it. Nothing compared to your talents. But technically yes” “You’ve watched me so often you know of my talents?” he asks and you watch as his fingers push seeds into a neat row. You chuckle “yes, im not ashamed to say it. You’re captivating and insanely talented.” His cheeks flush and he clears his throat “is..is this right?” He asks and pulls his dirt covered empty hands away “that’s perfect Beni” he holds his hand out for more seeds and you smile as you pour some more into his palm.

“These are chamomiles, one of my favorites although common” you say “why do you like it?” he asks and you feel your stomach birth a butterfly or two “when i was younger, my grandma owned the flower garden. She would plant beautiful flowers and let me pick whichever ones I wanted. Then at the end of the day she would let me go pick as many chamomile flowers as i wanted so she could make tea. As we drank tea should tell me stories, I love chamomile because it reminds me of quality time and the stories that can be shared over a good cup of tea”

You finish your story as you both finish planting. You wipe your hands off on your pants as you stand up with him “thank you for your help” you say with a smile that he returns “thank you for the story” you nod “anytime Benimaru” he picks up your shoes and hands them to you before he puts the watering can back and disappears inside the guard house.

You snap your fingers as you walk inside, the lanterns going out before you close the door.

You don’t see Benimaru for the next few days, he wasn’t there for breakfast or dinner, you guess he has fire force duties that keeps him busy but you can't help but wonder how he is.

You get home from work late again, a wedding coming up that has been keeping you busy. You shower and then make your way through the guardhouse to the kitchen, it’s quieter than usual, a few families homes are already built and yours should be soon as well. You walk into the kitchen and smile when you see Beni already there “hi” you whisper as you shuffle to the cupboard to grab a mug and some tea “hi y/n” he says when you stand next to him at the stove, the tea kettle already heating up “can’t sleep?” you ask and he nods. You notice the dark circles under his eyes and how bloodshot they look. You hum in response and frown at the response your heart had when you saw him. Like you wished you could take care of him and rub his back while he lays in bed. “Are you just getting back?” he asks and you nod and cover your mouth as you yawn “yeah. Mrs. Kim’s daughter is getting married sunday and I’ve been making all the arrangements. White peonies, lavender, and ivy, it’s gorgeous” he notices the bandages on your fingers and dark circles under your eyes that almost match his. He wants nothing more to hold you while you both fall asleep. He’s so sleep deprived and he can see you are as well, but his thoughts are cut off by the whistle of the pot. “Do you wanna sit?” he asks and you nod with a smile.

You sit and talk at the little table in the kitchen, the only light coming from the one hanging above the table. It felt like you were in your own world as you talked and shared stories, laughing at the many things he told you about growing up and meeting Konro.

You told him more stories about your grandma, about your childhood. You bonded over mutual feelings for religion and politics, over what you want for the future. Before long you’ve finished a cup of chamomile tea and your second cup has gone cold, at some point he grabbed your hands and was now playing with your fingertips as he told you the story of how he became captain, sharing his fears with you in the safe space of the quiet kitchen. “I think I will always believe that Konro could have been better at this than me” he whispers and you lean forward, reaching up to brush his hair from his forehead before cupping his cheek “for what it’s worth, I think you are perfect” you hear his breath catch as his eyes look up into yours “perfect for this company, for this town. I talk to many of the people who live here and I have only ever heard praise and kindness for you. Your people love you. I know you don't like sweets that much but I’ve seen you accept them AND eat them and that says so much about you. People always give you so many gifts because it’s the only way we know how to give back, to you and the company for protecting the people and always being there.” Your hand slips as you go to move it from his cheek but he moves his hand up, covering yours and holding it in place.

“You may not feel worthy of this mantle, Waka” you smirk and give him a sweet look, knowing about his nickname and using it in this context makes his heart race as a small chuckle escapes his throat. “And no matter what i say, you can live with what makes you comfortable. But know that you are ultimately not living the truth.” He ponders your words for a moment and brings his hand down, taking yours with it. “The truth being that you DO deserve this position. You ARE worthy. You ARE the best and most qualified for this” his fingers laced together with yours “and you have the support of your team and basically the whole city...” your cheeks blush and you look down at your hands together against the table “and you have mine as well” you whisper

Benimaru was gone the next few days, Konro as well. Leaving you in the guard house as more and more families left, able to go back to their newly built homes until only a few of you remained.

Your bare feet plop along the wooden floor, echoing in the empty quiet hallway as you make your way to the back. Your long duster cardigan hitting the back of your ankles and making your shorts and tank top seem even more cozier. The sound of birds makes you smile as you take a deep breath of the fresh morning air, walking to the little garden with a watering can in your hand.

“Good morning” he said softly, his voice strained and tired. You smile and your head snaps up to look at him, your smile falling as you take him in.

You set down the watering can and stand, making your way to him in an instant. “Are you okay?” You ask, your hands reach for him but stop a short distance away. His face had a bandage on his cheek and forehead, his left hand wrapped, and a bruise forming around his left eye. “Just a couple scratches is all” he says, taking one of your hands with his right hand and slowly leads you back to the plants. “They’re growing nicely” he says as he looks down at the sprouts, already a little tall and poking out of the dirt in just a week.

He drops your hand to pick up the watering can, raining down the cool liquid over your plants, the dry lightened dirt turning dark brown. “You’re going to work?” He asks and you shrug “I don’t have anything special to do today, and if I’m being honest” you blush and take the can from his hand, walking to put it away so you didn’t have to look at him “I wanted to go in today so I didn’t think about how much I wanted to talk to you”

His breath catches and his wounds don’t even throb anymore, he wasn’t paying attention. All that matters is the soft way your voice reached his ears, saying something he didn’t even realize he was hoping for. You’ve been missing him, just as much as he seemed to miss you. “Will you get some breakfast with me?” He asks, his voice normal, hiding every anxiety and feeling deep in his heart, but as you turned and met his eye you could see the hope he's feeling in them.

“I was thinking” you say after Konro excuses himself from breakfast, leaving you and Beni alone. “Could you.. I mean. Do you know of anyone who could train me with my abilities? If it’s possible I could get stronger then I want to” your hands are in closed fists against your thighs and you me eyes shone with the determination you feel. He chuckles softly, popping a piece of fruit in his mouth and thinking as he chews. “I think I could figure something out. Tomorrow night work for you?” You beam at him, grinning from ear to ear with excitement “that works perfect!” You place your hand on his arm that rests against the table “Thank you Benimaru” you say softly and he nods, trying desperately to suppress the blush he feels is imminent.

The next evening you went out to check your ganden before you were supposed to train, you hoped that he had found someone nice to help you. “Are you ready?” He asks behind you and you smile while you stand from your place by the small growing herbs “as I’ll ever be! Who will you have train me?” You ask and meet his eyes, raising yours brows in question, noticing his face was without his bandages today and his wounds really did look like scratches. “I will” he states and you watch his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows.

You take a couple steps towards him “no!” You exclaim louder than intended and you laugh once awkwardly as his eyebrows raise “I mean. You’re hurt! and my power is so low it’s not worth your time. I’ve seen the boys you train! their power and skill is levels higher than me” he walks over to you, setting his right hand on your shoulder and leaning down to your ear “I want to” he whispers and your cheeks dust pink as a small gasp leaves your throat, oh how he desperately loved that sound. He pulls back with a smirk “and I’ve said” he raises his left hand that still had a small bandage around his palm “it’s just a scratch” he begins to walk away from you, over to the training space and you’re stunned for a few moments. Standing there and watching his back as he walked away, your heartbeat racing and your brain empty save it for the way Benimaru’s breath tickled your ear.

“Well?” He asks when he realizes you’re not following him, turning back and looking at you with daring eyes, snapping you back into reality. Your smile spreads and the sight sends him over the moon, a feeling invading his heart that he’s become enamored with these past few days having you at the guardhouse. You were the sun slowly rising in his life, and he was drawn to your warmth. “Let’s do this” you say as you reach his side, the back of your hand brushing his for only a moment but it sends fireworks up his arm.

“Show me what you can do, outside of lanterns” he says as he stands to the side, his eyes taking in your form as you stand facing him. You hold up your hands and nod once, the tip of each finger igniting in small flames. “I can’t make them bigger but I can do..” you tighten each flame to smaller tips, growing in power and heat until they blazed like the head of welding guns. He nods once “she’s more powerful than she realizes” he thinks as he watches the flames reflecting your eyes.

“That’s good” he says as he approaches you “is this all you know how to do?” He asks as he takes a hold of your wrists gently, turning your hands and looking at your flames. “I couldn’t really practice a lot growing up so this is it unfortunately” he chuckles once, mostly just air from his nose, but it made you smile anyway. “Can you control which fingers or..” before he finishes you start randomly lighting and unlighting fingertips. “Now try to shoot the flames out” he says and you nod, trying to push the flames out but just ending up breaking a sweat and flashing your flames, not going anywhere else.

After fifteen minutes of absolutely nothing happening you sigh and flung your hands up in the air “I can not be this WEAK” you exclaim and shake them as you scowl. He sighs and comes over to you, reaching up and smoothing out your eyebrows gently before holding his hands out to you.

You hesitate, your hands almost being set in his before you pause and he raises his eyebrows “chicken” he whispers and you drop your hands against his “tch” he clicks his tongue and you roll your eyes as he uses his thumbs and first two fingers to rub your wrist gently “it’s your first test. Relax” he says, his fingers moving to the middle of your hand “there are many other things we’ll try, none of which make you weak if you can’t do them” goosebumps running down your spine as he moves down each finger, your breath catching in your throat with how gentle he was being with you and how nice it felt for him to be doing this to your hands, another sound that he found he adored. He brings your hands up and kisses each knuckle softly, effectively short wiring your brain yet again. “Try again” he whispers, letting your hands go and standing back again.

You took a deep shaky breath and closed your eyes for a moment, feeling the warmth of the sun on your skin and the warmth he has ignited in your heart, before opening your eyes and shoving your hands out, each finger popping as flames, strong, bright blue flames, shoot from each finger.

“BENIMARU!” You shout and laugh, dropping the flames and turning to run and throw your arms around his neck “oof” he mumbles as you hit him, his arms wrapping around you to keep you both stable. “I did it! I did it! I did it!” He sighs softly into your hair, “I saw” he whispered “wanna find out what else you can do?” He asks, his lips brushing against the side of your head. You squeeze him closer for a moment before pulling back “does this mean I should call you my Senpai? Or my Captain?” He rolled his eyes but couldn’t stop the blush that rose to his cheeks “No.” he says, but you laugh when he won’t meet your eye.

“You’ve come a long way for just a few hours” he says as you walk back to the garden, the sun beginning to set “you’re a really amazing teacher” you lean in close “Captain” you whisper before making a turn for the hose. He stops in his tracks after you whispered, his heart fluttering in his chest as he forces himself to calm down before turning and walking over to you

You look up to him from where you were crouched, running hose in one hand after you washed your face and the back of your neck. “You look a little flushed” you say as he crouches by you, reaching out for the hose. He just Humphs as you move the water closer to him, a smirk in your lips and mischief in his eyes that he would have known right away had he looked up at you.

Your thumb covers the end just so as he leans down, raising the pressure as it hits his hands spraying his face as well. You chuckle before placing your fingers against your lips, holding in as much of your giggles as you could. He slowly looks up into your eyes, water droplets falling from his hair and nose, he was annoyed for half of a second until he meets your eyes, notices the sweet mischief in your eyes and hears your soft giggles as they leave your lips. “Did you just..” you nod and slowly stand to back away from him, the mischief rising to his eyes as the corners of his mouth twitch up into a smile. He stands and takes one step towards you and you raise your emotu hand, “WAIT” you say and he stops “we.. we can talk about this..” you say with a smile, giggles escaping with every exhale. “I think we’re too far past talking about this” he says before he moves, quick with his hand out towards the hose but you scream and try to run, spraying him behind you as he gets closer. He laughs as he grabs you, his arms wrapping around your middle from behind not caring about the cool hose water that was currently soaking him. He reaches up and takes the hose from your hand and turns you around before smiling and slowly running the water across the back of your head then across both of your shoulders making you gasp and tense in his hold. “I think we’re even now” you say with a shiver and a laugh and he cocks his head “not yet” he says softly, his hands reaching up to tuck your damp hair behind your ears.

You gasp, his cold fingers cooling off your warm cheeks as he cups your face. The hose forgotten about, dropped on the grass by your feet, soaking the earth and making your toes muddy. But nothing else matters besides the way he’s looking at you and the way the sun is turning the sky red behind him.

Your hands grip the sides of his soaked shirt as you lean into him “and how, tell me, can we make it even?” You ask, following his hands with your face as he pulls you closer, his body curving forward as you lean forward on your tip toes, brushing your nose against his making his breath hitch “can I show you?” He whispers and you nod, your eyes fluttering closed as he closes the last inch between your lips.

Kissing him felt like the first breath of fresh air after an infernal has been put to rest. Felt like the first relaxing step into a hot spring. It sends goosebumps from your head to his toes before being followed by electricity making your skin tingle. Fireworks dance across the backs of your eyes as he wraps an arm around your waist, holding you tight against him. You sigh as your heart sways within your chest, comforting and warm as he holds you like his lifeline.

His thumb brushes softly against your cheek when he pulls away. Your hands smooth out his shirt before running your hands up his wet chest, his hands moving down to both rest against your waist. You can’t think of anything to say, just savoring the moment as you look into his eyes.

“Are you guys coming to dinner?” The twins say from the porch, effectively startling the hell out of you. You gasp and clutch your heart as Beni just smiles down at you, his back to them. “Thanks. We’ll be there in a minute” he says and they skip off. “We should get going. We’re gonna get sick” you say and reach up, running a hand through your damp hair. He reaches down and turns off the hose as you gather it, putting it away correctly and he reaches out, hooking his fingers with yours. “Mom will kill me if you get sick” he says softly and you laugh “maybe you could.. help me clean up. Make sure I don’t get sick” he coughs a few times, choking on his spit in shock and you laugh “Beni” you say softly and pause in the doorway, looking up at him. “I’m playing. I really like you. I’d like to take it as slow or fast as we both are comfortable with, okay?” You reach up and ruffle his damp hair, pushing it out of his eyes. His cheeks flush and he leans down, pressing his forehead to yours as your eyes close. “I adore you” he whispers and your heart flutters. “Let’s go get cleaned up” he whispers and squeezes your hand, guiding you along with him to the showers.

[jaskiers-sweetkiss]

Sunset Swerve - Part 10

Pairing: Luke x OC

Word Count: 5.3K

Warnings: some swearing, i actually think that’s it for this part?

A/N: Okay here’s part 10, or as I’ve been calling it: Part 9 2: Electric Boogaloo. This is a very special edition of Sunset Swerve in which you get to read from Luke’s POV! This is covering the same time frame as part 9 but Luke’s pov provides some different scenes and new insight that’s kinda significant so I would really recommend not skipping it lol. I wanna shoutout @meangirlsx for being my sounding board and giving me loads of help on these two parts! As always, send me a message/drop a comment if you want to be tagged and let me know what you think!

Part 9  Masterlist

___

The week started off great for Luke. He was coming off the high from their performance at the open mic time and the relief that Julie didn’t have to quit the band. The latter fact also absolved him from his guilt of having suggested that Julie sneak out in the first place.

He found himself spending a lot of time with Jordan in the following days between talking about the book he’d started (she had been right, Annabeth was really cool though he maintained that she was stuck-up) and writing music. Their relationship had become much more civil following his birthday, though the fighting didn’t stop. Luke was starting to wonder if Jordan could survive without regularly making snarky or sarcastic comments. Still, the newfound closeness had been… nice. Luke wasn’t entirely sure how to categorize it, especially alongside the feelings he was certain he had for Julie.

As he sat across from Jordan, close enough that their knees were touching as they worked through some rhythms on a new song, Luke found that he wasn’t certain of anything. Jordan felt like a magnet- he realized belatedly that she always had- constantly pulling him closer and closer no matter how much either of them tried to pull away. He was starting to wonder if learning metaphors at book club was really a good thing.

“Hey Luke, can I ask you about something?” Julie pipped up from the entryway of the garage, pulling him away from his thoughts and Jordan.

“Sure, what’s up?” He asked, quirking an eyebrow quizzically.

“Oh, um, actually can we talk outside?” She asked and he furrowed his brow but nodded, setting down his guitar and jogging over to where she stood by the doors.

“This is gonna sound weird but can I ask why Jordan was with you at your house the other day?” Julie asked unsurely once they were outside and Luke froze, not expecting the question.

“How’d you…?” He trailed off, peering at the girl suspiciously. He hadn’t told anyone that he made frequent visits to his house, though he suspected the guys knew and Jordan had figured it out on his birthday.

“Alex and Reggie took me…” Julie said, tucking her hair behind her ear embarrassedly. “After I called you selfish and said you didn’t care about anyone but yourself…”

“That’s ironic coming from you, Miss Boundaries,” he scoffed irritatedly, brows furrowed in anger and Julie sighed.

“I’m really sorry Luke, it was wrong.”

“But now you wanna snoop even more,” he frowned, raising his brows as if to say ‘seriously?’

Julie opened her mouth to defend herself but Luke cut her off with a sigh before answering her question.

“If you must know, Jordan and I have spent every birthday together since we were five, I guess she figured I could use the comfort and familiarity.” He shrugged, trying to downplay how much the gesture had meant to him. It’s been really difficult, grieving his loss of his parents while they grieved him even twenty-five years later. At least when he was a runaway there was still always the possibility of reconciliation. Now there never would be.

“That’s really thoughtful,” Julie said, “But it doesn’t make sense. You guys hate each other, what happened?”

“Oh, we always have,” he smirked to himself, remembering that first day they met. He’d found a massive spider in the yard and thought it would be funny to put it in her hair, obviously, she hadn’t felt the same and the rest was history. “But our parents really wanted us to be friends so… birthday parties.”

“That explains a lot, actually,” Julie nodded thoughtfully and now it was Luke’s turn to be confused, tilting his head in a silent request for the girl to explain. “You guys have these moments where you like, exude this closeness that totally doesn’t fit the nature of your relationship. It makes sense now, knowing how long you’ve known each other.”

“I mean, there was a point where we were basically the closest thing to family each other had,” Luke shrugged, thinking about those last five months in the studio. “Guess we forgot about that when we died.”

They’d grow inexplicably close in those months that they’d lived together. It was an unspoken closeness, neither of them dared to acknowledge it but Luke saw it often in the little things. They’d stopped calling each other names when it was just them in the garage and sometimes when he was stuck on a new song he was writing she’d shout out suggestions from across the room. It was like they’d called an unconscious truce in their grief but when they came back as ghosts that all disappeared, the two immediately back at each others’ throats.

When Luke returned to the studio after his conversation with Julie it had sort of felt like the same thing had happened again. He’d thought he was finally making headway with Jordan, that they’d finally started back on the path to friendship after his birthday, or maybe even something more, and while things hadn’t totally changed, they felt different somehow.

She’d stopped hanging out with him in her free time. Instead, she spent the time holed up in the corners of the studio with her notebook or sitting behind the piano or her guitar, playing or strumming as she hummed softly. Luke wanted to help her out or tell her she sounded beautiful but he couldn’t help but notice how secretive she was being. They’d been working on songs together recently but this one she seemed determined to keep to herself.

When he entered the studio one afternoon to find her notebook on the couch, completely unguarded he couldn’t help himself. He blamed his overwhelming curiosity for why he picked it up despite knowing first-hand how sacred a song journal was.

When he found the partially written song at the back of the notebook he sucked in a breath, chest filling with hope at the lyrics on the page. It wasn’t much, only one verse and a chorus and what looked like half a pre-chorus but he couldn’t help but wonder if it was about him.

[Verse ?]

Bored of games why do you still play?

Back and forth, it’s always the same

You’re player one, I’m player two, who is she, player who?

Roll the dice and make your way

Pre-chorus

I know I’m hard but that’s part of it

You could leave but you are still here

and I’ve nowhere to go but ???

His mind whirled as he tried to work it out for himself. It screamed jealousy to him. She’d started writing after he’d had his conversation with Julie, so it wasn’t an unreasonable guess that he was “you” and Julie was “she.” She was jealous of him and Julie. But was it platonic? Was it more than that?

He was pretty sure he’d lost his damn mind in the hurricane of questions racing through his brain. It was the only explanation for the pure stupidity of what he did next.

“Moss, what’s this?” He asked when she found him with her notebook. Then he started to read off the chorus,

“I’m selfish, I’m selfish, I’m selfish

when it comes to you.

I can’t help it, can’t help it

crazy things that I do.”

“Give it back,” she snapped, cheeks flushing in what he later recognized as a mix of embarrassment and anger but at the time his brain ignored entirely, too caught up in an unthought-out attempt to confront her feelings.

“When I need you I come back to you.

I’m selfish, I’m selfish

when it comes to you.”

“I’m serious, Patterson. You don’t see me poking around in your notebook,” Jordan argued, grabbing hold of the notebook but not pulling it out of his hands.

“You don’t see me leaving my notebook lying around.” His body and his mouth were moving on autopilot but without a GPS as he responded cheekily, letting go of the notebook. Somewhere in the back of his mind, his rational brain was screaming at him to shut up but he just kept talking. “Who’s it about?”

“None of your business.”

Though his brain was on a self-destructive warpath, he couldn’t help but notice how adorable Jordan looked hugging the notebook to her chest protectively. Though, the adorableness factor was negated slightly by the death glare in her eyes.

“I think it’s about me,” he announced smugly, leaning back against the couch haughtily as if daring her to contradict him.

What the hell are you doing, man?

“I think you’re a dumbass,” she spat, and just like that she was gone, poofing away.

He leaned forward, putting his head in his hands with a groan as he realized what he did.

For the next day and a half, he could feel how the atmosphere between them had grown frigid. He’d tried to apologize a few times but every time he got close she would poof away, clearly not wanting to hear from him. What interactions they did have in those couple days were short and snide, laced with venom and insults. The behavior didn’t seem out of the ordinary to the rest of the group, but to Luke, it felt like he’d just stepped from the warm beach into ice-cold water and it was all his fault.

Luke was on the brink of losing his mind again when he went out on a limb that night. He, Alex, and Reggie were about to go out exploring like they did most nights after all the lifers went to sleep and he really wasn’t keen on leaving Jordan in the studio to stew in her anger.

“C’mon, Moss, we’re going exploring!” he called up to the loft. Deciding he’d given her enough space, it was time for ambush mode.

“And why would I want to go anywhere with you?” She called back venomously, not even deigning to come to the railing of the loft or poof down to speak to him face-to-face.

He sighed, clenching his eyes shut briefly before exhaling heavily and speaking.

“Look, I’m sorry, alright?” He called back, wishing he wasn’t doing this in front of Reggie and Alex. “I shouldn’t have gone through your notebook, it was a dick move.”

Luke was surprised at how quickly she forgave him, poofing down only moments after he apologized. He stared at her surprise, his body more relaxed now that she was spending time with them again. He hoped Alex and Reggie weren’t watching him, afraid they might somehow see the pure relief and adoration that he felt for her. Maybe he was being dramatic, but he swore he stopped breathing when she finally turned to look at her. He was totally screwed.

___

The next morning was quiet, though it felt like everything had gone back to normal. Jordan was sprawled across the couch which Luke had stopped trying to claim possession over, it was his couch but at this point, it might as well have been hers. Alex was sitting across from him making a friendship bracelet that he secretly hoped was for him but thought might’ve been for Willie, and Luke was reading his book. Things were really starting to pick up in the characters’ quest and he was apparently so invested that he barely recognized Reggie’s arrival until he heard the word “gig.”

Just like that he was on his feet along with Jordan and Alex, quest entirely forgotten as they all started blurting out questions.

“Where?”

“When?’

“How?”

Reggie excitedly explained how they were having a garage party at the house so that their band could perform and Ray and some of his colleagues would record them professionally for the band’s YouTube. Then Reggie patiently explained what a YouTube was and Luke briefly wondered when he’d learned more about modern technology than the rest of them. He supposed Julie did give him that iPod.

“We’re gonna record a music video? Like on MTV?” He exclaimed excitedly after Reggie had explained.

“Yes, dude! And Julie says if we get enough views we could go big!”

Luke gaped at his three bandmates, trying to come up with a vocalization for the thoughts flying through his head. All of a sudden there was a lot at stake for this event, the whole world would be able to see their performance. It had to be perfect. They needed to practice, hell they needed to pick a song.

He needed to talk to Julie.

When he reappeared in the school hallway he realized he probably should’ve told the group where he was going but it was too late now.

“What’re you doing here?” Julie asked him after getting over the initial shock of his sudden appearance.

“We need to talk about what song we’re gonna play tonight,” Luke said excitedly, grinning at the girl. “I was thinking Great?”

Julie held up a finger to signal she needed a moment before pulling out her phone.

“Wait seriously? You’re just gonna take a call while we’re talking? That’s so rude!”

Julie rolled her eyes at his dramatics before explaining, “Otherwise people might think I’m talking to myself.”

“Right, nice, okay,” Luke nodded, impressed by her quick thinking.

It was strange to be back in a high school hallway after so long, chatting with a cute girl by the lockers. The thought immediately brought the image of Jordan. Wow, he was really screwed.

“But yeah, I think Great is a… great choice,” Julie answered his question and he nodded, satisfied with the choice.

“Alright, sweet! Well, that was pretty much all I wanted to talk to you about so…”

“Oh! Okay,” Julie said, surprised.

