#people see it even though the outcome is literally in the title

[lonz-ee]

rereading ragad for the third time this year. “guil: there must have been a moment at the beginning where we could have said— no. But somehow we missed it (he looks round and sees he is alone) Rosen—? Guil—? (he gathers himself). Well, we’ll know better next time. Now you see me, now you—“ IM NOT OKAY

I’m obsessed with tragedies that you know are tragedies from the beginning. I am obsessed with Horatio ending the play surrounded by the dead. I’m obsessed with Achilles and Patroclus not being able to grow old because they’ve been taken from the world too young. I’m obsessed with Romeo and Juliet lying dead, side by side. I’m obsessed with Orpheus turning around and Eurydice crumbling to dust over and over. 

I’m obsessed with stories that are so engrained in our society that we know how they are gong to end, and that they are going to end with everyone dead or destroyed. I’m obsessed with the fact that we read them anyway. I’m obsessed with the hope that it could turn out differently and the willingness to feel that despair again. 

[after-witch]

Horrorfest: Twist of Fate [Yandere Shigaraki x Reader]

Title: Twist of Fate [Yandere Shigaraki x Reader]

Synopsis: Were you always going to end up here, running, with death at your heels?

For Horrorfest request:

Happy Halloween! Could we see perhaps something like Shigaraki as Death? Some unstoppable force, bringing decay and destruction, while his love tries to run. But she cannot outrun death...

Word count: 450

notes: yandere, descriptions of death

How do you determine what events in your life were inevitable and which could be avoided?

For instance, the pavement you just tripped on--was it predetermined that you would take this specific path at this specific time, that your shoes would catch on the crack in the sidewalk, that you would stumble? Not enough to fall down, but just enough to slow your flight, to give him a few seconds to get closer to you?

Or could you have avoided this if you’d made a different decision? If you took a different path, if you saw the crack and jumped over it, if you were running 2 inches to the right and missed it entirely?

Maybe you could have avoided tripping altogether if you weren’t running for your life. 

Ah, but then: wasn’t it inevitable that you would be running for your life, thus negating any choices within this inevitable experience?

Because there was no other outcome for you than to run for your life, quite literally.

Shigaraki Tomura was death himself, and death came for everyone.

Even you. 

“You’re being stupid. Just give up, sweetheart.”

You hear his words spat from somewhere behind you--how far away is he?--but don’t turn or stop or think too hard about them. That’s what he wants. He wants you to waste your breath with arguments, even though you desperately need all of it to keep your body moving. To keep your blood and arms and legs pumping.

To keep running.

Not everyone was able to run. And it was your fault, wasn’t it, that he was tearing through the city; that he was reaching out and crumbling the lives of anyone who got in his way, knowingly or not? Because you refused him. Because you told him he was a sick fuck and you would never, ever love him. Because you ran from him

You can taste the dust of other people’s corpses in your mouth, blown by the wind. Sometimes when you round a corner you’re faced with evidence of his presence--piles of dust, dust, dust, where a person used to be. 

Eventually, you hit a wall.

A literal one. 

You’ve run out of places to run. You’ve run out of places to hide.

You hear his footsteps, his own labored breathing, making its way down the alley with deliberate slowness. You can smell his death and decay, like stains on his fingertips that won’t go away. A rot that has no doubt seeped into his bones, his soul.

Still, he goes slow. He doesn’t charge. He doesn’t taunt, though you’re sure it must be tempting.

Because he, too, knows that this was inevitable.  You’ve just been delaying it… and for what, really, nothing at all. 

All that’s left now is to decide: do you keep staring at the wall, or turn around and face him? 

[clatoera]

Always Remember We're Burned For Better Epilogue: I Vow I Will Always Be Yours, For We Survived the Great War

Here we are. The end of an era. I have..so much to say.

First of all..if you do not like the canon epilogue you will not like this. If you do not like the choices Katniss makes you will not make the choices they make.

Secondly...This fic took me exactly forty weeks to write. That is intentional, as forty weeks is the length of an average pregnancy is forty weeks. This is my baby. You have all travelled with me from the middle of my third year until the middle of my residency interview season. I hope you will continue to follow for what comes next, but this is my baby. Today I release her into the world for the last time, and I am incredibly sad about it. Thank you for loving her with me.

Third.. I hope along this journey you have grown to empathize with the four careers of the first Hunger Games Book. I hope you see them as the children they were, I hope you have even grown to care about them. I am a careers apologist (one of the OGs thank you very much) and I hope you have all opened your hearts to them, as well.

Finally.. thank you. I will never be able to thank you all enough for your endless support and comments and likes and reblogs and asks. Thank you to you all. I of course want to give shoutouts as usual. There are so many people beyond this list. Who I don't know well, or I don't talk to enough to want to bother them with a tag (like you @dukeysquid I dont want to bother you). But you are ALL seen. You are all loved.

I cant give one to the og, who has to keep her socials clean, but you know who you are. You are the first person I ever told about this fic, and have been around for allll the changes. Thank you friend.

