#or at least he’s prone to melancholy…

[cruel-hiraeth]

i don’t think jing yuan orgasms very easily, but he physically cannot cum unless he sees your face

[clockwayswrites]

Birds and Mice and Tea Parties 20

Masterpost

AN: B really was trying his best to protect Danny last time, he just was missing too much information. Poor Danny...

No reading over. We suffer and post at 2am.

-

It had been two weeks since the last rogue Wayne visit.

Danny hadn’t intended to keep track. There was no reason to. One visit from Cass and one from Tim did not a pattern make.

He tried to dismiss the observation. He had plenty to do; it wasn’t like he didn’t have friends. The bi-weekly trivia group would start meeting again soon. He also had a TTRGP session that did its best to meet around all that life threw at them. Tucker and him played online games when they could make schedules match and he and Sam talked when she was stateside. He even had regular lunches with coworkers!

Still, there had been something different about spending time with the family.

So no, Danny hadn’t meant to keep track, but he still knew it had been two weeks and a day. But of course he wouldn’t see the Waynes that often. Bruce was a very busy man and most of the children would have no reason to come to W.E. They had their own lives with work and school and being kids or young adults. The other visits had simply been flukes, as nice as the visits had been.

The subtle feeling of melancholy that had settled over him was ridiculous and he wasn’t having it. His mood was simply off because of the whole Ancient thing. The way it was affecting his health didn’t make feeling better any easier either.

Danny leaned against the wall of the elevator as he tried to catch his breath. He really shouldn’t be walking right then to get lunch, not with the way that he felt, but he hadn’t had anything at his place to make lunch with. He hadn’t had the energy to go shopping. He’d just go somewhere close instead of walking to anything on the other side of the park.

The natural reverb of the lobby assaulted Danny as he stepped out of the elevator.

He just had to get through the lobby, the street, the restaurant, back through the street, and through the lobby again. Then he could hide in his office and eat. Or he could hide in there and eat as long as Lucius didn’t find him. Maybe even Lucius would give him a break today though.

“Dr. Fenton…?”

Danny looked up from rubbing his neck.

It was Tim. Damian was at Tim’s side, flanking him like a little guard dog and scowling. Tim was frowning too. Danny immediately wanted to fix whatever was wrong.

“Look at that, a pair of Waynes. How are you two?”

“That is unimportant,” Damian said with a little sniff. “You are clearly unwell. I assume you are returning to your apartment to rest?”

“Oh, no, I’m just going to go grab lunch. I’m alright, really,” Danny said and put on the best smile he could muster.

Tim and Damian looked at each other in some sort of silence conversation. Danny started to edge away from them, thinking he could escape before they came to some sort of end. He really needed out of the lobby and its echoing sounds.

A startled shriek from the entry way cut off that plan.

Danny twisted to face the sound as he stepped in front of the kids.

Of course it was a rogue, what else would it be in Gotham? It was a rogue, but at least it was the Mad Hatter and his squad of likely mind controlled goons. He usually wasn’t prone to death and destruction like some of the others were. But still, Danny felt his metaphorical hackles rising. The kids were here.

The kids were here and sure to draw the Mad Hatter’s attention if he saw them. Danny stepped slowly backwards, herding the kids away from the scene. At least they weren’t far into the lobby.

“Back up to the stairwell,” Danny said lowly, trying to cast his voice behind him.

“Tch. We can—”

“The elevator, the back left one,” Tim said quietly but firmly over his brother’s protest. “I have a code to take it to a safe room in the basement.”

“If he kills the power,” Danny started.

“The elevators have emergency back up.”

“That’s not very good behavior for a tea party, is it?” the Matter Hatter shouted at someone.

Danny bit back a rising noise of anger in his throat. His fingers twitched to act. But he couldn’t. The best plan was to get the kids out of there away from any action.

“Yes I see, Damian,” Tim hissed. “We’re almost to the elevator.”

“Call it as soon as you can,” Danny said. Was there a reverb to his voice? It felt like there was a reverb to his voice. No, no, he couldn’t, he had to…

“That’s better! See? This is how you behave when someone invites you to a tea party! Now where is that little dormouse?” the Mad Hatter called. “I know I saw him come in here! With an even littler one too.”

He wanted Tim.

“Calling the elevator.”

“Another mouse? A rat? A cat?"

The Mad Hatter wanted Tim and Damian.

“Here mousy mouse mice… where are you?"

Danny would not let that happen.

“Oh there you are! Hiding back by the doors, of course he is!” The Mad Hatter said. The crowed parted in fear. His wide, manic eyes looked right past Danny and he grinned. “Get them. We have a tea party we’re late for.”

“Over my dead body,” Danny growled.

The Mad Hatter blinked at Danny like he just noticed him for the first time. His goons rushed past him and through the crowd. “Oh, who are you? Never mind, if death is what you want, we can make that happen.”

Danny couldn’t hold back the chortling laughter. “See, that’s where you have a problem you don’t even know you could have.”

“And what is that?”

“You couldn’t handle my dead body,” Danny said just as the first goon reached them.

Danny stepped forward. He ducked under the swing of the punch and used the momentum to spin the goon around. With a push of his ghostly power, he sent the attacking goon careening into the next one and they both went tumbling.

“Danny, it’s here!” Tim shouted.

Not turning his back to the attackers, Danny stepped backwards into the elevator. Tim slammed a button and the doors basically snapped closed, much faster than they should. Danny was left staring at the polished metal surface of the elevator. Luminous green stared back at him. Soft black feathers dotted his temples. His fingers ended in talons. And he could feel it.

He could feel the skin on his back started to split.

Wings.

[sweetoneiros]

Tom Sturridge as François Clicquot in “Widow Clicquot.”

“Compared with Barbe-Nicole, however, it seems François was sensitive and moody, and she must also have noticed immediately the way in which his mother and father coddled him. She soon understood why. He could be cheerful and energized one moment and apparently turn melancholy and despairing the next. This was a side of her husband she would not have expected. Despite the close connections between their families, she had not seen much of him for several years.”

———————

“François's letters home from 1792 to 1794 are filled with patriotic zeal. He had a romantic view of war and was naturally an idealist. He was also apparently prone to illness and more worryingly to depression. Philippe wrote urgent letters to his son in Switzerland, reminding François of his "weak temperament" and history of hernias. In other letters, he begged his son to fight melancholy and eat well. There was a darker side to François's ebullient personality that his parents knew only too well.”

———————

“But even if she did not realize it yet, she and François were essentially mismatched in at least one fundamental way. She had inherited all her father's and Philippe's ruthless pragmatism and keen business instincts. Barbe-Nicole, however, had married a dreamer. And he had his heart set on the wine business.”

———————

[crimson-and-clover-1717]

Mother Teach, Ed, and Self-Determination CW: Emotive

I want to explore Ed’s mother in the red silk flashback, and its lasting impact on Ed.

Mother Teach begins with the imperative, ‘Feel it, boy’. There seems to be a certain lesson in showing Ed the thing he cannot have, before explaining the rich folk she works for own many items of this quality; so matter of fact as if it’s nature’s law.

When Ed asks in innocence the question, ‘Why can’t we have things like this?’ Mother Teach comes up against an alternate line of thinking which she seems never to have considered. She blinks in what could be surprise before giving what appears to be an obvious answer: ‘It’s up to God. He decides who gets what’. This establishes the idea that life is ‘not up to us’, but controlled by an external locus: God, providence, fate… ‘He decides’.

Mother Teach is conditioned to believe in determinism, and who can blame her. Her life is decided for her. What hope of agency for a poor, indigenous woman in a world run by a rich, white patriarchy? And it’s easier to attribute the decision to God, His unfathomable will. God is also likely and conveniently a rich, white man, so the issues blur somewhat in who is actually doing ‘the determining’; but frankly, the outcome is the same. It is safe to say God isn’t a poor, brown woman.

Ed carries this belief into his future life, struggling with agency, succumbing easily to manipulation; not having beautiful things despite acquiring riches, and giving up quickly in the face of setbacks. The second part of Mother Teach’s explanation, ‘We’re just not those kind of people’ further reinforces Ed’s class and race inferiority, which again he carries painfully into adulthood. These words are spoken with some emotion. We hear the shake in her voice as she acknowledges certain truths about the limitations of their existence.

The impact of his father on Ed’s psyche is largely plain in the cycles of abuse with older white men, but the transmission of generational trauma via Ed’s mother is also significant.

Mother Teach isn’t trying to be cruel. She clearly loves her son, and the silk is a love-token which she possibly took without permission so her child could have at least one chance to look upon and own a ‘beautiful thing’. But her own trauma means she further damages her son’s self-esteem during this interaction. She doesn’t want Ed to be a dreamer or believer in a better life. Best accept your lot, know your place, then you won’t be disappointed. There is a certain wisdom to it; and had she an average son with a dullish mind, it’s probably sound advice in this particular time and place.

But her son isn’t ordinary. He is a genius, an empath, a creative, as well as prone to overthinking and melancholy. His race foremost, and class also, are against him, and that is outside of his control; but everything else is up for grabs with someone as brilliant as Ed if he can find inner worth. He might always have to live within a subculture to find both success and happiness, but he may have done so sooner with a stronger internal locus of control, and belief in his own worth and agency, had he received a different message in childhood.

As it is, he lives a life in the shadows, emulating and enhancing further the toxic masculinity revered in the dominant culture which is so against his true nature. He uses his genius for strategy and theatre to enrich himself for protection and subsistence only, never going beyond and allowing luxury or beauty; and when finally world-weary and screaming for change, finds himself trapped by the ghosts of his childhood, some of whom are reshaped into new human forms.