“Actually wait- I wanted to talk to you about Jordan,” He started. He knew he and Julie had something between them but with these rising feelings about Jordan he’d been experiencing he didn’t want to lead her on. “Look, I, uh, I don’t really know how to say this but-“

“You have a crush on Jordan!” Julie gasped, effectively cutting him off.

His cheeks turned red and he scratched the back of his neck embarrassedly.

“Yeah- I mean, I don’t know but…”

“But you don’t want to hurt me,” Julie finished and Luke raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Wow, you are really perceptive Molina,” he said and she smiled.

“You don’t have to worry about me-“

“Sorry, my Patterson Idiocy Meter was going off,” Jordan explained as she suddenly appeared beside him, effectively putting an end to his conversation with Julie. “It lets me know when he’s doing something especially stupid.”

Luke rolled his eyes at the comment, sticking his tongue out petulantly at the girl and Julie gave him a knowing smile.

“Anyway,” Luke said dramatically, rerouting the conversation and turning back to Julie. “I was thinking, you should just ditch school today and come rehearse with us.”

He probably should’ve anticipated both girls’ protests but he still found himself trying to rationalize what he knew was a bad idea.

“Right, you were at school first, and now you’re leaving to go rehearse.”

“Stop trying to persuade her to do bad things!” Jordan chastised him, smacking his shoulder lightly.

“I really can’t. Plus I promised Nick I’d be his dance partner…” Julie explained, and Luke noticed Jordan wiggling her eyebrows at the mention of the name. He was clearly missing something.

“…and he’s heading this way,” Julie finished, pretending to hang up the phone in favor of talking to the blond-haired boy who just walked up.

“Well don’t you look sharp!” Julie’s reaction to his teasing told him all he needed to know about her feelings and the boy was not being sly about his at all. “Uh-oh, I think somebody’s got a crush on Julie!”

He couldn’t help it. It’s the designated role of all close friends to make fun of each other for their crushes. He knew by the way Julie had reacted when he’d told her about his (well, tried to tell her) that she was never going to let him hear the end of it. So, he dove right into it, mimicking Nick’s motions and facial expressions all with a playful glint in his eyes.

“Oh he is just too cute,” he teased when the blond lifer finally walked away.

“Boundaries,” Julie reminded him with a roll of her eyes. “I’ll see you after school.”

She began walking away towards her class but Luke wasn’t ready to end the conversation.

“Fine! I guess we’ll just have to carry you tonight, just like we always do!” He called down the hallway and he could see Julie shake her head slightly in exasperation. “I know you’re smiling, Molina!”

“Shut up, Luke,” Jordan rolled her eyes, smacking his chest lightly and he sent her a cheeky grin. “Good luck Julie! You’ll do great!” She called after the girl and Luke awed internally at the support.

“Yeah! Kill it on the dance floor!” He joined in, shuffling smoothly across the floor as he yelled.

“Dork,” he heard Jordan mutter and he snapped towards her, feigning upset despite how pleased he was at the attention he was getting.

“C’mon, we’ve gotta get rehearsing,” he spoke, brushing off the dramatics but she waved him off.

“I’ll be right there.”

He frowned, wanting her to come with him but he poofed away anyway, landing back in the garage between Reggie and Alex.

They immediately got to work, Luke walking them through Great. He felt bad doing it without Jordan since it was really her and Julie’s song more than anything, but he really wanted them to sound as best as they could. It was her song and they needed to do it justice.

They’d only just gotten through the basic structure and Jordan’s plans for the song, which she’d scribbled into the margins of his notebook pages while they worked on it together, when they were interrupted by a face in the window.

“Again? What’s all that about?” Reggie asked when Willie’s face disappeared from view, the boy clearly knowing he’d been caught.

Luke shrugged in response, just as lost as the rest but Alex stood, seemingly determined to get answers this time as he poofed out.

Despite their typical itch to snoop, the two boys gave Willie and Alex their privacy, instead moving over to their respective instruments to tune and warm up while they waited.

Luke could tell something was off when Alex returned but the blond-haired ghost had gone straight for his drumset, insisting that they start rehearsing. So, Luke didn’t push it, until about halfway through the song Alex got a little too into his drums, no longer playing along.

“Alex are you alright?” He asked sincerely once he’d stopped playing.

“Yeah... yeah, why?” Alex asked, trying to brush it off but Luke and Reggie had already connected the dots.

Alex only ever played like that when he was upset and since he was in a good mood before Willie showed up, it wasn’t difficult to figure out.

“I know it’s tough man. People say you never forget your first ghost.” Reggie spike sympathetically, “but... I’m sure there will be others.”

“Yeah, thanks Reg,” Alex nodded and Luke stepped forward, clutching his guitar strap as if to brace himself. He wasn’t very good at expressing things outside of music.

“Yeah, and Alex, you’re a great drummer and a great guy, okay?” He said, leaning onto the drumset slightly as he spoke. “I wouldn’t let all that stuff get in between you and what you love.”

Alex nodded and Luke finally noticed Jordan’s presence in the studio. He’d started to take steps in her direction to ask when she’d gotten there when Reggie spoke up again.

“I don’t know, sometimes a little fire onstage can make things better,” he said suggestively and Luke froze in the center of the band setup. “Like you and Julie.”

His head immediately snapped towards Jordan, trying to gauge her reaction to the statement. He was already certain she thought there was something between him and Julie, she’d written a whole song out of jealousy after all, but he needed her to know that wasn’t true.

“Uh, what... what is that supposed to mean?” Luke asked, trying to play innocent and hoping Reggie would get the hint and back off.

“C’mon, everyone can see the way you look at her when you sing,” Reggie chuckled, clearly not understanding. “You guys ooze chemistry.”

“Please never say ooze again,” Alex said to Reggie before turning to Luke, “But you have to agree he’s right.”

“No, no.” Luke denied vehemently, chancing another nervous glance at Jordan only to find she had become suddenly very interested in her shoes. “I have chemistry with everyone I sing with.”

It felt like a reasonable excuse to him, and it wasn’t exactly wrong. He did have chemistry when he sang with people, but it wasn’t because of the person, it was because of the music. Still, Reggie and Alex gave him looks of disbelief and he huffed and rolled his eyes.

“Seriously, watch,” he said, taking a determined step towards Jordan. Sure he was trying to prove a point to the guys, but maybe he could prove something else to himself and Jordan.

Still, before he could even take another step she stopped him.

“You’d better take that step back,” she demanded, not even looking up from the floor and his heart sank.  

He shook it off with a sigh, still determined to prove his point to the guys. So he turned on his heel, confidently stepping towards Reggie as he began to sing.

“I believe, I believe that we’re just one dream away from who we’re meant to be.” When he got close enough, he slipped his hand around the back of the bassist‘s neck, pulling their faces even closer together. “That we’re standing on the edge of… great.”

He winked at the boy when he finished and stepped back, watching with a smirk as Reggie gulped. Mission accomplished.

“Wow,” Alex remarked, “I see chemistry.”

“Yeah, that was pretty hot,” Reggie admitted, voice cracking as he spoke.

Riding on the high of his success, Luke took it one step further, kissing two of his fingers before placing them on Reggie’s lips. When he heard a giggle from behind him he whirled around to grin at Jordan, elated that he could turn her mood around. She rolled her eyes in response but he didn’t care. He was starting to think maybe they were a sign of endearment from her with how much she did it.  

“Girls, amiright?” Reggie croaked out and Luke chuckled.

“Yeah,” he agreed and Alex quickly chimed in.

“No,” the drummer said definitively with a light chuckle.

Jordan barked out a laugh at that, poofing over to the drummer to give him a high five before poofing back to the front of the band setup. Luke shook his head at that, ducking his head to hide his smile as he slipped his guitar strap back across his body.

Practice went smoothly after that, though Jordan and Reggie insisted on messing around until Julie got there. He felt kinda lonely with Jordan now hanging out on Reggie’s side of the setup but it was worth it to see her smile and hear her laughter. He didn’t even have the heart to tell them to take this practice seriously since they had a performance tonight. When the hell did he become so whipped for a girl he wasn’t even sure liked him back?

He couldn’t begrudge them their fun, even screwing around Jordan and Reggie were some of the best musicians he knew and it was obvious when Julie got there. They only had an hour of true, focused rehearsal with the whole group yet it sounded amazing. Still, Luke was nervous. If he’d had his way, they would’ve practice until it was perfect but he knew that wasn’t reasonable.

Luke was bummed when Jordan left to get ready in Julie’s room. He figured they needed their “girl time” or whatever but- though he’d never say it out loud- watching Jordan do her makeup had become part of his pre-performance routine and he was a bit fascinated by the whole ordeal. Instead, he spent the time leading up to their performance reading his book or talking with Alex and Reggie.

Luke’s nerves didn’t present themselves outwardly as much as Jordan’s did. It was something he’d noticed back when they’d both started performing. When Jordan got nervous she moved, flicking and shaking her hands, bouncing in place, anything to stop her standing still. Luke, on the other hand, internalized his nerves. He would become uncharacteristically quiet the closer he got. When he first started performing for crowds his hands would tremble, something he’d had to figure out how to counteract pretty quickly because it’s really hard to play the guitar with shaky hands.

Still, pre-performance nerves were when his insecurities popped up the most so when he looked up and saw Jordan, Alex, and Reggie all holding hands in the garage while Julie started the song, he felt like the wind had been knocked out of him. He probably looked like a kicked puppy but he felt like one. His bandmates had left him out of something.

As if reading his thoughts, Jordan reached her hand out to him in a silent invitation to join whatever pre-show ritual they’d started without his knowledge. As soon as he took her hand he understood why they did it: silent solidarity. A small but strong reminder that they were in this together. Then Jordan squeezed his hand lightly, giving him just enough time to squeeze back before they were poofing onstage, well, onto the driveway.

Julie and Jordan were electric in center stage and all five of them were sounding great (no pun intended). Everything was going perfectly until Luke nodded his head at Jordan, silently asking her to come share his mic but she pointedly ignored him. Luke furrowed his brow in confusion as she angled her body away from him as she picked up the next verse.

Maybe it was a mistake, he thought, trying it again as he and Julie joined her vocals.

“Sometimes we gotta lean, lean on someone else to get a little help until we find a way,” they sang together, and Luke frowned slightly. Those lines had always made him think of Jordan, especially after his birthday and it hurt extra that she was ignoring him.

He tried to ignore the stab of jealousy he felt when she moved to the other side of the setup to sing to Alex by focusing on the music and singing with Reggie but it didn’t fully work. He still wanted her attention and he wanted to know why he wasn’t getting it.

His wounded puppy eyes were fully intact when he stepped up beside where Julie crouched on the piano to play his guitar solo. She gave him a sympathetic smile before shrugging lightly, seemingly understanding why he was upset but also unaware as to why he was being shunned. It made him feel a bit better, at least he wasn’t the only one in the dark. As the section came to an end he noticed her eyes flicking out to the crowd and followed them, spotting a familiar blond. He sent her a teasing wink as he hit the last note and she stood fully on the piano in what was a truly epic moment. That girl was a performer through and through.

He slid back to his microphone behind the piano, still hurt but pushing it aside to finish out the performance. Now really wasn’t the time to get lost in speculation and self-pity.

He was surprised when he and the guys returned to invisibility only to see Jordan still out there, singing and playing along with Julie. It was clearly a beautiful and emotional moment for the two and he wondered when they’d planned it. Still, that wasn’t his first question when he finally got time to talk to the ghost girl.

“Hey, so, how come you were ignoring me out there?” He asked her after the lifers had evacuated the driveway.

Reggie and Alex were playing some basketball on the hoop hanging from the garage door while Jordan was perched on the ledge at the end of the driveway, scribbling into her notebook.

“What are you talking about?” She asked, looking up to stare at him in confusion.

“During the performance… I wanted you to come sing with me…” he spoke, leaving pauses in hopes that she’d catch on and put him out of his misery but she never did. “C’mon Moss, I did the head nod and everything!”

“Those were for me?” She exclaimed, looking at him like he’d lost his mind, “I thought you were trying to get Julie!”

He felt the relief wash over him with those words. So it was just a simple misunderstanding.

The relief was short-lived, however, as the four of them were suddenly struck through with another jolt, sending the three guys sprawling to the ground and Jordan doubling over.

“Jesus fuck,” he heard Jordan curse as she clutched her chest and he groaned in agreement, pushing himself off the cement.

“That wasn’t like the other ones,” he said, “It’s getting worse.”

“Why is this happening to us?” Reggie asked, still bent over as he recovered.

“It’s because you guys are in serious trouble,” Willie answered, nervously approaching the four ghosts. “We need to talk.”

They all nodded in agreement, silently moving together before Willie poofed them to Hollywood.

They followed him along the Walk of Fame as he explained all about how Caleb’s stamp was the reason the jolts kept happening. That he’d stamped them to force them to work for him because they were too powerful.

“So, if we don’t join his club, the weird power outage thing continues until there’s no power left at all?” Reggie asked, crossing his arms over his chest nervously.

“Yes,” Willie answered, not meeting any of their eyes.

“What exactly happens when the power goes out?”

“That’s… that’s it. You’re done.”

Luke heard Jordan suck in a breath beside him, freezing in her tracks and the rest of the group slowed to a halt.

“Yeah, what do you mean by ‘we’re done?’” Reggie asked the question none of them wanted to hear the answer to.

“You just… you don’t exist… anymore. Not anywhere.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jordan slap a hand over her mouth as if to cover up a sob. He knew she was thinking about her parents, how she’d never see them again because of this and his blood began to boil.

“So what, we have to give up everything and work for Caleb for eternity?” He spat angrily, “That’s some club you guys got going on.”

He took a step back, reaching down discretely to grab Jordan’s hand, hoping to provide her with any kind of comfort and support.

“But there is another way,” Willie explained, “That’s why I’m here.”

“Another option?” Alex asked skeptically.

“Just please, hear me out.” Willie pleaded, and Luke shared a look with the other guys. “Alright. If you guys could figure out what your unfinished business is, you do it in time, you could cross over and be free from all of this.”

“Okay, so what’s our unfinished business?” Luke asked, squeezing Jordan’s hand reassuringly. He’d figure it out just for her.

“I don’t know,” Willie said. “But since you all died at the same time it could be something you all have to do together.”

Luke’s mind began whirling, trying to figure out what it could be. He was so caught up in his thoughts that he barely registered Willie departing, or Alex and Reggie talking.

“We have to figure out our unfinished business,” he insisted, finally joining in on the conversation.

“Yeah, man, and how are we supposed to do that? Alright?” Alex asked frustratedly. “There was so much we wanted to do.”

The combination of Alex’s words and him noticing the sign in the background brought upon Luke’s epiphany.

“Yeah, but the night we died, there was only one thing we wanted to do together,” he explained, pointing towards the Orpheum sign with his free hand.

Part 11

___

JATP Taglist: @meangirlsx @morganayennefertyrell

Sunset Swerve Taglist: @oopsiedoopsie23 @angryknightstatesmantrash @onlygetaway @deni-gonzalez @advicefromnixxxx @brooke0297 @vicesvsvirtuesfanfic @cordeliascrown

[mxtxfanatic]

Adding for comparison:

“You know, we do think the same way. You think I’m incomprehensible? Well, the feeling’s mutual.” He met Xie Lian’s gaze. “At this point, I might as well just tell it to you straight. I’ve got a whole bunch of opinions about you.” “Uh...well...I knew that already. For ages now,” Xie Lian said. “Oh really?” Mu Qing said coldly. “Then do you know that I often thought you relied on your status too much—that even though you were His Highness the Crown Prince, even though you had good fortune, your skills weren’t that much better than mine?” “...” “I also thought that you probably only liked doing all those good deeds for show, because you wanted all the praise and flattery. And that you only helped me because of that—I was the perfect subject for you to demonstrate your sympathy and kindness on. To be honest, some of my opinions haven’t changed, even now. Maybe they never will. Even if I push these thoughts down, they’ll come back eventually.” At that point, Xie Lian didn’t know whether to sweat about this or what. “There’s no need to say stuff like that in such detail to the man himself, you know?!” Unexpectedly, Mu Qing continued with, “But more often than not, I’m still...kind of in awe of you.” Xie Lian was taken aback. Mu Qing gathered his courage. As though someone were choking him, forcing him to speak, he stiffly said, “Isn’t that normal? You...are rather amazing. You’re...also...a better person than I am. In short, I...very much wanted...to become your f-f-friend.” “...” Xie Lian had never in a million years imagined he’d ever hear that from Mu Qing’s lips. Though they were stuttered, forced, and stiff, they were such honest, sincere, sensible words! His eyes went wide. “You...” Mu Qing had finally squeezed the sentence out through the cracks of his gritted teeth, and he let out a long breath. “That incident after Xianle’s fall...no matter if it was right or wrong, no matter if I was in a difficult situation, I still owe you an apology.” Xie Lian was stumped for a moment. “...It’s all water under the bridge, so let it go. But let’s not worry about it now. We need to get out of here first!” Mu Qing raised his voice. “He told me that if I fell under suspicion, you would take advantage of the situation and not save me even if you knew I didn’t do it. That you wouldn’t believe me because you hate me.” “He”? Xie Lian knew exactly who “he” was. “I didn’t agree to help him, but even so...everything he said, I’ve thought before,” Mu Qing continued. “Deep down, I always thought you hated me, that you despised me, so I... I’ve always... Anyway, you don’t actually think that way. I’m glad.”

—Vol. 8, Chapt. 127: Upon the Heaven-Crossing Bridge, Three Idiots Return to Olden Times, 7seas

It's interesting because it seems like the edits were rearranging (Mu Qing being called over by Jun Wu is mentioned before the end of the "f-f-friend" speech), adding more depth to their convo (they're actually conversing rather than Xie Lian being stumped or trying to quickly brush Mu Qing's confession aside), making Mu Qing more clear (such as him directly naming Jun Wu as the instigator instead of weirdly playing coy like in the unrevised), and—what I consider the most significant change—removing Mu Qing admitting that he won't honestly change after this.

So much of Mu Qing's character in the story is him hoping that Xie Lian is actually a terrible person, and it diminishes his character growth of admitting this is all projection and undermines his reconciliation with and apology to Xie Lian for him to then admit that some of his unfair opinions have not changed, will likely never change, and will in fact probably return later. However, because mxtx removed those lines and also cleaned up Mu Qing's speech, he directly admits that his thoughts were projections, accepts that Xie Lian does not and never has thought less of others, least of all Mu Qing, and is willing to finally see Xie Lian as he is going forward, without falling back on his terrible habits like the unrevised states that he would.

tgcf revised—mu qing & xie lian's reconciliation, chapters 192-193, translated by me

note: i'm not a translation professional, i did this for fun to give a rough idea of what happened in the revised version of this scene. it's also inevitable for subtleties to get lost in translation so do be aware. i know the english prose sounds a little awkward because chinese prose works differently but i wanted to translate it as directly as possible & any attempts at making it sound "smoother" or nicer would demand biased input from me which i wanted to minimize

edit; found a typo in the first slide. mu qing should say "even thought" not "even though"

[nellie-elizabeth]

Queliot Fic Recs - Master Post (March 11, 2020)

Hi everyone! I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, but now that we’re staring down the barrel of the show’s official ending, I thought I’d finally take the time to post a master fic rec list!

A couple of notes:

This is by no means comprehensive; I’m sure I’m forgetting several lovely fics, and will be updating this list as I remember/find more.

This list will not include WIPs (the only exception being where I rec a completed story that is part of a series, and mention that sequel(s) are still in progress). I will add the WIPs I’m reading once they are complete!

I am open to suggestions from others, so please reblog and add your own recommendations! I would love to add to this and make it a one-stop-shop resource for people looking for something new to read.

When I know the tumblr handle of the author, I have included it. But in several cases I don’t know the author’s tumblr, if they have one - if you have this information to fill in, please let me know and I will update the master post. (Also, if you notice any broken links or mistakes - I did my best, but this thing is hefty and I’m sure there are errors!)

This took me… forever to put together, so if you find it useful, please reblog - and more importantly, please leave comments & kudos on the stories you read!

Link to the Google Doc, if that’s easier for you to read.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sIUMZcIcpnZ1_9T3o7dkqUaqEw0miwNTfTuZjvjGto4/edit?usp=sharing

Hefty rec list under the cut.

Season Three Gapfillers/Deviations from Canon

These stories usually deal with the aftermath of the mosaic in some way. Many of them were written before the revelations of 4x05, but some were written later, and either comply with canon, or deviate from it from that point.

shipping it by Mizzy (@mizzy2k). Mature. 16,344 words. The Muntjac “ships” Queliot and is trying to help them along. What else can I say? There’s angst, there’s love, it’s silly and it’s sincere.

Sense Memories by mtothedestiel (@summersteve). Explicit. 2,616 words. This is an ABO fic, which is not something I would typically read. But I love this author so much that I decided to give it a try. The thing I like about it is the idea of the mosaic timeline leaving a tangible, physical impact on Quentin and Eliot, and how they might deal with the fallout in this more extreme scenario. If ABO isn’t for you, though, proceed with caution.

throw your shadow over me by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 8,187 words. Okay I’m going to recommend basically everything peacefrog has written, but this one is probably my favorite. It’s a super angst-y sex scene between Quentin and Eliot during season three, where Eliot believes this is his last chance to be with Quentin, and is basically dreading the emotional fallout even while it’s happening.

i start spinning (slipping out of time) by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Teen. 2,570 words. Before Eliot goes to Margo to discuss the god-killing bullet, he and Quentin have a conversation about Quentin’s choice to stay at Blackspire. Features a heartbreaking memory of their life together at the mosaic, and just generally gorgeous canon-compliant angst.

Promises by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Explicit. 7,751 words. Eliot and Quentin have it out about Quentin’s decision to stay in Blackspire, and hash out their feelings for each other. This one is canon-divergent (and is probably the one-shot I am the most proud of!)

Overthinking It by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Teen. 3,581 words. Eliot finds out about the abyss key, and it prompts a discussion about Quentin and Eliot’s relationship.

Honey You’re On Fire, Let Me Help by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 5,857 words. Quentin accidentally picks up the abyss key… Eliot finds him and does what he can to distract him. This is hot, of course, but also so desperately full of feeling and love. As the summary implies, there is a good deal of depression and talk of suicide in this story, so take care.

Can’t Let Go by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 5,384 words. UGH. This is what SHOULD have happened after Eliot and Quentin remember the mosaic time-line. This is so satisfying and gave me some catharsis in the aftermath of the direction the story has taken in canon.

~~~~~

Post-Season Four Fix-Its

These stories maintain the canon of season four, and continue on from there. They generally involve bringing Quentin back from the dead.

What Matter Where by achray. Explicit. 28,782 words. Eliot becomes Prince Consort of the Underworld. He gets to be with Q when he’s back home, though. This is almost tough to read, because my brain doesn’t want to accept any half-happy endings, any reality where Eliot can’t spend all of his time by Quentin’s side. But on the other hand… Eliot has to make a big, big sacrifice to bring Quentin back, and you definitely feel the gravitas of that.

life ain’t fair (so i guess we’d better cheat) by micksgotkicks (@lovelyquentin). Teen. 1,137 words. This is more of a pre-fix-it. Eliot rages against the heavens for taking Quentin from him, and resolves to get him back. Short and painful. Cathartic.

Being Alive by miss_whimsy (@bambiesque). Gen. 7,022 words. Eliot sends the letter to Quentin with the magical stamp. And when that doesn’t work, he sends a bunch more. This is one of the very few fics on this list that has any connection to season five canon, which I’m not watching. I did watch 5x03, however, and this fic is borne out of Eliot Waugh never giving up - the way we all know it should have gone.

What kind of man (loves like this)? by destielpasta (@queliotpasta). Explicit. 3,160 words. Eliot and Quentin go out dancing. This fic has a certain quality about it that’s difficult to describe - I could just really feel their love for each other jump off the page, specifically in how badly they clearly want to care for each other. This fic also straddles the line between categories - the author describes it as a “fix-it” and it does deal with Quentin’s resurrection in a more immediate way, but the subject matter itself is much more about the aftermath, rather than the actual “bringing Q back from the dead” part.

You’re a Story (I Can Follow) by Page161of180. Mature. 19,695 words. I think everyone’s read this, but how could I not include it? This technically isn’t a fix-it, because it was written before the season four finale confirmed the theory of Quentin’s death. This author, like the collective fandom, assumed that death would be temporary… and thus, this is the story of Eliot being the Orpheus to Quentin’s Eurydice. It is stunning - a gold standard in writing intense grief with a happy ending. Eliot is undone by Quentin’s death here, and has to fight through obstacle after obstacle to get him back - the biggest one being, his own lack of self-worth. There’s also a somewhat-connected sequel/prequel called And Remember What You Were Before (Not Rated, 6,998 words), which is completely worth the read.

(like a perfect picture) in a broken frame by PanBoleyn (@eidetictelekinetic). Not Rated. 20,631 words. Another resurrection/fix-it fic… Really great group dynamics as everyone works on bringing Quentin back, but also a focus on Eliot’s despair. Kind of your standard fix-it, exactly what the characters should have tried to do, in a world where canon hadn’t betrayed us so badly.

life fades (but you remain) by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 62,735. Stunning. STUNNING. Eliot finds a way to get Quentin back, but it comes at a cost. The two of them have to work it out. This features some incredibly good angst with a happy ending, scorching sex, a really intriguing OC in an early chapter, and some nice screen-time for the lovely Alice Quinn, to boot.

as it was by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Mature. 3,913 words. Short and sweet - Penny-40 leads Quentin to where he needs to go, and that’s back home to Eliot.

In the Woods Somewhere by pineapplecrushface (@pineapplecrushface). Explicit. 15,528 words. This is the most creative take on a fix-it I’ve seen! The summary outlines the premise best: “Alice being unable to wipe younger Quentin's memory during the timeshare spell had a ripple effect.” Eliot is so desperate for Quentin in this one, and Quentin, from the afterlife, is having to work out how he feels and where he wants to be.

In Which We Grieve by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Teen. 3,413 words. I hesitate to call this a “fix-it” really, since Quentin doesn’t come back to life. But despite that, he and Eliot make it work. This is sad, but cathartic too.

(this is not a) Temporary Love by rizcriz (@sadlittlenerdking). Teen. 20,684 words. A fix-it that includes some intense mosaic feels too, as Margo and Eliot read over some letters/notes written during the mosaic timeline. I also like this one for how the rest of the gang finally notices how sick and worn-down Quentin is, and forces Q and Eliot to take a mental health vacation once Quentin is back in the land of the living!

