#not that i particularly want fearne to be sad because i don’t

[leafspiritz]

- maybe you’re going to change the world

— i think she already has

- she’s certainly changed ours

[masterqwertster]

I'm on a roll. Another Breaking, Mending chapter

Suit Up and Prepare for What's Next

“Not that you’re not rocking the au natural look, FCG. Love the fuzz. Don’t know if you’ve got a cat dick or no dick to be seen. But, I think it’s about time you got some clothes on,” Chetney says, tossing over his old pants and tunic and bringing the cuddle fest (with a still nude FCG) to an end. 

And getting a reprimanding hit for bringing up the obvious from Imogen. And Laudna. And Orym. Look, it’s not Chetney’s fault that full fur makes other people feel less awkward about nudity without actually changing the fact that it’s still a birthday suit.

Chet would almost say he’s surprised by the patience with which Ashton helps and teaches the aeormaton-turned-katari to wiggle into clothes that weren’t particularly tailored for their bodyshape (but hey, they’d managed digitigrade legs and a tail and fur all the times he’d wolfed out before), except that Ashton has always had a mile-wide soft spot for FCG and helping them out. 

Besides, it’s good to see their titan-blooded genasi finally settle out of that swinging state of dissociation and intense focus. Get Ashton back towards the caring grump that is his usual emotional state. 

Hell, everyone’s looking a little better in their emotional stability now that they’ve got FCG back. A little less taunt. A little less sad. A little less ready to go straight for the throat at the slightest threat to the group’s safety (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing to be ready to do, just not towards allies).

Fuck, it’s nice to cheat a sudden and violent death.

Once Ashton has Fresh Cut Grass settled into his clothes, they set him up on slightly unsteady legs and guide him through a little twirl to show the rest of Bells Hells how the borrowed duds look. Chetney has great taste in clothes, obviously. The blues of his old outfit are a nice contrast to FCG’s still fairly yellow tones. Though the pants bunch a little oddly at the reversed knees of the new katari and–

“Ashton, why the fuck did you tie the tunic up like that?” Chetney scolds, seeing the split hanging edges from the front pulled to the back and tied into a bow that folds up the hang of fabric in the back.

“Because Letters doesn’t know how to use legs, and I didn’t want them getting tripped up by this shit or getting his new tail tangled up in it,” Ashton grumpily defends. 

Which, okay, he’s got a point.

“Lay off, Chet. It’s cute!” Fearne says with a playful nudge, bustling forward to tie a decorative sky blue ribbon around FCG’s tail.

“Oh, uh, thanks, Fearne,” Fresh Cut Grass says distractedly, turned towards their tail and watching it flick about agitatedly, the streamers of the ribbon following the movement. 

Continue on AO3

[stomp-that-ho-regard]

Boy oh boy. I didn't watch the oneshot but I watched a clip of when Kingsley went to Beau and Yasha to talk about Molly to see if we got any interesting introspection from Yasha since Molly was supposed to be her platonic soulmate, in Ashley's words. Yasha can only describe Molly in awkward, bumbling words. "Uhhh... He was fun... and caring... And uhhhhh good to talk to" while Beau gives some actual interesting insight.  Then Yasha's advice is to "Stay on the good path" and "not the bad one" and that she's "speaking from experience". I honestly don't know how people think Yasha is a well roleplayed character. Ashley is given so many chances to explore her character and she just doesn't, especially post Beau romance. Even when she and Beau decide to adopt children in the oneshot, it's in such a dumb, awkward, hamfisted way with Ashley just agreeing "Yeah yeah I like that" to what Marisha says. Ashley may be a good actress when given a script to work with, but she is not a good roleplayer.  Maybe that's why Fearne suits her better since as a faye she can do whatever chaotic thing she wants and still have it be technically "in character". I was honestly hoping the oneshot could bring a little redemption to her character but it's just more of the same.

It’s always boggled my mind how these people, majority of whom are in long-term committed relationships, can somehow end up roleplaying romance so badly. And how the cast is so close, yet end up roleplaying friendships so badly. In either case, they have such a hard time getting their characters to string words together to describe how much they love/care for one another.  

Out of Marisha and Ashley, Marisha seemed to be better at that. 

Back when Molly died... at the time, I was sort of sad because I felt bad for Taliesin. I wasn’t too broken up about the character. Then came the scene where they buried him. Beau made a little speech about him. I remember being iffy about how that was gonna go. But I teared up. I teared up over a character that we had only known for 26 episodes and who I wasn’t particularly fond of. Marisha managed to make me feel something.

To be honest, even in later episodes when she’d talk about him, Beau seemed to have better insight into Molly. Beau made me FEEL Molly’s loss. Yasha never did. Yasha and Molly were supposed to be like two peas in a pod and yet, she could never manage to talk about him as anything more than a surface-level passing thought. I keep wondering how Ashley wasn’t embarrassed by that.

I just can’t stop getting the feeling that she would come to table completely empty-headed. You could tell that 1) she wasn’t bothering to watch any previous episodes to get some sense of where everyone was at and 2) she wasn’t spending any time thinking about her character. Two things that should be a given, so that when you do come back to the table, you’re focused and clear on what you want to accomplish. You can fully engage with whatever transpires because you’re not sitting there wondering what the fuck is going on. You end up with a sense of calm continuity.

I never felt that from Ashley. There were always long silences and stumbling over words. Always struggling with what to say and how to say it. The only time Ashley’s ‘mind fog’ actually came off as funny was in ep89.

The fight club underneath the King’s Cut Butchery that you could only enter if you used a specific phrase at the door. They were like, “We’ll let Yasha talk to the guy.” (And you could see the terror on Ashley’s face. She was even looking through her notes (even though she never wrote it down). She wasn’t ‘acting’ as Yasha. SHE was confused. Even though she was present while the party was discussing the fight club, she took NOTHING in.)

She said, “Yes, uh, uh... We came here for the... Shit. The special cut of-- we have some-- a cut in the back. What?” And the rest of the table broke down in giggles. 

Her confusion worked in her favor and made for a genuinely funny moment.

The problem comes when Ashley continuously has moments like this. It’s especially disappointing in more important moments like, when talking about the person she’s supposedly in love with or when talking about the one friend she called her ‘soulmate’. Ashley never made me FEEL any of it. And clearly, nothing has changed.