One of many things which saddens me regarding Ed’s sacrifice in killing his father as an act of protecting his mother is I don’t feel it changed anything much. It was a micro action against a macro problem. If Ed possibly then ran away, his mother would’ve had to do what she always did: find another male protector, possibly a white man to enable a certain social standing, and she would likely be back within a similarly psychological and physically abusive situation. It isn’t inevitable this would happen to a woman in her situation, but it’s the most likely outcome because her choices are so limited. And that’s hugely tragic for both herself and Ed.

It’s often said for Ed, there’s a psychological affinity between Stede and Mother Teach. The rich, white man who is kind and optimistic is everything Ed’s mother could’ve been with those same sociological advantages. Stede is able to self-determine. He is a repressed gay man in a heteronormative society, but much of the world is built with his empowerment in mind, and he is able to take full advantage of that and change his path. Both Stede and Mother Teach love or loved Ed, and in an unequal world, one of them at least is able to model a different way of living; help push open the psychological door enough to allow Ed himself to begin to change his stars, and self-actualise as the person he truly is.

Writing this made me sob…I’m sorry if it does the same for you reading it

[gingermintpepper]

Day 1: Apollo

Interpretation notes and trivia under the cut!

His interpretation for my work is based very much around the concept of his manifestation as the Radiant God of the String. Because of this, quite like Hecate, he’s triple-fold and occupies three major spaces; the string of Fate and therefore prophecy, the bowstring and therefore distance and destruction and the lyrestring and therefore music and order. He’s a somewhat melancholy figure all things considered - Fate and following Fate’s tennants is something that he struggled a lot with as a child and even now as a more mature deity, the only solution he’s truly found is to take things one day at a time. Very diligent and fastidious, he’s a hard worker and tends to put his everything into completing any task set before him which also tends to work to his disadvantage since he’s prone to becoming tunnel-visioned until he’s finished what he said he would finish. His family orchestrated his winter breaks because he had the nasty habit of working himself sick when he was still very young.

Apollo is generally represented by circles in my work - priests of Apollo will be marked with at least three circles on their face and usually wear triangular jewellry (typically earrings or necklace charms) to reflect the triple-nature of their god. His favoured colour is a rich, deep blue and while he typically wears elaborate eye paint, he rarely uses face powders. Wears gem-toned blues for his lips unless in mourning where he will leave himself unadorned and unpainted out of respect.

Some quick trivia: 

Was born identical to Artemis even though they were born (years) apart. Had brown hair, wolf’s ears and fangs and horns when he was a child but never manifested those features again after his penance for slaying Python. If he’s very stressed or angry, sometimes his fangs will show. The brown of his hair grew out to blond naturally as he developed and matured as a god.

Proficient in all instruments but has always especially preferred stringed instruments. Truly unmatched with a kithara but only uses it for special occasions and official meetings. Generally prefers his lyre for every day usage

Really good at sewing and braiding strings together due to the exercises he had to do while under the tutelage of the Moirai sisters. Can’t weave since Athena banned him from touching a loom but he does like watching her spin. The one time she caught him trying to replicate her patterns with a needle and thread, she complained to Zeus that he had broken his oath. He teases her about that even now.

Was the last of the Twelve to learn how to read and write because he hates letter systems and finds it too arbitrary. Prior to the collaboration that resulted in written letter systems, everyone was perfectly fine with remembering the important stuff and encoding the rest in artistic format such as tapestries, pottery, furniture and jewellry. Apollo himself has a truly formidable memory since he’s been composing and immortalising the events and histories of the world in song since he was very young. He finds written books very dull but Clio’s very insistent about written histories being important and convenient so reluctantly, he’s given permission for his songs and poems to be -gags- transcribed and written down.

Is only called Apollo by his parents, Artemis and Dionysus. Hermes rarely calls him by name in general and the others, including other siblings like Ares and Athena, have always called him Phoebus. Interestingly, Zeus usually calls him Phoebus but will call him Apollo when they are alone or when he’s being especially serious. Apollo is completely comfortable with either name but he does see Phoebus as a bit more formal than Apollo. (Despite his best efforts, both Calliope and Clio also still stubbornly call him Phoebus though he’s fairly sure it’s mostly because they know it bothers him.)

[sitp-recs]

hi liv!! been working my way through your rec lists thank you for all that you do i admire the work you put into keeping fandom alive 💗

ive been listening to anthems for a seventeen year old girl by broken social scene on repeat these last few days, do you have any recs for fics that explore feeling lost in your young adulthood/nostalgia about a younger version of self that had big dreams or things of that sort? thank you so much :)💓

Hi anon! Thank you, I really appreciate your words - although I believe the Drarry fandom is very much alive and kicking without any help from me 🤣 that’s a very interesting ask, as someone who’s prone to melancholy I have to say both themes (coming of age and youth nostalgia) are right up my alley and speak a lot to me on a personal level. Here are some recs that came to mind:

Five Years by @shiftylinguini (M, 4.5)

For Draco, December means finding somewhere he can lose himself in the thrum of a crowd and the throb of music ― and Potter. It always means Potter now, too.

Poor Unfortunate Souls by @doubleappled (E, 19k)

Draco is a potioneer. Harry is trying to save his sex-challenged marriage. Everything is a mess, but at least there's an octopus in the lobby.

Under Giant Mountains by @wolfpants (E, 33k)

Harry doesn't know where he's going. Everyone else has their life paths figured out; he doesn't even know where his map is. Who'd have thought Draco Malfoy bathing in a Norwegian forest would be the guidepost Harry needed?

(Un)wanted by @aibidil (E, 35k)

Ginny's pregnant, then she's not and Harry's single. Harry, again with no family, doesn't know what to do with this turn of events, or how to find a new life—post-war, post-Ginny, post-abortion—in which he belongs. He doesn't expect that life to include dancing to the Backstreet Boys with Hermione and Draco Malfoy. A story of finding belonging in the unexpected.

Here's The Pencil, Make It Work by ignatiustrout (M, 49k)

Harry thinks "Why is Malfoy working in a coffee shop in muggle London?" is a much simpler question than, "Are you going to accept that auror offer and, if you don't, what will you do?"

Such Great Heights by aideomai (E, 93k)

Draco Malfoy, wide-eyed and pale and in a decidedly ragged shirt, was crouched next to the pile of whatever the dragon had been eating. Harry threw himself to a halt and yelled, “Merlin, how many times do I have to save your life?”

Little Deaths and How to Avoid Them by nerakrose and dustmouth (M, 96k)

Malfoy is way too interested in coroner reports for somebody who's definitely not looking for ways to die, Harry wants to be friends with him, and Ginny wants to break up with Harry. Features: Little League Quidditch, an abundance of bath bombs, happy endings, and gay robots in space.

where all the veins meet by @saxamophone (E, 146k)

It's the summer of 1998. The battle is over, and Voldemort is dead, but Harry still has more questions than answers. Who is he without a piece of Voldemort's soul in his head? What is he supposed to do now? His friends try to help, but the only thing that can hold his attention—one of the only things that ever has—is Draco Malfoy, out on parole and weirdly hanging around the British Museum.

[cursedonyx]

Wand Woods and Cores

In planning my fic, I did a lot of research into HP and HL lore to try and make it as accurate as possible. In doing so, I had a wonderful time trying to picture what wands our emerald trio had, and came up with the following. Included below are the woods, cores and lengths of their wands, as well as notes from Ollivander on what each wood symbolises, and I highlighted the parts that I thought most relevant to our trio. I also threw in some floriography for the woods, which I personally think match our trio marvellously.

Dracaena – 10 ½ inches

Blackthorn wood

"Blackthorn, which is a very unusual wand wood, has the reputation, in my view well-merited, of being best suited to a warrior. This does not necessarily mean that its owner practises the Dark Arts (although it is undeniable that those who do so will enjoy the blackthorn wand’s prodigious power); one finds blackthorn wands among the Aurors as well as among the denizens of Azkaban. It is a curious feature of the blackthorn bush, which sports wicked thorns, that it produces its sweetest berries after the hardest frosts, and the wands made from this wood appear to need to pass through danger or hardship with their owners to become truly bonded. Given this condition, the blackthorn wand will become as loyal and faithful a servant as one could wish."

Symbolism - Transition, Sudden Change, Death

Core - Phoenix Feather

This is the rarest core type. Phoenix feathers are capable of the greatest range of magic, though they may take longer than either unicorn or dragon cores to reveal this. They show the most initiative, sometimes acting of their own accord, a quality that many witches and wizards dislike.

Phoenix feather wands are always the pickiest when it comes to potential owners, for the creature from which they are taken is one of the most independent and detached in the world. These wands are the hardest to tame and to personalise, and their allegiance is usually hard won.

Ominis – 11 ¾ inches

Cedar

"Whenever I meet one who carries a cedar wand, I find strength of character and unusual loyalty. My father, Gervaise Ollivander, used always to say, ‘you will never fool the cedar carrier,’ and I agree: the cedar wand finds its perfect home where there is perspicacity and perception. I would go further than my father, however, in saying that I have never yet met the owner of a cedar wand whom I would care to cross, especially if harm is done to those of whom they are fond. The witch or wizard who is well-matched with cedar carries the potential to be a frightening adversary, which often comes as a shock to those who have thoughtlessly challenged them."

Symbolism - I live but for thee, Think of Me, Prosperity, Longevity

Core - Unicorn Hair

Unicorn hair generally produces the most consistent magic, and is least subject to fluctuations and blockages. Wands with unicorn cores are generally the most difficult to turn to the Dark Arts. They are the most faithful of all wands, and usually remain strongly attached to their first owner, irrespective of whether he or she was an accomplished witch or wizard.

Minor disadvantages of unicorn hair are that they do not make the most powerful wands (although the wand wood may compensate) and that they are prone to melancholy if seriously mishandled, meaning that the hair may ‘die’ and need replacing.