~~~~~

Post-Season Four/Post-Possession - Not Fix-Its

These stories take place after the events of season four, or, in some cases, after an imagined ending of season four (written before the series finale aired), ignoring season five canon. They are not fix-its in the sense that either a) they ignore Quentin’s death in canon and proceed like it never happened, or b) Quentin’s resurrection happened “off-screen” and is not the focus of the story. These fics often deal with the aftermath, both physical and psychological, of Eliot’s possession. They also usually deal with Quentin and Eliot’s reconciliation after the events of seasons three and four, and sometimes continue through their time as an established couple.

your body (your heart) in his hands by Allegria23 (@allegria23). Explicit. 18,636 words. This fic follows Eliot and Quentin into their future. I’m recommending it specifically for the way it deals with Quentin’s discipline - I’ve never seen a fic tackle the subject in quite this way, and with so much care and gentleness. If you are not a fan of kid!fic, don’t be put off by the premise - Eliot and Quentin are great fathers with amazing kids in this future universe, but the focus really does remain on their romance. This story is part of a series called second time around which is all worth a read, especially the latest part, entitled The Special Dish. The whole series really embodies the romance of effort, and how putting in the time to nurture and grow a relationship is what makes it work.

Be still my foolish heart (i’m almost me again) by Butterfly (@butterflydm). Explicit. 3,754 words. A birthday fic for Quentin - he’s a little overwhelmed by the party held in his honor. He sneaks off to be alone, Eliot follows him, and Q tells Eliot about his discipline.

Living Room, NY by cartographies (@honeybabydichotomy). Teen. 11,254 words. Eliot goes to therapy. I’m recc’ing this specifically for Eliot’s rambling confession of love to Quentin in chapter two. The whole thing is lovely, but that part really knocked me the fuck out.

Imagine being loved by me. by destielpasta (@queliotpasta). Explicit. 11,225 words. Holy moly. This is a top-tier fave for me. It’s about sex, it’s about love, it’s about working through a relationship after trauma. Eliot is touch-starved but can’t be touched - so Quentin and Eliot must get creative.

Yes and Yes and Maybe Yes by hetrez (@hetrez). Mature. 5,542 words. The author describes this as “consent porn, with feelings,” and that’s a pretty good descriptor. Quentin has PTSD because of the Monster, and Eliot’s touch can be triggering for him. They work together to get through it. This is hot, yes, but it’s hot specifically because of how badly Eliot wants to take care of Quentin and make him feel safe.

The Dreamers by hetrez (@hetrez). Teen. 10,143 words. Post-possession, Quentin and Eliot are together but things aren’t smooth sailing. The scene from this story that always sticks in my head is Quentin asking Eliot if he wants to have a family again, like they did before with Arielle and Teddy - and Eliot’s horrifically wrong-footed response: “You’ll get a wife again and we’ll have another baby.” As might be predicted, Quentin doesn’t take that very well… and this story is at least partially working out where they stand, what they both want.

The Drum Beats Out of Time by HMGFanfic (@hmgfanfic). Mature. 68,605 words. This series features two stories: Suitcase of Memories and I Fall Behind. Both are amazing, but I Fall Behind in particular is one of my top-tier favorite fics in the whole fandom. This fic does not pull its punches in terms of the effects of Eliot’s possession, and it makes things really rough for Quentin and Eliot’s relationship. Quentin does a reckless thing, Eliot panics, they hash it out - but it’s not easy, and it’s not so clear-cut. These fics also features glimpses of their life together at the mosaic, and a lovely epilogue that shows how they’ve made progress and are still healing as a couple.

the right time and place by impossibletruths (@impossibletruths). Teen. 3,675 words. Eliot trying to propose to Quentin. It’s sweet and fluffy and good for the soul.

hearts like houses by impossibletruths (@impossibletruths). Explicit. 11,888 words. Quentin and Eliot celebrate Eliot’s birthday, post-possession. They get away for a trip, to try and put their worries behind them. This story is full of so much intimacy and gentleness that it just melts my whole heart.

five times my writing was better than the magicians by micksgotkicks (@lovelyquentin). Teen. 6,019 words. These are just… soft. It’s five different short fics, all with slight variations on the simple concept of Quentin and Eliot reuniting post-possession. There’s no intensive deep-dive, nothing too grim or challenging. It’s just the two of them finding their way to each other again and again. Very healing to read, in light of canon’s (inferior) version of reality.

struck from a great height by mtothedestiel (@summersteve). Explicit. 4,517 words. “Life affirming sex” is the most telling tag on this thing. Post-possession, Eliot and Quentin find their way into each other’s arms. Really hot sex, lots of feelings… everything we deserved at the end of the Monster story-line.

And So Lift Your Spirits by OrchardsinSnow (@orchardsinsnow). Explicit. 3,437 words. This was one of the first fics I remember reading in the aftermath of my desperate post-season four feelings, and it hit the spot in the best way. Eliot’s POV - he loves Quentin, but has doubts that he’s actually deserving of something so wonderful, that Quentin could really reciprocate and want to stay. Quentin finds an insanely hot, insanely romantic way to reassure him.

Ten Twenty-Eight by Page161of180. Not Rated. 5,974 words. This is slice-of-life about Quentin Coldwater and how he’s spent Eliot’s birthday, October 28, over the years. It’s told through notes from the Library branch of the Underworld, with added comments from Alice and Penny. It’s weird, but rewarding. I love the record-keeping aspect. This author has a real gift for outsider POV, and this is one of my favorites!

Nights and Mornings by Page161of180. Mature. 6,734 words. Two connected stories, in the aftermath of possession. Quentin doesn’t die, but he does still get back together with Alice, a la 4x12. These stories deal with Eliot’s thoughts on that, and… spoiler… Quentin/Alice is just not meant to be. Quentin makes a different choice.

The Honor of Your Presence by Page161of180. Mature. 18,117 words. Quentin and Eliot get married, and we hear the story from three different POVs… Todd, Rafe, and Marina 23. Random? Yes. Brilliant? Also yes. I love how each POV has a different and distinct literary style. And how even the people who aren’t closest to Quentin and Eliot can see how insanely in love they are with each other.

The Wanting Then, the Needing Now by Page161of180. Not rated. 3,799 words. Alice’s POV, as Eliot is saved from possession, and Quentin falls apart. Basically, Alice realizes where Quentin really belongs. I love the way this author does justice to Quentin’s love for Alice - it’s not a footnote, it’s not an insignificant blip. It’s real, and that doesn’t invalidate the fact that Quentin chooses Eliot. This has a much longer sequel which is also very good - but that story is more Alice-centric and not really focused on Queliot as much, even though they definitely play a part.

Lay Me Down (Pockets Full of Stones) by PanBoleyn (@eidetictelekinetic). Not Rated. 10,024 words. Post-possession, Eliot realizes how badly Quentin has been dealing with things. He’s angry at their friends for not keeping a better eye out - but all that matters right now is finding Quentin and making sure he’s alright. I love this story for how messy their reunion is - how all of their feelings just come spilling out of them without finesse.

(one kiss) it all comes down to this by PanBoleyn (@eidetictelekinetic). Not Rated. 6,391 words. True Love’s Kiss… the boys need to talk about their feelings, and a curse forces the issue. This is so entirely my jam.

box of chocolates by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Mature. 9,256 words. This short series begins with the Teen-rated for love (if it finds you worthy) and features Eliot asking Quentin to be his valentine. Because Quentin and Eliot are… Quentin and Eliot, it still takes them a little while to get their shit together, after that.

when lips and skin remember by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 6,163 words. This is for the monthly prompt challenge - “blindfolds” and features Quentin helping Eliot through some sensory issues, post-Monster possession.

an end (but the start of all things that are left to do) by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 2,388 words. Birthday smut! Q is alive and gets a blowjob, as the universe requires.

the one with the dog by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 80,517 words. If you haven’t already read this series, what are you waiting for?? It is IDEAL for soothing the soul. Eliot and Quentin deal with the aftermath of their trauma, both physical and mental. They hang out at the condo in New York, they take care of an adorable dog named Lady Desdemona, they have lots of hot sex of course. They heal. Every single one of the twelve stories in this series is worth reading, but my favorites are probably (this is) the beat of my heart (Explicit, 11,700 words), Five Card Draw (Explicit, 3,531 words), all the way home I’ll be warm (Explicit, 15,640 words), and Come What May (Teen, 3,352 words).

5 Scenes from a Road Trip by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 16,218 words. In the aftermath of season four (sans Quentin’s death), the boys need a change of scenery to begin healing and finding their way back to one another. I love how this fic shows their closeness, and how the boundaries of their relationship often defy description. They love each other beyond sex, beyond conventional romance - although they achieve those things, too, as they definitely deserve.

did you know my baby loves me? by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 7,776 words. Quentin tops Eliot on his birthday. What it says on the tin. But as always with this author, even something that should be ostensibly a PWP is filled with so much feeling and love that you could just drown in it.

To Learn to Be Again by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 18,295 words. “I don’t think- I can’t be anyone’s boyfriend right now, Eliot.” Eliot loves Quentin, Quentin loves Eliot, but that’s not always enough to give them a happily ever after. Quentin goes to therapy, deals with his trauma and his mental health, and Eliot is right there beside him with no expectations. This is so, so lovely and every ounce of their happiness feels earned and all the more precious for the pain that’s mixed up with it.

do not go gentle by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 10,260 words. This is almost a fix-it, in that Quentin imagines the events of 4x13, but they don’t actually happen. So be warned if any depiction of Quentin’s death is a trigger for you. I love the way this story deals with the Alice of it all, and also the way Quentin and Eliot talk through their situation and find a way back to each other once again. (Also shower sex happens). This author has written multiple versions of this same reconciliation, but each one is so lovely and I’ll never get sick of it.

the strange act of living by propinquitous (@propinquitous). Explicit. 13,632 words. So there are a lot of fics out there that deal with the aftermath of Eliot’s possession of course. A lot of fics that feature Eliot and Quentin slowly, painfully, finding a way to reconcile. This one holds a special place in my heart for this particular moment, where Quentin walks past Eliot without saying anything, grabs a muffin from the counter, and leaves the room. Later, Q finds Eliot crying in the shower, and Eliot asks him why he just left, taking the food Eliot had made for him, and then ignoring him. That one moment has stuck with me ever since I read the fic, and I keep coming back to it. In all, this captures a very specific kind of hurt that both Quentin and Eliot are feeling, and gets them on the path to healing. Gorgeous.

the safety of others by propinquitous (@propinquitous). Teen. 8,122 words. Quentin doesn’t die in 4x13, but he does get injured. And Eliot keeps vigil. This is - so powerful. I don’t even know how to describe it. Just read it, please.

Magic Curses by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Explicit. 134,886 words. This series includes six stories, each dealing with Quentin and Eliot’s relationship as they undergo external threats from creative and somewhat evil magical curses. It’s my attempt to write in some more hurt/comfort to the fandom, and also to indulge in some established-relationship goodness! The first story, Lover’s Touch (Explicit, 24,781 words), is summarized thusly: “Q gets cursed, and Alice can’t help. Magic forces Q and Eliot to cuddle and talk about their feelings.”

Coming Home by rizcriz (@sadlittlenerdking). Not Rated. 2,958 words. Short and sweet. The author succinctly describes this as: “Eliot gets to be brave.” And he does. He says the thing he wants to say to Quentin, and Q eventually believes him.

Enough by SabbyStarlight. Teen. 2,746 words. This was written just before 4x13 came out. If only if only this is how it had gone instead… basically just Quentin and Eliot talking about their feelings, negotiating their relationship.

Boyfriend by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Teen. 6,727 words. Quentin is sensitive about the fact that Eliot isn’t introducing him as his boyfriend. This is just… the sweetest. I love that there’s some jealousy and insecurity, but it’s a manageable, reasonable type - Eliot and Quentin are able to talk about it and get past this small bump in the road.

Hunger by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 4,327 words. Quentin gets a birthday blowjob. The end. :)

~~~~~

Mosaic Timeline

These stories are ones that take place almost or entirely within the mosaic timeline - both in keeping with, and in deviation from, what we see in 3x05.

help me hold onto you by ameliajessica (@ameliajessica). Explicit. 14,768 words. This one will hurt your heart, but it’s so rewarding. Featuring Eliot being ridiculously turned on by talking about feelings during sex… and Quentin loving Eliot while grieving for Arielle.

‘Cause my baby’s sweet as can be by destielpasta (@queliotpasta). Teen. 645 words. Tiny fic - maybe the shortest one on the list. Quentin and Eliot are bad at talking about their feelings. Who’s surprised?

flowing all this time by mtothedestiel (@summersteve). Explicit. 5,488 words. This is one of those fics where Arielle isn’t an obstacle for the boys… but rather, Eliot is an obstacle for Quentin and Arielle, in a way. It has some bittersweet moments, but I love how much Eliot loves Quentin here. This is also (spoiler) the rare fic where Arielle chooses to leave, rather than dying.

a cure i know (that soothes the soul) by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 4,857 words. Little snippets of Quentin and Eliot’s life through the years at the mosaic. Recc’ing especially for middle-aged Queliot, which we see all too little of in this fandom!

measure in love by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 51,827 words. This is a series about Quentin, Eliot, and Arielle’s lives together at the mosaic. I don’t know if the author plans to write more in this series or not, but each one can stand alone. I am particularly enamored with The Ways We Fit Together (Explicit, 11,661 words), which is summarized succinctly as “sex and love in the mosaic timeline”, and You Steer My Heart (Explicit, 25,217 words), which follows Eliot’s mindset as he watches Quentin and Arielle fall in love with each other, while Quentin and Eliot continue to love each other as well. It’s stunning, and probably my favorite take on the three of them and their polyamorous relationship. This series has everything - the best combination of smut and feelings you could hope for.

Running All This Time by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Explicit. 179,478 words.The story of the mosaic timeline, built on the foundation of love and communication. To my knowledge, the only completed mosaic long-fic in the fandom thus far! Includes Fillorian nonsense, a quest within a quest, plenty of sex, lots of hurt/comfort, a different take on Arielle, and happy endings for everyone.

Reciprocal by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Teen. 8,259. Eliot is an idiot about his feelings (what else is new?), and he tries to make things better in the worst possible way. This fic imagines a world where Eliot and Quentin find happiness together without Arielle as a part of their romantic/sexual lives.

my heart is thrilled by the still of your hand by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 9,586 words. This is the porn-iest version of “Quentin and Eliot don’t know how to talk about their feelings.” Basically, the boys keep jerking off next to each other in bed, and they don’t talk about it because they’re IDIOTS.

you know that’s my love (bursting loud from inside) by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 11,904 words. Another fic where Arielle decides to leave. Eliot is so good at taking care of his family.

tomorrow past tonight by vegansheilseitan. Explicit. 7,676 words. Okay - if you’re only going to read one gap-filler for 3x05, that’s basically just the missing sex scene and nothing else, make it this one. It’s hot, and it’s aching with everything Quentin and Eliot aren’t saying to each other. This is one of my absolute favorites.

~~~~~

Brakebills Alternate Universe / Season One

These stories are generally, but not always, pure relationship fics where the plot concerns of canon (i.e. the Beast, and time loops) do not exist, and instead Quentin and Eliot get to be magical grad students together, and fall in love.

Every Blessed Thing by achray. Explicit. 7,795 words. Quentin turns himself invisible. This fic is complex in how Alice and Quentin’s relationship is portrayed, and the resolution isn’t clear-cut. I really like this characterization of both Quentin and Eliot.

saturate the atmosphere (wake me from a dream) by Allegria23 (@allegria23). Explicit. 7,394 words. This is some good ol’ sexy times with a healthy dash of feelings. Eliot involuntarily levitates them while Quentin’s giving him a blowjob, so… that’s honestly all you need to know about this one. Go give it a read.

i feel it in my body, know it in my mind by ameliajessica (@ameliajessica). Mature. 11,817 words. Let’s pretend that this is what happened in 1x03, okay? Kady doesn’t interrupt when Eliot pours Q a drink, and sex ensues. I love how flabbergasted Eliot is by everything that happens - especially his reaction to the news that Quentin isn’t straight, and isn’t going to be squeamish at the thought of sleeping with a man. So hot, so cute.

if being him is who you are / say it loud say you know you are by ameliajessica (@ameliajessica). Mature. 5,293 words. Okay, holy shit. Mike’s POV - he decides that he and Eliot should have a threesome with Quentin, so Eliot can get it out of his system. Uh. Yeah, that backfires. Poor Mike. But also - the sex in this is the epitome of tenderness and love. Eliot is so careful with Quentin, so awed and desperate and shaky at the chance to be with him. There is a sequel in the works, too, so watch out for that!

Hedonism for Beginners by ceeainthereforthat (@ceeainthereforthat). Explicit. 20,730 words. A series of filthy sex, basically. Eliot is teaching Quentin about what he likes in bed. I don’t know if the series is abandoned or not, but in any case, each of these works on its own as a PWP but with a deep undercurrent of feelings.

Something Good by HMGFanfic (@hmgfanfic). Teen. 162,260 words. The Gold Standard slow-burn rom-com AU! Seriously, I know everyone’s read this, but if you haven’t for some reason… please do. The slow-burn is so slow you’ll be tearing your hair out by the end, but it’s all worth it when you get to the catharsis. How oblivious can Quentin be about Eliot’s feelings? This fic asks and answers that question, and the answer is - very. There are also two fics that accompany the main story: Someone Good (Eliot’s POV of the main story) and Somewhere Good (future one-shots of Quentin and Eliot’s life together). Both are on hiatus but the author plans to return to them. You can read the existing chapter of each without feeling like anything is unfinished, though.

Not Always Folly by HMGFanfic (@hmgfanfic). Explicit. 262,583 words. Another amazing romantic… comedy? but this one is from Eliot’s POV and is in some ways more a character study of Eliot Waugh than it is simply a romance. Although the romance… you guys… the pining levels are off the charts. Eliot ends up hurting Quentin, and really everyone else he cares about, in this story, but he puts in the work to make it right. I admire this fic for diving deep into Eliot’s psyche while also delivering on an amazing slow-burn of a different sort. Bonus points for Alice and Eliot getting to be friends like they deserve!

Be kind by longnationalnightmare. Explicit. 10,069 words. It’s the highest kudo’d fic in the fandom! I assume that means you’ve all read it? This is a PWP, but I love it specifically for how much Eliot loses his usual control when he’s with Quentin.

to be unbroken or be brave again. by milominderbinder (@disasterbiquentin). Teen. 14,135 words. Hey, it’s a 10 Things I Hate About You AU! Kind of! Josh asks Quentin to pretend to date Eliot to cheer him up after a breakup, so that Margo will go out with Josh. But Q tells Eliot what’s up right away - so they’re fake dating but real feelings happen. Super cheesy, of course, but it hits the spot!

in the world full wrong (you’re the thing that’s right) by Mizzy (@Mizzy2k). Explicit. 5,307 words. Eliot tries to hook up with Quentin Coldwater and gets more than he bargained for. I love this for how matter-of-fact Quentin is, about the fact that Eliot wants to seduce him… and then hpw he ends up doing some seducing of his own.

If You Haven’t Yet by OrchardsinSnow (@orchardsinsnow). Explicit. 5,828 words. Obviously we all love confident Eliot Waugh totally rocking Quentin’s world… but I have a soft spot for oddly confident Quentin who really knows what he’s doing, and this fic has the perfect blend of both dynamics. The best part is Quentin slowly and methodically undressing Eliot and not letting him help. It’s… whew. *fans self*

the heat that drives the light by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 9,296 words. Quentin and Eliot have an antagonistic relationship, until Eliot realizes Quentin might be what he’s looking for in a sexual partner. Sub Eliot, new-to-being-a-Dom Quentin. Super hot.

it started out with a kiss (how did it end up like this) by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 7,896 words. In the aftermath of a bad breakup, Quentin and Eliot find their way to each other. This is super amazing all on its own, but the author is also working on a sequel that I’m really enjoying thus far. Either story could probably be read without the other, too.

the bridge between us by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 16,201 words. Dom Eliot, Sub Quentin. Quentin and Eliot navigate their BDSM sex life, but also their feelings. Eliot is so tender and soft with Q, and Q learns to take care of Eliot in return. This is one of my absolute favorites from this author. Also, as a note, there’s a “prequel” to this fic called paint it red (Explicit, 7,197 words) that could totally be read as a separate piece, but is worth checking out as the origin story of how these two got together and started shaping their dynamics, sexual and otherwise.

(Everyone Has) That Drawer by ProofOfConcept and wilddragonflying. Explicit. 5,782 words. Eliot finds Quentin’s stash of sex toys. It’s enough to get him to finally act on their mutual, unspoken attraction. Hot!

Wake Me Up by rizcriz (@sadlittlenerdking). Not Rated. 4,000 words. Quentin has sleep apnea, but Eliot doesn’t know that… and he gets a little - alarmed. This is objectively an odd premise, but it’s incredibly sweet. rizcriz has about a million stories and I’ve read a lot of them, but I’m a fan of the ones like this, that take a specific concept and run with it, sort of like slice-of-life. Check out more of their work, though, I can’t possibly put them all on the list!

Migraine Mastery by SabbyStarlight. Not rated. 2,012 words. Short and sweet - Quentin has a migraine and Eliot helps.

Between Friends by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 15,019 words. This is the quintessential (Quentin-sential?) Brakebills get-together fic. It’s a party, Quentin and Eliot end up going to bed together… both of them are a little uncertain about what this means, but they work it out. Recc’ing for the hot sex, but even more for the “wake up in the middle of the night to have a tender round two without talking about what it means” sex.

Sex Magic by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 42,006 words. Uhh… what it says on the tin. Every one of these is scorching, but my favorite is probably the first one: How Easy You Are To Need.

All Of You A Verb In Perfect View by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 6,398 words. PWP where Eliot distracts Quentin while he tries to do his homework.

