#ostensibly form a relationship

[himblebo]

Again again thinking

[triptychgardener]

Oh also am I being a tad reductive when talking about the quadrants? Yeah absolutely. But I do think it's important to see what the comic actually says and demonstrates about relationships within these frameworks, rather than trying to find like. Some platonic ideal of a "TRUE" romance, or trying to figure out how the quadrants are actually *supposed* to work.

Like. We're supposed to take Meowrails as the platonic (no pun intended) ideal of a moiraillegience. They are quite literally used as The Symbol for it in comic (their typing quirks forming the <>).

And when we see their initial relationship online, it is... not great to say the least!

Equius is domineering and dismissive of Nepeta's agency, and is very explicitly *keeping her away from her friends* in this game, and keeping her with him, ostensibly for protection, a thing he does an awful lot despite Nepeta clearly being very capable (see him keeping Nepeta from FLARPing with the other teams. Even if that, in universe, may have been a good idea.)

And even though we do see softer moments between the two of them, and their relationships seems to have improved by the time we reach [S] Equius: Seek the highb100d, this is one of our FIRST demonstrations of a pair of moirails in the comic, designed to be indicative on the concept. In our other examples, Vriska seems barely cognizant of the idea that she's even IN a relationship with Kanaya to begin with, and it falls apart due to the boundaries between pale and red romance (boundaries that, like the human boundary between "friend" and "lover," are artificially constructed); Karkat and Gamzee failed so horribly that Karkat gives up, and it fails to prevent Gamzee from enacting more violence on Terezi; Feferi finds it utterly exhausting to constantly be preventing Eridan from committing violence, and rightfully breaks it off with him; and finally, Terezi is unable to prevent Vriska from inflicting a final and great violence upon herself at the end of the comic, especially when she wants clearly to be Vriska's everything.

For kismessitude, I keep seeing people groping around in the dark for what a True, Healthy Kismessitude is, and I really hope I don't have to tell you that you shouldn't build a relationship off of mutual hate. Our key example given for black romance is, well.

A relationship that literally always ends up with one member murdering the other. In both universes.

Also notable is that we almost never see a kismessitude where there *isn't* some significant power imbalance between the two parties. The Black Queen is Jack Noir's boss, Equius literally designs Aradiabot to be utterly subservient to him, and Gamzee specifically uses Terezi's disability and insecurity to trap her into a relationship with him.

A healthy rivalry or making fun jabs at each other is one thing. But a system is what it does, and kismessistude consistently produces abuse and often fatal violence between two people. The only one that ends without that violence is Eridan and Vriska. And that was just because Vriska didn't really care anymore.

Auspisticism is pretty rare in the comic, and even most of the characters don't seem to have a very strong grasp on the subject. Our example is... Kanaya auspisticizing between Vriska and Tavros.

Which mostly just feels like Kanaya is trying to stop Vriska from picking on Tavros, not facilitating a relationship.

Kanaya is kind of our Key Person here though, being described as "the vvillage twwo wwheel devvice" by Eridan when he is trying to proposition her to auspisticize between him and Vriska. It's a mediative position, that seems to mostly be used in attempts by Eridan to make women talk to him (getting Kanaya to mediate between him and Vriska, trying to get Feferi to mediate him and Sollux, both times unsuccessful because, again, they don't care.) It also exhausts Kanaya, she doesn't like it, and she's not very good at it, if there even is a good state to be in for auspisticizing, as anyone who's had to deal with polycule drama knows.

Ultimately, it's a way to offload the emotional baggage of a toxic relationship, either extant or imminent, onto a third party (always a woman for some reason! Funny that) because Alternian relationship structures seem designed to encourage violence and aggression for the purposes of imperialist expansion.

The REAL point where it matters is when Rose starts to get into Auspisticism, and we start to see when it can really go wrong.

During Game Over, while Gamzee is ACTIVELY BRUTALIZING TEREZI, Rose, who has been talking to both parties and trying to auspisticize, freezes.

Trying to understand this framework as an extant thing is actively causing her to undergo analysis paralysis. She sees, obviously, brutal violence being inflicted on her friend, but because she has positioned herself as the mediator of an obviously abusive relationship, the maintenance of this relationship is suddenly a priority in trying to navigate it. Her fear of getting in the way of what could be a "normal" relationship loses her precious seconds that may have ended up costing lives.

This sort of thing happens all the time. When you see a relationship as an object and a structure whose preservation is worth striving for, even when there is nothing to be gained by maintaining that relationship, it can leave you trapped in abusive and toxic scenarios. On Earth, the preservation of marriages beyond the point where one or both members of the contract get anything positive from it causes devastating unhappiness, inequality and abuse. The preservation of these structures has a purpose.

In America, as well as many other countries on Earth, the purpose of the institution of marriage is largely to put reproductive and financial power in the hands of men, and to construct the nuclear family along the lines which maintain structures like Christianity, capitalism and patriarchy. That has just historically been the case. Does that mean that no one should get married, or that no one can be happy in a marriage? Of course not. But people didn't fight for things like gay marriage, and are still fighting for marriage equality for disabled people and other groups, just for the sake of being "normal." They did it for a lot of reasons. Hospital visitation rights, the ability to have some say in what happens to their partners after death, insurance sharing.

But as the institution of marriage is expanding to include more people, we should really start questioning why these sorts of things are locked behind a contract that also assumes A Lot Of Things about two people that may not necessarily be true, i.e. a desire to live together, have sex, reproduce, share financial interests etc, when a more holistic approach to relationships where they aren't simply All or Nothing is going to make a lot of people a lot happier.

There's a couple of specific phrases in wider Homestuck Fanon that always bothered me. Those being that a relationship "is beyond or transcends quadrants" and that someone wants another person "in all four quadrants." Partially because it always seemed to just describe two people who really really love each other a lot, semantically similar to us calling something True Love but I digress. Like, in an ideal world, most relationships would transcend quadrants! Individual aspects of each type of relationship that are usually cordoned off should be available for you to pick and choose. The lines between a friend and a rival and a lover should be obliterated, but it's said instead to indicate when someone is No For Real In Love, when usually it's just two people who are human dating. There's a good swathe of people who seem to think that all the quadrants are bad EXCEPT for red which is the Normal Human Way Of Being In Love and is therefore good. I mean, this is kind of the whole thing the Candy timeline is based around, right? Everyone cordoning themselves off into neat little marriages, having babies and living in suburban houses with white picket fences.

And we all know how well that's going.

[asterlark]

me and den @unloneliest were just talking about murderbot and ART's relationship and i want to discuss how they quite literally complete each other's sensory and emotional experience of the world!!

there's a few great posts on here such as this one about how murderbot uses drones to fully and properly experience the world around it (it also accesses security cameras/other systems for this same purpose). but i haven't seen anyone so far talk about how once MB stops working for the company and consequently doesn't have a hubsystem/secsystem to connect to anymore (which for its entire existence up to that point had been how it was used to interacting with its environment/doing its job), after it meets ART, ART starts to fill that gap.

ART gives MB access to more cameras, systems, and information archives than it would normally be able to connect with while MB is on its own outside of ART's... body(? lol), but also directly gives MB access to its own cameras, drones, archives, facilities, and processing space. additionally, so much of ART's function is dedicated to analysis, lateral thinking, and logical reasoning, and it not only uses those skills in service of reaching murderbot's goals, it teaches murderbot how to use those same skills. (ART might be a bit of an asshole about how it does this, but that doesn't negate just how much it does for murderbot for no reason other than it's bored/interested in MB as an individual.)

we all love goofing about how artificial condition can basically be boiled down to "two robots in a trench coat trying to get through a job interview" (which is entirely accurate tbh) but that's also such a great example of ART fulfilling the role of both murderbot's "hubsystem" and "secsystem", allowing it to fully experience its environment/ succeed in its goals. ART provides MB with crucial information, context, and constructive criticism, and uses its significant processing power to act as MB's backup and support system while they work together.

from ART's side of things, we get a very explicit explanation of how it needs the context of murderbot's emotional reactions to media in order to fully understand and experience the media as intended. it tried to watch media with its humans, and it didn't completely understand just by studying their reactions. but when it's in a feed connection with murderbot, who isn't human but has human neural tissue, ART is finally able to thoroughly process the emotional aspects of media (side note, once it actually understands the emotional stakes in a way that makes sense for it, it's so frightened by the possibility of the fictional ship/crew in worldhoppers being catastrophically injured or killed that it makes murderbot pause for a significant amount of time before it feels prepared to go on. like!! ART really fucking loves its crew, that is all).

looking at things further from ART's perspective: its relationship with murderbot is ostensibly the very first relationship it's been able to establish with not only someone outside of its crew, but also with any construct at all. while ART loves its crew very much (see previous point re: being so so scared for the fate of the fictional crew of worldhoppers), it never had a choice in forming relationships with them. it was quite literally programmed to build those relationships with its crew and students. ART loves its function, its job, and nearly all of the humans that spend time inside of it, but its relationship with murderbot is the first time it's able to choose to make a new friend. that new friend is also someone who, due to its partial machine intelligence, is able to understand and know ART on a whole other level of intimacy that humans simply aren't capable of. (that part goes for murderbot, too, obviously; ART is its first actual friend outside of the presaux team, and its first bot friend ever.)

and because murderbot is murderbot, and not a "nice/polite to ART most of the time" human, this is also one of the first times that ART gets real feedback from a friend about the ways that its actions impact others. after the whole situation in network effect, when the truth of the kidnapping comes to light and murderbot hides in the bathroom refusing to talk to ART (and admittedly ART doesn't handle this well lol) - ART is forced to confront that despite it making the only call it felt able to make in that horrifying situation, despite it thinking that that was the right call, its actions hurt murderbot, and several other humans were caught in the crossfire. what's most scary to ART in that moment is the idea that murderbot might never forgive it, might never want to talk to it again. it's already so attached to this friendship, so concerned with murderbot's wellbeing, that the thought of that friendship being over because of its own behavior is terrifying. (to me, this almost mirrors murderbot's complete emotional collapse when it thinks that ART has been killed. the other more overt mirror is ART fully intending on bombing the colony to get murderbot back.)

in den's words, they both increase the other's capacity to feel: ART by acting as a part of murderbot's sensory system, and murderbot by acting as a means by which ART can access emotion. they love one another so much they would do pretty much anything to keep each other safe/avenge each other, but what's more, they unequivocally make each other more whole.