Sebastian – 12 ¼ inches

Aspen

"Wand-quality aspen wood is white and fine-grained, and highly prized by all wand-makers for its stylish resemblance to ivory and its usually outstanding charmwork. The proper owner of the aspen wand is often an accomplished duellist, or destined to be so, for the aspen wand is one of those particularly suited to martial magic. In my experience, aspen wand owners are generally strong-minded and determined, more likely than most to be attracted by quests and new orders; this is a wand for revolutionaries."

Symbolism - Excess of sensibility, fear, Lamentation

Core - Dragon Heartstring

As a rule, dragon heartstrings produce wands with the most power, and which are capable of the most flamboyant spells. Dragon wands tend to learn more quickly than other types. While they can change allegiance if won from their original master, they always bond strongly with the current owner.

The dragon wand tends to be easiest to turn to the Dark Arts, though it will not incline that way of its own accord. It is also the most prone of the three cores to accidents, being somewhat temperamental.

Masterlist

Wandlore

[diana-bluewolf]

MC profile

Some info about my MC Chris Mongrel. Profile is under the cut.

Name: Chris Mongrel

House: Slytherin

Birthday: 24th November

Gender: Male

Sexuality: Demisexual, demiromantic

Nationality: British

Residence: Oxford, Oxfordshire, England

Motto: Sink or swim

Wand: Cedar Wood, Dragon heartstring, 12 ½" Length, Slightly yielding flexibility

"Whenever I meet one who carries a cedar wand, I find strength of character and unusual loyalty. The cedar wand finds its perfect home where there is perspicacity and perception. I have never yet met the owner of a cedar wand whom I would care to cross, especially if harm is done to those of whom they are fond." Olivander

A wand with this flexibility will initially resist new owners, but if the owner is persistent, it will warm up eventually. Wand owners with slightly yielding wands are often very kind and compassionate, but they may have some reluctance in trusting others since they possess a strong sense of skepticism.

Patronus: Dingo

APPEARANCE

Hair colour : dark brown

Eye colour : minty green

Skin tone : beige

Distinguishing features : freckles, scar over the left eye. Due to sleep deprivation, there are often dark circles under his eyes.

PERSONALITY

MBTI: INTP

Enneagram: 5w4 sx/sp

Four temperaments: Phlegmatic-melancholic

Strengths:

logic

creativeness

resourcefulness

resilience

quick-thinking

he can be a good listener

loyalty

he can notice patterns in close people’s behaviour and figure out when they are not okay by small changes in it

Weaknesses:

disconnection and tendency to get easily lost in thoughts

low self-worth

adrenaline addictiveness

absolute recklessness regarding his safety

prone to self-isolation and melancholy

trust issues

insensitive at times, especially when he’s absorbed in a new project/puzzle

Hobbies:

drawing (he likes to do sketches of anything he finds fascinating)

experimenting with magic, enchanting muggle artefacts (like making a fountain pen with everlasting ink, a self-sharpening pencil or a notebook with extension charm)

Amortentia (what he smells like to others):

cedar wood (smell of pencil shaving) due to his habit of making notes and sketches, and he finds muggle stuff more convenient for it

forest and fresh air (as a result of frequent flying and exploring Forbidden Forest)

wiggenweld potion (a side effect of being adrenaline addictive)

Favourite subjects:

Charms

Transfiguration

Study of Ancient Runes

Defense Against Dark Arts

Least favourite subjects:

Care for Magical Creatures (how can you deal with something that is, with rare exceptions, as far from being logical as it gets?) 

Herbology (it’s just boring)

History of Magic (nothing wrong with history itself, but, gosh, Professor Binns’ lessons are such a waste of time! You can read everything you need to know in a book much faster)

Divination

When you are an adrenaline addictive introverted bookworm.

Childhood:

"Mongrel" isn't his real surname. When he was 11, Chris discovered himself at the doorway to a muggle charity school, a typical so-called bluecoat school in those times where orphans and kids from poor families lived and got educated (if they were lucky to get a place there). He didn't remember how he ended up there, how he got the fresh scar on his face, where he had lived before, who his parents were, not even his surname. 

A local boy passing by mentioned to Chris that weird kids with mental problems would never be accepted to any school, where there's not enough space even for "normal" children, and the best place for them is living on the streets or in workhouses. Chris didn't know if it was true but decided not to reveal to anyone that he didn't remember anything, just in case. 

The school's headmaster, a man with a strange, absent-minded expression (he was under the Imperius Curse), expected the new student to arrive that day. When Chris was asked his full name, he made up his surname promptly, saying the first word that crossed his mind. It was from the phrase the boy had told him, "Y'know, nobody wanna deal with mental mongrels like you."

A bit later, Chris realised that some snippets of his childhood were still tucked away in his memory: the precious and warm moments with his father, a muggle professor at Oxford University. Nevertheless, Chris didn't remember his name or what had happened to him. His dad sometimes spoke with him in a foreign language. For example, Chris remembered that ‘misha’ meant an affectionate version of the word ‘bear’. 

Relationships:

★Before he arrived at Hogwarts (and some time after), he had been struggling with insomnia and nightmares, especially the repetitive ones about an unfamiliar (or not?) boy with cloudy eyes. The dragon attack was, of course, a shocking experience for Chris, but when he first entered the Slytherin common room, he was even more stunned to meet a person who resembled the constant participant of his nightmares, though 4-5 years older.

★Chris and Ominis didn't get along at first. Or, more precisely, Ominis was hostile towards the new fifth-year. So even when he had to mention Chris to Sebastian, for example, he called him anything but by name. He could say "that walking magnet for troubles", "your accomplice", "your new best friend" (with some extent of sarcasm in his voice) or "the neophyte". It took him a while to address Chris by name for the first time.

★Eventually, they became very close. During the 7th year, Ominis developed romantic feelings for Chris but kept it a secret for many years because he was aware of Chris' asexuality (which turned out to be demisexuality later). Chris realized that his feelings towards Ominis had evolved beyond platonic only in their late 20s.

★For quite a long time after Chris arrived at Hogwarts, he mostly avoided people, trusting no one. Sebastian seemed friendly, but Chris was sure that it was only because of his ancient magic abilities, which possibly were a key to saving Anne. It took him some time to realise that Sebastian was actually a friend, not just someone he was hanging out with due to win-win cooperation.

★Before Chris could finally open up to Sebastian and Ominis, his only friend was a wolf that he named Misha (because it was huge and more resembled a bear than a wolf). Chris stumbled upon him in the Not-So-Forbidden Forest. The wolf was seriously wounded after a fight with a dugbog but still tried to attack the boy, who wanted to help. Dealing with animals and beasts was really not Chris' cup of tea, and he was annoyed by the irrational creature, which did everything to prevent its own rescue. But eventually, they got along, Misha recovered, and he would even start running to meet Chris whenever he entered the forest.

★Chris became good friends with Amit. He admired Amit’s thirst for knowledge, enthusiasm for researching his areas of interest and the ability to say no to things that make him uncomfortable.

★Professor Fig was the first person Chris opened up to. One of the most profound regrets in Chris' life was his inability to muster the courage to call Fig 'Dad' while he was still alive. After Fig's passing, Chris withdrew further into his shell, isolating himself even from Ominis and Sebastian.

★Chris contributed to making the Keepers' Wand with Olivander, offering what little help he could. Later, during the 6th and 7th years, Chris worked part-time for Olivander, mostly as an errand boy. He really enjoyed the job and became interested in crafting wands. Olivander helped Chris get over Fig's death.

Some facts:

★Before Hogwarts, Chris had never participated in magic duels. In fact, he didn’t even know that magic existed, being very sceptical about it when Fig first told him about Hogwarts. But anyway, he had to hone his reflexes in the frequent scuffles at the charity school, full of boys with behaviour problems.

★No matter the weather, he often feels cold, which makes him favour sweaters. When he was a student, his clothes, like most of his belongings, were quite shabby due to his extreme lifestyle and orphanhood. Besides, even when he earned some money by running errands like potion deliveries and later working for Olivander, buying new clothes was always his least priority. 

★Having all the extra assignments and schoolwork to catch up on, he always tries to push himself to the limit, sometimes neglecting to sleep. Due to his low self-worth, he feels he must do the maximum to prove to himself that he matters like others. He’s either the best or nothing. He doesn’t value his life at all, which, together with adrenaline addiction, makes risking it daily easier. 

★He can forget to sleep but tries not to miss meal times as he was often hungry in the charity school. Not a picky eater. 

★When he's nervous, he uses humour as a defence mechanism. While sometimes it helps to discharge tension, it can also be not appropriate at all. 

★He can easily break the rules if the pros outweigh the cons. 

★The Sorting Hat doubted whether to place him in Ravenclaw or Slytherin, but settled on the latter. Maybe the idea of sorting a guy with the last name ‘Mongrel’ into Slytherin of all places seemed funny to it, idk. But Chris can defend himself, anyway - he's used to it.

★He isn't the type of person who says "I love you." often, but even if he does, it may sound like, 

"I think I love you." 

"You…think?" 

"Well, all the symptoms confirm the diagnosis". 

★He had a hard time learning how to deal with emotions and feelings, mostly "postponing" them to process later. Though he rarely shows affection, it doesn't mean he isn't capable of it, but it takes him much time to open up to someone.

★He can be manipulative and cunning with strangers but becomes a different person with close people, trying to be as honest as possible. Able to admit when he's wrong. Prone to unnecessary self-sacrifices when it comes to those he holds dear. 

[horizon-verizon]

Isn’t it kinda weird that people ship daemyra? I'm not targeting daemyra, but the shippers. Though their relationship was acceptable in their era, I see many fans using this as a pretext to actively endorse it, which is problematic. It's one thing to acknowledge the historical and cultural context of a relationship, but it's another thing entirely to romanticize or ship it when we now have the knowledge and understanding that one of the individuals involved is a child.

Need your opinion on this

DISCLAIMER: I am a Daemyra shipper. Read with caution.