You Can Devastate Me by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 9,018 words. Marqueliot sex scene - Quentin and Eliot are a couple, but Margo is running the show. Just… hot, but of course Eliot’s love for Quentin still permeates the whole piece. So much tenderness, with so much filth.

~~~~~

Alternate Universe (No Magic)

So many of these seem so completely random in premise, but they’re all amazing!

Our Sublime Refrain by destielpasta (@queliotpasta) and mtothedestiel (@summersteve). Explicit. 233,929 words. It’s 1836, Eliot is a pianist. This one is Marqueliot, y’all, and let me tell you - it is a journey. If you are somewhat put off by the idea of an AU so far removed from canon, about a topic you know very little about… please give this a try. I was a little hesitant too, but I promise it will not disappoint.

Pretty Good Year by Hth (@spiders-hth-is-an-outlier). Explicit. 175,728 words. I’m not going to lie - this is a difficult fic for me. It’s stunning, but getting through it was an incredibly emotional, challenging journey. While many fics in this fandom deal with Quentin’s mental illness, I’ve never seen a fic talk about it quite like this one. That’s not to put you off from trying it if you haven’t already - this is one of the most achingly real stories I’ve ever read, and it will reward you for giving it a chance.

opening doors by impossibletruths (@impossibletruths). Mature. 52,230 words. Quentin is a playwright! Eliot is an associate director who used to act! This is a slow-ish burn, and the worldbuilding of the characters in a theatrical setting is so fun!

couch party verse by marcel. Mature. 33,725 words. These two stories feature Quentin, Eliot, and the rest of the gang at a non-magical grad school. The thing I love about these stories is how slow and realistic the escalation of the relationship feels. It’s not a hot hookup right away - they clearly like each other, but circumstances sometimes get in the way, and there’s also no big rush to the finish line. This is a softer, gentler universe that still has its own realism and trauma, too. I hope the author chooses to add to it someday!

Saltwater by mtothedestiel (@summersteve). Explicit. 35,560 words. It’s a pirate AU! What more could you possibly need to know? I love how all of the characters and locations are cleverly repurposed here - the Whitespire and Our Lady Underground are ships, Quentin is a ship’s doctor, Eliot is a captain, etc. And the slowburn between Quentin and Eliot is masterful. This is actually a series - part one is complete, and part two is in progress.

A (Gingerbread) House that we can Build by mtothedestiel (@summersteve), with art by eliotsvests (surprisegents). Explicit. 28,189 words. I am not a cheesy Christmas movie person, and I am not a kid!fic person. So I thought this might not be the story for me, at first. But I’m so glad I clicked on it - this is a story about second chances, and finding happiness when you aren’t even looking for it. And I love the way little Teddy is written here. He’s got all the sweetness of Quentin Coldwater’s son, without tilting over into being saccharine. This is just the right amount of sweet if you want to put yourself back in the holiday spirit.

I’ll Follow My Secret Heart by OrchardsinSnow (@orchardsinsnow). Mature. 17,613 words. I don’t really know how to describe this one… it’s weird! It’s a meet cute, Eliot gets in an accident, there’s a blizzard, bed (floor) sharing so as to prevent freezing to death, Eliot is kinda famous and Quentin doesn’t know. All I can say is, this is precious, and odd, and I got totally swept up in the world.

I Need You So Much Closer by OrchardsinSnow (@orchardsinsnow). Explicit. 14,436 words. I love this story. Eliot is a musician, he and Quentin are exes from years ago, who fell apart because of Eliot’s alcoholism. But he’s sober now, and he’s touring where Quentin lives - so they reconnect. Eliot calls Quentin the “smoke show love of [his] life” at one point in this fic, and that phrase just… stuck with me in the best way. Don’t miss the mini-sequel, You Need Me So Much Closer (Explicit, 3,874 words), either. I really hope the author writes more in this universe!

Experimentation by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 4,812 words. PWP where Eliot meets Quentin at a sex shop and Eliot teaches him what he’s into. Hot hot hot.

(i just might) remember that night by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 4,732 words. This might be crack, I don’t know. There are dick pics, and it’s silly, but also Quentin and Eliot feel this amazing connection to each other right off the bat, and that is honestly my jam.

and if tomorrow it’s all over (at least we had it for a moment) by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Explicit. 45,461 words. Quentin and Eliot were a couple in high school, but they haven’t seen each other in years. They run into each other again at Julia’s wedding, and everything comes rushing back. I like the fact that this fic features very little (if any) angst. The idea is that these two people missed out on their chance to be together, but they haven’t been desperately pining for years. But once they’re back in a room together… their connection is undeniable. Also, the sex is great.

hold me like a (liar) lover does by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart) with art by Doomkitty25. Explicit. 80,812 words. A holiday fic! Fake dating! Mutual pining! So tropey and excellent. Really hot sex, as is the norm for this author! Warning for Alice being something of a villain in this piece, although there’s a potential reconciliation implied right at the end. I love this fic for going beyond just the romance, and also telling a story about Quentin and Eliot’s careers, and what they want out of their lives - in terms of romance, yes, but in terms of their work lives as well.

Ask Me, I Won’t Say No by vegansheilseitan. Explicit. 22,616 words. A… pub trivia AU? Which is a thing I didn’t know I needed? Mostly this is about widower!Quentin, with a kid, meeting Eliot Waugh. They fall in love. The sex in this is incendiary, but the growing relationship between these two is what really makes it worth the read.

~~~~~

Alternate Universe (With Magic)

These stories feature roughly the same worldbuilding as the show’s canon, but the character’s journeys deviate significantly. Maybe Quentin and Eliot don’t meet at Brakebills, or their journey to getting there is different in some other way!

fire and life by everytuesday. Teen. 7,060 words. This is a high school AU, where Eliot discovers his magic, and accidentally kills his father. Quentin helps him to bury the body. It’s a little bit dark, obviously, given that description… so take care.

First Year by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Mature. 11,957 words. Quentin is a Brakebills student, who also happens to be a sylph from Fillory. He has wings, and Eliot is more than a little intrigued. The author may have plans to write a sequel!

push me (further than i thought i could go) by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 15,036 words. Quentin and Eliot meet at a game of Push, and then have their own private contest later on. Mostly recommending this one for the sex, but also for Confident Quentin Coldwater, and for the fact that no matter the circumstances, these boys are gone for each other pretty much right away.

Hedges, Bitch by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 56,568 words. This series has four works, the longest “main” story of which, theón kai andrón, is another personal favorite of mine. It features Eliot as the leader of a coven of hedge witches, and Quentin as a magical novice who didn’t make it into Brakebills. I love the dynamic between Quentin and Eliot in these stories, as they fall naturally into a dom/sub relationship, but Eliot works to make sure the power differential between them doesn’t adversely affect things, either on the job, or in their personal lives. Eliot is just so soft for Quentin in these stories, while also admiring him and depending on him as the gang gets themselves caught up in a dangerous threat to hedges all over the world.

~~~~~

Fillory/Royalty

These stories are sometimes canon deviations, and usually deal with Eliot as the High King, and his relationship with Quentin from there.

oh this is us, this is love and this is where I sleep by buckybunnyteeth. Explicit. 4,360 words. Quentin is jealous of Idri! Eliot is way, way too delighted about it. Really hot. I probably shouldn’t be as charmed by jealous!Quentin as I am. But this is amazing.

Make a list of things you need by longnationalnightmare. Explicit. 10,264 words. Eliot and Quentin are getting married, but Eliot’s okay with keeping it platonic. Quentin… is not. Hot, hot, hot.

i’d be the last shred of truth (in the lost myth of true love) by milominderbinder (@disasterbiquentin), with art by gilestel. Eliot and Margo are made the High Kings of Fillory, and then later Eliot meets a cute Brakebills professor Quentin Coldwater, who is staying at Whitespire for research. There’s a truth curse! Eliot is set to marry Idri, but uh-oh, feelings happen! Tropey as hell, super cute.

and this is the map of my heart by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 14,033 words. Eliot is High King, and he is expected to marry. Quentin magnanimously offers himself for the position, and of course there’s angst about that. And scorching hot sex. And Eliot struggling to be emotionally vulnerable. One of my absolute favorites from the author.

whitespire by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 1,529 words. Eliot sits on his throne, Quentin drops to his knees and calls him “Your Majesty.” So… yeah. Yum.

~~~~~

Brian and Nigel

This is an area where more content needs to exist! Send me a note if there are some I’ve missed.

A Little Disguised, or a Little Mistaken by Page161of180. Mature. 17,807 words. Brian and Nigel find each other, and fall in love. This is gorgeous. Quentin and Eliot are recognizably themselves, but also just different enough that when their real selves start poking through the memory wipe, you can feel the change coming. Another story where canon comes along and steals happiness right out from under them. They were so close!

Shine Through My Memory by PanBoleyn (@eidetictelekinetic). Mature. 61,311 words. This one starts as a fic about Brian and Nigel meeting and falling in love… and then the Monster still possesses Nigel/Eliot, and the events of season four continue from there. But with memories of Brian and Nigel’s love in Quentin’s head, things play out a little differently. We follow the story all the way through to Eliot getting saved by Margo and Quentin, and the reconciliation/reunion afterwards. This fic has a little of everything, and it’s really the only re-telling of season four I’ve seen that covers the canon plot while adding something new and unique to the story!