[dilfartist]

Selfish

Pairing; Yandere Leon Kennedy x reader

Synopsis; You escape your captor during one of his many missions. You stop by a diner searching for help. What will happen next? Find out by reading

Word count; 3.8K

TW; Kidnapping, non-con touching, Stockholm syndrome, maybe just a tad bit ooc, Yandere (obviously), obsessive behavior, cussing.

Notes; hopefully you enjoy reading. It’s not the best since I’m still maturing as a writer and because of my hiatus; but I hope you enjoy.

!Reblogs and Comments are greatly appreciated!

Sapphire-embellished twilight transitions into dawn’s light blue hue bringing alongside the sun. Birds sang good morning to one another, on their side of the forest. You ambled down the road that ceased the strong odored forest from connecting.

You stared at the endless road up ahead. Night to morning, ahead of you was forest and road. Perhaps this reason is why your captor moved into the isolated forest since raccoon city incident.

Or maybe he wanted to live a life of normalcy given the opportunity; the monsters he claimed he fought, seemingly every month, stressed him greatly and you noticed. Plus, he mentioned he needed a vacation frequently.

You pause, double-checking onward on the ostensibly never-ending road. Was your hard work a waste of time?

Looking back on the way he treated you, you pondered if it would have been smarter to stay home. Most days he wasn't overbearing. Once in a while, he’d annoy you, other than that he was tolerable. Besides being unable to leave the house unattended and having no say in choices at times, he gave you more freedom than most.

But then you remember the day before. At the crack of dawn, he’d left for a mission: bidding you goodbye with a note and breakfast at your night table side. You were left all alone, so naturally you sought a form of entertainment.

The television; Which was your only option.

You were clicking through the television channels when you came across a crime documentary. The story was similar to your personal life so you continued to watch the channel.

The story was about a woman, age twenty-three, who was kidnapped for around four years. During her kidnapping, she fell deeply in love with her kidnapper to the point they had to detach her from the cop car when they arrested him.

In your situation, you’ve been abducted for at least eight months. Her situation only took a year till she developed Stockholm syndrome.

Clarified by the show as the psychological condition of a victim who identifies with and empathizes with their captor or abuser and their goals.

Learning this information a thought came to mind.

Would you become like her once it hits New Year's? Loyal to a man that took you away from society. No. You refused to allow the same situation to happen to you.

You’d never allow it to happen.

When it came to the relationship your captor so desperately longed for with you, you caused many difficulties to prevent any form of romance.

Any attempt at affection had him pushed away or smacked. Discussion about the past before your absconding was simply ignored. And in general, you kept your distance from him. Well, at least you tried to. He stays at your hip like a lost puppy majority of the time he has off work, talking your ear off. There was no way in hell you’d fall for him. Not after the months you spent in that isolated house.

Regardless of how certain you were, you mulled over it some more. You finally concluded running. So far, you felt regret and relief.

Out of nowhere, a loud reverberating sound of a car grew closer, arising behind you. You quickly spun around to see what the sound originated from.

The engine growled, sending a ping of fright to your heart. You spent no time thinking about Leon’s reaction to your escape. However, now your mind consumes thoughts of his response.

Could your captor's fury be so robust that the car in the distance embodied his rage? Knowing him since your best friend introduced you to the man becoming a rookie cop in raccoon city; you’ve never seen him enrage.

From time to time his witty replies and mean scowl would showcase his anger. Of course, that didn't mean his rage wasn't feasible. But never had you ever witnessed a stronger emotion from him.

Inching closer, you were able to discern the details of the car. It was a massive black car, with tinted windows. A car your captor might arrive home with after a mission. It announced its presence with its vociferous roaring.

You observe with dread blooming in the pit of your stomach, every other part of your body tingled.

Although the person driving the car was yet to be revealed, you were petrified, stuck in place like you had been glued onto the concrete below you.

It must be him.

Why else would they be heading so fast toward you?

Already, you’re willing to surrender. Your captor is a forgiving person when it comes to you, so there’s a likelihood he’ll forgive you if you cooperate.

Standing on the side of the road, you acquiescently wait for the car to stop. Waiting for him to take you back to your prison.

The car slows but even then it's at a fast pace. The car passes you momentarily. Slightly it reverses until the passenger window is in front of you. Unhurriedly, the shadowy window rolls down. In the driver's seat, instead of who you believed it to be, it was a woman.

She looked to be in her middle thirties. She wore black sunglasses in her strawberry-blonde hair, a red blouse with denim jeans. Her makeup reminded you of Jennifer Tilly in Bride of Chucky, but she wore a sweet smile.

“Oh my lord, are you alright darling?” The woman asked like you were a child outside without a jacket in the freezing winter.

You continued to stare at her. You wanted to say something, but your throat felt drier than sandpaper. You opened your mouth, wheezing a bit as you sipped the fresh air. “I don't know,” you responded as loud as you possibly could. So barely above a whisper.

“Do you know where you are?”

“No.”

“Are you safe?”

“I’m not sure yet.”

The woman shook her head disapprovingly, then she began to throw whatever laid in the passenger seat into the backseats. “Come on sugar, get inside. I’ll give you a ride.”

“Okay, thank you.”

She reached over and pushed the passenger door open. You entered the vehicle, settled in, and got comfy. You buckled in making sure you heard the reassuring click.

“There you go,” she commented with a smile. “Now, we're going to make a stop by a gas station, then we’ll find out what we can do with you. Is that alright?

You smiled back, “Yeah, I don't mind.”

The car began to ride forward and the air conditioning blew on your overheated body. You relished the cold air. You hadn't realized how hot it had been outside, even in the early morning. Where were you?

You put that thought aside. Now you needed to worry about something to drink and eat.

“Do you…have anything to drink or eat?” you glanced at the woman.

She nodded. “Of course sweety! Why didn't I offer before?” she looked away from the street to grab a half-empty bottle of water from the side of the driver's door. “Sorry, that's the only drink I have at the moment.” she apologizes.

Without a second thought, you unscrewed the cap off the water and chugged the water. Water had never tasted so refreshing before. It was like you’d been roaming in the desert for hours on end and finally found a source of water.

The woman glances at you. You must have looked crazy. “How long have you been out there?”

“Since eight last night.” You sounded better. No more raspy voice that hurts you to speak. “I should have packed a bag but something came up.”

Before you left the house last night, you weren't in your right mind. Your captor never gave you an exact time he’d be home. His return ranged between the eight at night, the dead of night, the crack of dawn, or the morning. Recently, he’d been arriving home at eight. Which is the reason you left with nothing. Looking back, you had no confidence in yourself at getting away. You believed you were going to be caught in a matter of ten minutes. Now look at you.

You turned to the woman, “Thanks…” She finishes the sentence with her name. “Amanda.” You nod rephrasing your sentence, “Thanks Amanda for picking me up.”

Amanda smiles again, this time wider showing off her pearly white teeth. “I couldn't just leave you out there. Now, what’s your name?”

You tell her your name and hope she somehow knows it. Maybe the news reported you missing when you weren’t watching. You hoped so.

Rather than freaking out, realizing she had found a missing person, she simply responded with a “nice to meet you.” You died a little at the rejoinder.

Did no one care enough to report your absence? Not your family or close friends, no one attempted to reach out to the police?

No. You’re just overthinking. Not everyone watches the news or actively looks for missing people. You just had to be around more people. Someone was bound to know your identity.

Still, you can’t ignore the way your hands shake at the thought of being forgotten.

“So what were you out there for? If you don’t mind sharing that is.”

You bit the inside of your cheek. What were you to say? Tell her the truth and find out she was with your captor the whole time or keep your mouth shut and have no help in case he does find you.

A white lie would help.

“Escaping my abusive boyfriend.”

A frown pulled at the woman’s plump lips, her eyebrows scrunching together at your answer. “Do I need to the cops, family members?”

“No,” you responded quickly and harshly. The car fell silent. You took a small breather before speaking. “No, thank you.”

“Please, tell me, is there anything else I can do to help you any further?”

You needed cash, shelter, and a job. There was only one thing you were sure she could help you with. “ I need money and a hotel.”

“Don't worry, I got you covered,” she said softly.

The car began to slow when she placed her foot on the break. She turned the car and moved into a spot that contained a combination of a gas station and an old fashion diner. She parked the car next to a gas pump, then powered it off.

She dug into the middle counsel, pushing around pens and important items, and pulled out a pink wallet. She unzipped the front zipper and pulled out some money.

Amanda held the cash out to you, “Here’s 100 dollars. There's enough for lasting food, a hotel to stay, and a bus.”

You unbuckle your seatbelt just to hug her tightly. “Thank you!” you repeat over and over, like an unanswered prayer. She returned the hug, telling you she didn't mind lending you some service. The hug ended and you needed to plan your next move. What would you spend your money on first?

Well, all you knew was what you’d spend what was given to you on something important.

You looked out the window. Your eyes shift toward the diner. Mo’s dinner was on the sign, “been here since the ’50s.” which was written below.

Right. Food. You haven't eaten since yesterday. Walking as long as you did, you tried to forget your hunger and focus on the main goal of finding shelter or at least some safety.

“I think I’ll have myself a hot breakfast!” you announced. Amanda unlocked the passenger door, “go right ahead. Enjoy your freedom.” You nod, fleeing the car akin to a little kid whose mother gave them money for an ice cream from the ice cream truck.

The entrance bell chimes when you open the door to the cream-colored establishment. Once inside, you settled yourself in a booth in the far back. An old jukebox plays aged music ranging from the 70s to the ’50. Besides you, there was a single person in the restaurant. A man at the bar sipping his morning coffee whilst reading the newspaper.

You extend your arm over to the menu across the table. The menu displays numerous appetizing dishes, varying from breakfast to a juicy steak dinner.