You're essentially asking why it isn't a dealbreaker? You could refer to my post HERE, but here it is in short:

Perhaps I'm going to be flowery, exhaustive, and "purple prosey" again, but I think it is basically that that very context creating the exploration of a tragedy of forces stronger than oneself. People love tragic tales, esp doomed ones. It's almost always validating in that there is a persistence of self against outside pressures that may or may not (but usually does) have said pressures be compulsions to conform against one's own happiness or authenticity, even and sometimes especially when the couple dies at the end. That in of itself is a sort of "resistance" that's supposed to coincide with GRRM's whole thing of "choosing life in spite of death" or "we found love in a hopeless place" sort of thing in ASoIaF, but for royals and in a royal iteration.

Rhaenyra's story is a doomed one not because she was the entire cause of the Dance pr some evil temptress but bc the historical actions of her ancestors and the feudal-patriarchal system they all live under has already set up designs against women and those the women could use to occupy the positions granted to men. GRRM loves his tragic tales of love; look at Rhaelya! But they also tend to--long way forward--lead to strains of hope in later generations...which works to make the whole thing even more bitter sweet and melancholy. They also both buy into it of course, which certainly contributed, but from the jump we know these two will not succeed. So from there it's a thing of enjoying the couple as they are and what they serve in the narrative. Oh, and of course the true star is Dany, and Rhaenyra had to die for Dany's story to be what it was (death of the dragons, women subjugated, Targs losing their sense of self leading to the Rebellion).

When there is no or mostly and actively morally upright party like a Daenerys, humans will root for the most impressive, thrilling, or aesthetically beautiful story/characters/relationships that scratches that itch some. You can certainly whack GRRM for creating so many ships that are this too-taboo thing(s), but people are very prone to misleading some things about people-as-people that I think (even with the historical inaccuracies GRRM defends as "accurate" about ages when noble people married) the writer does convincingly capture between this "conversation" in his work about the relationship between environment and choice. At least for enough people that there is something to how he's doing it.

And then, yes, sometimes people will over-romanticize, and much more than I think you're imagining it, anon. I've read some fics...let's say that sometimes people feel the need to dramatically change the characters that always puts me off bec it erases what was fun about them in the first place.

Here it is written in another way:

A)

The draw of Daemyra for a lot of people is that CONSIDERING THE CIRCUMSTANCES AND EVEN DESPITE/BECAUSE OF THEM, they had one of the most the strongest bonds for the longest time (and yes, even with Daemon loving Laena) in the orig story and they matched each others' drive/fire/pride (the last in all its meanings). They seem (operative word here) to understand each other the most, were the most comfortable with each other, and were the others' biggest support.

Again, it's not exactly the incest but what the incest/age gap (IN THE CONTEXT GRRM CREATED) does for the bond that comes to be.

Daemon for all intents and purposes could have become a perfect culmination of patriarchal privilege and male pride: one of the best warriors of his time, access to one of the most formidable and impressive creatures through his state of birth, action-oriented but not opposed to using strategy tactics, nearly irresistible to women an attitude and inspiring enough to men both in the story and in the fandom with his charisma, blah blah. And he certainly still had all those things or was written that way.

The kickers are that he's forced to acknowledge his truer desires to support his family towards prosperity and survival--where his loyalty to Rhaenyra comes in--and those desires are so much a priority he basically shuns much else, or at least removes himself from that, and thus he cannot/does not bother to put on much airs or try to gain approval...which is a very common thing amongst nobility who often curry favor or imagine themselves to be "good" people because they follow an honor code. There's a "purity" to that, an shameless honesty that draws people in similar to how some people feel about Oberyn and Jaime. And it especially is very attractive to people who have quite a bit of shame themselves over love and sex (for whatever reason, religious shame, queer shame, female shame for sexuality and desiring a stronger partner even anyway) and are (at first or never) inclined to not to try to ennoble it but are lonely and looking for a story of a strong connection/ride or die. That loyalty to Rhaenyra is a "flaw" that some men in the fandom never forgave GRRM for.

Rhaenyra similarly could have been a typical or ideal princess--either way, people wouldn't have liked her or found something to say was a damning "flaw" to say she deserved her fate-- and in some ways, she was. Loved wearing luxurious things and showing off her beauty, beautiful, fertile. But she's inplacably different from the ideal of Andal patriaechy be

Rhaenyra "replaced" Daemon as heir, yet instead of really planning her downfall and committing to his ire against Viserys (yes after being forced away), he appears accept his subordinate position towards the middle and end of his life, even before they marry and fully commitsd to her without losing his own...je-ne-sais-quoi. Despite her loneliness and the surrounding doubt around her for being a female heir, Rhaenyra never seemed to seriously lose her belief in her right to occupy that sort of space and never demurred like some other female characters we (pre-the rise of YA fiction and the Capable+Alluring MC Girl/Woman) were familiar with WHILE not being that kind or good a person (the trope of a Steel-Under-Silk strong, Lady usually has the Lady be good or kind of selfless, sometimes to the point of self effacement). Both had a sort of belief in themselves to a degree and under contexts that put off both readers and their own contemporaries--for different reasons...sometimes the same ones. that sort of symmetry is very appealing BECAUSE OF AND UNDER THE CONTEXT of a world and system (unequally, but the closest it's gotten and could get).

B)

The argument of "for the time/environment", I think, is for use of when we have people claim that some characters like Ceryse Hightower, Larra Rogare, Daemon, Viserys I are pedophiles...when we have Robert Baratheon, Craster, Walder Frey, etc. right there. that they go out of their way to mess up children or teens bec they are genuinely want them for their teenhood/childhood. The childness (full knowledge of childness) is exactly what they aim for.

Sure, none of these characters do not and cannot have the exact same moral systems or values as real moderns (sometimes Western people) do...because they simply do not have that framework to live on and through. So automatically saying a character is a pedo or a groomer can be hasty and inaccurate.

SOMETIMES (again, Walder, Craster, Robert).

It requires one to think about what a groomer or a pedo really is. Which I've squared down to the person wanting to prey on what is known to them and everyone around them as a "child" or "too young" that is socially excluded from every practice and dynamic of sex and romance that adults are expected to participate with each other, and not with said child (or simply manipulate them away from their security/non-security to do so) because the "child" cannot develop psychologically/physically when said adults interrupt their development and/or make them think is one thing when it is the other. Characters like Daemon, Viserys, etc. do not try to seek out what is recognized as "children" or "childlike" (and the "young maidens" or virgins the text states weirdly juxtaposes the lack of Daemon continuing said behavior into his adulthood, which true groomers/pedos always do). All this is strictly against the idea of him being a "groomer", even though like other men and a few women, he gets into something with 14/15 yr old Rhaenyra...

HOWEVER, it is true that patriarchies tend to apply sex-purity values in ways that inevitably encourage attentions on teens (as these are the closest) AND this ALSO doesn't mean that GRRM wasn't/isn't trying to say that this is still a wrong thing for 111 A.C. Daemon to have done and that it wasn't potentially screwy. (I think this is kinda what also "saves" it for some people, that the narrative acknowledges this particular crazy as crazy).

And just as with Dany and Drogo and the age revealed at her first pregnancy, even with Dany having been a bridal slave to Rhaenyra's princess and thus presenting a more visceral stake the latter doesn't have, determining how one sees Dany's regard for Drogo as blatant victim-mindset. For Daemyra, though, it's still not exactly the same and it's just that there isn't much for a claim, story-wise not life wise, of blatant you-know-what-it's.

There are about 4 main theories as to why Daemon of the bk does what he does with Rhaenyra:

he wanted to get back at Viserys for all the years of his ignorance and the recent event of his shipping Mysaria off only her her to lose what would have been Daemon's first kid (so a denial of person, position, and his own heir/family when he seemed to start trying to make himself after a long series of war in the Stepstones, also trying to make some "glory" for himself that Viserys--for him--keeps preventing or ruining)

he thought that the issues of succession Rhaenyra or even Viserys might have with the burgeoning greens, esp Otto, would be better handled if he forced Viserys to have him and Rhaenyra marry and combine lineages...tag him in, coach, he's been ready and you're not doing the job right, so let me in (ironically, I think this is very Visenya-coded...no one is going to be as competent and dedicated as me...just [ugh] with all the male trappings and privilege that shaped his...all that) -- a burgeoning storm they all had to prepare for, and he has to be there for them to survive -- he sees Rhaenyra at court surrounded by greens and is so offended he's even more determined--some might read "desperate"--to handle things even with such little...grace, shall we say

he was "tailoring" and "preparing" Rhaenyra to become more like the wife/partner that would make him most happy and rationalized that he would pay her back with his "hand" and sword, bc they were the best bet for their house...yeah...

when he got there and saw Rhaenyra in her "marriageable" state, he became attracted to her and similar to Laena and the duel, decided to "risk" the damage to his own rep...without letting himself onvder over the possible damage to Rhaenyra

or, ALL OF THE ABOVE...SOME OF THE ABOVE

Whatever Daemon did with her/to her (sex, kissing, near-sex, groping, etc., we don't know what happened but I think it was either sex or something that looked like it would definitely lead to that), it wasn't based on a habit and intention of straight up p*dophilia. More so him being very selfish, continuing the pattern of Targ men Targ-menning against their female counterparts. Using Rhaenyra against Viserys, putting his foot down, whatever.

Therefore he was still abusing his experience and relation with her, the "child-not-child-who-should-have-been-seen-as-a-child-but-wasn't-bc-society-and-patriarchal-selfishness/advantage". So I don't fault or perfectly disagree with people who say "groomer!" After all, their priority is not allowing other crazy people or out already-male-scorched world in further footholding for nonsense in the real world. Can't call them stupid or morally incorrect for that or being concerned. However, I still think there's a misunderstanding of what's being conveyed by the text versus what such a thing would be in real life (Watsonian vs Doylist) AND we can't stop ourselves form writing or showing even the odd and taboo or genuinely concerning stuff when there's something to be shown/told.