Reaching in the Dark by sirfoxheart (@sirfoxheart). Mature. 53,040 words. Eliot remembers who he is, but Quentin thinks he’s Brian. Eliot and Alice work together to protect Quentin from the Monster. This is so complex and difficult and sad and challenging, and when you reach the end, you’ll feel so frustrated about how close they were to figuring their shit out. But ultimately, canon comes back to snatch that happy ending away.

~~~~~

Other

The few fics that I couldn’t categorize neatly into any of the above sections.

So It May As Well Be Me by achray. Explicit. 14,596 words. There was only one bed. Trapped in a closet. Sex pollen. Sex magic rituals. Every fanfic trope becomes manifest. Quentin seems oblivious; Eliot is freaking out. This is just the epitome of fun.

our place in the family of things by greywash, with art by yourtinseltinkerbell (@yourtinseltinkerbell). Explicit. 208,582 words. This is sort of a Brakebills AU, I suppose, but it takes place after Eliot has graduated. Quentin comes to visit over the holidays. So here’s the thing about greywash’s prose - they are stunning. They are dense, and complex, and almost hard to read - but I mean that as the highest compliment. This story, and really all of this author’s work, rewards careful study. This story has so, so much to offer. So if you haven’t given it a shot, or you’re intimidated by the length, please give it a try. Featuring Eliot’s complex relationship with his mother, with religion, with his sexuality, with Quentin, with Margo. Featuring a story of queer love that transcends time and convention. Featuring some excellent worldbuilding, especially as concerns Quentin’s family, and Eliot’s career. Featuring beautiful accompanying artwork. Featuring a proposal scene that knocked me the fuck out. Featuring love, in every way.

To Give You Hope and a Future by Page161of180. Not rated. 4,374 words. I couldn’t put this in the fix-it category, or in the mosaic category, or really even in the post-season four category. It’s all and none of those things. Eliot, in the aftermath of Quentin’s death, goes to the mosaic and talks to old man Quentin, who is grieving his husband. This is sad, y’all. But cathartic, too.

Cheat Day by peacefrog (@lizardkingeliot). Explicit. 1,624 words. Set during season four. Quentin misses Eliot, and does something sad and dangerous. Short and… well, sweet is the wrong word. This one will punch you right in the gut.

Movement by pineapplecrushface (@pineapplecrushface). Explicit. 17,036 words. These are three stories that are only loosely connected in that they are about sex, and introspection. They fit into lots of categories - parts of them take place in Eliot’s happy place, parts at the mosaic, parts in the aftermath of possession. All three stories in the series are scorching hot and full of so much feeling. I really admire how they weave through time, following the changing dynamics through the events of canon in a really unique way.

darkness, welcoming by portraitofemmy (@portraitofemmy). Explicit. 17,748 words. I almost put this in the Alternate Universe (With Magic) section, but this is not the same world as canon. Eliot is a vampire! He saves Quentin’s life and then… uh… well, they fall in love, and there’s some blood play. Eliot is super smitten, and it’s precious. Also really hot.

What Was and What Will Be by ProofOfConcept and wilddragonflying. Mature. 35,996 words. This is part mosaic-fic, part post-possession fic… it’s basically just another story of these two idiots being so bad at communication, but finally getting it right. A really satisfying journey, encompassing so many elements of what we all wished for in canon. I especially loved the long and difficult conversation they have during their reunion. The line that really punched me in the gut was: “fuck you for saying ‘I love you’ for the first goddamn time when you’re breaking up with me.”

kiss me harder, you’re better than you know by propinquitous (@propinquitous). Explicit. 4,633 words. This could easily take place in a nebulous post-season-four world, but it exists in its own little bubble and could really slot into any given universe. It deals with Quentin’s depression in a really direct, really devastating way, but also features Eliot being there for Quentin as best as he can. As the tags say, “not the healthiest of coping mechanisms.” But it’s filled with so much tenderness I can hardly stand it.

To Feel the Same by Rizandace (@Nellie-Elizabeth). Teen. 1,725 words. A small gap-filler at the end of the “I think you should probably hug me right now” scene in 2x01.

[robynmarkius]

Language Differences

So I have a bit of a long ramble, which involves Spoilers for the end of 5.3; obviously. Some of it’s already out there as I replied on mobile while half asleep, but it led to talking to the lovely @shiro-from-cafeberry​ about the German text. (Once again, thank you so much! I enjoy talking to you! :D <3 I have discovered I have even more questions for you to help with. lol) I then bothered my friend and co-writer @xehniscreations​ about French and she said it’d be a good practice to shake off the rust. (She ended up translating the whole ending scene for practice! <33 lol )

This all started because I am married to a man who has a degree in Linguistics and a simple questioning of one line/part led to hours of jokes and discussions. Which then turned into me putting my game client into two languages that I don’t speak a word of just to see what a character said... XD And! And! Learning a few other things along the way. I’ve been having so much fun with this and I hope you all can too. Plopping a cut here so as not to completely destroy anyone still trying to avoid Spoilers... or those who want to prepare some tissues. lol

I have cried a lot in the process of this entire Translation, and keep crying. lol As long as this post/translator ramble got, I made sure to post the ‘screenshot comic’, “Remnant” [as its own post] for the sake of focus. That was the scene that started this trip down the rabbit hole, after all. xD

After three days of editing this post, I decided to split it, so that this was just the ending scene. There’s flashbacks I also covered, but this was getting extremely long and I realize that I had not asked Shiro about the first flashback at all! So I still have things to finish and more to talk about before I have more.

For now, though, let’s talk!

Part One: Elidibus’ Explanation

The lines in question came from when Elidibus picked up the crystals, then told us he heard the voices of despair/cries and lamentations of his friends. After which there’s a slightly awkward explanation about how there were lots of opinions and thoughts about the world/star, which led to Elidibus pulling himself free of Zodiark in order to help his friends. It bothered Hubs because it felt kinda “clunky”; he explained:

“I think it’s because of a general norm of Japanese society we hear so much about. That it’s important to have a consensus and not to stir up trouble or stick out too much; which is how that part kind of reads. Your direct Translation is fine. I just feel like the localization team just kinda gave up when they wrote the English version. They could have give a little more context on it when they wrote it. Instead, what happens is, it feels out of place and awkward where it is. It also doesn’t give the context of when Elidibus freed himself from Zodiark. Is there any context that says that wasn’t when Hydaelyn shattered the star into the reflections or Shards?”

Putting aside his question about when Elidibus actually separated from Zodiark for now; as that’s a whole ‘nother discussion that’s rather interesting; I finally understood what he meant by my Translation felt clunky. It was accurate to a “direct translation” versus a “localization”. I re-translated the whole part just to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, and made sure that the final lines I wrote in English still made sense. lol

First, I wanted to note the differences in terms; in case I slip when putting this together. ^^; The literal translation of 「十四人委員会」 would be "Fourteen-person Committee"; but in the context of FF14, (at least in English,) we call it the "Convocation of Fourteen", so I try to stick with that for final translations. What makes anything with the Ancients more difficult, is that they're not speaking a language that we can immediately understand, but rather making sounds that our Echo/超える力/l'Écho/Kraft des Transzendierens interprets into words we/the WoL/WoD can understand. The downside is lack of clarification for actual translation if you don't fluently read or speak another language. lol

For example, when Elidibus speaks, we hear the words spoken, so if there's a kanji that's said more than one way, I can hear which definition is correct by listening to the sentence. But the Ancients' "woop woop wop wah wahp woo" is harder to interpret... but, at least it's the same in every language, right? XD For German, they have “The Convent”, and French has “The Council of Fourteen”.

Second, in English, we called him “The Emissary”, which is another term for “Mediator; Arbitrator; Go-Between” which is the definition of the term 調停者 [shouteisha] , his Japanese title. When translating from German, Shiro used the term “The Advocate”. His French title is “le Médiateur” His role seems to be the same, at least, he settled disputes, found the facts, kept things in check, and generally maintained balance. That was the seat of Elidibus; which is necessary to understand why he said what he said about being needed. (Those titles come from the first flashback as well as the second one; which I’ll get to in the next post. <3 )

The English lines that started this conversation are: “Divided -- over the fate of the star. A rare occurrence, always fleeting. But not this time. Not this time... Reconciliation. Elidibus. I was needed. I withdrew myself from Zodiark. For them...”

Japanese: 世界の行く末について、たくさんの意見が出た…… そんなことは珍しいから、委員会のみんなが悩んでいた。

だったら、エリディブスが手助けしに行かないと…… そう思って、ゾディアークから零れ落ちたんだ。

Final Translation: (after edits and all this discussion) "A great many opinions were expressed regarding the fate of the world, Everyone in the Convocation was troubled, since such a thing was unusual.

That being the case, I could not go help them in my role as Emissary. I believed that they needed Elidibus, so I pulled myself from Zodiark.”

In French, from Xehnis: "Le Concile avait perdu sa cohésion...Face à l’anéantissement, les avis divergeaient sur la marche à suivre pour sauver notre planéte…

Ça ne leur ressemblait pas...Plus que jamais, ils avaient besoin d’Elidibus...Ils avaient besoin de moi...Alors, je me suis détaché de Zordiarche pour voler à leur secours…”

Her final translation: “The Council had lost its cohesion...In the face of annihilation, opinions differed on the way to save our planet…

It does not resemble them...more than ever, they needed Elidibus...they needed me....so, I detached from Zordiark to fly to their aid…”

The German lines, from Cafe Berry’s Shiro, along with the explanations: "Die Zukunft der Welt hing in der Schwebe und Chaos machte sich breit. Die Ascians waren zutiefst gespalten. Der Konvent uneins..."

Here, they are talking about how the Ascians, and most importantly, the convent is divided. How the future of the world was not clear and with that chaos spread.

"Elidibus, der Fürsprecher, musste etwas tun. Ich musste etwas tun. Und so spaltete ich mich wieder von Zodiark ab ..."

Here, Elidibus says that Elidibus, as the Emissary, had to do something. HE had to do something. So he split off from Zodiark.

Their translation they gave me then, was: "The future of the world hung in the balance and chaos spread. The Ascians were deeply divided. The convent divided ...

Elidibus, the advocate, had to do something. I had to do something. And so I split off from Zodiark again ... "

This was the part that my husband had called into question; with my original translation to:

"Many opinions and thoughts came forth, regarding the fate of our world.... The Convocation was worried, as such a thing was unusual."

世界の行く末について、たくさんの意見が出た…… そんなことは珍しいから、委員会のみんなが悩んでいた。

The literal translation of it all, would be: "The world's future/fate concerning/regarding, a great many/a lot (of) comments were brought up/expressed......

such thing(s) are/is curious/rare/unusual because/since, committee of everyone("Everyone on the Committee") (was/were actively being) troubled/worried.”

There was also the lines that followed, which were also rough to word in English, so the whole section had felt awkward.

だったら、エリディブスが手助けしに行かないと…… そう思って、ゾディアークから零れ落ちたんだ。

“if that's the case, Elidibus (from) assistance (as/in the role of) to go/to do (could not),

so/appearing that/seeming that considered/believed/reckoned/judged/decided/desired, Zodiark (from) spilled over/scattered from (n'da - 'no desu' / 'no da' used to add emphasis)"

I had tried: "I decided that they needed Elidibus, but as I was I couldn't help them, so I pulled myself away from Zodiark.

Which was another way to put the idea of: "That being the case, Elidibus could not go rescue/help, I believed, then spilled and fell over/scattered from Zodiark."

It ended up: "A great many thoughts and opinions were expressed regarding the fate of the world, Everyone on the Committee was troubled, since such a thing was unusual.If that was the case, I could not give them assistance in the role of Arbitrator. I believed that they needed Elidibus, so I fell/scattered from Zodiark."

In the end, for this part, it really helped to learn what was said in French and German, because it helped solidify more what was trying to be said, and that there probably is at least a little societal influence in the Japanese text. If it hadn’t been for Xehnis and Shiro’s assistance, I probably wouldn’t have landed on something that felt comfortable enough in English. <3

They all feel different, but have the same general idea: that even after Zodiark was summoned; and Elidibus became his Heart; things hadn’t been fixed. Things continued to grow worse, and they began to fight, and have conflict. As Arbitrator/Emissary/Advocate/Mediator, Elidibus’ job was to maintain balance, and settle disputes, but he could no longer do the job of his seat as the Heart of Zodiark, and it seemed to be destroying the Convocation; making things worse; so he yanked himself out of a Primal to go tell everyone to SIMMER DOWN, NOW.

Sidenote/Side Question here... I wonder what happened with Venat and Hydaelyn...? Perhaps we’ll get clarification in the future, as the only person who’s become/been anything like Elidibus has been Minfilia as the ‘Words of the Mother’, then sent off as an “Emissary” of sorts to the First. lol

This all led to wondering about the last line; as it was clearly different in the Japanese Audio than the English Text. I do want to state that I think what they did in English worked just as well for the emotional gut punch intended from Elidibus’ last words; but it’s very different. It did lead to looking at the flashback in Anemnesis Anyder where we heard the line about the rain, which will be in the next post.

English: “The rains have ceased, and we have been graced with another beautiful day. But you are not here to see it.”

Japanese: 私が最後に残ったって……仕方ないじゃないか……。 Translation: “There’s nothing for it then, is there? I’m the last one left...”

French: Je devais partir en dernier... Comment aurais-je pu abandonner mes amis, esseulés en ce bas monde? Translation: “I had to leave last...how could I abandon (forsake) my friends, lonely in this lowly world?”

German: Es ist vorbei ... Alles verloren ... Ich bin der Letzte ... Translation: "It is over. Everything lost... I am the last..."

Japanese can also be read as “I’m the last one left... I guess it can’t be helped, huh?” but even in context, it didn’t flow quite as well as I’d like.. but that doesn’t take away from the crying, does it... ; A; I got the term “Remnant” from Japanese, where “watashi ga saigo ni nokotta tte” would literally translate to “I’m the final remnant”/”I’m the last leftover”, which I did word as “I’m the last one remaining/left.” (It is also 'Sumo term, cried by the referee to indicate that a rikishi is still in the ring’, but that didn’t quite feel right here, however, you can take the sumo joke if you’d like. <3)

I’m going to repeat that I think referring back to the line he was told back when he’d gotten the title of Elidibus wasn’t bad, and it did still work very well to convey that lost, lonely, longing he was left with as a remnant; what little was left of him, lamented the loss of his beloved people; people that he’d just wanted to save. This is evidenced in French and German; where he states that he’s all that’s left, everything is lost, it is over... that he had to go last, so he wouldn’t abandon his friends.

I appreciate that we gave Elidibus all the constellation stones, which, in a way, let him finally be with all of his friends once more. All the stones, except for ours; we kept that, because Hades made it for us. He made it for us to remember, so that the story of the Ancients wouldn’t be forgotten; the ‘truth’ he made sure he told us when we asked about the past.

At least, that’s what I choose to believe for now.

[Next Post >>]

[stevenuniversallyreviews]

Episode 133: Dewey Wins

“But...I’m hurt.”

I started reviewing the Week of Sardonyx in late 2017. It was slow going thanks to grad school and student teaching and licensing tests and my job (boy do I not miss those days), but I’d clawed my way through Cry for Help in October and Keystone Motel on the first Sunday of November. In those reviews, I wrote at length about how this was the most devastating arc of the series, a massive argument spanning multiple episodes with no easy answers.

Then the Friday after my Keystone Motel post was uploaded, Cartoon Network dropped the Breakup Arc on us all at once, and I had to make some edits.

There’s no official name for the span of episodes between Dewey Wins and Kevin Party, but considering it features not one but two breakups, with only one reconciliation by the end, I think my nickname is apt. Just under a fifth of Season 5 is devoted to six consecutive episodes designed to make us miserable, and on top of being an outstanding sequel to the Week of Sardonyx, it’s the best precursor we’ve got to adolescent trials of Steven Universe Future. 

The Week of Sardonyx is strengthened by numerous previous episodes where Pearl does bad things without consequence, making it something of a shock when her actions are finally addressed. In a similar way, we’ve been taught from Log Date 7 15 2 and Kindergarten Kid and The New Crystal Gems that emotionally draining arcs are followed by cooldown episodes, and Dewey Wins sounds like the name of a fun adventure with our goofy mayor. There’s no situation where the Breakup Arc would be a pleasant affair, but the pattern adds an extra layer of angst as our anticipated relief period ends up more stressful than the arc we needed relief from.

But not every big arc gets a cooldown. Our very first, ending with Jailbreak, is followed by one of the Breakup Arc’s major prequels: Full Disclosure, an episode about missed phone calls and the importance of keeping friends in the loop regarding space adventures. The ghosted party is flipped, as Connie now refuses to talk to Steven, and watching his struggle gives an even greater appreciation for Connie’s own turmoil (not just from Full Disclosure, but Steven’s reckless self-sacrifice).

We know something’s wrong from the moment we see her, in a way that’s different from Greg and the Gems’ wide-eyed concern. Her discomfort manifests just as it did in Mindful Education: a downcast expression and curt demeanor made more apparent by Steven’s cheery chattiness. But because she’s the only one of them that has truly taken the lessons of that episode to heart, she soon expresses her feelings outright (after a brutal “Of course I’m happy to see you”—Grace Rolek only needs one scene to be the episode’s MVP). Her complaints are all valid: this is not the first time she’s been left on Earth, and her sense that Steven isn’t taking her seriously is confirmed when he can’t even take her seriously within the conversation. She’s as direct as she can be, but when Steven refuses to acknowledge her pain, her anger takes over and she shuts him out. Lion’s side-eye is icing on the cake.

My biggest issue with Dewey Wins, however, is Steven. I’m torn, because it’s easy to justify his behavior throughout the episode as a result of recent trauma and the relief at surviving such a harrowing experience (and, later, the same sleeplessness that made him snap in Rose’s Room and Warp Tour). It makes sense that his martyr complex is intensified by his experience with Lars, that he falls back on helping others at the cost of his own well-being on instinct. But his flippant dismissal of Connie’s emotions still feels off, especially because it comes with a heretofore unseen swagger about his own heroism. She pours her heart out, making it clear that she wants to keep being Jam Buds but he’s making it really difficult, but every word goes right over his head. This is a version of Steven that somehow doesn’t get that “hurt” can refer to emotions instead of physical damage.

Throughout the episode, but particularly in this opening scene, Steven feels exaggerated for the sake of honing Connie’s argument. Perhaps it’s necessary, considering how easy it is in first viewing to see his sacrifice as noble rather than selfish; we need to see a more extreme version of his behavior to understand that going it alone was a bad move, or else Connie’s arguments seem small against the scale of the stakes. It’s further complicated by the fact that Steven’s sacrifice was noble, even if it was selfish at the same time. This isn’t a case where Steven is fully right or fully wrong, so it’s bound to be confusing to hear that his traditionally heroic move wasn’t as great as he (or we) first thought.

So yeah, I get why Steven is acting this way for the sake of the show. And, again, I can find reasons to explain his sudden emotional idiocy, making it leagues better than a true Annoying Steven episode. But it still comes across as clumsy to me; I can see the wheels turning to move the plot along in a way that’s normally hidden better on this show. His final monologue where he realizes that Connie felt the way he feels about Dewey abandoning the race feels like something from another show, a show that’s way more on-the-nose than Steven Universe is at its best. It was probably the right move, because as much as I can’t stand it when media is patronizing to young audiences, this lesson is complex enough that it’s worth a little clunkiness to ensure that the message gets through to smaller viewers. But compared to the elegance of our recent space adventure, Dewey Wins sacrifices polish for clarity when we usually get both.

But enough about what doesn’t work for me, because so much of this episode works for me. Even if his behavior feels forced, Steven provides seamless in-universe exposition recapping his space adventure. His follow-up conversation with Sadie has the same kind of douchey detachment that he shows Connie, but in a way that’s far more consistent with his character: dismissing Connie’s emotions is out of left field for him, but it makes plenty of sense that he’d see Lars as “okay” despite being trapped in space, considering the alternative was a very real death. And, of course, there’s the matter of the episode’s actual hero.

Nanefua Pizza has been my everything since Beach Party, and it’s thrilling to see her gain more prominence in the tail end of the series. Her beef with Mayor Dewey has been running since Political Power, the Dewey episode that established all the flaws that drive him out of office in Dewey Wins. Then, she responded by rallying rioters to tip over his truck, but now she takes a more civic-minded approach to effect real change. Still, she’s driven by the same anger at Dewey, and can only become a true force for good when she gains a new appreciation for his struggles.

While the correlation between Dewey and Steven is obvious well before Steven straight-up says there’s a correlation (a moment that’s made easier to swallow when Dewey points out he has no context for Steven’s friend troubles), the general conflict between Nanefua and Bill(iam) is a more fascinating study on blame. At first, both candidates believe in the power of blame, with Nanefua laying all the city’s troubles on Dewey’s inaction and Dewey arguing that taking the heat is his greatest strength: in his mind, there’s not much he can actually do about the cosmic misfortunes that befall Beach City, but giving its citizens somebody to blame gives them a sense of control that’s necessary in a chaotic world. And both of these viewpoints can be found in Steven’s self-image.

Steven, like Nanefua, is quick to lay blame when anything goes wrong. But Steven, like Dewey, sees the absorption of blame as a virtue. So he loops between those two positions, looking for someone to blame at the drop of a hat and only finding himself. The ensuing guilt make him want to fix the problems of others to atone, rather than focus on the underlying cause of his own issues, and if that sounds familiar it’s because Steven Universe Future is entirely about how important it is to break this loop.

But obsessing over fixing things is also how Pearl tries to solve her argument with Garnet in the Week of Sardonyx: she focuses on finding Peridot instead of doing anything about her own actions until she has no choice but to talk things out. And, as I said back in my Friend Ship post, it evokes something Pearl once said about humans (which it turns out applies to Gems): 

“They want to blame all the world's problems on some single enemy they can fight, instead of a complex network of interrelated forces beyond anyone's control.”

When was this said? In Keep Beach City Weird, in regards to Ronaldo. The same Ronaldo who poured gas on the fire in Full Disclosure by presenting the idea that heroes are aloof and keep their friends at a distance. So in a way, the Breakup Arc can be chalked up to ignoring the good Ronaldo lesson but taking the bad Ronaldo lesson to heart. But more on him in Gemcation.

Steven’s turmoil lends a somber edge to Nanefua’s powerful change of heart, where she rejects her past choice to blame Dewey. She apologizes for her own part in pointing fingers, because blame is a lousy substitute for getting things done, and forgives him for not being perfect. She pitches the act of helping as a community effort, rather than something that any one person must do alone; she remembers that the lyrics are “we can be strong in the real way.” She’s giving Steven all of the answers well before Steven Universe Future shows how much his guilt loop will continue to plague him, but he isn’t ready to listen yet, and leaves the debate dejected instead of empowered. (Considering Jenny’s appeal to taking breaks during trying times in Joy Ride, and an adventure with Kiki about not spreading yourself too thin on behalf of others in Kiki’s Pizza Delivery Service, this is the third time a Pizza woman’s fantastic advice has gone ignored by our hero.)

Even Dewey seems better off than Steven, accepting defeat by acknowledging that Nanefua would make a better mayor. And he’s right! She sets up actual services to account for alien threats, services that end up changing the universe in a way Dewey’s brand of keeping the peace never could. He may need a new job (Sadie foreshadows both his fate and her own imminent career change in one fell swoop), but there’s a sense of calm as he passes the torch after a full episode of Joel Hodgson’s hammy anxiety.

I appreciate that Dewey is allowed some points in his favor even as he flubs his way out of office. Yes, he should be more thoughtful and attentive: his vow to find a new donut shop kid when presented with news that Lars is trapped in space is even broader than Steven’s reaction to Connie’s pain, but the mayor has always ridiculous so I don’t mind at all. Yes, he should try and do something to address the concerns of his citizens beyond saying everything will be fine. But it’s not lost on the show that it isn’t easy running a town that’s a lightning rod for alien encounters, so Dewey remains sympathetic even if his ineptitude must be addressed. After all, if he’s gonna stand in for Steven in a metaphor that’s clear enough to be monologued about, it’s important to point out that it’s okay when you fail against impossible odds. Neither Dewey nor Steven can do everything on their own, no matter how much power they wield.

Steven might skip a few crucial lessons of Dewey Wins, but he at least learns one. Perhaps in an earlier season, that would be enough to mend fences with Connie. But time makes you bolder, children get older, and she’s getting older too. She’s been more than patient with being treated like an afterthought, so the moment she’s had enough is bound to be a big one. Thus, we end with a cliffhanger, one that pulls Steven into the same landslide that’s surely consuming the rest of the town after his kidnapping. The Barrigas are missing a son, and Sadie’s missing a romantic friend. Bill Dewey is no longer Mayor Dewey, and Nanefua has a whole new set of obstacles to face. Greg and the Gems have their son back, but his kidnapping was traumatic for them as well, and Connie gets that trauma on top of her stated complaints. And Steven had learned two lessons instead of one: it’s important to take your friends seriously, and timing is everything.

It’s gonna be a rough week.

We’re the one, we’re the ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR!

I do like it, really. But Steven’s behavior takes it down a few notches, regardless of my ability to find ways to explain it. Great episodes don’t require the audience to seek ways to justify a character’s weird behavior. There’s more good than bad here, but I’d be lying if I said I loved Dewey Wins.

Top Twenty-Five

Steven and the Stevens

Hit the Diamond

Mirror Gem

Lion 3: Straight to Video

Alone Together

Last One Out of Beach City

The Return

Jailbreak

The Answer

Mindful Education

Sworn to the Sword

Rose’s Scabbard

Earthlings

Mr. Greg

Coach Steven

Giant Woman

Beach City Drift

Winter Forecast

Bismuth

Steven’s Dream

When It Rains

The Good Lars

Lars’s Head

Catch and Release

Chille Tid

Love ‘em

Laser Light Cannon

Bubble Buddies

Tiger Millionaire

Lion 2: The Movie

Rose’s Room

An Indirect Kiss

Ocean Gem

Space Race

Garnet’s Universe

Warp Tour

The Test

Future Vision

On the Run

Maximum Capacity

Marble Madness

Political Power

Full Disclosure

Joy Ride

Keeping It Together

We Need to Talk

Cry for Help

Keystone Motel

Back to the Barn

Steven’s Birthday

It Could’ve Been Great

Message Received

Log Date 7 15 2

Same Old World

The New Lars

Monster Reunion

Alone at Sea

Crack the Whip

Beta

Back to the Moon

Kindergarten Kid

Buddy’s Book

Gem Harvest

Three Gems and a Baby

That Will Be All

The New Crystal Gems

Storm in the Room

Room for Ruby

Lion 4: Alternate Ending

Doug Out

Are You My Dad?

I Am My Mom

Stuck Together

The Trial

Off Colors

Like ‘em

Gem Glow

Frybo

Arcade Mania

So Many Birthdays

Lars and the Cool Kids

Onion Trade

Steven the Sword Fighter

Beach Party

Monster Buddies

Keep Beach City Weird

Watermelon Steven

The Message

Open Book

Story for Steven

Shirt Club

Love Letters

Reformed

Rising Tides, Crashing Tides

Onion Friend

Historical Friction

Friend Ship

Nightmare Hospital

Too Far

Barn Mates

Steven Floats

Drop Beat Dad

Too Short to Ride

Restaurant Wars

Kiki’s Pizza Delivery Service

Greg the Babysitter

Gem Hunt

Steven vs. Amethyst

Bubbled

Adventures in Light Distortion

Gem Heist

The Zoo

Rocknaldo

Dewey Wins

Enh

Cheeseburger Backpack

Together Breakfast

Cat Fingers

Serious Steven

Steven’s Lion

Joking Victim

Secret Team

Say Uncle

Super Watermelon Island

Gem Drill

Know Your Fusion

Future Boy Zoltron

Tiger Philanthropist

No Thanks!

     6. Horror Club      5. Fusion Cuisine      4. House Guest      3. Onion Gang      2. Sadie’s Song      1. Island Adventure

(No official promo art for most of the Breakup Arc, given the way they were released, but I can’t be too mad when we get brilliance like this from ajora.)

[loboglobalmedia]

CAN YAMAN & DEMET ÖZDEMIR

(This is a translation of the original note written in Spanish)

AN INSTALLED FORMULA

It is easy for people who achieve a good combination in their joint work, put together a FORMULA, install it and position it. And when that FORMULA is the architect of total success, disintegrating that partnership that was the focus of public appreciation is a difficult task. It is not impossible, of course not, but it will require very careful analysis of what strategy to carry out so that both regain their identity and the public values them individually. We see it followed in the Political FORMULAS, which are put together and disarmed thanks to teams of strategy advisors that will make you choose them again.