Flipping the page your eyes landed on a mouthwatering breakfast sandwich, including bacon, egg, and cheese.

“Hello ma’am, I’m Stephanie, I’ll be serving you this morning. What would you like?”

You placed the menu aside to give the waitress your whole attention. The woman was of average height, wearing a pink uniform that reminded you of the 50s. She wore a smile that did not reach her black doe eyes. “Did you hear any of that?”

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” you said sincerely, feeling anxious about possibly pissing her off. “Could I have a number six and a sweet tea?”

“Of course, is that it?”

“Umm…yeah, that’s it.”

“Alright then,” she replied disinterestedly. She left quickly, retreating to the kitchen.

You continue gazing at the closed door to the kitchen. What else could you do? You should have brought along something to entertain you, then again there wasn't much back at the house you called a jail cell. For the remainder of the waiting duration, you’d have your thoughts to amuse your lethargy.

Ding Ding

Instinctively, your head turned. 50s music began to fade, superseded by the loud thumping of your heart. Your breathing became shaky, parallel to your hands. Dirty blonde hair is what you see first. It’s him! You repeat in your head, like a religious prayer.

“Jessica, hey!” you heard a joyous exclamation. You watch as the man from the bar rushes over to the person entering the restaurant. Your anxiety left as quickly as it came. A hand places itself onto your cheat, and on the spot your heart thumped rapidly. You had to calm down. You took deep breaths, and your heart slowed with each sip of air. You rest your head on the table.

After taking the time to calm yourself, you analyzed the restaurant furthermore. Now, the place was vacant, since the man had left. Fifteen minutes passed and you found a newspaper from the newspaper rack adjacent to the front entrance.

Nothing in the article was new to you. At your captor’s home, you watched the news almost once a week to see if anyone had reported your disappearance. Nothing ever came up though. At least you were up to date with everything going on.

Your waitress finally returned, carrying your meal on a maroon-colored tray in her left hand. “Sorry for the wait, ma’am. Kitchen malfunction.” she apologized, giving you a guileless smile. This would be the only expression besides tedium that you’d receive from her.

“It's alright,” you said, watching as she placed the food on the table for you to dig into. She left carrying the tray back to the kitchen she emerged from.

You took a bite of the sandwich, chewing slowly to savor the flavor. Juicy and delicious are solely vivid words to illustrate the taste. The egg had a spongy texture that combines well with melted cheese. And the hickory bacon wasn’t too crispy or chewy, it was simply perfect.

Back at the prison, your captor wasn't the best cook. But he tried to be for you. Still, you preferred takeout. Chinese, Italian, and burgers began to become a boring taste on your taste buds. Having a breakfast sandwich was refreshing, to say the least.

“Enjoying your meal, huh?” rough voice inquiries. The question was said cockily but their wrath was audible in the way the last word was spoken.

You stop mid-chew, the overwhelming flavor vanishing from your mind. It now tasted bland. You kept your eyes shut. Were you afraid? No. Afraid couldn't explain the ineffable amount of dread you felt at the moment. Ruffling could be heard on the opposite side of the table; He was sitting down. Your eyes open involuntarily like your body already knew what he wanted it to do.

Across the table, seating snugly is your captor; Leon Kennedy. He looks rougher than the last time you’ve spoken. The dark circle underneath his eye has grown darker. His brunette roots have begun peaking out ruining his natural blonde facade. And he looked exhausted. Must have stayed up all night looking for you.

He looked more than pissed. He appeared disgruntled. Compared to Leon, you were small. But now, Leon was like a giant towering over you. Despite never abusing you in any shape or form, your body shakes like a leaf in the wind. The way he glares down at you drives you to shift uncomfortably in your seat.

“Do you know how long I've been up for, y/n?” he asks whilst pulling out a flask from his jacket pocket.

Regardless of how parched you are, you force yourself to converse with him. “No,” you're voice is brisk and faint.

“Two days. For two days I’ve been on my feet.” He takes a swig of the flask and then continues to rant. “I could have joined you in bed and fallen asleep, but there was a problem. You weren't anywhere.”

He shakes his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. “What the hell is the matter with you? You could have gotten hurt. You probably are.”

Leon is getting angrier, you can tell by the way the furrowed eyebrows deepen and his frown morphs into a glower, as he utters each sentence.

“I’m sorry.” That's all you can say. It's all that comes to mind.

“Sorry won’t make up for the scars you've gotten.” he retorts angrily.

Now you're mirroring his expression. You’re angry and tired as well. Definitely not as tired as him but still tired. “You’re acting as if I didn't have a good reason to run.” you petulantly cross your arms, akin to a child not getting a toy from the store.

Leon wasn’t delusional. Back in the day, when he was a rookie cop, in some aspects he was delusional. However, as the years continue to pass so does his past self. Leon understands what he has done to you is inhumane, but he can’t help it. He kept you locked away for a reason. You won’t get hurt with him by your side.

Leon sighs, closing his eyes and leaning closer with his forearms on the table. “I know, I know.”

You tilt your head, “really? So, why are you mad at me?”

His eyes open, displaying icy-blue orbs. They hold Empathy in them. Empathy Leon has a difficult time communicating to you.

“I keep you in the house for your safety.” He began, taking your hands into his own. “To keep our relationship safe.”

“But I don’t want a relationship with you.”

“I know.”

“So why are you forcing me to stay with you?!”

Leon’s hands squeezed yours, provoking a cry out of you. “All my life I’ve been a generous man. I saved many and gave up my life for others. I’m always providing for someone else and rarely caring for myself. And the one thing I yearn for to the point I was convinced I deserved it. It was you.”

For a beat, he ceases his gabbing. Leon stares down at your connected hands, his thumb starts rubbing against the back of your hand. It’s a domestic act that earns your displeasure.

“For once, allow me to be selfish,” he mumbles, eyes slowly trailing up to meet yours. His lips press your hand, giving it a chaste kiss. “You’re the only thing I’ll fight to keep for myself.”

Part of you wishes the relationship was normal. Leon truly did care for you, and you still cared for him, But he did something unforgiving. He took away your free will.

“...you can’t just steal a person, Leon. You can’t expect me to love you.”

“I don’t.”

“So why won’t you let me go? You still have Ada, don’t you? You were more into her than me. Why isn’t she in my position?”

“Because I love you, not her. You haven't betrayed me. Well, not until now.” he jokes, letting out a faint chuckle.

Leon pulls out his wallet, his fingers sliding through the pockets to find his card. “Wrap your food up. We’re leaving.” he puts his wallet back in his back pocket, “Be right back. Stay here.” he commanded sternly.

The waitress is at the bar, cleaning the counter with a blue rag. Leon approaches her with an “Excuse me.”

Leon put too much faith in you because you were on your feet immediately when his back was turned. You quietly inched towards the door and ever so slowly dragged the door inwards. Leon was distracted, the waitress deciding she’d flirt with him despite seeing you and him together. You manage to slip through the door before Leon notices your second escape attempt.

You bolt out the door when you hear the enraged roar of your name from behind. You grip the railing to the stairs, running down them, tripping a couple of times. You don’t look but you know Leon’s on your tail. The door slams against the wall, the bell ringing loudly.

“Y/n, get back here!”

Amanda’s car was still parked by the gas pump. You sprint towards it, slipping through the tight space of the car and the gas pump. Luckily for you, Amanda was in the car, applying her strawberry-pink lipstick.

“Amanda!” you shout, startling her enough that she drags the lipstick across her cheek. She shouts, frightened by your sudden appearance. She looks at you, like you're crazy. She says your name to clarify the person at her window, “What are you doing.”

You shake your head, “yo-you gotta help me, he-” you say breathlessly.

“Hey, Amanda.” you hear Leon’s voice call out. Unlike you, he isn’t out of breath. Thanks to his military training. Amanda peeks her head out the window, she smiles waving at Leon. “Hey, Lee!”

Your eyes widen till it’s physically impossible to widen anymore. She knows Leon. Your body feels numb as you watch them interact like old friends. You feel like you aren’t real at the moment. Like you're watching the scene unfold outside your body.

“Sorry, she just came back from the hospital. She isn’t in her right mind right now.” Leon excuses, leading you to his car like a shepherd's dog guiding the sheep to its pen.

Amanda nods as she understands completely. “No worries, I’m just glad I found her before she hurt herself.”

Leon puts you in the passenger seat and closes the vehicle door. The keys lock the door from the inside, so you are left choiceless.

Leon joins you in the driver’s seat, definitely too angered to chide you. He seethed quietly, powering on the engine with the quick twist of the car keys.

Wordlessly, you buckle up. You wouldn’t make an endeavor to anger Leon any further.

You’d allow him to be selfish. Allow him to have you.

What other option did you have now?

[exhaled-spirals]

« [W]hat if I told you that you will witness many strange and marvellous beings, creatures and sensations along your path; that you will experience new colours, shapes and textures – make contact with fields and trees, and with people from a wealth of backgrounds; invigorating games, vehicles, animals, the touch of mud and flesh, sweet and savoury foods, new companions, the experience of love and friendship, of anger and hurt, of aloneness and contemplation. And what if I said that all these experiences will lead to fresh ideas, creations and relationships… to a personality with choice and possibility as well as limits and apprehensions; and that these limits and apprehensions will point to a vast background of sky and consciousness, a background that will give you the feeling of being a part of something much greater than yourself? […]

Would you want to go? […]

It is much easier, at least ostensibly, to live in isolation from other people. It is much easier to develop a relationship to a leader, a party, a doctrine – or, for that matter, a television show (or set of shows) – and a passive-receptive lifestyle than it is to live in direct contact with people, with the exchange of ideas, with the diversity of perspectives, with wonder and surprise, and with unsettling yet potentially edifying truths about life.

Moreover, it becomes easier to live virtually […]. The power in these situations is enormous, and yet it is so often about trivial matters […]. While there is clearly no antidote as such to this problem, there is a sensibility […] that, in my view, powerfully counters the roboticist trend, and this sensibility is ‘awe’. I think of awe as the humility and wonder, or sense of adventure, toward living. It has also been defined as a sense of vastness that defies accommodation. However one defines it, the sensibility of awe subverts mechanised living. […]

That being said, one of the challenges with awe is that it is so often framed as a ‘high’, or short-term lift. That is why I distinguish between the short-term jolt of awe, or what I call ‘quick-boil’ awe, and the life-changing ‘slow-simmer’ form of awe.