It changed to what it needed to be, became what was its potential, AND Rhaenyra was set to marry someone else (before the confirmation that it was always gonna be Laenor, and she didn't know it was him until last minute) who she would likely never be able to trust because of her position, men, yada yada. Might as well be someone she cared for her entire life and we know would not go out of his way, even shift for someone he thought was "worthy", and whoo-boy, was Rhaenyra "worthy" to Daemon. Again, refer to the doomed narrative.

Now Daemon here is so not exactly a good guy if he:

was willing to use his own about-to-married-off-and-subiect-to-purity-politics-standard-that-could-affect-her-reputation both as a girl/woman-as-a-female-heir niece in this way, even if it was after Viserys basically caused him and Mysaria to lose their first kid and came after years of Viserys basically ignoring Daemon--Daemon's eyes, bk and show--in favor of a man who could never hope to be as loyal as Daemon....IN FACT, THIS PROVES HE WAS NEVER THE "GOOD" GUY (I'm yelling at some fics)

prioritizes "sameness" and it comes off as arrogance--"only people like me can handle all this"...however, he'd be not totally incorrect (just annoying to some, charming to others, a little bit of both and feeding-into-each-other for others-others). He's not only a person who grew up, like both female and male nobles, value having the highest classed and prestigious person as a potential mate even if it may contradict "obedience" and he like others wishes to, he also. Again, the appeal of SYMMETRY. And sameness (albeit, in lesser degrees) does have an importance in how many people define what their ideal partner is. Not have the same hobbies or ways and color of dress, but values. Which Rhaenyra and Daemon have the potential of to the max.

If a potential partner's "worth" to be of a certain category or class...but it's fun to see shamelessness at a point AND such shamelessness works to, again, support said female character bc it's a great pair to loyalty, which Rhaenyra needs a lot of and assurance of from. And, no, I don't think she got enough of that from Harwin for all that she did love him (if they did become lovers...but I know you know they were, come on now). Those two had to hide; Rhaenyra's not a hider, not where it doesn't concern her kids' safety at least.

C)

Ironically those assurances come from the reversed--or at least done a little topsy turvy--familial relations, feudal constraints, AND the reality of Targaryens being both a part of this society but also not really on part because of their dragons/innate magicness but also because they are the ruling family.

They are apart from most people around them and find more things in common between themselves, us against the world (yes, in the bk, too); isolated always--unless you're like Rhaena, Dreamfyre's 1st rider, who could and did find female friends everywhere and discovered more freedom and comfort in them through their woman-ness than anyone in her family...but even then, she was more or less emotionally isolated just by being such a woman and a Targ, and the male stink still manages to encroach its way in through Androw Farman and the love she had for Androw's father/her lover's love for said Androw. and as royals, they are by social definition not in physical proximity, thus not as easier seen as any more than political figures/leaders. I mean, sure, we might say "boo hoo", and we'd not be totally wrong, but there is still an effect of treating people not like people that humans have never been able to rein in, and it's important to how the Targs handled many things and were perceived, thus how they responded--queue Jaehaerys I. When we especially talk about the costs to oneself and to how others treat you under the nonphysical protections of power. Whether for good or ill.

Contrast to Jaehaerys and Alysanne, who, thought GRRM notes as one of the greatest pairs, also end up separated by Alysanne's & Jaehaerys' fights over their children's safety and places in the succession, with the obvious running line of it going back to misogyny for the sake of assimilating/holding power instead of using it for making the said society a little better/a lot better.

Contrast to Daario and Daenerys (yes, yes, why would I compare PoV character's observations of a person vs a history book, we get it), Daemyra/RoguesDelight has Daemon knowing and giving more suggestion of longevity bc it's suggested in the text that he had access to the most intimate stirrings of Rhaenyra's head (final letter at Maidenpool as well as all I said above) in a way Daario never did or wanted to with Dany. Oh, of course Daario knew Dany loved her people, was lonely, was all that and the 3rd; but I trump that up to be his observation of what she needed and wanted so he could indulge in being with such a woman and profit from it. Even though he wasn't exactly terrible or whatever, or impatient. This is far from Dany's fault, tbc. Daario is gonna Daario. But, as one person kind brilliantly explained about Dany being a goddess in Twitter:

Part of her struggles is w being dehumanized as a symbol of power but she constantly subverts that by placing the weight of her responsibility/influence into liberating ppl.

Jaehaerys I sorta sets himself and his later scions, by contrast, even with it having had the desired effect of getting people off his back about sibling incest. So does Aegon I, tbh, when while it left the Targs the ability to adapt to their necessities concerning succession, his and his sons leaving it open to duking-it-out...then Aegon named heir over Rhaena...made way for the first stone against women in their house....those most necessarily it seems (after the Dance).

Anyway, they were pretty solid until Rhaenyra's kids started falling like dominoes and were caught in a deceit.

D)

I remember an ask I got once about Daemon showing Rhaenyra explicit imagery in S1E4, where anon said that him doing so proves he is a groomer in the show, where Rhaenyra is 19 instead of 14-15. And adult but just barely AND a lot of people hold that grooming--nonsexual, too--can happen to people to people as old as 34. Personally, I think that the latter is more general manipulation more than "grooming", but I digress and it doesn't really work for 18-20 year olds and up, who again, are practically teenagers.

But I brought up my misgivings about Daemon wanting to abuse children/children adjacent for its own sake already, and it's less evident in the show where the show makes it a point that he wanted Rhaenyra at most stages of her life (when again, she wouldn't be a child-child to them, scowl at GRRM, not me):

the beach scene in S1E7 with adult Rhaenyra, we all saw them heave for each other

we hear/see nothing of his messing with too-young girls after said marriage...the narrative implies he was likely imagining it as some "perfect" Valyrian bride...who happens to be around the same age as state as his niece (still problematic for all the implications of Rhaenyra's significance to him----both in the nature of sex work affecting women/girls AND we really didn't need to hear of that without proving how old those girls usually were to be so used like this as proxies…this is where I personally would have rolled my sorry self out) -> -> -> the probable immediate recall of Jorah doing similar with Dany OR simply Mysaria's observation of this unconscious/repressed desire/teasing him and show!Daemon never having actually done these things -> -> -> of course this could be due to any number of reasons, like his frustrations with Viserys manifesting in looking for a companion in the closest person possible more than that sort of desire

Mysaria: What troubles you, my Prince? I could bring in another. Perhaps a maiden. I have several. I could even arrange one with silver hair. [pause]

This included language of "could" and "perhaps" and "even" (as if this were a thing that she knows it's out of the ordinary) plus her solicitousness to meet his silence and disappeared enthusiasm indicates that show!Daemon was not in the habit of messing w/very young sex workers as bk!Daemon is rumored and told (A Question of Succession):

"and was said to have an especial fondness for deflowering maidens"

Language is important these types of documents. We're given an entire description of his philandering and the contrast of "he sampled" (definite, final, statement-to-not-be-doubted), but there is room with "was said" for Daemon to not have gone around this particular act of seeking out virgin girls. Like how one would say now "I heard such and such also went pulling people's pants down after Marcus saw him go into a strip club" or "people say that Marsha went to Payless for her prom shoes".

Active ("he sampled") vs passive voice ("he[...]was said") can be pretty important to indicate what def happened vs what people believed and could have happened but was never proven. But what do I know, I'm just a probably too-biased Daemyra shipper (this genuinely was not to be snarky, really, you can take or leave my points).

END

For me, it's more when Rhaenyra & Daemon both get older that they shine and I "approve" or really most enjoy Rouges Delight (bk ship name some have taken to call Daemyra) whatever you want to name and distinguish the couple. (I prefer their younger interations [pre E6, S1] in the show not bc Emma is a bad actor--they re not, they're just underutilized and Rhaenyra is written so...terribly that I can never get as into it...I liked Daemyra when they reconciled in S2, for example, but I hated how they got there and not bc of "the ship is sinking" but bec it genuinely was not written well and depended on diminishing both characters). I'm not, however, out here trying to say that anyone else should love this ship, this couple, this story just as much as I don't really mind people not getting into GRRM's writing.

The 111 A.C. issue, there is a certain odd quality it of being obviously out of line and manipulative...while evidence of being a convergence of long-held tension, a beginning towards an inevitable outcome years down the line. SYMMETRY and good writing. I suspect that part of the appeal for some is that push-pull of the delight of "matching freaks and the moral conflict of "but....he's her uncle and he's 2x her age and/or they probably did things when she was way too young", but that's a whole other thing. It keeps people engaged and is perfectly symptomatic of that quality of medievalesque/historical fiction, sure, but bc humans love to play with taboos in fiction...to a certain point. (Personally, again, it is that later timeline that "saved" Daemon for me, as flawed as that may be.) They can indulge in the curiosity of the play of "what ifs" GRRM writes and the subsequent quandaries safely in fiction without getting openly judged & misunderstood for wanting such stories. Sometimes we "play" too close to the sun, though, I admit.

So unless someone's gone off the deep end trying to say that they wouldn't be bothered by a 15 yr old and her 2x older uncle smooching in real life, or try to deny that Daemon was performing, it really doesn't discomfit me that much in the grander scheme of things to me.

Again, I can't blame HotD for uping Rhaenyra's age AND people for just not jiving or hating the ship just as there are those who cannot ever get into ASoIaF for the incessant (to them, too often unpunished by the narrative) incest even outside of the Targs alone. And I get how this is just not going to be enough or that he later is her strongest supporters is enough for a lot of people. But I do want the air cleared a bit and explain the position from where I'm standing. Could change, but I dunno about that. Perhaps this all too biased a breakdown. I warned ya.