THE CANDEM & CANEM FORMULA   The same is true in the artistic medium, we were spectators of the fantastic FORMULA composed by Can Yaman & Demet Özdemir, the protagonists of Erkenci Kuş. In this family series, suitable for all audiences, careful in what they 'showed', we were convinced that their love pierced the screen. A perfect and unbeatable chemical composition, which was awarded and recognized in Turkey as abroad winning thousands of fans around the world. And if you also tell the information and rumors that this love was still off set, let me tell you that you will need a lot of strength to lift the anchor and set sail for a new destination or project. But, what happens when the series ends and the protagonists must take a new job? How can we get the audience to agree to see them with a new partner without "attacking" against the previous FORMULA that has been tattooed on the viewer's heart? It will be a challenge for producers, marketing experts and advertisers to convince the public of that acceptance in a new story, the goal of which will be no more or less than to install a new FORMULA.   FIRST THE LADIES The first to try to break the paradigm was Demet Özdemir, who taking the opposite path to romantic comedy, stars today, with the talent that we are accustomed to ¨Doğduğun Ev Kaderindir ¨ (the house where you were born), a true drama, by the hand of Ibrahim Çelikkol. Why him? Let us begin by highlighting that he is a very dear, talented and experienced Turkish actor.  But, from our point of view, we understand that there was an essential component in the search for the profile that is related to the personal life of the actor: low profile, married and with family.  Are you surprised? Not to us, because that detail that does not seem important will be the unconscious guarantee of the acceptance sought.  Even the actor who appears as her partner in the first chapter meets the same requirements. Chance? No. On Demet's part, it was also key to keep their private life out of exposure, of course, those of us who know the media business, we know what happens in the face of a lack of information, but this is what we'll talk about later. Even a minor detail that the press has installed, at the time of ending Erkenci Kuş, the belief that Demet had fought with Can Yaman and that not only did she not want to know more about him, but also that she was in relationship with the success they did together. This supposed dissociation undoubtedly favored the welcome to the new FORMULA.  And if they put even more inventive and creativity into this, they could even convince us that the actress had hired a company to remove from the internet search engines any trace that the relationship affectionately with Can Yaman. How lucky that many of us read the news wisely and don't believe everything they postǃ THE FORMULA Demet & Ibrahim was accepted, perhaps not with the absolute fanaticism that the CANDEM & CANEM FORMULA. We can interpret that this is due to several reasons, firstly Can & Demet had left the rod very high at the level "LEGENDARYDUO", what they transmitted together was really magical. Second, the new story doesn't give rise to moments that show the madness of two lovers who seek each other with soul and life until their eyes connect and sparks emerge like fireworks. We should also keep in mind that the audience that viewers of a romantic comedy like Erkenci Kuş differs from that of the drama, because in the first we will be able to find children and teenagers that catch them a romantic and funny story, even more so when it is starring young influencers. Similarly, the number of older people who prefer to abstract themselves from a reality with drops of sadness, with a story that invites you to laugh and dream, is superior.   IT'S CAN YAMAN'S TURN After serving in his country and spending time in "boxes", came a project that caught Can's attention and the time to embark on the adventure bound for BayYanış (Mr. Incorrect) has arrived. Preparing the ground for what is to come, Can shared images of his life showing mostly alone or with his mother, without fans or situations where he could see him with some company. Prior to this enthusiasm and expectation, some "brains" have analyzed how to put together a new FORMULA.  What did they choose Özge Gürel?  But hadn't the press told that no one wanted to work with him again? Maybe you feel cheated, it's not for less, so the press works, how lucky you didn't believe them againǃ The chosen profile, arguably, is that 'kill two birds with one stone'. A safe bet, hand in hand with this talented, versatile and beautiful actress with whom Can has already shared the lead in "Donulay". Both Özge and Can are very much loved abroad, especially in Italy and Spain, which allows us to project the commercialization of the series outside Turkey. And of course, there was no shortage of the ingredient we suggest: Özge has been in a couple for many years with a talented, attractive and well-known actor, while keeping both a low profile, in a relationship that we might call "sweet, durable and pastel color". Will we let Özge kiss Can? Of course!   THE PRESS - That Partner / Evil Needed Always remember that the press will collaborate in the promotion of the actors, their series and illuminate them with the most powerful focus to capture everyone's gaze, but this is not free. In exchange for this 'service' they will need a kind of "coima", said in other words, they will want to be part of the business, of that brightness that they themselves helped to illuminate (and that they almost believe that the actor owes them their popularity). How will they do that? Do you think a magazine sells because the headline announces who the actor was inspired to develop his new character? No, let's be fooled. The press will need as currency PRIVATE LIFE INFORMATION, this is non-negotiable. Some Hollywood actors, experienced in the subject (who have already gone through all kinds of situations), usually generate their own rumors and the press operators will deal with the distribution. They will eventually deny them, but in the meantime, the magazines achieved the expected sales. Romances, acquisitions, investments, how much they earn, who they're fighting, what they did on their vacation, how much they spent, who they spent the night before, and even what religion they're dabbling into to find inner peace. Do you understand how it works? Now, what happens when this balance ¨I give you – you give me" breaks? Well, you as a faithful follower of Can and Demet witnessed many slander, remember? Can and Demet long to keep their private life in a safe under 7 keys and with exclusive access through their fingerprint. They will debunk, deny, hide, omit, distract, and if necessary lie to keep their eyes to another place. Occasionally they share a photo of their pets, some language they learn, a dance and how they are generous kids, some solidarity action that help spread.  But this for the press, it's not enough, they can entertain them only for a few hours. Then, in the face of this 'unbalance' they are "forced" to invent the famous rumors of courtships, fights and situations that infuriate the fans. How sad we get when we read the opinion of many Turkish ladies prejudging Demet for the number of boyfriends attributed to him by the press. Or when many claim that Can and Demet hate each other. Please don't be ridiculous! Hate is not part of these kids' language.    LAST STEP: 'Self-agreement: If you buy it, you can sell it Resuming our discussion on THE FORMULA, we cannot omit to refer to the brief note that can was made yesterday at the departure of Gold Film, after the meeting with the members of BayYanış.  ¨Out of courtesy, the first questions he was asked were about how he was and the new series. After the press's "gentileza" was over, they quickly inserized the recent rumour made with editing techniques, by a character of little value, who would have built an image with a false conversation with Can. Of course, it had already been explained by his press advisor, which was an absurd lie with Photoshop. But the worst happened then, understand this well, from the commercial point of view on the way to the launch of your new series, when asked about his relationship with ¨Demet = PREVIOUS FORMULA¨. They pointed to 'if they made peace'. Then, began to circulate different translations from the original Turkish that divided the audience according to their interpretation.  Let us remember that at the world there are few who perfectly master the Turkish language, outside Turkey, with the level of a ¨native¨', however much many can understand single words or make a literal translation word for word. Many interpreted the question as whether we wanted to know if there was a friendly reconciliation, leaving behind the so-called "fight or angry situation" (that made-up discord I mentioned earlier). On the contrary, others interpreted the question as to whether there was a "love reconciliation". Which of the two interpretations is correct? Neither, both or just one, does it matter? No. The important thing strategically in this instance is to take distance from everything that can relate them to the FORMULA Candem & Canem, because both Can and Demet choose to continue to grow in their artistic careers, choose to be part of this medium and choose that their private life, be private. We are confident that these sweet and hardworking guys will continue to learn day by day, achieving their professional & personal goals. Increasingly developing, the tactical knowledge that will bring them closer to a healthy and non-defamatory balance with the press.   UNOFFICIAL INFORMATION - OUR ENIGMATIC Do we ever tell you about our TOPO Theory? We can divide them (topo = reporting mole) in 3 (three) types without evaluating the quality of the information, but how they give it.  1) The PRICE TOPO you charge for reporting, is an infiltrator or is close to one. 2) The SPEAKER TOPO, the one who heard something and freely distributes the information, carrying and bringing, just because it has a big mouth.  And finally 3) The Innocent TOPO, is that person who, with a distance not so distant, who has feelings so noble and strong that it cannot avoid "highlighting" when false information begins to circulate.

Tonight, fans of CANDEM & CANEM, can thank Ms. No. 3 with a fair profile, are likely to be able to continue wearing their pink lenses. Say no more.

Go Back to Spanish Version Read the full article

[rosiemotene]

My passions in life are Women, Africa, and the arts. On a recent visit to Rwanda, I had the opportunity of meeting the countries most celebrated artist and activist, Hope Azeda. I was introduced to Hope through one of my Ugandan sister, Fiona Marwa. It was the last day of my trip in Kigali and had a limited amount of time but Fiona insisted that I touch base with Hope, who was also trying to push through a crazy work schedule. I was fortunate enough as she made time between her meetings, rehearsals and running Rwanda’s top performing arts centre. We met at a beautiful book shop in Kigali, which had the most breathtaking view that saw endless hills and immaculate gardens. On sitting down with her, her energy and spirit ignited my soul. I knew that although we had set aside 30 minutes to talk, it will be worthwhile.

So who is Hope Azeda?

Hope is the director and founder of the Mashirika Performing Arts and Media Company. Hope Azeda was born in Uganda. Her parents, Norman and Beatrice, were born and lived in Rwanda but fled to neighbouring Uganda in 1959 as a result of increasing ethnic tensions following a Hutu uprising against Tutsi leadership. Hope is one of 11 children and her sibling’s life in Uganda was spent living at a hospital residence, where her mother worked as a midwife. Her father lived and worked at a refugee camp, teaching maths and French. Hope later went on to study at Namasagali College in Eastern Uganda, where her love and passion for the arts began. This led to her pursuing a career in music, dance, and drama. Growing up, Hope’s relatives had told her how beautiful Rwanda was, so it had always been a childhood dream of Hope’s to return to Rwanda – a place she called home despite never having lived there. In 1998, Hope followed her dream and moved to Kigali. It was not easy as she had no friends there and was not fluent in Kinyarwanda or French (two of the languages spoken in Rwanda). Many of her family lived in Rwanda but unfortunately became victims of the Rwandan genocide.

Soon after her arrival in Rwanda, Hope founded the Mashirika Performing Arts Media Company in Kigali. At first, she used to sit with her students under a tree and work, they now work from a beautiful house in Kigali. When she arrived in Rwanda, there was no infrastructure. She went on to say “the country was on its knees. It was in ashes and was trying to rise. As an artist, your instinct takes you there – what can I do?.

As we began chatting in the coffee shop, we realized that we needed a lot more time together and so he invited me to come and visit the centre and sit in on a rehearsal. A few hours later I arrived and a beautiful colourful house. As you enter, the entrance hall is a mirrored room, with beautiful quotes on the wall. The rest of the house is made of a kitchen and an office and I was led outside to the upstairs terrace, where the students are rehearsing for the show. The terrace, like most of the ​Rwandan terraces,​ overlooks another spectacular view of Kigali’s rolling hills and perfectly manicures laws.

Mashirika Performing Arts and Media Company.

Mashirika Performing Arts and Media Company were established in 1997. Through different modes of performance including dance, movement, music, drama, and spoken word, Mashirika is constantly exploring new ways to develop, learn and create exciting theatre. The company uses the arts as a tool for social transformation. Partnering with organizations such as the Aegis Trust and the Ministry of Justice, Mashirika has produced many films, plays, and performances based on the causes and prevention of genocide, the Gacaca proceedings (a system of community justice in Rwanda, to help with community rebuilding) and the importance of unity and reconciliation. Mashirika uses performing arts to engage the audience, and teach about important issues. Through its use of interactive theatre and forum theatre, Mashirika is at the forefront of theatre for development; demonstrating its mission that performing art can be Mashirika Theatre Company

The mission The Mashirika Performing Arts Media Company mission is to prove that performing arts is not only entertainment but a tool of social transformation and source of employment. Mashrika uses drama as a tool for social transformation, its productions intended to teach, commemorate and raise awareness of important issues.

Topics of plays have ranged from reconciliation to sexism and AIDS. Plays are taken to communities in villages and markets, intended to create platforms for civic dialogues to encourage development and reconciliation. Mashirika has been at the forefront of using theatre for development, using forms like interactive theatre, image theatre, forum theatre.

Combining art and activism: As the Genocide had taken the front stage in the Rwandan narrative, Hope decided to use that as a way to find healing, create awareness and establish a brighter and positive platform for those to come. The production, Africa’s Hope, was a theatre production which was commissioned in 2004 for the 10th anniversary of the genocide, more than 1,000 performers drew on personal testimonies from the war. Its running time was 100 minutes, which represented the 100 days of the genocide. The play was performed in Rwanda and in Edinburgh for the G8 World Summit in 2005. It also recently toured 15 schools and theatres in the UK. The subject matter was incredibly difficult and it dealt with emotions and trauma through the eyes of a child. Hope, felt that as adults, they had messed up and wanted to explore the narrative through the eyes of the children.

Her other works and projects since have dealt with other social topics from sexism to Aids, often performed in sites ranging from refugee camps to open football pitches and village halls.

Ubumuntu Arts Festival.

In 2015, with a grant from the African Leadership Initiative, Hope set up the annual Ubumuntu Arts Festival, bringing music, dance, art and theatre to the amphitheater at the Kigali Genocide Memorial. It attracts about 5,000 people per day. Azeda chose the venue not only for its symbolic value, but also because the performances give Rwandans a way to engage with the conflict both individually and as a group, or through what she calls “public introspection”. “The set is well-dressed, the scenography is there… It crosses into your own internal conversation,” she says.

The G25 production G25 is the latest theatre production, will commemorate 25 years since the end of the Genocide. When I visited the centre, I sat in on their rehearsals for this production. The production will be performed in two phases in Rwanda, after which it will be staged in New York. For the first phase of the production, Mashirika will collaborate with artists from the UK and Argentina, and their joint piece will be performed on April 12, at the Kigali Genocide Memorial Amphitheatre, to coincide with the start of the official genocide commemoration period. The second phase of the production will see further collaboration between Rwandan artists and those from the U.S, and the performance will be staged at this year’s edition of the Ubumuntu Arts Festival in July, at the Kigali Genocide Memorial Amphitheatre. The production will then be staged in New York, in the US. On the production, Hope​ says, “The theatrical performance will be a collective of young voices questioning the past as they take on the responsibility of being guardians of a dark history they were never part of. The big question at hand would be; ‘why did one million people die in 100 days, in a country they love, with beautiful people and a beautiful culture’?”

Azeda described G25 as “an open script of global concerns”, as the issues it seeks to address are not unique to only Rwanda, but rather a rallying call to global young voices to be authors of their own destiny.​

My time with the performers at their rehearsals​ and a few pictures taken in the house.

Through Waka talent agency, we aim to work​​ with The Mashirika Performing Arts and Media Company and Ubumuntu Arts Festival with the aim of creating​ powerful Pan African​ synergies​s that tell our stories, in the most authentic way. ​ Rwanda’s catalyst​ for Hope! My passions in life are Women, Africa, and the arts. On a recent visit to Rwanda, I had the opportunity of meeting the countries most celebrated artist and activist, Hope Azeda.

[kuriquinn]

Samsara [Part Six]

General Disclaimer

AN: Edits will happen when they happen. I'm having an iffy week this week, and my beta has adulty things to do so I don't want to bug her. Patience please!

True to her word, Shachi spends the coming weeks visiting with her father-in-law. The first few days it is because Kanna is still ill. When Shachi asks to see her, Asura lightly shrugs it off.

“It’s simply the weather. This time of year puts her in a sad humour,” he tells her, but from the way his eyes shift, Shachi suspects he isn’t being completely honest. “Besides, you should not exert yourself in your condition.”

Right, because pregnancy means we’ve suddenly become incapable of doing anything…

“I’m with child, not carrying the plague,” Shachi mutters as she walks away, and Sakura can’t help feeling a little pleased that somewhere within the quiet, respectful woman there’s some indication of spunk.

Asura was right when he said how dull it is around the estate in the winter. Shachi can only watch his disciples train so often before she grows bored. Some of them even talk to her now, but she thinks most are still afraid. Taizo makes a beeline in the opposite direction whenever he sees her, which is only right.

Asura is more merciful than his brother; Indra would have had the man flayed alive. On her loneliest, most unsatisfying days she can’t decide whose method of justice she prefers.

It’s how she finds herself sitting across from Lord Hagoromo, sipping tea and listening to him talk about everything and nothing. He ruminates on the weather and his students, of Asura’s work with them, and explains the concept of ninshu. Sometimes he recites old poems. Every now and then he will pause, look at her as if he wants to ask her something, and then simply continue talking.

In an effort to distract her from her homesickness, he begins to tell her a story. Before she realises it, she finds herself enraptured in the same tale that Indra once told her, but much more detailed. Her husband is a man of concise words and has little use for flowery imagery; Lord Hagoromo is a wordsmith.

Before she is aware of it, she is drawn into the chronicle, an eager listener

Because neither she nor the old man can sit for long periods of time, he doesn’t tell it to her in all one sitting. He draws out the tale across the weeks, and she returns to see him every day, even long after Kanna is well again. Occasionally her sister-in-law joins them, other times Asura does as well; sometimes it is just Ashura and Hagoromo.

She begins to suspect about her sister-in-law’s mystery ailment; she has seen that expression too often on the wives of Indra’s disciples. Especially those who have miscarried or given birth to stillborn babies. She has never been so unlucky, but she can sympathise. And understanding the pain Kanna has undergone somehow makes her seem more relatable.

The longer she is with them, in fact, Shachi learns that her in-laws are not horrible people. She had always suspected that Indra exaggerated his tale some, but it’s difficult to reconcile the two different views.

Perhaps they sense her wavering in her sensibilities, because as the days become longer, her in-laws’ conversations turn to Indra. Together, Asura and Hagoromo tell her of the circumstances leading to his departure, and also mention their hopes that reconciliation can be found in the future.

“Unfortunately, the situation is a complex one. There’s no right way to go about fixing it,” Asura sighs.

“You might start by considering it from your brother’s point of view, instead of treating him like the only unreasonable party,” Shachi suggests, ever loyal.

Asura stares at her. “He attacked us.”

“He was upset,” she replies. “Understandably so.”

“Unders –” Asura cuts himself off. “No amount of emotion should lead a man to summon a beast made of chakra and try to ravage our home. His home.”

Shachi sighs.

“My lord brother, you do not have children,” she remarks softly, conscious of the flicker of pain across his features; it’s a fact she has noticed in her time here, not least of all in the time puzzling at Kanna’s supposed illness. “And you did not know the care of a mother.”

Her father-in-law confirms this quietly. “A regrettable truth. My wife was taken by sickness too soon after Asura’s birth.”

“My lord father – forgive me for being indelicate…”

“I am too old to care much for delicacy, child.”

“From the stories you and your son have told me, your esteemed mother was not overly concerned with your well-being as she was for her pursuit of power,” she points out, somewhat hesitant.

“That is so.”

“None of you three benefitted much from a woman’s influence – whether it be a wife or a mother,” she concludes sadly. “It is a burden that I, too, had to bear, though I believe I was perhaps luckier in a way. My mother’s former servants raised me. They showed kindness to me when no others would, cared for me when I was sick and fed me when I was hungry. Perhaps they did it to fulfill their obligations to my father, but perhaps they were simply good people. In any case, their treatment of me gave me some idea of what a child needs. Having my own children has taught me the same. And I wonder, if their mother had lived, whether the situation with your sons would have ended differently.”

“I fear it would not have made a difference.”

“Are you so sure?” she challenges. “Would she not have questioned your decisions in choosing your younger son as your successor? Or, if she did not, would she perhaps have cautioned you to handle it more delicately than you did?”

“Sister –” Asura warns, a little perturbed at the idea of someone chiding his father.

“No, let her continue,” the old sage interrupts, frowning.

“I do not claim to know the wishes of your esteemed lady wife,” Shachi says, “but as a mother myself, I know that I would have suggested to the father of my children if there were a similar situation. Whether he listened or not. And being forthright would have solved more ills than it wouldn’t.”

Asura is utterly tense, looking between her and his father as if expecting an outburst of some kind. Shachi pauses, and when her father-in-law continues to listen, she goes on.

“Instead of telling Indra your decision right away when he returned from his journey – a decision you had already likely made in your heart long before you even asked them to go on that journey – you allowed him to wait almost two years,” she points out, trying to keep her tone calm and non-accusatory. “In your fear that telling him news that would anger and hurt him, you allowed him to build up his expectations. To believe he had fulfilled the task you set before him adequately, when in fact he had failed. And instead of telling him so – instead of informing him of the hardships that fell on the village he had visited and having him return to correct his mistake – you let him idle here, and you allowed that village to fall to ruin.”

“The village had already fallen to ruin by the time he returned,” the old man says stiffly.

“Which you also knew, from your toad friend, and perhaps could have done something about with your far-reaching abilities,” she says placidly. “In any case, it is something that should not have been kept from Indra. Whether he learned to lesson you wanted him to or not, he is not one to back down from completing a task. He may have found a way to prove himself once more if given the chance.”

The old man looks thoughtful at this, but she continues.

“Then, when you did tell him that he had lost his status as your successor, you did so in front of all of your disciples. Not after years worth of reflection, but within an hour of my lord Asura returning home,” she continues. “Can you perhaps understand how hurt Indra would have been in that moment?”

“At some point a man must learn to make the correct decisions on his own.”

“And yet is your child not still your child even when have become grey with age?” she counters. “Are the failings of a student truly his failings? Or is it the teacher that has neglected to impart the lesson in the best manner? I won’t argue that some responsibility lies on the child to learn and grow…but if he is not given a torch to find the way, will he not wander in darkness?”

Lord Hagoromo’s expression has softened now, and he is watching her in the same way she has sometimes seen Indra look at her – as if he has no idea what to make of her.

“You know that my husband is someone who does not understand the immaterial – comradery, trust…love,” Shachi explains quietly. “He only knows the force of his hands and the power of his will. These are concrete to him. He does not…he is unable to recognise these things in the same way a bat is blind to the world around it. And yet, nature has still given the bat the ability to fly.”

Both men are staring at her in surprise now, as if they didn’t expect her to be capable of such argument. She is somewhat offended by this.

Yeah, you should be! What, did they think we just sat beside Indra looking pretty for the past couple of years?

“And my lord brother,” Shachi goes on, turning to Asura. “You never wanted the succeed your father. Your entire life, you expected Indra to inherit his ways and you supported him. Even if you are better suited to the task, the ease with which you accepted it is what causes your brother to believe you betrayed him.”

“But I didn’t –”

“If you had truly honoured your brother’s wishes, you would have fought for him,” she tells him firmly. “Perhaps you would have tried to teach him the lessons you had learned, so that he might become a better person as well as a better leader. Or perhaps my lord father could have, instead of naming only one successor, left his craft to both. Two halves of a whole, dependant on each other and needing to work together for success.” She cocks her head to one side and considers the wizened old man before her. “Which is the lesson you wanted them both to learn from the beginning, is it not?”

Lord Hagoromo stares at her for a full minute, and she suddenly shrinks.

“Forgive me,” she says. “I may have overstepped –”

But the old sage chuckles, to both hers and Asura’s surprise.

“For one whose eyes are not as sharp as ours, you see much, daughter,” he tells her, his mouth quirking upwards. “I hope that perception serves you well when you need it most.” His tone becomes serious once more. “And I hope it does not blind you to the truth of matters.”

“My husband is not perfect,” Shachi responds, aware of what he is referring to. “Nor is he blameless. He has made many mistakes – like you, perhaps he sees himself entirely as the victim of circumstance. If you truly want to reconcile with him, all three of you must acknowledge past insults but agree to move on in peace.”

“Would you help us do that?” Asura asks.

“…me?”

“You have seen the part of him that only Father and I know or remember. And you’re his wife. He will listen to you.”

Shachi frowns at this.

“I did not mean that as it sounded,” Asura quickly says. “That is to say – this was not a plan, an attempt to sway you to our way of thinking. But now that you have heard both sides of the story, perhaps you can be the voice of reason if we were to all meet again.”

She hesitates, torn.

“I will not go behind my husband’s back in any way,” she says finally, willing her voice to keep from trembling. “I will not return to him as your instrument, speaking words to change his mind to your way of thinking. I have never done so before, and I will not so now. But I will raise the issue once. If he is favorable, I will try, but if he is not – I will not pursue the matter. It has taken many years for him to place any trust in me – I would sooner die than break that.”

Asura appears resigned, Hagoromo thoughtful. She isn’t sure she likes the way he is looking at her, as if he knows something that she doesn’t.

“That is all that we can ask,” the old sage says, sighing heavily and sitting back. “All that remains now is to find Indra.”

夢

“Do you think your family would have liked me?”

Sasuke doesn’t stop stirring the antibiotic paste they are making, but his movements become a little jerkier.

“We’ve had this conversation before.”

“I know, but I need to hear it again,” she prompts, and then pats her stomach. “He needs to hear it. You know that babies can hear sound in the womb by eighteen weeks, right? He needs to hear your voice, and face it darling, you aren’t exactly talkative.”

They’ve been calling the baby he since Sasuke mentioned the tendency of main family Uchiha to be male.

After a beat, Sasuke shrugs and says, “I don’t see the point of revisiting questions that can never be answered.”

“I…I guess you’re right,” she sighs in defeat; she has learned the importance in not pushing certain matters too hard. “It was just something on my mind, but that doesn’t mean you want to talk about it. Sorry for bringing it up.”

She doesn’t want to mention that ever since her dreams have started to centre on Indra’s family, Shachi’s interactions with her in-laws have made her curious about what her own might have been. It’s a completely different situation, of course – she can’t think of any reality where Sasuke’s parents would have kidnapped her – but she suspects there would have been some similar sense of alienation.

She tries to focus on what her husband is doing across the room; the local apothecary was kind enough to lend them his back room to work on a treatment for the area’s pneumonia outbreak. Sasuke is carefully measuring and sorting through ingredients with a frown of concentration; it’s understandable, considering some of them are toxic in large quantities.

Ever since she became pregnant, they try to avoid her working with anything too poisonous; some materials can be absorbed through the skin into the bloodstream, and neither she nor Sasuke want to take any risks when it comes to the baby. As such, her husband has become her unofficial assistant-slash-apprentice, learning how to put together passable antidotes and remedies under her watchful eye.

He’s also learning that a lot more goes into it than just memorizing precise ingredients and solutions. Even having a Sharingan to help him doesn’t help him here, and for once Sakura is the genius having to patiently explain the process to him.

“Be careful, you’re adding too much sumac.”

“I’m adding exactly what you told me to add.”

“For a general dose – you’re making an antidote, not a paralytic.”

He shoots her an annoyed look, but remeasures the amounts. She beams at him in approval.

“My mother would have liked you immediately,” Sasuke tells her as he carefully grinds the thick brown root down to powder. “She was a warm person, and she never said an unkind word to anyone.”

Sakura blinks, surprised that he has chosen to answer her after all. Her cheeks warm with pleasure, and she smiles to herself.

“Sounds like Hinata,” she muses softly.

“No. My mother had more mettle to her. And she could have a temper,” Sasuke remembers. “There was no point to disagreeing with her. Perhaps it’s why I don’t remember my parents ever arguing.”

“So your father just agreed with everything she said?”

“When it came to raising my brother and I, I have no doubt.”

“But otherwise he was the boss.”

“He was the head of the clan. He had responsibilities.”

“Right.”

“It…would have taken some time for him to warm up to you,” Sasuke says after a pause.

Sakura doesn’t allow herself to be upset by this. “He would have wanted you to marry another Uchiha.”

“Yes. At first.”

“But think I’d win him over in the end, then?”

“He would soon see how much you have to offer. No woman in my clan has ever achieved what you have.”

Sakura blushes. It isn’t often that Sasuke is complimentary, but when he is, he delivers his words with the utter conviction that what he is saying is true. It’s better than any remark about her looks could be.

“And Itachi already liked you.”

“Eh?” she squeaks. “But I…I only met him once! And he tried to kill me, and Naruto and –”

“He knew that you and Naruto were trying to save me,” Sasuke tells her quietly. “That alone endeared you to him.” He raises an eyebrow at her, a grim smile tugging at his mouth. “You may have noticed that my family can be single-minded in our pursuits.”

“You think?” she replies dryly.

“Anything or anyone who supports those same pursuits is someone to be valued. Anyone who would face certain death to protect a mutually precious person…he would have respected that.”

Sakura considers that, unsure what to say; it’s not exactly a healthy way of looking at relationships, but it makes a bit of sense. In a mercenary kind of way…

“If anything else, he would have appreciated your chocolate making skills,” Sasuke goes on, an ironic note in his voice that tells her he is teasing. She wasted years learning that particular skill for the benefit of someone who couldn’t care less. “He had a sweet-tooth, though he tried to hide it.”

“That’s…” Sakura blinks, and then giggles. “I never would have considered that.”

Somehow the knowledge that the legendary Itachi Uchiha had such a commonplace weakness like sugar makes her feel marginally more comfortable with the idea of him.

“Thank you for telling me this,” she says quietly. “I get that you don’t like to...you know.”

“It’s…easier than it was,” Sasuke tells her, shifting uncomfortably. “And it’s practice.”

“Practice?”

“He will no doubt have questions,” Sasuke says, nodding to her middle. “I suppose I need to become used to answering them.”

“Yeah, staring broodily off into the distance and hoping he stops asking isn’t really going to cut it with our child,” Sakura agrees

“Not if he’s half as tenacious as you.”

“Or if he spends a lot of time with Naruto.”

Sasuke scowls. “Let Naruto corrupt his own children.”

Sakura burst out laughing at this, causing him to return to his grinding with the aggrieved air of someone who has been unfairly insulted. They both know he isn’t truly angry; Naruto is the closest thing he has to family, and he will likely expect (or even demand) the loudmouth’s presence in their child’s life.

Her mirth dissipates as her thoughts return to another family, long ago.

She exhales in resignation.

“Indra’s family liked Shachi,” she tells him quietly. “They might not have known what to do about her when they first met, but afterwards…I think even though Asura promised to bring her back to Indra, he doesn’t want to.”

“He knows how dangerous Indra can be. He wants to protect her,” Sasuke concludes, tone carefully level and trying to pretend like he is utterly absorbed in his task.

“Yes, I think so. And I think she senses it too, even if she’s trying not to think too hard about it. She never had a family before, and it’s tempting.” Sakura shivers, folding her arms in front of her. “I never knew what it was to grow up alone, but when I’m her…I sort of get it. What you and Naruto experienced. After being alone, it’s natural for her to want that.”

“You sound as if you think she should stay.”

Sakura can’t help the guilty face she makes. “Is that wrong of me? I know she loves Indra – and he might even love her back – but their relationship isn’t healthy. It’s worse than ours was before…before the end of the war.”

“It’s not wrong of you,” Sasuke says slowly. “But I think you know as well a I do that she won’t come to that conclusion.”

“No,” Sakura sighs, clenching her fists; when she looks up at him, her eyes have filled with tears. “Oh, Sasuke, why do I think that her story isn’t going to have a happy ending?”

He doesn’t answer her, but she knows it’s not because he can’t.

眠り

For the rest of the winter, Asura is absent from the household. Shachi learns from Kanna that he has renewed his efforts to track his brother down.

“He is more determined than he was all these past years,” her sister-in-law confides one evening. “Before you arrived, he sought Indra as a means of confronting his own guilt. Now, he has a hope for reconciliation. You are the reason he searches so ardently.”

Shachi shifts, uncomfortable over the praise. “I don’t believe I’m the only reason.”

“You are an important one, though,” Kanna says. “You are his family. He will do anything for family.”

The woman is unable to completely keep the concern from her voice though, and Shachi can sympathise. They both know what Indra might do to Asura if the wrong impulse should take him.

Shachi chooses to change the subject.

“I have noticed that you and my lord brother do not have children,” she mentions, tentative. “And yet…you both appear to be in fine health.”

Kanna’s cheeks turn red at this. “It…it is nothing. A childhood ailment, most likely. It makes it hard to carry a child. If the gods mean for me to…” She shakes her head. “We do not want for children. Not with those who look to Asura as their father.”

But the evasion rings hollow.

“Have you spoken to my lord father?” Shachi asks. “With his power…”

Kanna shifts uncomfortably.

“As he grows older, his abilities begin to ebb as well. He has not been able to heal for many years now. It is why he could do very little for you while you were ill.”

“And none of your healers have found the cause?”

“Our healers busy themselves with treating those who have been injured in combat, or besieged by plague,” Kanna says, a little stiffly. “The…the trials of a woman are not of interest to them, and I would not wish to distract them from good works for my own ends.”

Shachi makes a face.

“You are most unselfish, even if such reluctance is a waste,” Shachi remarks. She steps forward, and reaches for her sister. “May I?”

Kanna hesitates, but then nods. Shachi places her hand above Kanna’s womb and focusses.