The quick-boil form of awe tends to link with activities such as hiking through woods, falling intensely in love, taking a mind-altering drug, playing a vigorous sport, and travelling to exotic places. The slow-simmer awe, on the other hand, transforms the exhilarating energy of quick-boil awe into something long-lasting – such as staying open to the daunting scenery of every day, making a lifestyle of wonder and discovery, delving deep into a project or craft, and consistently engaging with life’s many-sidedness, whether unveiled in one’s work or love life, in child-rearing, friendships, or the larger community of which one is a part. […]

The problem, however, is that we are so susceptible to commodification in our culture, and to the conversion of substantive reforms into expedient elixirs, that we need to stay ever vigilant about the larger path that is imperative for us.

In a nutshell, if awe is to be a life-changing experience, it will need to encompass something that is all too often overlooked in today’s prepackaged world: anxiety, and in particular, life-enhancing anxiety. Life-enhancing anxiety is invigorating anxiety. It is anxiety that enables us to live with and make the best of the depth and mystery of existence. It also enables us to live with and make the best of the paradoxes of existence, such as our capacity for wonder and discovery in the midst of apprehension and even dread. Too often, however, we ignore the paradoxes of anxiety and fail to do the work necessary to go beneath the surfaces of life, to unveil the fuller and deeper questions of life.

Among these questions are: given the spectre of death, how is one willing to live? What is the purpose and meaning of one’s life, of the life of one’s culture? How do we shape ourselves and our societies so that we can pursue what we love? How do we avoid war and tyranny, sexism and bigotry? […]

[S]low-simmer awe is a […] layered and nuanced experience. For example, if we search beyond the surfaces of [it], beyond the readily observable, we often find the element of unease, of apprehension, and even of dread. Put more plainly, when we peel back the layers of slow-simmer awe, we often find death […]. Consider, for example, how the complex symbol of death – or the groundlessness and helplessness of our condition – looms abidingly in classical art: painting, music and literature. This is because the element of death looms over and intensifies the elements of grace, beauty and compassion that exemplify such work. […]

This is also why I have concerns about recent trends in awe research that de-emphasise or even reject these darker elements of unease.

[…] Here, then, is my summary of the capacities we need in order to optimise slow-boil awe. Or, to put it conversely, these are the capacities that are likely to atrophy the more we model ourselves after machines:

The capacity to slow down.

The capacity to optimise presence, or the holding and illuminating of that which is palpably significant within ourselves, and between ourselves and others.

The capacity to deeply reflect on ourselves and our society.

The capacity to act on our reflections about ourselves and society, to make available a more awe-based path for ourselves and our world.

The capacity to savour the delights of life […] even as they are tinged with sadness and pain.

The capacity to be deeply moved throughout one’s lifetime.

The capacity to focus on what one loves.

The capacity to see the big picture of life and its possibilities. […]

The capacity to appreciate mystery.

The capacity to appreciate the fact that we are alive.

The capacity to nurture balance (for example, between fragility and boldness).

The capacity for solitude.

The capacity to commune with nature.

The capacity to deeply appreciate travel and the ‘foreign’. […]

The capacity to give oneself over – discerningly – to the unknowable.

The capacity to trust the ultimately unknowable.

Let’s give Becker, who grappled mightily with the cost of automation, the final word:

Whatever [the human being] does on this planet has to be done in the lived truth of the terror of creation, of the grotesque, of the rumble of panic underneath everything. Otherwise it is false. Whatever is achieved must be achieved from within the subjective energies of creatures, without deadening, with the full exercise of passion, of vision, of pain, of fear, and of sorrow. »

— Kirk Schneider, "We need raw awe"

[polygonal-trees]

Welcome new Transformers fans!

You might have seen this Don't Make Me Tap The Sign meme floating around. Transformers One has been out for a little while now so I want to expand on it as well as some other TF fandom things.

What does "Transformers doesn't have a set canon" actually mean?

Essentially, every new Transformers story is a reboot. They might draw from or expand on concepts from previous iterations but canonically each continuity family is separate. This means all lore is extremely flexible - origin stories, relationships, even personalities can change wildly between iterations and while some may be better or worse than others, they are all equally canon.

For example: Orion Pax was a dock worker in G1, an archivist in Prime, and a miner in TF One. None of these contradict each other.

Continuities also tend to share ideas without being directly connected. For example Transformers One draws from Transformers Prime in multiple ways (e.g. it features Airachnid) but it is not a prequel to Prime and in fact directly contradicts it. Yes I know there's a guy on xitter claiming tfone is a prequel to the Bay movies but he's wrong.

What is a continuity family?

Most storylines include tie-in novels, comics, video games, and other shows that all share the same canon.

The Aligned Continuity is the most well known. It consists of Transformers Prime, Rescue Bots, Rescue Bots Academy, Robots in Disguise 2015, multiple video games, and some tie-in novels and comics. They are all ostensibly set in the same canon... except the Aligned Continuity is inconsistent so even its lore is loose :')

My point is that while every continuity is separate, some shows are connected.

(Sorry if this is confusing. It is confusing. You get used to it)

What about fanon?

The Transformers franchise is old enough that a lot of fanon has become so pervasive it exists in a sort of nebulous space where it feels like it could be canon or at least become canon once enough fans are working for Hasbro but essentially: oh boy is there a lot of fanon

For example: seeker trines, doorwing speak, the Unicron Singularity and all forms of robot sex (sorry) are fanon, but they appear so often in fanworks that it's easy to get confused (I know I do!)

It's safest to assume something isn't canon unless you've seen it in a show (and even then, it may only be canon to that particular show)

Can I mix-and-match in my own fanworks?

Absolutely! It's very common for creators to set a story in one continuity but transplant a character from another, or use a different backstory, or borrow whole plot points from different canons. Chop up that lore and make a delicious continuity soup.

So why is this important?

It is very, very, very, very, very frustrating to be "corrected" about something that isn't relevant, or to see someone critisize a show based on lore that doesn't apply, or to have a character be called OOC when they're not, etc. I think a lot of fandom slapfights could be avoided if more people understood how loose Transformers canon actually is. Do what you want with your own creations but please be mindful when it comes to interacting with other people's.

This is A Lot

You don't have to know everything about Transformers to be in the fandom and have a good time - if you're only interested in TF One that is perfectly alright, you don't need to watch every show and read every comic and play every game to be considered a fan of something.

But if you want to find out more I recommend checking out the TFWiki - it isn't perfect but it gives a good rundown of most general lore as well as details about specific shows.

That's it from me. I hope this is helpful! It's the sort of thing I would have liked to read when I first joined the fandom haha

[transmutationisms]

could you talk more on eds and biopolitics?

sure, so this is broad strokes and it's also worth reiterating that the energy deficit characteristic of EDs can have a lot of different causes besides intentional food restriction—food insecurity is a huge and underrecognised factor here but there are many others. so when i talk about intentional restriction and the desire to be thin / lose weight, i'm not suggesting these are universal characteristics or causes of EDs.

anyway though, in the context of discussing these things, and particularly the relationship between 'diet culture' and EDs, a perennial frustration to me is that i often hear people fall back on the idea that the desire to be thin comes about as a result of the beauty standards perpetuated in mass media, fashion adverts, &c, without any subsequent interrogation of why it is that beauty itself is now so heavily dependent on thinness. after all, plenty of people have pointed out this is not a universal; beauty varies in different times and places, what is described or depicted as beautiful in historical records doesn't necessarily have much overlap with today's hegemonic standards, and so forth.

so when historicising this phenomenon it becomes very clear that the euro/anglo standard of thinness as beauty is, one, part of the ideological apparatus justifying colonialism thru the creation of race and white supremacy. sabrina strings and da'shaun harrison have written on this. two, the thin ideal is also inextricably tied up in medical discourses defining the ideal body as one that is economically productive, with the promise being that if the populace can be transformed into 'healthy',*** useful, hardworking citizens, the state benefits. control of bodyweight is therefore certainly a means of demonstrating one's supposed self-control, moral discipline, &c, but it is also a demand expressed in medical terms: these two discourses merge and overlap, and are both part of the capitalist state's transformation of its citizenry into a biological resource that can be controlled, managed, and exploited to bourgeois ends (profit): hence, biopolitics.

(***the story of how 'health' itself comes to be so dependent on thinness is obviously a critical piece of all this but this post is long as shit already so suffice it to say that this conflation is also not obvious, necessary, universal, &c &c)

medico-political discourses in the 19th century tended to talk about the dangers of both over- and under-weight more than what we hear now; similarly, if you think about something like wilbur atwater's calorie-value charts, these were explicitly intended to guide labourers to the most calorie-dense foods, because to atwater the central danger to be avoided was starvation among the workforce. these days in wealthy countries like the us, you are much more likely to hear about weight management in the context of demands to reduce; this is of course following moves like the WHO declaring an 'obesity epidemic' in 1997, and the rise in the usa of more explicitly nationalist, militaristic weight-loss rhetoric in the post-9/11 era.

however, my position is that these demands for thinness, and the beauty standard that follows and justifies them, are not a departure from earlier 19th- and 20th-century scientific nutrition advice, just an evolution that, for a multitude of reasons (politics, medical professional interests, insurance company practices, &c) has simply come to focus more on the ostensible economic and national threat posed by fatness. the underlying logic bears the biopolitical throughline: the state has, or ought to have, an interest in enforcing the health of its population, and as part of this demands that you the individual surveil and alter your weight according to the scientific guidelines du jour.

this is fertile ground for the development of what, in extreme form, we regard as ED pathology. first, because even the most purely 'health'-motivated individual engaging in the required degree of bodily monitoring and caloric restriction is liable to respond to energy deficit in ways that can become diagnosably distressing. second, because the morals of 'health' are never far from standards of beauty; thinness is sold in overtly profitable ways (the diet and weight-loss industries) and furthermore, our idea of beauty is often a kind of post hoc justification for the thinness already being demanded by state and medical authorities. which is really just to say, beauty is part of the ideological superstructure both resulting from and invoked as a justification for the material conditions of capitalist biopolitics. again this is very broad strokes, but imo it is a much more useful framework to understand EDs than simply presenting them as a result of desiring thinness because it is glorified in The Media, because... reasons (essentially the rené girard model, lol).