This is all in regards to shipping, of course. 😉 Anyway, watch out, there might be more freaks about you in your everyday life like Daemyra shippers, anon!

[4ce-of-2pades]

I watched Princess Mononoke for the first time yesterday. I really liked the movie, but my one complaint is that Ashitaka and San should have died at the end instead of being cured of their curses. (For plot reasons, I mean. I have nothing against the characters.) Ashi had made peace with a fate that was inevitable, despite being undeserved. San decided her fate when she stayed with the old boar god to try to help him and was consumed by his demon mass (far more contamination, far faster spread and fatality). The forest spirit could heal Ashi’s wounds but not his curse. It only makes sense that they were doomed to die like so many others.

I mean, it’s good for them that they got to keep living on, but it felt sort of weird to watch them both go off to their lives and promise to keep in touch and visit, like friends going off to separate colleges. It seemed oddly… easy. How quickly they could return to peace, with nothing more than a few faint scars.

I think their deaths would have really drilled in the theme of lasting consequences. The gods are dead and aren’t coming back. Our heroes were cursed and died because they tried to help others. The actions of humanity have hurt the world and its people, and though there is hope in the return of green land, some things can’t be taken back, like unhealable curses.

I was VERY sure throughout the movie that this would be different from all those other deadly curses that find miraculous healing in the end of a story. The tone of this movie felt different. Ashi was too accepting and melancholy, too resigned. The world was too dark and had too much finality to it. I think it would have meant more for him to be told he’s going to suffer and die, and then suffer and die. It would have been tragic and awful, but I think it’s what was needed. It felt… off balance, to have them both saved in the eleventh hour. Some things can be healed, yes, but some things can never be taken back.

Sometimes you can do everything right, and give everything you have, and it still won’t be enough to save you. It doesn’t matter what’s fair. You can’t cheat death.

Other than that though, I thought everything about the movie was absolutely AMAZING. I especially like how much importance they placed on Ashi saving those two injured guys, making all the background characters whose deaths barely registered into real people who matter. I also love the little white tree spirit guys, because they are adorable.

(Also I firmly believe that no arrow could possibly decapitate a person so cleanly, or pop their arms off like that. Not in a million years. It was jarringly cartoonish. But admittedly pretty funny.)

Also, next time I watch this movie I need to keep lists of A: every time Ashitaka gets injured, and B: every place Ashitaka gets banished from on pain of death. He’s so injury-prone and banishable. I’m struggling to think of a significant location he’s gone where he hasn’t been told at least once to leave and never return.

[bakasara]

oh, they are Addams couples. Aziraphale and Crowley, and Ed and Stede, are both a flavor of Addams-type couple. Hear me out--

We tend to associate Stede and Aziraphale, and Ed and Crowley, right?

Aesthetically, you have Stede and Aziraphale both looking like posh Blonde White Man Who's Trouble, while Crowley and Ed both got the Edgy Goth aesthetic going on.

By character traits/narrative role, Aziraphale and Stede are the Covert Bastard who can and will be a bitch; they have both long dealt with living in oppressive systems by way of painful compromises and self-repression, always teetering on the edge of desertion and, sooner or later, called to make a choice to disavow those systems for good.

Crowley and Ed are these brilliant and vibrant minds frustrated by hurt, both betrayed in life by a social system outside their control that cast them down without a choice; they take a Flint-style "this ends when I forgive the system, not the other way around" approach to it in that they openly shun the system back, but the original rejection and its cascading effects still left them traumatized and fragile around the matter.

(Then there's all four of these characters being soooo dramatic and such a Theater-Kid-type person, so they all have that in common.)

However, there is a place where the parallels switch, bringing Stede and Crowley far closer on one side, and Aziraphale and Ed closer on the other. And it has to do with the fact that in both these couples there's a character whose job often tends to be Beach, just Beach Husband, just Husband, opposing the other character who's prone to going into High Maintenance Diva / Mermaid With Melancholy modes.

Aziraphale is quite capable of taking care of himself, but he'll literally fold his arms and play princess in the castle waiting for Crowely to rescue him, because Enrichment. He'll do it in life-or-discorporation situations, like when he's about to get guillotined. He'll do it with minor inconveniences - like with the paintball stain, where it's obscenely obvious he's just waiting to be indulged, wants the satisfaction of seeing that Crowley will treat him. He'll pretend he was reading when Crowley comes back from an argument and make Crowley ring a bell to get his attention. "Pleeease, Crowley, do the bullet catch with me even though you've never used a rifle". "Let me take the Bentley while you look after the bookshop". Et cetera. And Crowley takes to all this like a bee to honey. Follows him around the neighborhood, indulges his every caprice, dreams of Alone Time at the Ritz where they can just treat themselves to brunch and, I guess, where he can watch Aziraphale eat some more, which is his idea of this Absolutely Great Activity that just makes his day.

Ed will lean on the helm and sigh like he's Ariel, yes, but it's more than that. Painting the bride cake topper in kajal to look like him sits at the (narratively fucking ingenious) intersection of "I'm making it me because I'm never there, it's never me" and "I'd really like for once for someone to treat me like I'm precious and worthy of pampering" which reflect feelings we've known about since the beginning of s1, at least since he touched the piece of cashmere in Stede's cabin. He also genuinely swings fast between energized/manic and low energy/feelings of hopelessness, and his brain goes Faster Than Yours, and he gets genius-slash-crazy ideas on the reg. When he needed to call to all of his strength he imagined it as a giant sea creature with huge, all-encompassing arms. Florence Welch Big God Behavior. It's a big personality, and you're either enamored with it or not, you're either happy to follow him around basking in it, or you're not strong enough a suitor to his heart and should abandon pursuit. But luckily Stede's also a crazy maniac whose life goal is riding or dying for that in his Boyfriend Era until he can ride or die for that in his Faithful and Realized Husband Era.

So yeah, there's a lot to the dynamic between these duos - more than this, don't get me wrong! - but I'm VERY appreciative of this facet of them that gets all tongue-in-cheek kinda

[thefatiguedfatale]

Rayleigh’s melancholy is…

a small folded piece of paper. It is tattered and yellowed and the creases so weak that a gentle breeze left it prone to rip.

It is a paper opened only twice in its lifespan. 

The first time…

It arrived folded neatly into the palms of younger, less calloused palms.

‘I was afraid I wouldn’t find the words. So I wrote them in a letter…’ those words alone could barely pass your lips without a quiver. 

His curiosity had peaked as he graciously accepted and began reading your note.

You desperately hoped the whipping bitter winds flying across the Oro Jackson would cool your burning cheeks. 

The moments in which he read your message felt like hours before his gaze lingered back up at you.

The thought of running away immediately hit your mind and your legs, but before you could pivot into a full sprint in the opposite direction,

you saw it. 

The slow and loving smile creeping its way on his face. 

The only thing Rayleigh could do was nod, unsure of his own ability to create a sentence that would be able to express the swelling of his heart.

Not even a second later, he had you wrapped in his arm, his hands still gripping the note.

A sigh left your body, as both of your hearts rang out. 

‘Finally’

The second time…

was decades later. When the sparkle of the Sabody waters he watched brushed along the edge of the island, gently drifted away his thoughts miles and miles away from him. 

He put hands in tattered pockets, just playing with the old yellowed and eaten away note between his finger tips.

He didn't know what brought him here to the shores of Sabody. Maybe it was the way the sun shined as brightly as you used to smile. Or maybe it was the sweet vendor on the island that had the same eyes as you, the same hair. Or maybe it was the- 

Rayleigh attempted to will his emotions to wash away with the offgoing tides. 

‘No more.

Please.’

But instead, in return, the tides chose to mock him. 

Instead of washing away the tears his heart poured out, they returned the melancholy 10 fold in the form of a muted pale, and dull heart. 

His very own.

Or at least the one that he used to own.

Its beat thrumming in a language long forgotten to Rayleigh. 

This was the heart that he had let die with the Oro Jackson…with Roger…and with you.

He didn't notice his fingers pulling out the note. 

There was not a lot of room on the small piece of ripped paper. Only enough room for a few sentences. However, the emotions that poured out, overflowed upon its reopening.

He had tried his best before not to think about you after his departure from Roger’s crew. He had tried not to think of each time you smiled at him from across the deck. Or each time you run after the children on the boat baring your teeth and claws in mock terror shrieks of laughter ripping across the deck. 

He had tried his best to not think about the lips he would never be able to press against his own instead, now forever out of reach.

And yet…

His eyes caressed its gaze over your handwriting again one final time. 

But the old carved scar on his heart began to ache with a pain that not even he could withstand.

And with 

a deep

slow breath, he turned away from the Sabody waters, closing the note and pushed it back deep into his pocket.

As he willed his aching heart to do the same.

For: @childofblackmaria

[dancedance-resolution]

i started a supercorp portrait of a lady on fire au like three years ago. i'm never going to finish it, but the writing style is pretty cool, so i want to share it. so um enjoy the prologue and a bit of chapter one?

---

Prologue. Bonnelles, France. 1786.

“First, my contours,” Kara said, her voice soft and level. She looked out upon the dozen or so young women, their eyes darting back and forth from their papers to Kara herself. “The outline,” she continued. The increasingly swift sound of scratching charcoal prompted Kara to further instruct, “Not too fast. Take time to look at me.” She paused. “See how my arms are placed.”

At that moment, Kara saw the painting.

She swallowed and took in a breath; she schooled her expression before letting out the air with a pathetically soft “My hands.” Her students’ gaze followed her verbal direction, now observing as Kara’s fingers curled with remembrance. Their own hands now began to sketch the slope of hers—the slope that had once coaxed breathy moans from a lover, the slope that had once created that very painting in all of its hollow longing.