She can sense something, but it doesn’t make itself apparent right away. But Shachi has not birthed six children of her own, or helped ease the pregnancies of the women in her husband’s sect for nothing. She adjusts her chakra, reaches out with her senses and concentrates on the places most healers (especially men) would not think to look.

“I see. There is scarring here,” she says, frowning with closed eyes. She concentrates, sending a burst of healing energy flicking out through her fingers. Kanna startles at the sensation. “Please keep still.”

Several minutes pass in complete silence before Shachi straightens up.

“I have removed the scar tissue,” she announces. “You will bleed soon, and afterward there should be no more difficulty in conceiving.” She smiles softly. “I have no doubt you will be a good mother.”

Kanna stares at her in shock, and as Shachi’s words set in, tears form in her eyes.

“My lord Indra does not understand how fortunate he is to have you as a wife,” she tells her quietly. “If you can still be so kind despite being married to him…”

Her sister-in-law doesn’t mean to give insult, and Shachi chooses to ignore it. It’s a skill she has developed in her months here.

Still, she can’t help a minor note of exasperation, directed not at Kanna, but at her husband.

If he understood how fortunate he was, he would be trying to find me.

夢

It’s become an accepted morning ritual, helping Sasuke get dressed.

They both know that he can do this by himself – he managed a lifetime without her, both before and after he lost his arm – but for some reason he indulges Sakura’s coddling tendencies. Maybe because he is so independent that there aren’t many thing she can help him with, maybe because he has learned to like having someone take care of him.

She privately thinks it might be the latter.

When they stay at guesthouses, as they’ve been doing almost every night lately (with the onset of winter she’s surprised that Sasuke hasn’t insisted they hole up in a cabin somewhere until the snow melts) they can take their time about it, enjoying the simple peace of the moment.

This morning, though, Sakura is distracted; her thoughts are firmly in the past, reflecting on her former self’s recent experiences. The idea that Asura’s wife might never have had children – that only Indra might have had descendants if she – if Shachi – hadn’t interfered makes her very aware of the precariousness of the future.

She fumbles with his shirt sleeves and drops his fingerless gloves several times before finally slipping them onto his hands. He frowns, clearly impatient, but instead of making a contempt filled comment as he might have when they were children, he instead asks, “What’s wrong?”

“What if I couldn’t have children?” she blurts out instead of an answer.

Sasuke’s blinks, the smallest downward turn of his lips the only indication he has heard the question. He doesn’t answer, instead waiting for her to provide context or more detail. As if what she’s asking him is incredibly complex or nonsensical.

“Would you still have married me if I couldn’t have children?” she asks, quieter this time. She hates that she sounds so insecure, but Shachi’s anxieties have been seeping into her waking moments more often lately. Combined with pregnancy hormones, Sakura doesn’t know how she isn’t a mess of tears every day.

Sasuke is frowning now, calculation happening behind those fathomless eyes. “It was never a reason to marry you to begin with.”

“But it was a reason!” she insists. “You’ve wanted a family since we were kids, and if it turned out that I couldn’t…”

“Wanting something and deserving it are two different things,” Sasuke dismisses.

“But –”

“I would have been satisfied either way,” Sasuke cuts her off. “If circumstance decreed I wasn’t meant to have children, I would have accepted that.”

“Even though you wanted them.”

Irritation is clear on his features. “Is there a reason you’re asking repetitive questions?”

“I just…” she gestures with the hand that isn’t still wrapped around his. “Sometimes I’m not sure if this is real.”

“Because of your dreams?” he questions, irritation giving way to speculation.

“No. No, even before the dream I wondered. Sometimes, I thought – sometimes I still think – I’m going to open my eyes and be staring at the ceiling in my bedroom. I’m fifteen years old and all of this has just been a dream. Or worse –” Sakura shivers here, “ – maybe I was trapped in the Infinite Tsukuyomi after all. Maybe all of this is just a fantasy my brain cooked up.”

“You fantasized about living a vagabond existence with a former international criminal?” he asks dryly. 

“Not necessarily,” she replies, rolling her eyes at his subtle teasing. “But I wanted to be with you, and now I am, and – especially with all these dreams messing with my head – I just worry it’s not real.”

“Wouldn’t it be more likely to not be real if events proceeded exactly how you imagined them?”

“You mean, like, if I was still at home, playing the happy housewife and running the clinic and you were – I don’t know – running the Konoha police?” she suggests.

“Hmph.” There’s the tiniest indication of a wistful smile there. “Perhaps.”

“Actually…if I’m being honest, I can’t imagine you having a regular nine-to-five job anymore,” she confesses. “I guess that would sort of be a tip-off that something was wrong.”

“Childhood dreams do change,” he agrees.

“Some don’t.”

Their eyes meet and hold for several heartbeats, silently exchanging a sentiment that needs no words.

Sasuke reaches forward, slowly, eyes softened in just that way; his index and middle finger tap her forehead and she blushes.

“Some are annoyingly persistent,” he agrees, beginning to pull away, but she snatches his wrist, not allowing him to move back just yet. He acquiesces, allowing his fingers to instead slide across her cheekbone, then slowly cup the side of her face. She smiles, shifting her hold on him to keep his hand pressed there, leaning into the warmth and the smell of leather.

“I’ll need that back, eventually. It is the only one I have.”

“Only because you’re so stubborn,” she retorts, guiding his fingers to her lips and pressing a brief kiss to the tips before letting them go.

She returns to the task of helping him dress.

“There are other ways to have children,” he says after allowing this to continue; she pauses. “Other ways to have a family. We would find a new path.”

Her eyes widen. “But…but then your family…it would end with you. And the Sharingan would die out.”

“Some might argue that’s for the best.”

Seeing his utter nonchalance at that idea, her eyes widen with realisation.

“Do you think it will happen?” she asks. “I don’t have a Sharingan – you’re hoping he takes after me, aren’t you?”

“If he does he will be saved a lot of trouble.”

“But if he has it…if we had more than one child one day…would we…would he…?”

“It would be a topic that would need to be addressed,” Sasuke allows. “A conversation would have to be had.”

Sakura bites her lip.

“Should we…should we only have one? Maybe we should only have one. That way he can’t be tricked into…or in case there’s an accident, he won’t have to –”

“Kill me or his siblings and take their eyes?”

Sakura winces. It sounds even worse once it’s been said out loud than it did in her head. She tries to offer in a repentant look, but he shakes his head at her; he is not angry or insulted by her obvious train of thought.

“If we only ever have the one, who’s to say he won’t have many children when he grows up? It would be counterintuitive to base all of our decisions on an event which may or may not happen,” he tells her. “If I truly thought it was an issue, I would never have had children. I know as well as you do that there are ways to prevent such a thing, permanently.”

“Did you ever consider it?”

“Sometimes. But not with any great deal of sincerity,” Sasuke admits, unapologetic. “I did tell you that I’m a selfish man.”

“Shut up, no you’re not,” she insists, abandoning his shirt sleeves in favour of wrapping her arms around his middle, pressing her face into his chest. Mostly it’s to hide the sudden onslaught of tears.

Sasuke’s arm wraps around her, and she feels his chin on the crown of her head.

“I won’t hide the truth from our child,” he tells her quietly. “When the time comes, I’ll explain the power and the price of the Sharingan. Even if he doesn’t have it.”

“Children,” Sakura corrects with a sniff. “I do want more than one. So he won’t be lonely. So you won’t be lonely.”

She hears a short, rumbling sound in his chest, close to laughter. “Let’s have this one first.”

眠り

The snow finally begins to melt, and the cherry blossoms begin to bloom. In her seventh month of pregnancy, Asura finally returns with good news.

“You’ve found him,” she breathes on the day he enters the courtyard where she and Kanna are walking. He looks tired and dirty from his journey. Although his first act is to embrace his wife, there is a look on his face that Shachi knows is meant for her.

“Yes.”

“And the children?”

“They are safe. All of them have relocated to one of the smaller islands. It was hard to find because of the warding – and because I had to mask my own chakra – but they are there,” Asura says, “And they show no sign of leaving.”

“Then we have to hurry!” she declares, not wanting to somehow miss the opportunity to be reunited with her husband and children.

“We will,” Asura promises. “But we have to do so carefully. If he senses my presence – especially anywhere near you – it could lead to conflict. And that is something we don’t want, especially considering your condition.”

She wants to argue, but knows her husband well; he prefers to lead with force and ask questions later. “Fine.”

It takes a week of planning and preparation before they are ready to leave. Asura gathers several of his most trusted followers, as well as the litter she had so jokingly mentioned months earlier. There’s no choice now but to use it, as she can’t walk for extended periods anymore.

At the gates as they prepare to leave, Asura bid goodbye to his wife, promising a safe return. Despite bidding each other farewell, they share secret smiles and hold each other’s hands a little longer than normal. Shachi knows that they will be welcoming a new member of the family soon enough, and leaves them to their moment.

To occupy herself, she meets one last time with her father-in-law, who has left his chambers to see her off.

“I hope when we next meet it will be under better circumstances,” he says quietly, before beginning to cough; when he wipes his mouth, it comes away bloody.

“My lord father, you are ill,” she realises, wondering how she couldn’t have noticed in the past months.

He motions for her to lower her voice, inclining his head toward Asura. “You are perceptive, daughter.”

“Can I – ?”

“There is no healing anyone could perform that can help me now, but your kindness is appreciated,” he tells her. Off her stricken look, he adds, “I have some years left. Enough that I live in hope that I shall see grandchildren. I am given to know that this might happen soon.” His mouth quirks a little, and she smiles back, as if they, too, share a secret. “However, in the event I don’t…may I?”

He indicates her stomach, growing much larger but well hidden in her voluminous white robes. She pauses only a minute, and then nods.

The old man places his hand upon her, just below her breast, and for a long time is quiet. Then, he says, “For all your faith and love for him, you have noticed that there is a darkness surrounding your husband.”

She is quiet.

“I do not know how he came by it, for it was there long before I considered naming Asura as my successor,” he continues. “I fear it will lead him to great loss and sadness. A constant black hole of despair.” She swallows, because it’s a fear she has secretly harboured for years. “But this child you carry – this child carries in it the potential to break free. The fan the flames of change in Indra, and all those of his bloodline.”

She looks up at this, eyes wide. Is he making a prophecy?

Fathomless eyes focus on her, his expression grave.

“But flames burn for destruction more often than they do regrowth. There will be much heartache before it happens if there is no stalwart hand to guide it.”

“…Father?”

“Remember this,” he tells her, squeezing her hands with unexpected affection. “Farewell, Daughter.”

And then he turns and walks back into the courtyard.

夢

“If one more old biddy puts her hand on my stomach without my permission, I won’t be responsible for my actions!” Sakura declares loudly, stomping down the snow-covered road from their latest village stopover. “Or – or! – tells me I shouldn’t be walking around in my ��condition’!” She whirls around and glares at Sasuke, who is following several paces at a leisurely pace. “I mean, do I look physically incapable to you?”

“Hn.”

“Exactly!” she crows. “Where is it written that a pregnant woman automatically loses all of her physical capabilities! If we ran into a band of mercenaries right now, I could take them with one hand behind my back – you know I could.”

“Let’s not, though,” Sasuke suggests.

“Obviously,” she rolls her eyes. “But I could. It’s not going to hurt the baby. He’s strong – healthiest baby ever, because I’m the healthiest person I know. Because I’ve got this!” She taps at the seal in her forehead. “Diseases and physical ailments and…and stuff! I can punch out goddesses, but they think I should be sitting on my ass doing nothing – shannaro!”

Sasuke sighs.

“Are you hungry?”

She shoots him a dark look. “What kind of question is that?”

“It’s a question about whether you’re hungry or not.”

“No, it’s not. It’s you being patronizing. You think my mood is tied to my stomach and you’re trying to placate me, and I don’t appreciate it.”

There are several beats of silence, and then,

“Am I wrong?”

“…No.”

She lets him lead them off the road and unpack their rations, ignoring the amused smirk he wears the whole time.

“You think this is funny,” she accuses.

“No,” he replies. “I just find it…interesting. You usually have patience for even the most irritating individuals.”

“Well that’s because I never had to put up with stupid people while I was having hot flashes,” she snaps. “It’s winter and I’m dying here. I am actually sweating buckets right now, look! I’m drenched like I just walked out of the bath! How is that even possible?”

“Put your cloak back on,” Sasuke chides as he opens a sealing scroll for their kettle. “You’ll be cold again in a minute.”

“I am not a child!” she snaps, though she does as he suggests because he happens to be right. She kicks at the ankle high snow. “Nice to see attitudes towards pregnant women haven’t changed at all in the past thousand years… The only difference now is people think it’s okay to invade personal space.”

She looks up to see Sasuke quirk an eyebrow at her – she was never really one to respect personal space when they were younger, after all – and she rolls her eyes.

“You know what I mean,” she tells him. “Before, no one – not even an old grandma – would put their hands on my stomach without permission. Except if they had mine or my husband’s. And even if they did, they knew damn well better than to ask.”

He snorts. “You have a friendly face. It puts people at ease enough to think they can take liberties.”

She pouts.

“I don’t know which is more annoying – you making fun of me, or you threatening to dislocate people’s fingers for getting to handsy,” she mutters, rubbing at her shoulders through her cloak. Her core temperature is returning to the way it was before and now she’s freezing again.

Sasuke frowns at her in confusion. “I never threatened anyone.”

“Right, because I just imagined all of those people with broken fingers, my mistake,” she drawls. “Though, you’d think if you were that protective of me, you would have figured out where I am by now and come get me. Instead, I’m sitting here, freezing and boiling, promising everyone else that they’re going to be happy, while I’m alone. Always alone…And Kanna and Asura are so happy, and it kills me every time I have to see them like that, because I miss –”

“Sakura.”

The word is quiet, but sharp, almost like the crack of a whip.

A shiver runs up Sakura’s back, and she feels a curious sensation of having been doused in water.

When she looks up at him, she sees that all traces of amusement are gone and Sasuke is eyeing her with concern and wariness.

“What?” she asks.

“What were you just saying?” he asks her neutrally.

She blinks, casting her mind back. The past few seconds are a little muddled, but some of the ideas come back to her.

“I did it again, didn’t I?” she asks in a small voice.

He nods once, stiffly.

“I’m sorry. It’s like…she gets closer to the surface whenever I’m angry or upset – which is weird, because she was the most…well adjusted, placid person ever.”

“Don’t apologise,” Sasuke tells her, as he has been doing ever since these dreams started. It rings a little more hollowly than usual. “You have nothing to apologise for.”

“I know that, but I also know it freaks you out.”

He doesn’t answer, but she reads the truth in his eyes.

She holds her elbows close to her body, looking away. “Sasuke?”

“Hm.”

“If you…if you think it will help…do you think he would have answers?”

Mismatched eyes harden. “Sakura…we don’t have to.”

“It’s the third time this week. We need to start considering this might not be over any time soon. And if anyone has answers about talking to the dead…”

“It’s him,” Sasuke concludes, grim. He studies her closely for several seconds, as if trying to gauge how serious she is, and then nods. “Alright. We’ll find him.”

“Find him?” she repeats. “I thought he was staying outside of Konoha?”

“Only when he feels like it. He was up to something in Tea Country the last time I communicated with him,” Sasuke says, bringing out a summoning parchment; she notes that it’s the one with the line to Ryūchi Cave, not the aeries of his usual hawk summons. “I suspect he enjoys making Captain Yamato go prematurely grey…”

眠り

The journey back home is much longer than Shachi expected, although she supposes that’s because this time she’s conscious. For two weeks she and Asura, along with the small contingent of his followers, trek through forest and field.

The closer they get to Indra, the more anxious Shachi becomes. She tugs at her sleeves, readjusts her voluminous robes over her belly – she’s smaller than she usually is at this point in her pregnancy, probably due to her illness – or fans herself with the shikai Kanna gave them at their parting. She walks as much as she dares, but her condition doesn’t always allow for her to move by her own power. She would much rather they stop for rest more often than accepting the necessity of being carried by litter.

The third time she begs for a stop, Asura obligingly calls for a halt and offers to escort her to a nearby stream for some water. This is pretense, she discovers, when they reach the water source and he flat-out asks her if she’s alright.

“You were so insistent on returning to your home, and yet now you appear satisfied to delay while you regain your strength,” he points out. “This journey is for your benefit, little sister, yet I feel perhaps you are having reservations.”

Of course, her brother-in-law would notice.

And, as she has become accustomed to in the passing months, she finds herself confessing her worries to him.

“He hasn’t been looking for me,” she murmurs, wringing her hands fretfully and turning a beseeching look on Asura. “What if he doesn’t want to see me? What if he doesn’t want…?”

Her unspoken ‘me’ hangs in the air.

“We don’t know he hasn’t been looking for you,” Asura says evenly. “And if he was…unless he knew to seek you out in our homeland, he would not have been able to find you.” At her confused look, he explains, “My chakra tends to overwhelm our entire region. There’s no need for me to hide it in my own home, and so even though you haven’t had your chakra suppressed since you first arrived, he wouldn’t be able to notice yours in the same vicinity as mine.”

“And he never would have thought to seek you out when I was taken, because it was one of your followers and not you that committed the deed,” she concludes dully.

Asura offers her his usual apologetic expression at this; she hates that look, because he reminds her of a sad puppy. It’s hard to remain angry at him, and so instead she glares over at the aforementioned man.

“Is that why Taizo is here?” she asks. “To acquit himself?”

“Somewhat,” Asura says. “But…I suspect Kanna wanted him along. No doubt he intends to knock me out and drag me back home in the event I put myself in true danger.”

“She would do it herself if she wasn’t worried for the baby,” Shachi agrees.

Asura nods, his expression softening. He looks into the distance, no doubt thinking of his wife at home and their future child. From what Kanna told Shachi, she has never been able to carry a child very long past her first month; upon their departure, Kanna was almost at three months.

I wonder if you and your brothers and sisters will ever meet your cousin, Shachi wonders, pressing her hand to her middle.

She hopes so.

Something occurs to her.

“Wait – if your chakra is so overwhelming, won’t my husband sense you coming?” Shachi asks. “He might expect an attack.”

The idea of the brothers coming to blows disturbs her.

“It may draw him out, yes, but that’s what we want,” Asura says. “Especially now that I have you with me. I wouldn’t have risked that when I was searching for him myself. I kept my presence masked.”

“Why?”

“I fear without your stabilising influence, one of us would surely die from that encounter.”

Shachi sighs. “You seem to think I have a stabilising influence.”

“You have been married for him for nearly a decade, and yet you live,” Asura tells her. “Not only that, you are still good and kind and generous. Even Indra cannot fail to be tempered by that.”

Shachi blushes at the compliment. “You think so?”

“I know so,” Asura says, confident. “And if my brother requires the truth to be beaten into him – I’d sacrifice life and limb to get the point across.”

つづく

Huh! So, parts of this fought me, other parts came easy and others took me completely by surprise because I wasn’t planning  them. Enjoy?

クリ 

Next Chapter

[we-legodesk-lawfirm-things]

10 Best Free Online Productivity tools for Lawyers

Best Free Online Productivity Tools for Lawyers

Who isn’t looking to be a little more productive and efficient with their time? If a task is to be done, rest assured there is always a piece of software aiming to decrease the workload in its best possible way. We have listed some best Productivity tools From browsers plugin to maintaining relationships with clients or maybe to optimize time, productivity apps target to do it all. The internet is not all bad. In fact, there are a lot of really great things out there that make your life and your work easier, simpler, and more efficient. The key is to use the internet to your advantage. Getting access to online tools can make your marketing more potent and is a big win for lawyers. Here are 10 functional Productivity tools  to make your time truly as productive as it needs to be: E-MAILS Mails are where the majority of client communication takes place, as well as interactions with other attorneys and staff members. Most lawyers practically live in their mail inboxes. Managing email effectively can make a huge difference not only in your product but more importantly, in your sanity. WHATSAPP Whatsapp, the world’s most popular chat app uses end-to-end encryption for all messages, photos, videos, voice messages, documents, group chats and text on the device. The end-to-end encryption gives each chat its own security code to verify calls and messages. Attorneys who communicate client confidential information via messages and call, Whatsapp is an app you would love to use. CAMSCANNER   CamScanner is a primary interface to digitize written work. With CamScanner, any document you see in the real world can be digitized and saved right away with your mobile. It can create PDF; scan any kind of document, texts, and graphics, in second. Access, edit and manage documents anytime and anywhere you need. CamScanner enables quick search in seconds. Google Drive The free and very accessible Google Drive is an intelligent choice among collaboration office suites in the cloud. You can create and edit documents, solo or with others, in real time. Google Drive is accessible wherever you have Internet access and a Web browser. There is an optional, downloadable component that enables file-syncing directly from the computer. Google Drive is compatible with platforms such as iOS, Android and Windows. Trello Trello is an amazing and simple project management and collaboration tool that uses cards to organize your ideas. Its biggest virtue is the visually appealing and unadorned user interface which feels intuitive, making it easy to track your project. Trello supports iPhone, Android, and Windows 8 platforms. However, its website has been designed to be accessible in most mobile web browsers. Trello gives perspective over all your projects, at work, and at home. It offers a better and easy way to communicate with the senior attorneys, team members; assistants and juniors. It is infinitely flexible and incredibly easy to use. Process Street Process Street is workflow and process management software that provides a simple and powerful way to manage checklists and procedures. It is a platform built specially to track processes to save money, minimize mistakes and better scaling. You can quickly create and assign a checklist workflow to your team and track activity from your dashboard and get notified when done. It makes communication with juniors, assistants and business associates simpler and convenient. TOGGL Excel timesheets don’t give a real insight into how productive one really is. Here comes Toggl to save your life. It has changed the time management field by providing a really simple time recording tool for solo users or teams. Toggl also has powerful reports, giving you an accurate breakdown of how you are spending your time. It is designed for several different operating systems including iOS, Android, Window and Linux. It has both mobile and desktop applications for time-based tasks and projects, either through an interactive task time or through manual entry. SLICKPIE Slickpie is online accounting software designed for small businesses, offering online invoice and billing, bank reconciliation, financial reporting, tax management, document management, and every other banking solution. You can send online invoices, create payment reminders, get phone support, and is user-friendly and handy. LINKEDIN LinkedIn can be a powerful online tool to help you expand your professional network, raise your visibility, and position and control your personal brand. Good cases can be added as accomplishments in the bio, adding value to the lawyer's brand value. One of the great benefits of a LinkedIn profile is that it allows you to add up to three links to your law firms – Website, Blog, Twitter account and any other weblink you deem important to add to your profile. ZOHO With Zoho CRM, you can bring all your conversations into one place, and make the most of your interactions at a moment’s notice. Not only can it help you better manage your client relationships and your caseload but it can also help you improve team collaboration within your firm. Zoho can help lawyers more effectively manage client relationships via automated contact management and progress tracking. It is easy to use and offers robust features including the ability to attach documentation to specific client profiles.  Time management for lawyers is one of the most difficult tasks in busy law practice and productivity tools lessen the burden of both, administrative and personal workload. By implementing these simple productivity tools into law practice, an attorney can increase productivity while improving career satisfaction at the same time. Read the full article

[bountyofbeads]

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/06/reparations-hearing-ta-nehisi-coates-danny-glover-2019.amp?__twitter_impression=true

Reparation hearings begin today- the first in over a decade on the subject. What you need to know: https://t.co/zynm1bHINu

#Reparations @DukeU @SandyDarity @DukePoliSci @Slate

What to expect from Wednesday’s reparations hearing involving Ta-Nehisi Coates and Danny Glover.

What Americans Need to Know About Reparations Ahead of This Week’s Big Hearing

By MARCIA CHATELAIN, WILLIAM A. DARITY JR., ROY E. FINKENBINE, andSTEPHANIE E. Jones-Roger's | Published JUNE 18, 201912:41 PM | SLATE | Posted June 19, 2019 |

 On Wednesday, a House Judiciary subcommittee will hold the first congressional hearing in more than a decade on the subject of reparations. Ta-Nehisi Coates, the author of the 2014 essay “The Case for Reparations,” and actor Danny Glover are scheduled to testify at the hearing, which will focus in part on H.R. 40, a piece of legislation that would establish a commission “to study and consider a national apology and proposal for reparations for the institution of slavery, its subsequent de jure and de facto racial and economic discrimination against African- Americans, and the impact of these forces on living African-Americans

Earlier this week, four leading scholars joined Slate to discuss what they hope to see from the hearing, why they believe reparations are necessary, and what a successful reparations commission might hope to establish. Marcia Chatelain is an associate professor of history and African American studies at Georgetown University; she participated in the school’s Working Group on Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation. William A. Darity Jr. is a professor of public policy, African and African American studies, and economics at Duke University, who has written extensively on the economics of reparations. Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers is an associate professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South. Roy E. Finkenbine is a professor of history at the University of Detroit Mercy. His work studying 18th- and 19th-century reparations cases was featured in Coates’ essay.

Their conversation, which began with a discussion of what they hope to see in Wednesday’s hearing, has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Marcia Chatelain: I hope the committee hearing can do three things: 1) Make clear that the reparations movement has long existed, and that the question of recompense is based on 19th-century deliberations about accountability. 2) Make clear that there are a number of financial tools and instruments available for us today to use as a vehicle for reparations. I think that this helps clarify the misguided notion that this is too difficult to do in the present. 3) Recognize that reparations do not end a conversation about the pervasive legacy of white supremacy, racism, and slavery in the United States. Rather, it provides an opportunity to deepen the discourse on breach and is a gesture toward repair for a problem that can never be fully reconciled.

William A. Darity Jr.: I would like the hearing to make it clear that a program of reparations must designate black American descendants of persons enslaved in the United States as recipients, that a primary goal of a reparations program must be elimination of the racial wealth gap, and that the injustices that form the basis for the reparations claim must include slavery, nearly a century of legal segregation in the United States, and ongoing racism manifest in police executions of unarmed blacks, mass incarceration, and employment discrimination.

Roy E. Finkenbine: I’d hope to hear several things Wednesday. First, that reparations can come in many forms, including acknowledgment and apology for past wrongs, but that part of the suffering involved can also be monetized. The continuing racial wealth gap from slavery and other oppressions means that the past dramatically affects black Americans’ well-being today. Black Americans, historically 12 percent of the population at any given time, had 1 percent of the national wealth in 1865, and 2 percent a century and a quarter later. Experts tell us that at the current rate it will be 228 years for racial wealth to be equalized. Second, all of this [wealth disparity] is inherited. Timothy Dwight [the president of Yale College from 1795 to 1817] noted that all Americans “inherit … [the] incumbrances” of their ancestors when it comes to past oppressions. Even families like mine, which had little to do with slavery, segregation, etc., have historically benefited from white privilege. The impact is multigenerational. Third, reparations claims have historically been based on Western, democratic, and Judeo-Christian values. And fourth, reparations advocacy has a history dating back to the 18th century. It’s not new or strange.

Darity Jr.: It’s critical that the history of the reparations movement itself be brought into congressional deliberations. The black American demand for reparations is at least 150 years old.

Chatelain: I also hope that someone speaks to the viability and importance of direct cash aid, which is a controversial topic for some. In the conversations surrounding Georgetown’s history of slaveholding, I hear that scholarships, admissions, and other mechanisms that are aligned with the university should serve as reparations. I think that these mechanisms—due to the narrow population a school like Georgetown admits and teaches—are fine, but I believe in actual financial compensation. The notion that reparation monies are earmarked for specific purposes is somewhat paternalistic, and it creates a framework for determining the “right way” for reparations to operate.

Darity Jr.: Marcia is on point! It’s peculiar that no one has complained about direct payments being made to Japanese Americans for unjust incarceration during World War II, or direct payments being made to the victims of the Holocaust. Somehow that issue always comes into play when reparations for black Americans are the topic of consideration. Ironic? Regardless, for both substantive and symbolic reasons, direct payments to eligible recipients must be an important part of a reparations program, particularly if a major objective is to eliminate the racial wealth gulf.

Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers: Members should also underscore that reparations are not about holding individuals responsible but rather redressing the myriad ways that the federal, state, and local governments—in the South and in the North—benefited from and upheld slavery and orchestrated circumstances that made slavery’s perpetuation possible.

Darity Jr.: Just a small proviso on Roy’s comment about the 228-year projection. The study in question does not say black and white wealth will be equalized in 228 years; it says, under current conditions, it will take 228 years for blacks to reach the level of wealth currently held by whites. To close the racial wealth gap, we need to move the black share in national wealth from 2–3 percent to 12–13 percent. That should be a central objective of a reparations program for black Americans.

That’s also a great point from Roy on the importance of understanding the impact of black oppression on white advantage, regardless of whether individual whites come from families directly implicated in slavery or the slave trade.

Jones-Rogers: I also think it is vital that those speaking before the committee remind them/the public of the fact that the federal government had no problem with compensating slave owners for emancipation while not allocating a dime to the enslaved. The D.C. Emancipation Act of April 1862—which I discuss in my book and which Tera Hunter discussed in a recent op-ed in the New York Times—actually paid slave owners a set amount for eligible slaves if they applied for it and offered proof of ownership. In addition to this, Lincoln’s September 1862 Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation called for compensating slave owners in all states that voluntarily agreed to emancipate black Americans.

Darity Jr.: It is important to note, though, that D.C. is the only site where compensated emancipation actually was undertaken.

Jones-Rogers: Absolutely, William! My point was that the federal government was quite comfortable with the idea of compensating slave owners, even if slave owners and slave states refused such proposals for compensation.

Chatelain: Talitha LeFlouria’s book about black women and convict leasing is an excellent illustration of the federal commitment to reparations  to the South. The rebuilding of the South [after the Civil War] was an economically intensive effort to make Southerners whole and further linked Jim Crow to the needs of the state and private industry.