[bairdthereader]

Intentional Touch, Respected Space: A By-Episode Study, Part 2

This is the space where their love grows in safety.

S1E2: Crush

[Note: My longest and giffy-est post yet, but episode 2 is nothing short of monumental in the Narlie relationship. Grab a cuppa, a few biscuits, settle in, and enjoy!]

When we pick up with episode two, Nick and Charlie are in their private spaces, both trying to process the events of the day. Charlie does this by playing the drums and likely engaging in some very negative and circular thought patterns. Nick, meanwhile, is busy integrating this new knowledge of Charlie’s life experience with Nick’s previous, less nuanced perception of him. He’s trying to get a more complete picture of Charlie, to understand more deeply how this part of Charlie’s life affects the rest of it and makes him who he is. Of course he turns to the internet first, because Nick. We get the sense that maybe Nick has never really looked at Charlie’s Insta, based on how charmed he is by the first few lighthearted posts he sees. Then he comes across Charlie’s post succinctly expressing his hatred for school and his horrible experiences there.

This triggers a flood of memories of comments Nick had heard made about Charlie around the time he was outed the year before. While it’s highly unlikely that Nick hasn’t thought about this at all in the time he’s gotten to know Charlie, perhaps it’s been mostly background noise, or at least somewhat removed from his own experiences with Charlie. After witnessing Ben’s psychological and physical assault on Charlie, these memories have new profundity, clarity, and a terrible nearness. And they bring with them some delayed and misplaced guilt; now that Nick knows Charlie personally, he knows he would have done something about the past bullying if he’d had the chance. This is the wholeness of understanding Nick wants, even if it is uncomfortable and distressing, and with it comes a pressing concern for Charlie’s well-being. Nick feels an intense need to check in, so he does.

Of course it must be noted that Charlie made the virtual check-in leap first, after a bout of classic Charlie Spring overthinking. Justified overthinking in this case, since Charlie is highly aware that, immediately after he and Nick were pushed across boundaries in their friendship by the confrontation with Ben, he’s stepping over another line by adding texting to the mix. At the risk of getting a bit too meta, I’ll say this counts as an intentional, if virtual, touch. It’s a point of contact, reaching across the space between them, and though there’s an asynchrony to this form of touch, it’s still a new type of closeness for Nick and Charlie. It’s clear that they have not exchanged messages before, so by establishing this connection Charlie moves their communication from school-based and public to online and private. It doesn’t seem like a big deal on the face of it, but it is; it’s a pebble dropped in a pond that starts a flood.

Especially when Nick decides to reciprocate. Another thing we have to note here is that, in direct contrast to Ben’s rapid-fire, aggressive texts with Charlie, Nick gives Charlie time to respond. He respects that space between them, the room Charlie needs to emotionally maneuver and figure out how much he wants to tell Nick about Ben. Only when his uneasiness over Charlie's silence grows too great does he follow up on his original question, and even then, he continues to respect the space. He acknowledges Charlie’s right to keep things to himself, and simply offers a confirmation of his friendship, reiterating to Charlie that he is safe and trustworthy, and then leaving Charlie to decide on his own.

Charlie chooses to trust and share.

This new thread of connection snaps taut between them, and it never loosens again.

There now exists an increased ease between Nick and Charlie. When Nick invites Charlie to his house (ostensibly to meet Nellie), Charlie's posture is clearly relaxed and just slightly curled toward Nick, while Nick’s invitation is delivered easily and with no hesitation. Now, not only do they have private online conversation, they also have time together away from the social confines of school, time that belongs only to them. Another boundary is removed, that space between them narrowed just a bit more.

After requisite “hi”s have been exchanged and Nellie has been given the attention she rightfully deserves, Nick practically flings himself across the intentional touch divide. Charlie’s had a haircut (has he though? I’m with Tori on this one), and Nick reaches out, across the open doorway, to gently tug at Charlie’s curls. Charlie is obviously surprised, pleased, and a little confused. But this is a clear indicator from Nick, and a fairly clear acceptance from Charlie, that this kind of playful touch now falls within the bounds of their friendship. While there's a lot going on here for Nick as he realizes he does, in fact, notice aspects of Charlie's physical appearance and have strong enough reactions to them to both have and offer an opinion, he is not intentionally flirting with this gesture any more than Charlie is by asking nervously if the haircut is bad. Any flirting here is accidental or subconscious; they're still maintaining that caring respect for each other.

After Nick lists (just a few, it must be said) of Charlie’s positive qualities, Charlie mirrors Nick’s earlier playfulness with some of his own, covering Nick’s mouth with his hand and pushing him down on the bed. This could easily have become a more heated moment for Charlie, but it doesn’t, in part because Charlie is still incredibly conscious of the space required by their differing vantage points on the relationship. He uses only one hand, the other still grasping the video game controller and held down by his side; he looks at Nick's face only for a brief second before diverting his gaze; and he lets Nick push him off easily. Still, this is a freer Charlie than we’ve seen thus far, a Charlie who understands that, crush and romantic feelings aside, he’s found someone he can be himself with, and with whom he can safely express some affection, even if he has to keep the larger part of it concealed. Nick is surprised but responds in kind, equally playful with a huge smile and laughing “get off me!” (though notably slow to actually physically push Charlie away). His face clearly shows delight in witnessing a side of Charlie he hasn’t seen before, and these moments of casual but respectful touch have played a part in that.

Then comes the snow, and possibly the sweetest montage of the whole season. Here is a place where they can bring joy and easy openness into that safe, respected space between them. We get a glimpse of Nick brushing snow out of Charlie’s hair, shoving snow into the neck of Charlie’s coat, and flopping down to make a snow angel close enough to Charlie to brush his arm. Charlie’s delighted surprise is a little more nuanced, because the beginnings of hope are making themselves known, and there's a little bit of speculation in the way he views Nick's actions.

Despite Nick’s clear comfort with Charlie’s nearness (only Nellie separates them in this final scene, and Nick’s upper arm is crossed over Charlie’s while they talk in the snow), Charlie is still a bit more restrained—he doesn’t initiate much of this contact. He’s conscious of the fact that touch still means something slightly different, slightly more, to him than it does to Nick, so he generally allows Nick to choose when to use intentional touch.

While Nick’s conversation with his mom later isn’t about touch, I do think it’s there in the subtext. Sarah tells Nick he seems more himself around Charlie, so we have to conclude that she’s at least partly referencing the relaxed playfulness Nick experiences with Charlie (which is absent or at least different from his interactions with the rugby lads, with whom Nick is always aware, on some level, of the persona he is expected to present in that environment). Nick’s default setting is physical affection, but he’s been holding back all this time. With Charlie, Nick can let down his guard, trusting that the safe space they're nurturing between them, where they can see each other clearly and authentically, will allow Charlie to appreciate this essential part of Nick's nature.

The result—according to Nick, one of his favorite days, ever.

---

Much confusion and speculation about Nick's sexuality and romantic availability ensue among Charlie's friend group, causing Charlie to have extreme doubts about those stirrings of hope he felt while spending time with Nick. Nick immediately understands that something is wrong, and Charlie's highly uncharacteristic reticence toward him lets Nick know that whatever is wrong clearly has something to do with himself. He very deliberately puts a little extra space between them, trying to give Charlie room if that's what he needs, while also turning to face him a little more completely, opening himself up and communicating a willingness to listen. When Charlie still declines to talk, Nick, with his characteristic emotional intelligence, leans back in, removing that extra space, helping Charlie see that whatever's going on, Nick wants to understand it and, if he can, help fix it. Charlie, after an internal battle, briefly but decisively sets aside his doubts to ask Nick to come round his house. After all the drama and rumors, it comes down to just the two of them, as it always should have been, offering each other the space and support and patience they need to understand each other.

When Nick struggles in his attempts to play the drums, Charlie’s deeply buried but powerful self-confidence comes briefly to the fore and he tells Nick to budge up. He’s testing the waters here a little; by saying “let me help,” he’s still giving Nick the option to decline, but Charlie definitely isn't his usual deferential self in this moment. Nick does not decline; in fact, there is nervous excitement all over his face. Both of them are fully aware that they’re erasing that physical space between them—they’re pressed together from shoulder to knee—and they both agreed to be there.

Charlie takes Nick’s hands and guides him through a drum sequence, clearly focused and happy, in his wheelhouse for once, while Nick finally, fully realizes and admits to himself on some level that the kind of touch he wants to share with Charlie has changed. He can barely mask the confusion and exhilaration and little bit of fear that he’s feeling when Charlie stops playing and looks back up at him.

Then we have a very intentional removal of touch as Charlie recognizes that, maybe, this interaction affected Nick more intensely than Charlie, or even Nick, first thought it would. Charlie releases Nick’s hands and steps away, reinstating that safe space between them, giving Nick (and himself, really) a chance to assess how they’re both feeling. Nerves and uncertainty play a part in this, and Charlie is clearly a little concerned about appearing too flirty toward Nick, but by taking a step back he's also respecting that bit of fear and confusion he sees in Nick, trying to lessen it if he can.

And now we get to the most casually yet profoundly intimate scene thus far, as Charlie falls asleep on the couch while Nick watches a movie, both of them bathed in golden evening light and swathed in separate blankets, Nick much closer to Charlie's side of the couch than his own. Nick looks at Charlie with intensely confused longing—the first time he’s looking at Charlie when no one else, not even Charlie himself, can witness it—and wonders, what would it be like if this space between them was gone? What if he could be that close to Charlie?