Kara felt her heart rate accelerating, and her attempts at calming deep breaths only made her shoulders shake unsteadily. “Who brought that painting out?” Her eyes darted around, landing on each possible offender, as she tensed her core and adopted a stern countenance.

Every student dutifully turned to look at the work.

It was an especially young girl who finally lifted her hand. “I brought it. From the stock room. Should I have not?”

Kara’s “no” felt like a brick, its weight threatening to pry tears from her reddening eyes. So Kara took another swallow, a handful of blinks, a few more steadying breaths.

“Did you paint it?” the girl asked innocently. Nia, her name was? She stared at Kara, oblivious to the flood of sound overwhelming Kara’s mind and echoing in the cavern of her heart.

“Yes,” Kara uttered softly, the word barely audible as they fell from her lips. “A long time ago.”

Nia’s head snapped back to examine the painting once more. It stood on an old but sturdy easel, tattooed and scarred but still standing. The artwork itself was brooding, with a white sun bleeding into a dark vignette. Heavy clumps of clouds occupied the sky and caged some of the sun’s rays, so the fire burning behind the woman was bright enough in comparison to create a dragging shadow of her figure. The flames crawled up the back of her windswept dress, bringing sharp tension to an otherwise lulling, melancholy landscape.

“What’s the title?”

The sound of the sea began to swell in Kara’s head. Her lips trembled. Her body unwittingly swayed slightly. “Portrait of a Lady on Fire.”

---

Chapter I. The island of Brittany, France, and the surrounding sea. 1779.

Kara squinted into the distance, her face scrunching up a bit as she desperately tried to shield her eyes from the harsh glare of the sun on the water. For all its gorgeous teals and sparkling peaks, it certainly did make her wish for one of those brimmed hats the rowers were all wearing. With every one of their paced paddles, the cork-like little canoe bobbed haphazardly. Kara rather felt as if she were in the wine glass of a thoroughly drunken Marie Antoinette.

At least she wasn’t prone to seasickness.

She still felt quite unsteady, though, being thrown about and forced to pathetically grab onto the boat’s low walls. She leaned forward, trying to regain her balance and ground herself despite the absence of ground.

The wooden pallet holding her canvas was, apparently, as unstable as she was, and the next thing Kara knew, it had been lurched off of the boat like vomit from a drunkard. Kara watched helplessly as it thrashed among the choppy waves, the sea carrying it a few feet from the boat.

The chief rower met her desperate look with exhausted resignation; he ceased his paddling as Kara shed her overcoat and placed a precarious foot on the edge of the canoe.

With a strained creak from the boat’s wood, she jumped into the water, dress billowing behind her. Her first gasp for air upon emerging from the water was audible; she could feel the effort in her throat. Her arms moved in laborious little arcs as she slowly made her way towards the floating pallet and finally made a desperate reach for it. Kara’s fingers grasped onto a wooden board, and she pulled herself up onto it with a grunt.

---

The incessant wind upon the sea was certainly not helping Kara. Dripping wet, she wrapped herself up in her overcoat in a pitiful plea for warmth. She held the edges of the garment up to her lips, the sensation of the dry fabric bringing her some comfort as she closed her eyes and left herself to the mercy of the mighty sea.

But the interminable rocking of the feeble boat wouldn’t allow her any rest.

Kara wasn’t very religious, not anymore. Yet, the sight of the cliffs and coast of Brittany moved her to relieved prayer.

---

The sun had already begun to set as Kara trekked up the sandy coast. Her legs ached with every stumbling, unsure step—maybe she was a bit seasick after all—and her hands were tired of having to grip her full skirt to keep it out of her way.

She paused on the rocks, taking a moment to manually wring some of the water out of her skirt. She filled her lungs with an arduous breath before slinging the rope holding the pallet over her shoulder. Next came the fabric sling, which housed her trunk of personal items—she positioned it on her back with careful poise.

The journey up the cliffs and towards the trees was exhausting. Kara’s skirt required repositioning every few seconds, the rope was digging into her shoulder, and the pallet and trunk slammed into her back with each wobbling step. By the time she reached the straight path up to the residence, her breaths were heavy and pained, and the sun was nearly fully hidden beneath the horizon.

A soft light emanated from the windows above the mansion’s door, helping Kara feel a bit more secure as she knocked. A short blonde woman answered her summon and introduced herself with a flat “I’m Eve.” She opened the door a bit wider and gestured with her body for Kara to come in.

Eve held a small candle as she guided Kara up the stairs, the sounds of their shoes echoing through the grand yet starkly undecorated hallway. The walls of the stairwell were cement bricks, and the wrought iron bannister was rather plain and geometric.

They came to a stop in front of a similarly void room, bare save a few heavy curtains and a daybed. The raised panels along these walls matched the white-painted wood of the window frames, and they gave the chamber some elegant character.

While Eve entered the comparatively less intimidating room, Kara stayed back a moment, taking in the shafts of muted blue light from the windows and the contrasting warm glow of leaping flames from the central fireplace.

Eve crouched down to poke at the fire as Kara set down her belongings. “It was a reception room,” Eve explained. “Though I’ve never seen it used.”

The fire crackled pleasantly. “Have you been here long?” Kara inquired.

“Three years,” Eve answered, directing her attention back to the fire.

Kara peeled off her overcoat and draped it along the wainscoting. “Do you like it here?”

“Yes,” Eve said simply as she stood up. She turned to Kara, meeting her eyes now as her hands smoothed over her skirt. “I’ll let you get dry.” And with a nod, she was on her way.

Kara watched her every step.

Once the door closed, she hastily began removing her overskirt. It fell to the dark herringbone floor with an unglamorous thud.

---

There was no method or grace to the way Kara wrapped her hand around the rusting crowbar, but with a few jerks, she’d managed to successfully pry the top off of the pallet.

After setting down the wood cover, Kara extended her hand, letting it fall clumsily onto the slick canvas in front of her. It was still wet, and her hand’s small circular movement caused moisture to pool at her fingertips, as if her touch had beckoned the water. So her hand withdrew, and Kara slid the canvas out from its container. Her eyes danced over the surface as she considered how to dry it, holding it in front of herself like the Communion host of an evening Mass.

---

Kara decided to accompany her drying canvas, which was now positioned next to the fireplace. Stripped naked, she sat in front of the fire and pulled her legs towards herself—she was vulnerable, sitting there bare and in a new environment, and the action made her feel a bit more small, compact, and safe.

Kara set down her candle so she could light her tobacco pipe with the flames. Her large, smoky exhales grounded her, in a way, with the familiar sight and smell acting as a sort of sedative. And she stared forward, expression blank but unmistakably worn.

---

Kara walked barefoot along the cement floor, making her way through the hall and to the pantry room wrapped in nothing but her robe-like smock.

[madecanary]

(  NICHOLAS  GALITZINE  |  CIS  MALE  |  HE  +  HIM  |  TWENTY  -  ONE  )  — — —  it's  just  been  another  long  week  in  boring  -  ass  hawkins.  isn't  that  right,  WILLIAM  BYERS?  shit,  i  guess  they  can't  hear  me  over  WHY  CAN'T  I  TOUCH  IT?  by  BUZZCOCKS  playing  through  the  headphones  of  their  walkman.  it  looks  like  they're  gonna  be  late  for  WORK  as  a  SALES  ASSOCIATE  at  FAMILY  VIDEO.  did  you  know  WILL  has  been  in  hawkins  for  HIS  ENTIRE  LIFE?  yeah,  their  family  and  friends  describe  them  as  GENTLE,  but  i've  seen  them  be  RESERVED  too  !  i  would  also  say  they  remind  me  of  a  wound  in  the  shape  of  a  boy, raw-bitten  lips  as  sweet  as  they  are  sour,  an  intolerable  tenderness  nestled  in  a  center  that  cannot  hold,  splotches  of  ink  littered  haphazardly  across  flushed  skin,  eyes  rife  with  mischief  and  melancholy  in  equal  amounts,  but  is  that  weird  ?  i  guess  nothing's  too  weird  for  this  little  town,  huh  ?  — — —  (  dev,  any,  25,  est  )

usually found trying his best to not visibly judge family video's patrons and their taste in film, doodling on scrap paper, bobbing his head to whichever mix he's listening to now, with his head in a book, getting away with being a little shit in the background, and being soooo normal 😁👍 (lies) prominent traits empathetic, coy, pragmatic, anxious, sweet, sensitive, pixyish, prone to keeping things in & then exploding, self-sacrificing, frank mini anachronistic playlist climbing up the walls (radiohead), i'm just a kid (simple plan), prey (the neighborhood), i wanna be adored (the stone roses), basket case (green day), good feeling (violent femmes), unloveable (the smiths), my love mine all mine (mitski)

bridging the gap

whatever dreams will had of going to college were momentarily completely and totally squandered by The Horrors and Their Consequences. he went through a lot, year after year, and leaving the nest to venture out into the great unknown by himself right after just... wasn't in the cards for him yet. he wasn't quite ready, didn't know how to reconcile what he felt with the life he was living and the one he wanted to live. so, he stuck around.

got a job at family video because if the abysmal reviews in the local paper were anything to go by, then clearly this town was in great need of at least one person with good taste to guide them, and who else could it be but him, your resident movie buff? he's been there for a minute—probably over a year now—and he likes it. he likes it a lot, actually, and probably abuses his employee discounts lmao.

a lot can happen in two years, especially two years of peace, so i'd like to think will continued his self-realization journey he was on in canon and is in a better place than he was. he's in this unique position of simultaneously being both hypervisible (widespread gay rumors & bullying have existed since forever, and his family dropped hints throughout the years lol) and invisible (it doesn't stop girls from barking up the wrong tree; some doubt still exists), and he'd use that to his advantage. it isn't safe to be fully out, but i think... that if you need to know, you'd know. ...you know? so, not out-out, but not making a concerted effort to appear otherwise. you either notice his flags and put two and two together, or you don't. does that make sense? his family absolutely knows, and i do imagine he'd want his chosen family to know and love the real him, too.