I will say that having been an observer on the issue of reparations on my campus, the word reparations can inspire a lot of feelings of defensiveness and shame.

Finkenbine: Contemporary white Americans say they’d support reparations for slavery if only black Americans had raised the issue at the time of emancipation. They conveniently forget 40 acres and a mule, the slave pension movement, and other claims.

Darity Jr.: In our forthcoming book on reparations, From Here to Equality, Kirsten Mullen and I argue that a key dimension of a reparations program must be addressing historical memory. We need to ensure that young people receive an accurate and comprehensive curriculum on slavery, the Civil War, the Reconstruction Era, and the post- slavery world in America. We need a complete and detailed counterpoint to the false narrative that the United Daughters of the Confederacy has installed in our nation’s schools.

Chatelain: You are all getting to the heart of the matter: a real lack of historical knowledge on slavery coupled with a deep contempt for accountability. In light of all my cynicism, I appreciate that this conversation, and its complexity, has so many people to help frame it.

Jones-Rogers: The ADOS (American Descendants of Slaves/Slavery) movement is a powerful one, even if many academics seem inclined to dismiss it. And I think that the broader discussion about/around reparations will ensure that the ADOS movement can’t be ignored for much longer. Members argue that American descendants of slaves have not been the primary recipients/beneficiaries of the gains experienced by African- descended people in the U.S. since emancipation, and they call for policies/programs that will change this. H.R. 40 seeks to address the question of who will be eligible.

Darity Jr.: The key point being made by ADOS is that blacks who have enslaved ancestors in the U.S. have a particular diaspora history that merits restitution from the federal government for a full trajectory of harms dating from slavery to the present moment.

Jones-Rogers: In my book, I talk about the important role that former slave-owning women, and their immediate descendants, played in constructing a narrative about their relationships to slavery in which they were depicted as maternal figures who cared for their “black charges,” individuals who were “born” into slave ownership and thus indirectly benefited from having access to enslaved people’s labor, bodies, and the wealth they produced (many women hired the slaves they owned to others and pocketed the wages they earned), or flat out argued that African-descended people were uncivilized savages who benefited from slavery because it introduced them to Christianity and civilization. All of these ideas bubble underneath the surface of reparations debates, particularly those who argue against reparations. The hearing will expose some of these lies, I hope. Experts will hopefully speak about the lived experiences of enslaved African Americans and about the brutality of the regime.

Chatelain: When I tell my students the wealth gap statistics, they gasp. Then, I walk them through all the assets that can be passed down generations, and we talk about value.

Darity Jr.: Again, I set as a key target elimination of the racial wealth gap. The idea of “baby bonds” was developed by Darrick Hamilton and myself. It’s a universal program providing a federally funded trust account to each newborn infant. The amounts would be dictated by the wealth position of the child’s family and become available to the child when they reach young adulthood. Sen. Cory Booker has a version that does set constraints on possible uses of the funds, but it is possible to design the program with no restrictions.

But, regardless, baby bonds are not reparations. Baby bonds center on getting everyone closer to the median level of wealth in the U.S., which is approximately $97,000 per household. (Black median wealth was estimated to be $17,600 in 2016.) But to close the racial wealth gap, you need to target the mean difference in net worth. At the mean, the average white household has $800,000 more in net worth than the average black household. Baby bonds cannot approach closing that gap, much as I like the proposal. Reparations are a must to achieve that goal.

Jones-Rogers: I have major concerns about just how far any of these conversations will go in large part because of the government’s long-standing refusal to commit to protecting human rights more broadly and the government’s recent refusal to embrace initiatives that seek to draw attention to the violation of African-descended people’s rights more specifically.

Darity Jr.: Michael Dawson and Rovana Popoff estimated that in 2000, 4 percent of white Americans were in favor of reparations for black Americans. In 2016, a survey indicated that percentage had risen to 15 percent—and a survey last year found that close to half of millennials and a majority of Democrats favor reparations. I think that a report from a commission activated by legislation akin to H.R. 40, if the right people are appointed as commissioners, can move a still larger share of Americans into the favorable column.

Finkenbine: Those are hopeful numbers. One thread that I see throughout our chat is the need to better inform the public about slavery, segregation, and historic inequality.

Jones-Rogers: I’m kinda fascinated that this issue is being taken up in the way that it is in the Trump era. The 2020 election may provide us with the confluence of circumstances necessary to move the conversation in the direction of action rather than mere talk.

[thecosydragon]

My latest blog post from the cosy dragon: Interview with Timothy Jay Smith

An Interview with Timothy Jay Smith, author of The Fourth Courier

Raised crisscrossing America pulling a small green trailer behind the family car, Timothy Jay Smith developed a ceaseless wanderlust that has taken him around the world many times. Polish cops and Greek fishermen, mercenaries and arms dealers, child prostitutes and wannabe terrorists, Indian Chiefs and Indian tailors: he hung with them all in an unparalleled international career that saw him smuggle banned plays from behind the Iron Curtain, maneuver through Occupied Territories, represent the U.S. at the highest levels of foreign governments, and stowaway aboard a “devil’s barge” for a three-days crossing from Cape Verde that landed him in an African jail.

You have a new novel coming out, The Fourth Courier, set in Poland. What’s it about?

The Fourth Courier opens in the spring of 1992, only four months after the collapse of the Soviet Union. A series of grisly murders in Warsaw suddenly becomes an international concern when radiation is detected on the third victim’s hands, raising fears that all the victims might have smuggled nuclear material out of Russia.

Poland’s new Solidarity government asks for help and the FBI sends Special Agent Jay Porter to assist in the investigation. He teams up with a gay CIA agent. When they learn that a Russian physicist who designed a portable atomic bomb is missing, the race is on to find him and the bomb before it ends up in the wrong hands.

My novels have been called literary thrillers because I use an event or threat—a thriller plot—to examine what the situation means to ordinary people. In The Fourth Courier, Jay becomes intimately involved with a Polish family, giving the reader a chance to see how the Poles coped with their collective hangover from the communist era.

How did you come up with the story for The Fourth Courier?

The Fourth Courier book goes back a long way for me. In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell and Solidarity won the first free election in Poland in over sixty years. In the same year, Mikhail Gorbachev introduced new cooperative laws in the Soviet Union, which was an area of my expertise. I was invited to the Soviet Union as a consultant, which led to my consulting throughout the former Soviet bloc, eventually living for over two years in Poland.

At the time, there was a lot of smuggling across the border between Russia and Poland, giving rise to fears that nuclear material, too, might be slipping across. While on assignment in Latvia, I met with a very unhappy decommissioned Soviet general, who completely misunderstood my purpose for being there. When an official meeting concluded, he suggested we go for a walk where we could talk without being overheard.

I followed him deep into a forest. I couldn’t imagine what he wanted. Finally we stopped, and he said, “I can get you anything you want.” I must have looked puzzled because he added, “Atomic.”

Then I understood. In an earlier conversation, there had been some passing remarks about the Soviets’ nuclear arsenal in Latvia, for which he had had some responsibility, and apparently still some access. While my real purpose for being there was to design a volunteer program for business specialists, he assumed that was a front and I was really a spy. Or perhaps he thought, I really did want to buy an atomic bomb!

Have you always been a writer?

In the sense of enjoying to write, yes. I actually wrote my first stage play in fourth grade and started a novel in sixth grade, but I didn’t become a full-time fiction writer until twenty years ago. The first half of my adult life I spent working on projects to help low income people all over the world. I always enjoyed the writing aspects of my work—reports, proposals, even two credit manuals—but I reached a point where I’d accomplished my career goals, I was only forty-six years old, and I had a story I wanted to tell.

What was the story?

For over two years, I managed the U.S. Government’s first significant project to assist Palestinians following the 1993 Oslo Accords. One thing I learned was that everyone needed to be at the negotiating table to achieve an enduring peace. So I wrote a story of reconciliation—A Vision of Angels—that weaves together the lives of four characters and their families.

If anybody had ever hoped that a book might change the world, I did. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to bring about peace in the Middle East, but I’ve continued writing nevertheless.

The Fourth Courier has a strong sense of place. It’s obvious that you know Warsaw well. Other than living there, what special research did you do?

Warsaw is a city with a very distinctive character. It’s always atmospheric, verging on gloomy in winter, and the perfect location for a noir-ish thriller.

I had left Warsaw several years before I decided to write a novel set there, so I went back to refresh my memory. I looked at it entirely differently. What worked dramatically? Where would I set scenes in my story?

It was on that research trip when all the events along the Vistula River came together for me. There was a houseboat. There was Billy’s shack, and Billy himself whose “jaundiced features appeared pinched from a rotting apple.” There were sandbars reached by narrow concrete jetties and a derelict white building with a sign simply saying Nightclub. Fortunately, Billy’s dogs were tethered or I wouldn’t be here to answer your questions.

My main character is an FBI agent, and I didn’t know much about it. A friend, who was an assistant to Attorney General Janet Reno, arranged a private tour of the FBI’s training facility in Quantico. That was before 9/11. I don’t think that could be done now. Maybe for James Bond himself but not for a wannabe writer.

If I was going to write a novel about smuggling a portable atomic bomb, I needed to know what a bomb entailed. Weight, seize, basic design, fuel? How would a miniature bomb be detonated? So I blindly contacted the Department of Energy. I explained what I wanted and was soon connected to an atomic expert who agreed to meet with me.

We met on the weekend at a Starbucks-like coffee shop in Rockville, MD. We met in line and were already talking about atomic bombs before we ordered our coffees. He had brought basic drawings of them. He was an expert and eager to share his knowledge.

Can you imagine having that conversation in a café today, openly looking at how-to schematics for building an atomic bomb while sipping skinny lattés?

You’ve mentioned ‘scenes’ a couple of times. I know you also write screenplays. Do you find it difficult to go between the different formats or styles?

The sense of scene is crucial to my writing. It’s how I think about a story. Before I start new work, I always have the opening and closing scenes in my head, and then I ask myself what scenes do I need to get from start to finish.

I think it comes from growing up in a house where the television was never turned off. My sisters and I were even allowed to watch TV while doing homework if we kept our grades up. Sometimes I joke that canned laughter was the soundtrack of my childhood. I haven’t owned a television for many years, but growing up with it exposed me to telling stories in scenes, and it’s why my readers often say they can see my stories as they read them.

For me, it’s not difficult to go between prose and screenplays. In fact, I use the process of adapting a novel to a screenplay as an editing tool for the novel. It helps me sharpen the dialogue and tighten the story.

In your bio, you mention traveling the world to find your characters and stories, and doing things like smuggling out plays from behind the Iron Curtain. Was it all as exciting as it sounds?

It was only one play, and yes, I confess to having an exciting life. I’ve done some crazy things, too, and occasionally managed to put myself in dangerous situations. Frankly, when I recall some of the things I’ve done, I scare myself! By comparison, smuggling a play out of Czechoslovakia in 1974 seems tame. But I’ve always had a travel bug and wanted to go almost everywhere, so I took some chances, often traveled alone, and went to places where I could have been made to disappear without a trace.

It sounds like you have a whole library full of books you could write. How do you decide what story to tell and who will be your characters?

I came of age in the 1960s during the Civil Rights Movement and the anti-Vietnam War demonstrations, so I developed a strong sense of social justice. That guided my career choice more than anything, and when I quit working to write full-time, it was natural that I wanted my books to reflect my concerns. Not in a “big message” way, but more in terms of raising awareness about things that concern me.

For example, take Cooper’s Promise, my novel about a gay deserter from the war in Iraq who ends up adrift in a fictional African country. It was 2003, and in a few days, I was headed to Antwerp to research blood diamonds for a new novel. I was running errands when NPR’s Neal Conan (Talk of the Nation) came on the radio with an interview of National Geographic photographer Jodi Cobb about a project on modern-day slavery. It was the first time I heard details about human trafficking, and was so shocked by its enormity that I pulled my car off the road to listen.

I decided on the spot that I needed to find a story that touched on both blood diamonds and trafficking. When I went to Antwerp a few days later, I visited the Diamond District as planned, but also visited a safe house for women who had been rescued from traffickers.

In The Fourth Courier, you team up a white straight FBI agent with a black gay CIA agent. Even Publishers Weekly commented that it seemed like an ideal set-up for a sequel. Do you plan to write one?

Probably not. My to-be-written list is already too long.

I’m close to finishing the final edits on a book set in Greek island village, which is more of a mystery about an arsonist than a thriller. I’ve already started a new novel set in Istanbul about a young refugee who’s recruited by the CIA to go deep undercover with ISIS. I’ve never written a novel set in the States but I have the idea for one.

To date, my books have been stand-alones with totally different settings, characters, and plots. I try to write what I like to read: smart mysteries/thrillers with strong plots and colorful characters set in interesting places. I suppose like me, I want my stories to travel around and meet new people.

You’ve had gay protagonists or important characters since your first novel over twenty years ago when gay literature had not yet become mainstream. How would you say that affected your choices as a writer, or did it?

Friends warned me that I shouldn’t become known as a gay writer because it would pigeonhole me and sideline me from consideration as a serious writer. At the time, I think the general public thought gay books were all about sex and more sex. Of course, already there were many emerging gay literary writers; it was more stigma than reality.

The world of thrillers and mysteries is still largely uninhabited by gays. Hopefully I am helping to change that. I also hope that my novels expand my readers’ understanding of homosexuality in the places where I set them. In The Fourth Courier, the gay angle is key to solving the case. In my other novels, too, the plot turns on something gay, and the way it does is always something that couldn’t have happened in the same way anywhere else because of the cultural context.

What do you want your readers to take away from The Fourth Courier?

What motivated me to write The Fourth Courier was a desire to portray what happened to ordinary Polish people at an exciting albeit unsettling moment in their country’s history. I hope my readers like my characters as much as I do—at least the good guys. The people are what made Poland such a great experience.

The Fourth Courier is my thank-you note to them.

You can find out more about Tim and his novels using these links: Web page Instagram Facebook Twitter Goodreads Amazon

Photo by Michael Honegger @ https://ift.tt/2UYNZMt

from https://ift.tt/2U32rqw

[frontmezzjunkies]

Bush Moukarzel, Nina Hoss. Photo by Arno Declair.

St. Ann’s Warehouse’s Returning to Reims: Critical Questioning of Personal Shame, Homophobia, and the Rise of Nationalism.

by Ross

Entering into the unique space of St. Ann’s Warehouse, we find ourselves settling in to our seats as two men (Bush Moukarzel, Ali Gadema) settle into the sound studio office on stage. They talk in the casual uninteresting way two technicians who are about to do the simple task of work would chat, mostly, it seems, about good coffee. And as they head out of the recording room to find that caffeinated stimulus, a young blond actress (Nina Hoss) enters.  It’s obvious that she is the talent who these two men have been waiting and preparing for, but what is she there to record?

Nina Hoss, Bush Moukarzel, Ali Gadema. Photo by Arno Declair.

The scene is a well structured setup, especially those magnetic first few moments of her quietly reciting her lines in a seemingly solitary moment. The environment gives off a wondrous air of confessional (set/costume designer: Nina Wetzel; lighting: Erich Schneider), inviting the discussion and debate that will follow. I was, on entering, unaware and unknowing about the philosopher and writer, Didier Eribon, and never heard of his book, Returning to Reims that this play revolves around. Director Thomas Ostermeier’s staging of this memoir pulls us in deep, almost from the moment Hoss (‘Homeland’) begins to effortlessly speak into the microphone, reading from her script with a compelling and thoroughly engaging tone of voice. The three have come together to record a voiceover for a documentary based on Eribon’s writings. Images from the film are projected on the back wall, and we watch with utter amazement as we see the process of  image, idea, and the spoken word melting into one another before our eyes.

[The documentary film is directed by Sébastien Dupouey and Thomas Ostermeier, with Dupouey, Marcus Lenz, and Marie Sanchez on camera, editing by Dupouey, sound by Peter Carstens and Robert Nabholz, music by Nils Ostendorf, sound design by Jochen Jezussek, and documentation by Laure Comte and BAGAGE (Sonja Heitman, Uschi Feldges). Jake Witlen and Sabrina Brückner served as live system engineers, and Stefan Nagel and Annette Poehlmann production managed.]

Nina Hoss. Photo by Arno Declair.

At first this piece feels personal; about a man returning to his Reims home to reconcile with his mother and himself after his father’s death.  Hoss narrates Eribon’s difficult journey towards awareness, revolving around his deep personal shame and discomfort with his familial roots, especially in regards to the isolation that grew out of his father’s homophobia and his difficulty accepting that his own son in all the ways he is different. The intensely personal exploration of detachment and estrangement is completely palpable, real, and very relatable, especially for this gay man. Within his beautifully poetic language, Ebiron then adds the shameful layer of self-reinvention into the separating world of Parisian intellectualism and artistic elitism that conflicts and solidifies a wall between him and his poor working class parents. The act of confession and his attempt for reattachment is monumental and profound to many of us in the audience who also find themselves disconnected in the same manner, whether it be sexuality, intellectualism, or class, from their small town roots. We are reminded of the “naked violence of exploitation’ that exists within our unbalanced class-based environment. Ebiron and the documentary vibrantly shines a strong and harsh light on the physical and emotional cost of the poor being worked into the ground, and the scars left by and on the children that leave for the big and more exciting worlds of Paris, New York, or what ever other city allows escape.

Bush Moukarzel, Nina Hoss, Ali Gadema. Photo by Arno Declair.

But then there is a shift.  Hoss, as the well-spoken actress, shifts her stance from speaker to commentator as she starts to question Moukarzel’s choices and edits within his film.  The piece shifts to something more in the realm of political idealism, rise of nationalism, and the political left’s slow attempt to distance themselves from the working class people they once embraced. There is a compelling and thought-provoking discussion on the forces of ‘evil’ and/or the systematic oppression of the working class and their access due to greed and the desire by the 1% to hold on to their power. The documentary starts to focus more and more on the politics of the working class people of Europe and Ebiron’s own family, that were once proudly communist, running into the arms of right-wing organizations, like the French National Front, as the liberals begin to disregard their base. The documentary-within-a-play asks a very serious question that should resonate around the globe, “When did the causes of the Left change from defense of the ‘oppressed’ and ‘allegiance to revolution’ to ‘economic security’ and ‘personal responsibility’ of the poor and disenfranchised?” and how much of this can be blamed on the working class children, like Eribon himself, who renounced their class for the intellectual freedom of middle class and big city elitism?

Nina Hoss. Photo by Arno Declair.

A living debate on the uncoupling of identity politics from class structure starts to form before our very eyes, and the stage shifts from a working environment into a heady discussion about change and the hypocrisies and failures of the European neoliberalist left to hold onto the language of the people they say they represent. As populism gains steam around the globe, something we are frighteningly all too aware of in Trump’s America, we watch these characters attempt to understand through debate what exactly is happening and what can be done in the international world of political activism. Their concern floats around a disconcerting fear of what exactly is systematically grabbing hold of our contemporary society and pushing them towards this complex and unsettling embrace. And what can be done to change that flow.

Bush Moukarzel, Nina Hoss. Photo by Arno Declair.

It’s a deep and thoughtful conversation, one that at moments throughout the second part began to lose me in its heady discourse of international politics and theory. The discussants start to interact directly with us through an odd performance of rap (sound: Jezussek; music: Ostendorf) and some confessional dialogue and eye contact. I imagine that the production hoped this engagement would keep us connected to this ever increasingly intellectual questioning of social inequality, ‘evil’ forces, deracination and the parallels within our modern world. But alas, I was beginning to get lost in the fog of theory and idealism. Hoss’s character starts to recount her own father’s history of political reinvention from communist to Green Party revolutionary in Europe and South America. This confessional moment, through personal home videos and photos projected from her iPhone onto the back wall, attempts to pull us back into the realm of the personal and magnetic. It doesn’t quite work though, as I found myself longing for the return to the more interpersonal dynamics of family, class, and reconciliation.

Bush Moukarzel, Nina Hoss, Ali Gadema. Photo by Arno Declair.

Presented jointly by Schaubühne Berlin and St. Ann’s Warehouse, these concepts and concerns swirl all around the world we inhabit, ready and open for discussion and dissection.  They ring true most compellingly in this fascinating and adventurous staging of a complex book being read to us in such a straightforward manner. It’s almost shocking how this creative team has found a way to present a reading of such intense and high minded philosophy within a theatrical framework and find a way to keep us personally invested. Unsure where we are in terms of theatre creationism and true reality (I believe Hoss is actually talking about her real father, and not a scripted creation), Returning to Reims falters a bit in the end, losing its connection to Eribon’s writing, and leaving us feeling disjointed and lost, as if the argument and discussion got too big for the room to thoughtfully debate. But such is the nature of the complex and frightening world we live in politically and socially, with most of us intellectually confused as to how we find ourselves stuck in the dynamic arguments of the day.

In an interview with The Guardian, Hoss says, “Neoliberalism has managed to take away the safety net underneath people’s lives – and convinced them that, from now on, it will be entirely their own fault if they fail. If there is ever going to be a revival of the left, it’ll be because they have managed to fill that space and regain trust. I don’t have any solutions. I only have questions. And yet I am oddly optimistic. Playing allows us to expand reality. By playing we can explore, exaggerate and sharpen ideas with great freedom and thus reach some sort of insight. Thinking and doing are important, but only art allows us to break down borders in our imagination.”

There is no easy out or solution to be had, except to hope, maintain our optimism, and proactively move forward towards a greater systematically inclusive political stance that can create a more fair and balanced world. Is that too much to ask for? I sure hope not, and neither, I think, does Ebiron. Now I need to go read his book, and, above all, #Resist.

  #frontmezzjunkies reviews: #ReturningToReims @stannswarehouse #SchaubühneBerlin an adventurous play and reading based on the memoir by #DidierEribon directed by #ThomasOstermeier featuring #NinaHoss #BushMoukarzel #AliGadema St. Ann's Warehouse's Returning to Reims: Critical Questioning of Personal Shame, Homophobia, and the Rise of Nationalism.

[sarahburness]

7 Crucial Steps to Minimize Drama in Your Life

“When you are not honoring the present moment by allowing it to be, you are creating drama.” ~Eckhart Tolle

Well into my twenties, all of my friendships with women looked a lot like junior high.

One day, we’d be codependent and attached at the hip, sending incessant play-by-play emails throughout the workday like one too many notes in class.

The next day, we’d be dragging each other by the hair into a heap of combined emotional issues, complete with nasty suspicions, unfounded accusations, and a dramatic reconciliation that would inevitably be short-lived.

Shortly after one toxic friendship eroded, I found a new one, like a mythological creature that regenerates its head immediately after it’s cut off. Things weren’t much different with the men I dated.

For a long time, I lamented all the damaging relationships I’d been in, as if I was some kind of victim who always got the short end of the stick.

Then one day I realized there was a reason I always found myself in dramatic relationships: I was attracted to drama like a moth to a flame.

Chaos was the status quo for the majority of my life, and when it wasn’t there, I panicked. I didn’t feel comfortable unless I was fighting someone, or at the very least, fighting myself.

The things I said and did contradicted because it was easier to blame the world and stay the same than it would be to really see myself and make a change.

You might not be a recovering drama queen like me, but you’ve probably encountered your share of relationship histrionics.

Maybe your close friend has as many catastrophes as there are days of the week. Maybe you’re the person everyone calls with their problems. Or maybe you unknowingly turn small issues into major crises and you’d like to stop feeling so overwhelmed.

Whatever the case, you probably have at least a little drama in your life that you’d like to minimize.

With this in mind, I recently asked on the Tiny Buddha Facebook page: How do you minimize drama in your life? I took a sampling of the 183 responses and formulated this guide to diffusing drama:

1. Recognize when you might be creating drama.

You get what you put out. If you act in a way that is positive and minimal drama, you attract the same kind of positive situations and people. ~April Myers

Drama usually comes from my reaction to other people’s actions. I stop to think: Does this really matter in the long run, or am I just trying to be right? ~Anita Grimm-Hohl

I minimize drama within myself. When I’m focused and calm, so is the world around me. ~Cynthia Ruprecht Hunt

Take it off the page:

If there’s drama in multiple areas of your life, be honest with yourself—you’re the constant. Are you creating it? We don’t do anything repeatedly unless there’s something in it for us, so, what’s the payoff?

Are you looking for attention or excitement? Did you grow up with drama and you just plain feel best when there’s some around you?

Now aim to find alternative solutions. If you’re looking for attention, can you get it more directly? If you’re bored, what new adventure can create in your life?

2. Change your perspective.

Be happy about little things, let the big stuff go because I can’t change any of it. ~Grace Foo

I zoom out in my mind to a point far enough away and above so that I can see things in my life for what they are. By doing this, I can see from a distance how small and unimportant the situation is in the big scope of the universe. ~Larry Stilts

Is this situation going to matter a year from now? If not, it’s not worth worrying about. ~Angela Orr

Take it off the page:

A lot of the drama takes place in our own heads, and it’s usually because we’re too deeply immersed in a difficult situation to recognize it isn’t as dire as it seems.

If you feel yourself getting overwhelmed by a situation, step back and realize this feeling isn’t permanent—nothing is. Then focus on action steps—on the things you can control. What can you today to proactively create a solution?

3. Don’t feed into other people’s drama.

Build a reputation for not participating in drama. ~Addy Rodriguez

Just be. Anything you resist persists. Don’t add any negative or positive focus on it. ~Nikki Star

Speak less, listen more. You have time to hear and see the drama and sidestep it. ~Alexis Benjamin‎

Be an observer. Not everything needs a reaction. ~Angelina PhouGui Chan-Ong

Take it off the page:

If someone repeatedly comes to you with catastrophes, give yourself a window of time when you’ll listen, and then take care of your own needs by walking away. Also, resist the urge to jump into a pity party. Oftentimes people calm themselves down when other people don’t validate their complaints.

Lastly, focus on your breath. Your calming energy may even help them let go.

4. Reconsider unhealthy relationships.

Minimize dramatic people in your life. ~Jeff Palmer

Befriend only people with good energy that don’t promote or create drama. ~Carmen Portela

I realize that spending time by myself is always preferable to spending time with someone who wants drama. Nothing wrong with a dull day. ~Stephanie Goddard

Remove the source of drama from my life. It really is that simple. ~Claudia Jacobs

Take it off the page:

Take an inventory of which people in your life leave you feeling stressed and unhappy more often than not. If you don’t want to completely remove a toxic relationship, minimize the time you spend together.

If you don’t want to change how often you see each other, recognize drama triggers. When the conversation moves toward her horrible mother, steer it somewhere else.

5. Be clear and straight with other people.

Be as open and honest and communicative as possible. Listen without reacting. ~Faith McGregor

If I have an issue with someone I go straight to them to talk about it, and I don’t talk to anyone else about it if they aren’t involved. Gossip breeds drama! ~Kristie Sherman

Drama comes about because of either misunderstanding or overreaction. Be as honest and open in all cases as possible. Quell your own negative emotions, which will in turn diffuse the negative emotions of others. ~Vito Ruiz

Take it off the page:

A lot of drama comes from poor communication and confusion. Eliminate it by finding the courage to say exactly what you mean. It may be harder in the moment, but it can save a lot of heartache in the long run.

On the flip side, let people know that they can be honest with you. If someone thinks they need to walk on eggshells around you, they’ll likely hold things in—but they will come out eventually, if not in words, in resentful actions.

6. Be slow to label something as “drama.”

When it comes to people you know you love, always take an extra moment to reconsider, if the “problem” is actually a problem, if it’s worth making a big deal out of it. ~Christian Andersen Hauge

I realize that life is a roller-coaster and my problems are much like others’ at different times. ~Margaret I. Gibson

Love them a little more. It’s who they are. It might even be you. ~Ed Pulsifer

Don’t speculate, good or bad. Simply deal with what’s actually in front of you. ~Michael Stodola

Take it off the page:

Sometimes what we’re labeling as drama is just someone who really needs us. Instead of expelling mental energy judging the situation as good or bad, focus on being there and being a friend in the moment.

Then be a friend to yourself and let the drama go when you walk away.  A lot of the drama we experience in life comes from our interpretations of the things we experience—particularly after the moments have passed.

7. Learn from drama.

I attempt to allow the inevitable episode, extract any potential meaning or lesson, and equally allow it to pass. ~Joel Olmstead

I try to see the learning experience in the drama. And I think of the sentence “Without rain you can’t enjoy the sunny days.” ~Anja Feijen

Accept it, learn from it, and go on with life. ~Vincent Neerings

Take it off the page:

Sometimes it seems like drama happens to us, and we’re powerless to remove ourselves from the cause. Another perspective is that every time we find ourselves immersed in something that seems overwhelming, we have an opportunity to learn how to deal with challenges better.

Life will always involve mini fires that we feel desperate to put out. If we can learn not to fan them, they may actually be able to light our way.

Some of the Facebook responses were slightly edited for spelling; some were part of longer responses with more detail.

Photo by Sebastian Fritzon

SaveSave

About Lori Deschene

Lori Deschene is the founder of Tiny Buddha and Recreate Your Life Story, an online course that helps you let go of the past and live a life you love. Her latest bookTiny Buddha's Gratitude Journal, which includes 15 coloring pages, is now available for purchase. For daily wisdom, follow Tiny Buddha on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram..

Web | Twitter | Facebook | More Posts

Get in the conversation! Click here to leave a comment on the site.

The post 7 Crucial Steps to Minimize Drama in Your Life appeared first on Tiny Buddha.

from Tiny Buddha https://tinybuddha.com/blog/7-crucial-steps-to-minimize-drama-in-your-life/