And here he tests himself—does he have the nerve, or even the self-understanding required to take Charlie’s hand? Is that actually what he wants? Nick bravely pushes himself to cross the divide and confront his new reality. When he hovers his hand over Charlie’s, the intent to actually touch is there, but it’s not quite enough to overcome the fear and follow through. Nick pulls away, once again retreating into the safe space between them to process the fact that he very, very much wanted to hold Charlie’s hand. This happens not once, but twice, as Nick essentially double-checks his own impulses to make sure he understands them, to make sure he does feel this way about Charlie. Nick's gaze takes in Charlie's whole face--obviously there's a thought about kissing somewhere in there, but Nick is considering the entirety of his relationship with Charlie, the intensity of his emotions toward and about Charlie as a whole person. The potential for a different kind of intentional touch is just the final piece of that puzzle.

Now it’s late, quiet, and for all Nick and Charlie know they are, for the moment, alone (Tori’s lurking notwithstanding). There’s a sense, unspoken and shaky but undeniably there, that the tenor of their friendship has shifted. Charlie admits that he wishes Nick didn’t have to leave, a statement that, in a less charged setting would mean little. Here, though, it's a subtle admission of deeper feeling. Nick admits he would like to stay as well, and follows it up with a very telling line: “You look so . . . cuddly like that.” Lots of things are going on here. First, Nick is not looking at Charlie’s face for much of this exchange—he's looking at the rest of Charlie’s body. And this is only the second time Nick has commented on Charlie’s appearance; unlike when he notices Charlie’s haircut, here there is nothing obvious prompting this comment other than Nick’s own desire to voice his thoughts. Nick’s word choice is interesting, too. He could have said “cozy,” “comfy,” or some such. Instead, he says "cuddly," a word with connotations of both appearance and action, specifically reciprocal action. To say Charlie looks cuddly implies that Nick has thought about Charlie’s cuddlable-ness (not a word, but stay with me here). Combine that with the progression of the conversation—from admitting he doesn’t want to leave to telling Charlie he looks cuddly—indicates that Charlie’s cuddleable-ness is at least partly the reason Nick doesn’t want to leave.

Charlie, with all of his suppressed hope, tentatively picks up what Nick is putting down. “Do I?” really means, “did you mean that like I hope you meant it?” Nick responds with an emphatic “Yeah.” Then there is a pause while Nick holds a quick internal debate. Charlie waits, seeing clearly that Nick is struggling with something. As Charlie often does for Nick, he’s maintaining the space between them and allowing Nick to make his own decision about whether a meaningful touch is what he wants. This is one of Charlie’s most profound and consistent means of caring for and protecting Nick, and proof of how highly attuned he is to Nick’s conflicted emotions.

Nick comes to a clear decision and embraces Charlie for the first time. Charlie, unable to quite believe it and unsure of the meaning behind it, waits several beats to return the hug, giving Nick a lot of room to change his mind. And while Nick is clearly a bit panicked about his actions and their ramifications for him, while he is confused and scared, he intentionally, courageously chose this hug, this meaningful touch, as an expression of his deep care for Charlie.

And this is when that actual physical space between them becomes intangible space. It is still there, still a vastly important part of their evolving relationship, but when Nick and Charlie are alone, that space is now held between their minds and hearts rather than in the tangible world.

[darkcircles4lyfe]

Life after NDE

Before reading, please see this post. It’s where I first explored the possibility that what we think we know about One for All is unreliable. It also ends with my own guesses about how Katsuki plays into it all. Now, with chapter 404, I can continue where it left off.

There are a lot of different tangents floating around here that I need to bring together for you, so let’s start with what came to light in this newest chapter. There’s a clear emphasis on Toshinori’s vestige form:

but did you catch the slight of hand?

How about now?

As soon as I saw the panels where Shigaraki talks about how the vestige is taking full form, I was practically shouting “OBJECTION” Ace Attorney-style, because they were a complete contradiction to how we were made to understand vestiges in chapter 304 (oh hey look, exactly 100 chapters ago!). Back then, it was suggested to us that Toshinori was special because of his quirklessness, that it allowed him to imprint upon OFA in a way that none of the other previous users could. In contrast, Shigaraki makes it seem like Toshi is no different from the rest. Like oh yeah, this is just how it works, they aren’t fully formed until they die, right? Hello?? No? I thought we were assuming the vestiges didn't have to do with actual souls, apart from Toshi? Given Shigaraki’s own brand of unreliability in his immature frame of mind, I found myself wondering: is he making an assumption, or is he letting slip a secret bit of information about OFA? Idk man, OFA wasn’t even doing this whole vestige thing until like a few months ago, so.

Either way, we can observe the change. As Toshinori’s lifeforce fades, he appears in OFA. I’m left with the simple observation that if he were truly different from the other vestiges because of his quirklessness, it would not have happened this way, since OFA doesn’t have Toshi’s own unique quirk factor to work with, but rather the other way around. You would have expected his vestige to stay the same, or possibly disappear altogether, since it was ostensibly exclusively based on the influence of a living consciousness.

That exception to the rule described in 304 never sat right with me anyway, and I’m not convinced that OFA contains mere memories of its previous users via their quirks just like AFO does. Sure, it’s nice and edgy to imagine that OFA/AFO are more similar than they are different, deep down. But poetic opposites are more interesting to me: AFO isolates by taking, while OFA connects by giving. Previous OFA users give themselves to their successors. One for All was “truly born” not when All for One tossed Yoichi a stolen consolation, but when 2nd extended his hand. There is something distinctly emotional and personal about that. Nana was right—it is kinda romantic.

Because Toshinori kept living, because Izuku has meaningful relationships, that chain of giving linked down through OFA was finally brought to light, like a circuit that’s being closed. At least, that’s how I see it. That’s pretty much what I talked about in my previous post.

Back then I also suggested that this theory of personal connection in some way explains Katsuki apparently having a vestige. Since chapter 403, where Toshinori describes his legacy as being embodied in both Izuku AND Katsuki, I was reminded of how Toshinori was gradually shown this over the course of the manga, as he came to understand Katsuki and his relationship to Izuku, how they are inseparable.

When Toshinori was inspired to pass OFA on to Izuku as he witnessed him trying to save Katsuki, he had no idea the two boys even knew each other. What he saw as a random act of selflessness was in reality a desperate manifestation of a connection that extended beyond memory, of osananajimi. With the eyes of traditional heroism, one could choose to see this as Toshinori’s fatal mistake, that he accidentally chose a successor with a “weakness” of personal attachment, but we all know that heroic isolation isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. No, I think Toshinori made precisely the right choice.

This is going to seem like it’s coming out of nowhere, but bear with me: you know how we still haven’t been told how the first OFA transfer happened? I feel almost silly admitting this, but I think it absolutely had to have been done instinctually, because it’s just too damn specific. As in, they didn’t know what they were doing or what it would accomplish, but they did it anyway. As in. They moved. Without thinking.

Toshinori didn’t fully consciously understand what he was seeing when Izuku ran to Katsuki, but deep within OFA, perhaps he recognized something familiar.

What if, somehow, without knowing it, Toshinori gave One for All to two people? His conviction and intent to give it was inspired by Izuku’s connection to Katuski. Yes, the transfer is inherently physical, but it also relies on mental assertion. Plus, how we think the transfer works may also be an assumption (again, the first time it happened was probably on instinct). Let me break it down even more: Toshi probably thought, as he passed OFA on, “I’m giving it to a successor who has my same balance of heroism—save to win, win to save.” But, in reality, Izuku relies on Katsuki for that balance, as his image of victory. Therefore I think I can argue that their relationship is irrevocably bound within the pact of the OFA transfer. Maybe because Katsuki’s part of OFA is based on emotional connection, once that connection is reciprocated…

…the full extent of that dual transfer is awakened.

I understand I’m making a lot of logical leaps here, but there has to be some sort of explanation for the Katsuki we see at the point of his death, talking to Toshinori’s vestige. I used to think it meant Katsuki had a vestige too. But then why are Katsuki and Toshinori alone, and without Izuku knowing? Moreover, why didn’t Katsuki materialize from the metaphysical mist around Izuku when he died, just as Toshinori did here?

Here comes the other thing I realized in 404. The simplest explanation may be that Katsuki isn’t a vestige at all, but rather he was visiting the OFA interior just as Izuku has done in his sleep or in a coma. Because he’s not a previous user, he’s a current user. The sequence of Toshinori’s NDE (near death experience) in 404, the way it manifested externally around Izuku as something Izuku was aware of, rather than internally within OFA from Toshinori’s point of view, shows me that what happened to Katsuki was different.

A lot of us have been speculating that Katsuki “has access to” OFA in some form or another for quite some time now, but I think the way the idea is suggested in 403/404 is an important distinction because it specifies the mode of connection. To me, it matters that they have two halves of a whole given to each of them, as opposed to, “the chosen one + his sidekick with a little extra OFA boost.” This puts them on equal ground, and it implies that the closer they become, the stronger One for All will be against All for One. It promises that these two idiots who have been toeing around each other and leaving things unspoken for so long will have to really face the facts of their relationship.

One last thing: you might be wondering why the other vestiges apparently haven’t picked up on what’s going on and told Izuku. Well, Yoichi may have felt it? (Where has he been?) But also, Toshinori is the only one directly involved, the only one who realizes his legacy is carried by two. Up until this point his connection to his vestige self has been limited, sort of one-way. For example, he could tell the other vestiges about his research into OFA, but in return he could only faintly pick up on things, and only while Izuku was unconscious.

The time Toshinori spent as a full vestige was brief, but I’m sure it was enough to learn some things about where the shade of himself has been. Even if I’m wrong about everything else, I bet he can give us the answers now.

[maybe-boys-do-love]

Anticipating the ending of The On1y One, I've been remembering an interview with director Celine Sciamma about Portrait of a Lady on Fire. She said,

"The ending of it is really climaxing. Because when we watch love stories, it’s harder, the frozen image of two people leaving in a car, you know, marriage, whatever. Like the romantic-comedy ending where they end up together, then that’s the end. Eternal possession as a promise of fulfillment. Or, it’s the tragic ending, where they will never [be together]. And I really tried to find another way... It’s a love story about emancipation. And that’s so much what we’re trying to tell: it’s not about whether you end up together, or you don’t. A good love story isn’t about that, it’s about: did it give you emancipation?"