considering his unfathomably shitty luck in life, he probably spent most of that first year of peace waiting for the other shoe to drop, and only finally exhaled when november came and went without any issues. still doesn't know what he wants to do with his life (does he go the practical route and do something with computer science? or does he chase after his pipe dream and pursue art?), but he did enroll in some gen ed classes at the local community college with intentions to transfer someday, so that's progress. he still feels so behind, like he should have moved on by now, but baby steps are still steps.

so, y'know. he was living that small town life. getting by, shooting the shit, trying to not shit his pants thinking about The Future. everything was fine! so great, so normal. until. :)))))))) he started not being able to sleep as well as he used to. started feeling anxious, not entirely alone. he thought it was just... him, y'know? he knows he has ptsd, he knows that life isn't always as easy for him as it is for others — he made peace with that. but... he thought he was getting better, that things were finally starting to look up for him. and now this?

he hasn't told anyone. his options are both shitty: either he's so scared of growing up that he's getting bad again (and then he has to be the mentally ill one, ugh!) or it's not just him and they really are in danger (and now they have to fight for their lives again, great!). nightmare scenario no matter what. but it's probably fine. it's just his brain turning his fear of the unknown and unfamiliar into something that he does know and is intimately familiar with. it's — no, yeah. that's probably it. right...?

so, basically, old habits die hard and will has fallen back into the routine of pretending that everything is fine and soooo very normal, unaware that he looks and acts like a prey animal to anyone with eyes. if he has bags under his eyes, no he doesn't. if he's been listening to should i stay or should i go? again, no he hasn't. if he's extra quiet, extra jumpy, and a little more sensitive than usual, well. what happened to minding our own business, huh? 🤨 can't a man be a freak in peace? could someone going through it do this? (cue will giving himself a choppy wolf cut in shitty midnight bathroom lighting). it's literally so fine!!!!!!! (<- lying again)

he may... have to start opening up a little bit, though, given the latest murders. maybe. but only if you promise to not get mad... 🙄👉👈

extra tidbits

it's very important to me that will has a little gay hoop earring that someone gave him at like three am during a sleepover on a random whim. sometimes he wants to buy a pearl and serve full on girl with a pearl earring realness, but he also doesn't want to get hatecrimed, so. little innocuous hoop it is 💛

joining the war on smoking on the side of smoking by following in s1's historical accuracy footsteps and making will an occasional smoker. and yes, he does still bum cigarettes knowing full well he has a pack of his own on him (we love a scammer) + it's been a lil bit more than occasional ever since the return of The Horrors :(

i'll still be writing will as a sweetheart of course, but bitchy will is so near and dear to me. his season three WHO CARESSSSSS 🙄 & cracking up at the boys getting dumped & you weren't with her? 🤨😒 & general #imwithher vibes and season four sighing and rolling his eyes and calling others out etc mean Everything to me. get their ass, william!!! sigh and bitch and moan and complain, as is your right!!!

will had that hair you see in the second gif, but he cut it recently and now it looks like the first and third gif. is this because i'm indecisive? perhaps....

he still loves dnd + still the same old geek + still loves [video] games + please hang out with him he wants to hang out can he come over to hang out or do you want to come over to hang out when are y'all gonna hang out bc he just told me he wants to hang out. btw

[unironicposadist]

a new(?) M*A*S*H thesis

BJ and Colonel Potter embody the show’s capitulation to “true,” normative, “ideal” masculinity. Allow me to explain.

I had this thought and had to share with the tumblr girlies because in my real life, the people who watch MASH are not the sort of people with whom Gender Talks are fun to have, and the people that have the background, inclination and patience to talk gender have no interest in watching MASH.

There is the trend that many commentators have already observed that the show in the early seasons is generally just flat-out sexist, but simultaneously more anti-war and anti-empire, more progressive in a broad sense, and is more challenging and gender fluid (at least within the confines of male subjectivity), and these things are negatively correlated over the run of the series. As the show becomes less sexist, it also yields to normative gender roles and becomes more ambivalent and wishy-washy in its anti-war message.

I was thinking about these things and it occurred to me -- in the first three seasons, none (and I repeat: none) of the main characters can be said to embody an ideal masculinity or femininity, whether defined by standards of the ‘50s when the show takes place, or the ‘70s or ‘80s when it aired.

Hawkeye - too effeminate, expressive and prone to melancholy

Trapper - unfaithful to his wife

Colonel Blake - too indecisive

Radar - too naïve and innocent

Frank - is a cowardly dolt

Mulcahy - too touchy feely and earnest

Klinger - is a crossdresser and proud of it

Margaret - too smart, angry, courageous, independent to be “ideal” as a woman

All of the men fall short of the American masculine ideal, and the one woman with any depth explodes in many ways what is acceptable femininity. Many of the men don’t even believe in “ideal manhood,” or if they say they do, they say it with a wink. Frank’s the only one that buys into the ideological horse hockey of Total Masculinity, and he’s... well, he’s Frank.

Then arrive BJ and Colonel Potter. Married men, and faithful despite the temptations that cross their paths. They are worldly and stoic, and while they have their rare moments of tearful vulnerability, their shared doctrine is one of suppression, compartmentalization and stoicism. They must never outwardly admit to having succumbed to the horrors. They are charming, assertive, patriotic (whether in Potter’s stars-and-bars kind of way or BJ’s picket fence and apple pie kind of way) and they are men, no two ways about it.

And then slowly the failures of the other men fall away. Trapper and Blake are gone. They are followed in short order by Frank, who is just about as aggressive a satire of the contradictions of American masculinity as I’ve seen in media. Radar falls in love and grows up, just in time to leave. Klinger stops crossdressing. Mulcahy becomes less soft and caring, gets more sarcastic and more prone to anger. And even Hawkeye gets worn down into a good-soldier shell of the flamboyant, promiscuous pinko fairy man he used to be. In the early seasons he is truly hysterical in a way that defies diagnosis (and I use the word hysterical quite intentionally) and eventually this general insanity gets mollified and medicalized into panic, trauma, anxiety, the usual. But he learns to deal with it -- until he snaps obviously, but the big snap at the end came because he stopped engaging the little ones that seemed to come every three episodes in the early seasons.

There is plenty more to dive into, such as the curious case of the vaguely asexual sneering upper class masculinity of Charles Emerson Winchester III, the extremes of healthy and toxic masculinity represented by recurring characters Sidney and Colonel Flagg, and the expanded representation of women which goes along with Margaret’s enrichment as a character with wants and needs beyond having a Romantic Other. Maybe I’ll get into those soon but for now it’s 1am and I need to read my book and sleep. Please, engage me in discourse, if you wish. I’m curious what the 50-100 of us think about this. Lol.

[anarchosimdicalist]

URSULA ALLEN’S BACHELOR CHALLENGE

I’m doing the bachelor challenge thing! I thought a BC with all elders would be kinda fun and cute so that’s what I’m doing. I've kinda written myself into a corner of doing a BC with someone who would absolutely hate being on The Bachelor or anything like it, so I'm doing away with the TV premise. While Sage is kind of a presenter here, his segments aren't necessarily diegetic. As such, don't think of your contestants as people applying to be on a show.

RULES

Applicants must be elders

All genders welcome

Occults welcome (but I’m not counting a 100+ year old YA vampire as an elder, as much as I like that one What We Do In The Shadows bit)

Tragic backstories welcome, silly goofy backstories also welcome, no backstories also also welcome.

CC welcome but maxis match preferred, and no script mods (eg mod traits). I have all packs except Batuu.

At least 1 negative trait preferred.

1 applicant per person (subject to change depending on turnout)

Tag ‘#ursulaallenbc’ and @anarchosimdicalist in your contestant posts - if I don't reblog it within a day or so feel free to send an ask or DM.

Deadline: 10th August (also subject to change depending on turnout)

More about Ursula and Sage under the cut!

URSULA ALLEN

AGE: 72 PRONOUNS: She/her SEXUALITY: Bisexual CAREER: Author TRAITS: Gloomy, Perfectionist, Bookworm ASPIRATION: Bestselling Author

Though she has been writing since she was a child and published semi-regularly since the 80s, it was her middle-grade fantasy Tower series that got her properly famous in the late 90s.

Since then, she’s had a child, been divorced, publicly came out as bisexual, published upwards of 60 books for children and a good few for adults, built a legacy as the favourite author to a generation of kids, and amassed a modest fortune.

While she's happy to have the kind of security that her money provides, she doesn't like having a lot of stuff. Her house is pretty minimalist, her clothes are high-quality but she doesn't have many, and she only really splashes out on fancy food. A good chunk of her money goes to charity.

She has what she refers to as "artistic melancholy" and what her son quite easily identifies as "depression".

She comes off as kind of gruff and grumpy, but if you're willing to see past it she can be quite warm. She loves to complain and she doesn't suffer fools gladly but she's also very wise and prone to philosophising.

She's very passionate about what she does. She has no intention of retiring any time soon, though she could afford it. She wouldn't really know what to do with herself if she ever stopped writing.

Always been good with kids, though she only ever had one.

SAGE HAMMOND

AGE: 24 PRONOUNS: He/him SEXUALITY: Gay CAREER: ???? TRAITS: Childish, Lazy, Cheerful ASPIRATION: Joke Star

Very close with Ursula. She made up stories for him as a kid, supported him through his transition as a teenager, and now as an adult they're kind of a single unit. A little codependent but generally healthy.

Has an English degree, somewhat inspired by Ursula though he's not really interested in becoming a writer.

Has lived with Ursula since graduating. Feels like he should move out but he doesn't really know what to do with his life and can't find a job.

Flamboyant silly guy. Colourful aesthetic constantly threatens to intrude on Ursula's big minimalist house.