Both Portrait of a Lady on Fire and The On1y One are about queer memory and history. While one is about recovering the distant past and the other is about the past of adolescence, they each lean firmly into the ambiguous spaces of what could and couldn't be articulated. How does a work simultaneously acknowledge the potential queer feelings and relationships from our pasts alongside the limits that impacted people's ability to come-to-terms and act on those queer feelings?

So many queer plot pieces of The On1y One are left unresolved in the last episode, and it's important that we look at that as intentional. It's a disservice to a show so deeply passionate about poetry to read its narrative from a straight forward perspective. It's filled with symbols, patterns, and gestures instead of a generic plot structure. @toastofthetrashfire wrote about what we might make about the symbols of circular and linear time regarding Jiang Tian and Sheng Wang, and I think consideration of those themes ought to be applied across all the plots that mount up into irresolution at the end. Jiang Tian's history of neglect and abuse at the hands of his closeted father, the disruption of queerness into the teachers' intense platonic friendship, and, of course, Sheng Wang's young gay panic: how do we incorporate these failed models of behavior into our queer timelines? How do we offer the potential of freedom and mercy to our recollections of them and our imperfect past decisions?

We have to believe in potentials and futures that didn't necessarily arrive for them. The last image we get in the series is that ellipsis of belief, moving us forward without truly moving. We return to the image of the glass pitcher filled with mint lemon water, whole again, at least for now, and we hear a promise from Sheng Wang to come back. It's ostensibly a promise to return to Class A for Jiang Tian, but it speaks to the desire to revisit the our past and to let it revisit us in new forms, the way you're meant to return to a poem or the best books, not to recall an end you forgot or to memorize it's every line but to be moved.

[krispdreemurr]

I don't think player-centric sexuality can be criticized without criticizing male-as-default. Even ostensibly gender-neutral protagonists will be treated as male if the writer setup a scenario that can only work if the protagonist is A) male and B) alienated from women the way a straight man would be. But even still, a lot of assumptions about the audience are built in. Things like gacha or harems having a majority of female characters to collect confessions from, with the minority of male characters being aloof and professional. 1/???

In Snowgrave we force Kris & Noelle into specifically ungendered roles. Noelle is the mage, the girl, soft & malleable - she's also the offense & the stoic one in the face of calamity. Kris is the knight, the human, the commander - they're also Noelle's support & the one who calls for help throughout the route. But I don't think "Snowgrave Kriselle is heterosexual" overrides that. Like, throughout the Weird Route we pigeonhole Kris & Noelle into a pair of functional but imbalanced & codependent roles, isolated from everyone else, and naturalize it through ideas of Love, Marriage, & responsibility. Is that not related?

look, I'm going to be direct about a doylist aspect here that I haven't wanted to bring up as strongly because I didn't want to just come off as snarky: I don't think toby fox, who I suspect accidentally stumbled into writing nb characters to begin with and who has been consistently kind of bad about it, is deliberately writing anything about male as default or the horrors of misgendering. further, i don't particularly want to keep reading people finding reasons to call Kris male in terms of story roles or whatever, because it feels bad and I think people are way too quick to go to male as default.

i do think a lot of what "default RPG protagonist" entails closely overlaps with a heterosexual male view of the world (god knows I've talked w people about the quiet lesbian amusement when a game has a character creator but still has all the women fawn over you), and I do think that has bled into deltarune's critique; toby fox writes a stock RPG romance gone wrong, and that involves the bashful healer girl (who is none of those things) and the strong-willed protagonist (who is none of those things). but i just think reading Kris' role in it as "male" isn't quite how I take it, beyond the background radiation of the world where anything neutral or null will lean male.

snowgrave brings in signifiers of marriage like the rings, and then has them treated as flat objects to be given for bonus affection and better stats. there's no actual bond formed between Noelle and Kris by them giving her a ring, and in fact one ring is traded for another even worse one the second that becomes possible. the relationship is reduced down to equipment and grinding and saying the correct things in the correct order. it's a critique of the flatness of relationships in video games first and foremost, and I think the ways it feels heterosexual are mainly just background radiation

[jessaerys]

something i'm very curious about and am trying to explore in the undergroundverse is what near is when stripped of the hobbies and the no. 1 position and the L title and the government underlings and without a case or a school or even the iconic white pjs (replaced and not); given death note's absolute reliance on plot to bring forward characterization all we have left is inferences and extrapolation and hypothesis and correlation rather than causation...... that's why it's important for me, imo, that near is from "nowhere"; his paperwork lost to the sands of orphanage after orphanage till he gets to wammy's before he's even three, his racial makeup obscured by albinism (and near, never once taking that dna test plunge, running away from even the smallest hint within him of wanting to know; if he wants to know, it means there's something else to him, and if there's something else to him, it means there's something that has been taken from him), it's just another way of taking that last variable away. there's obviously not a single 100% canon answer to the question and there are other variables that ostensibly throw undergroundverse!near a bit off the axis of canon such as having had a relationship with L growing up; but to me that draws new connections through the synapses of canon rather than bring in something entirely extraneous y'know... the question of why near becomes L and why he continues to be L post-case is often easily answered with the path of least resistance -near is, after all, all the things mello isn't; mello is the one who leaves, mello is the one who chooses- but, to me, that character core gains depth when you strip everything away but give him one single point of reference upon which everything we know him to be in canon (clear and just and silly and truthful) can then orbit: the one formative childhood model of what love is supposed to feel like. what i'm saying is L was wiremother

[miziluna]

KINITO BUTTON FACTS AND DATA:

·APPEARANCE: He has a peculiar and distinctive appearance. He has a round, smooth head with several long, thin appendages extending from the sides of his head. His button eyes are large and dark, and he does not have a visible mouth. He wears a long-sleeved, V-neck shirt and long pants. His posture is upright, and he has an endoskeletal body instead of sewing needles. ··(little whisper: did you know that… when he takes his true form, he is taller than his normal height? Which makes him more agile than usual!) PERSONALITY: ·Charismatic and Friendly: Kini appears to be a friendly and charismatic individual, which allows him to gain the trust of his victims/visitors.

Egocentric and Calculating: Despite his friendly appearance, Kini is actually a dangerous and calculating creature. He thinks he is helping, but in reality he is deceiving and manipulating them to meet his own needs..

RELATIONSHIPS: kim:(wife) ): Kinito Button creates an alternate version of Kim as a perfect, loving wife for himself. Kim is designed to keep Y/N comfortable and content, luring her in with her affection and care, while in reality she is a puppet under Kinito Button's control.

sam:(enemy)The version of Sam in Button-eye's world is a creation of Kini. He was designed to be the "Other Sam", an idealized and manipulated version of the real Sam, who is always smiling and helpful. Purpose: The "Other Sam" was created to help lure and keep Y/N in the alternate world, gaining her trust and making her feel comfortable. Control: Kini has complete control over the "Other Sam" and can manipulate him to his will. This includes forcing him to constantly smile and follow his commands. Rebellion: Despite being under Kini's control, the "Other Sam" shows signs of rebellion and empathy towards Y/N. At a crucial moment, she helps her escape from Kinito Button's clutches, sacrificing herself in the process.

Jade: (Friend but Enemy) Jade appears as a caring and understanding friend to Y/N, always willing to listen and help. Although she appears genuine, Jade pretends to follow Kinito Button's orders and does NOT work to manipulate Y/N's emotions.

Anna: (Friend Puppet) Anna is portrayed as a friendly, concerned, and sad figure who looks out for Y/N. Her role is to create a sense of security and warning, but she is actually another of Kini Button's creations. Kinito Button is designed to keep Y/N in the button-eye world.

Coco: (Unrelated) Although under Kinito Button's control, Coco offers advice and helps Y/N, sometimes cryptically, to navigate the button-eye world.

Noah: (Enemies) Noah is presented as a wise and protective guide in the button-eye world. She ostensibly helps Y/N navigate this world, but her true intention is to keep Y/N trapped and away from the truth.

y/n:(possibly more)

FUN FACT:

Fun fact: before Kim's arrival, Kinito Button was always rejected by several women who visited the alternate world! But… did you know that the same thing happens to Kinito from the real world (the father)?! It's just a bit sad, the reason for it is unknown. Although… he could possibly have an interest in Sam… (crazy)

·Kini Button is embarrassed to be a father in public! But when he is alone with a baby, he is very affectionate and protective! Therefore Kini B is already made to be a father (which is cute)

·

[queenlucythevaliant]

How do you believe Theistic Evolution interacts with other aspects of Christian morality and tradition? I mean, obviously the commands of God are the commands of God - but what new perspective do you think a Theistic Evolutionary viewpoint gives?

Oh my goodness, so many things! Broadly, though, I'd divide the implications into two groups: God's character and the unity of creation.

God's character

Theistic evolution is (I contend) the only framework for understanding creation that has an equally high regard for both Scripture and scientific empiricism; thus, it makes a very profound statement about God's trustworthiness, and about our confidence in him as the arbiter of Truth.

Seeing God's fingerprints in the creative process over the course of millions of years gives us a real sense of his patience and tirelessness. As Chesterton might say, he never gets tired of saying to the replicating cell, "do it again."

We also get a beautiful picture of God's sovereignty over creation: he is the God that knew, from the first time two organic molecules crashed together, that he was creating Man to glorify and enjoy him forever.

In the story of creation through evolution, we see a God who transcends time, but also works within it to bring about his sovereign will; who is endlessly patient, who is clever and inventive, who has an eye for beauty and a love for tangents and (ostensible) dead ends. What does it tell you about God that he spent millions of years creating the platypus? That he created dinosaurs at all? Through theistic evolution, we see a creator who plays across the vast landscape of time, creating endless forms most beautiful. Most importantly, we see a God whose wonderful works are faithfully recounted not just in the pages of Scripture, but in the very substance of the world he created.

Unity of creation

Knowledge of evolutionary history pushes us to think about our own embodied nature, our creatureliness, and our place within creation/the biosphere. We are united in lineage with all other creatures, both living and dead. We are embodied in the same carbon as every other living thing, deliberately, beautifully. This pushes back hard against the strains of "flesh bad" gnostic dualism that have run through our faith for pretty much its whole history. Heaven is not our "real home"; our destiny is the New Earth. God has woven us into its fabric.

Jesus stepped not just into the human lineage, but the lineage of the whole earth! In becoming flesh, he took on our place in the tree of life. Jesus shared DNA with Mary and her family, yes, but also with bacteria and brachiosaurs and banana slugs. While Christ died for the sins of humanity in particular, His stepping into the unity of life points to a future in which all living things are to be redeemed.

We must take the Biblical call to environmental stewardship very seriously then, if the rest of the biosphere is not merely our dominion but something of which we are an inextricable part. Evolutionary theory calls us to reconnect our theology and the created universe. In the same way that Scripture calls us to care for the world God created, evolution tells us of our direct relationship with the rest of creation, which implies a duty of care.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Literary Terms

Allegory. A kind of story that has a meaning deeper than its obvious one, and it’s a sort of extended metaphor. A famous example is Bunyan’s "The Pilgrim’s Progress", which ostensibly tells the tale of the journey of its protagonist Christian, but has a symbolic meaning that describes the journey of a Christian from Earth to Heaven. In Medieval times, allegory was commonly used to communicate religious messages, but later it became a way of commenting on politics or society. "Gulliver’s Travels" by Jonathan Swift and "Animal Farm" by George Orwell are both examples of allegories that use bizarre stories as parallels for real political and social situations; Swift was commenting on everything from particular politicians to entire countries, while Orwell’s tale reflects events in the run-up to the 1917 Russian Revolution.

Aside. A device that has been used in plays for centuries, involving a character directly addressing the audience without the other characters being able to hear. It’s part of the story, usually kept brief and often used comically to gossip or make a comment about another character behind their back. Some films make use of this technique too, with a character looking directly into the camera to address viewers, known in this context as ‘breaking the fourth wall’. This is something "Amelie", the eponymous heroine of the French film that bears her name, does frequently by whispering conspiratorially to the audience.

Litotes. Understatement used for rhetorical effect, and usually makes use of double negatives for emphasis. For example, rather than stating overt enthusiasm for something, one might say that it was “not bad”. Another example might be “He’s not unintelligent”, as a means of saying that someone is intelligent (or even a genius). While understatement might at first seem a peculiarly British trait, the use of litotes is common in a number of European languages, and was a strong feature of Old English poems and Icelandic sagas. There are also instances of its use in the Bible, and even as far back as Homer’s epic "The Iliad", in which Achilles is described by Zeus as “neither unthinking, nor unseeing”.

Pathetic fallacy. A literary device in which human emotions are attributed to aspects of nature, such as the weather. For instance, the weather can be used to reflect a person’s mood, with dark clouds or rain present in a scene involving sorrow. It’s a form of personification. A novel that famously makes use of pathetic fallacy is Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte, the stormy characters and tumultuous relationships of which are reflected in the novel’s setting: the bleak Yorkshire Moors. Ferocious thunderstorms mirror Heathcliff’s aggression, and elsewhere reflect the turmoil Cathy must go through in choosing between Edgar and Heathcliff. Pathetic fallacy is even present in the name of the novel, which is also the name of the farmhouse in which the story is set; the word “wuthering” refers to wind so strong that it makes a roaring sound, or to a place characterised by wind that roars. Such threatening weather is used to create a sense of foreboding, forming a menacing backdrop to a story populated by characters whose violent and jealous temperaments are hugely destructive to themselves and others.

Stream of consciousness. This literary technique describes a character’s interior monologue (a continuous flow of thoughts going on in the character’s mind). It’s a technique that came to the fore in the 20th century, famously championed by Virginia Woolf in "To The Lighthouse" and, more bafflingly, by James Joyce in his groundbreaking novel "Ulysses", in which the idea of a stream of consciousness is taken to its extreme. Trying to represent the randomness of human thought processes literally, Joyce penned paragraphs like this: “My missus just got an. Reedy freckled soprano. Cheesparing nose. Nice enough in its way: for a little ballad.”

More: Word Lists

[pagannatural]

Season 1. Wincest Narrative

The way this story unfolds is so, so beautiful and I lose my mind a little when I think about it as a whole. When it opens, the brothers haven’t spoken in 3 or 4 years even though they've both desperately wanted to, and they both think the other doesn't want them. The first time they see each other after Sam walks out, they struggle in the dark and pin each other to the ground and then run away together.

Season character arcs

Sam begins the season ostensibly satisfied with his life at Stanford, with a career plan and a long-term relationship. Two things have to happen to disrupt that- Dean coming back into his life, and Jessica being killed. Kind of a switcheroo. 

Sam was going to marry his Dean-replacement girlfriend. He was never going to talk about his past even though he still thought about it all the time, still looked up cases and tried to follow along with what was happening in Dean’s life. He was going to box his past up and put it away forever and pretend to fit in because this is the life he chose, and because Dean didn't pick him. And then Dean literally breaks through Sam's careful barriers and all it takes is a gruff “yeah well I don’t want to [do this without you]", and Sam packs his bags. He doesn't even look back when Jessica asks where he’s going. He doesn’t kiss her goodbye. 

The way Dean appears to Sam as this dangerous, rough-around-the-edges, so familiar and so alive and so secret fork in the road is just delicious.

Dean starts the season believing that Sam has rejected and abandoned him. He wants his little brother back so badly, but he truly thinks Sam doesn’t want him. He finally has something to approach Sam with that maybe Sam will care about enough to come back to him- their dad, missing. I haven't seen this episode but I know later in the show Dean says he waited for hours outside before he broke in, agonizing over what Sam would say.

Over the course of the season Dean pursues Sam and shows him that he will protect him, keep him safe, choose him, respect him, and save him. The one thing he won't do is corrupt him, which is what he believes their feelings for each other would do. That's a conflict he'll bring into next season, but Sam decides to love him anyway. Sam tries so hard to hold onto the world outside of Dean but he ends up succumbing. By the end of the season, they’ve accepted that they're the most important things to each other.

John’s role is crucial to Sam and Dean’s relationship

Sam wants to belong and to be his own person. John is the force dictating his life before he leaves, so he has to get away from John. It’s not possible for Sam to grow up without breaking from his dad.

John gives bundled baby Sammy to Dean the night of the fire and that’s pretty much the way their relationships with each other form. John has handed Sam off to Dean. They hold conflicting positions in Sam’s life. 

John is a larger-than-life god-like figure to Dean. He’s distant and he has all the answers and all the power and his word is law, and Dean’s contract with him is to Take Care of Sam. So Dean serves this purpose under John’s rule until they reach a point at which Dean can’t take care of Sam without breaking from John and growing up. That rupture came to a head when Sam left for Stanford and Dean takes his first steps toward replacing John when John goes missing, by going to Sam. Dean makes the first move after years have passed to reconnect, something not even John would do.

Sam and Dean are fighting against getting close again for different reasons

Sam wishes he could have a normal life. A normal life is by necessity also a life distant from Dean. In the first episode, when Dean drops Sam off at Stanford and tells him they made a pretty good team, Sam looks conflicted and chokes out a “yeah” before watching Dean drive away. He knows they make a good team, that’s not the problem. Throughout this season, he is at war with wanting to be with Dean vs wanting to be normal.

From the very first episode and throughout the entire season, it’s obvious that they were very close before Sam left. They make each other angry and they make each other laugh and they communicate just by looking at each other- strategizing and seeking each other’s opinions and assessing each other’s needs in glances. They instantly fold back into each other’s lives, they save each other over and over. They gravitate toward each other and walk in sync and stand in each other’s spaces. There’s this sense that they know one another, not just better than anyone else, but better than anyone could ever possibly know them. It's clear to the viewer that they're matching puzzle pieces.

And I don’t think Sam’s conflict is actually about hunting versus normal at all. Sam rediscovers his love and aptitude for hunting right away. He feels fulfilled, admires Dean, and enjoys himself much of the time. In “It’s a Terrible Life” (s4) he still asks Dean to run away with him and be hunters together in an alternate universe. So his conflict centers on John and Dean. 

At this point Sam thinks Dean sided with John and abandoned him when he stopped hunting. But it’s more than feeling hurt and abandoned by Dean- Sam literally cannot have both Dean and a life. Dean is all-consuming. Sam could get the things he needs from Dean- belonging and respect- if it weren’t for two things: 1, Dean is still unwilling to break from John in a way that matters and 2, the way that they love each other is so abnormal it feels impossible.

Sam is unwilling to put Dean above everything else because it is in fact a dichotomy- Dean is bigger than just a brother, he can’t fit into Sam’s life as just another part of it. Sam knows that. 

Dean’s conflicts mirror Sam’s. Sometimes he resents hunting and wishes his life could’ve been normal. He faces the same dichotomy- once he becomes more independent from John, he can either have a family and home of his own or he can have Sam, and he hates himself partly because what he wants more is Sam. He knows that's not normal and thinks a part of Sam hates him for it. One reason their connection is so fraught with guilt and shame is because it's sexual/psychosexual, which is why I personally tag everything wincest. The way sexual and romantic relationships are so often a blatant point of conflict between them, the way their scenes are often shot like sex scenes, the jealousy and possessiveness, the way they touch each other, the fact that they see each other as desirable. It all points to a love complicated by sex. I have no problem with the idea of them as platonic soulmates, but I honestly think the text supports just straight-up wincest.

And actually they're not soulmates

They're twin flames. The idea that they're soulmates comes in later, but I think it's more precise and also more useful to the narrative to understand them as twin flames.

Twin flames are one soul split into two people, and their purpose is to cause one another to grow and be challenged by their connection. They're halves and also mirrors. That's why their dynamic is so often this push-pull, why their connection is so palpable, why they find each other in every universe and why they know each other so impossibly deeply. Narratively, one is often pursuing the other and they tend to push each other to the deepest depths of highs and lows. They separate, but they always come back to each other.