@mollywog a TRUE og who has stuck around even though this fic is far far from her usual andher cup of tea. She's a real one. I love her. I thank you, friend.

@cyansadness another OG friend. I don't even know what you're into these days..but thank you for listening to the earlier iterations.

@bodyelectric77 a NEW friend, who has given me such insight on Enobaria and the older careers. Thank you for taking a chance on this fic which is not in your usual wheelhouse.

@crookedlyniceperson I am so sad for my last set of memes, but so thankful for the memes that brought us together. Thank you, and I cannot believe the insane AU in our DMs that I'm going to bring up after this immediately in the DMs. Thank you.

@clarascrabarmy ANOTHER OG who I always feel like i'm bothering, but I could COUNT ON YOU to read these when I was dropping them at 4 am when I was on night shift. I love you, and I thank you.

@lwveless my little college baby I dont know if you're even around but I wanted to give you love for loving Marvel with me.

@kentwells a TRUE BACKBONE of this fic. A sounding board of all my insanity. I want you ALL to know that the outcome of Glimmer and Marvel (Namely them not being back together) is entirely her fault <3 It was her idea and it is her fault. I love you. I love you. I love you.

Ultimately, I cannot thank @ohhowwehavefallen enough. In the last nine months you have become one of my legitimate besties. You have supported me here and in my actual life beyond anything I can put into words here. Our constant, non stop Clato aus and talks literally keep me going on my bad days. I love you. I thank you. And of NOTE: She is entirely responsible for the wedding rites of District Two. I struggled so much creating them, it took me forever to figure out and I owe the answer to you. I owe this fic to you. I love you. Thank you bestie.

Fun facts:

The kids at the end are not named because it is hard to name them but I have ideas <3

There are jokes for most of my friends here

The sequel is called Picket Fences, Sharp as Knives (High Infidelity, Taylor Swift)

Alright.

AO3

tumblr masterpost

Title from The Great War, Taylor Swift.

The End.

Thirteen months after the end of the war

“Clove, stand still.”  Glimmer clicks her tongue, hands tugging tighter the fabric at the small of Clove’s back for emphasis. “If you fidget I can’t get these buttons. I don’t know what I was thinking when I added them, knowing Cato’s probably just going to rip them off like a heathen–”

“Oh no he won’t, Glimmer, you have no idea how much he’s going to love it.” Clove assured, taking in the length of her body in the mirror. It was the first time she had seen the dress too, and unsurprisingly Glimmer did far surpass any expectation she had. “You missed your calling with design, seriously, this is insane. You made this?”

The ivory crepe fabric was fit like a second skin through her thighs, where it fell freely to the floor, even fanning out a little behind her. The trail end of the train had little windows of lace, with the entire trim a continuous border of hand placed lace appliqués. The top of the dress was similarly overlain with lace, a few pieces trailing up at her hips before coming to cover the entire top half of the dress. The thin v-shaped straps were made of the intentionally placed lace, and though the entire back of the dress was open from the middle of her back upwards, a couple appliqués seem to float along the top of the fabric. Even the open sides are overlapped with the ivory design. The most unexpected aspect may be the deep cut of the sweetheart neckline, and the large strip of open skin from her neck to midway down her sternum.

“Of course I made it Clove! It’s just for you! I even used the lace from that dress, like you wanted. I was worried I didn’t have enough but with the open neckline I made it work.” Glimmer hooks the last button with the use of her littlest finger nail, pushes herself to standing. “It’s going to be the only wedding dress I ever make, though. It’s an honor but I was so afraid of messing it up. Besides…everyone else is dead, already married, or not going to be.” 

Clove turns to the side, catching the back of the dress in the mirror so she can fully appreciate it. She could not, no matter even if she wanted, wipe the smile that stretched across her face. “I know you think the deep plunge is a lot, but I don’t want to ruin it with blood–”

“I know, I know, you District Two freaks have a fucking blood ritual.” Glimmer bristles, taking her hand to wipe at Clove’s side, to swipe away some of the golden glitter from her own dress that transferred in the hustle and bustle of getting dressed. “You know in District One we just exchange jewelry like normal people.”

“We do that too.” Clove teases, bringing her left hand up to wiggle her fingers in front of Glimmer’s face. There was certainly no lack of the jewelry aspect either, with a flashy, oval shaped diamond with the equally shining gold band that had come to live on Clove’s left hand. “And it’s not a District Two tradition, Glimmer, it’s a District Two Victor tradition. We are the only ones that are left– we’re also the only two victors who have ever married each other. We have to do it.”

Glimmer grabs at Clove’s left hand, running her thumb over the diamond with a reverence only a girl from One, especially one with no marriage prospects of her own, would manage. “I just want to know how he got it. The diamond mines in one have been closed from the war, this should be impossible to get. I’ll never get my hands on one of these, and my cousin worked in gemstone acquisition. I should theoretically have a whole closet full.”  

If she can smile any bigger, she somehow manages. Clove twists at the ring on her finger, exceptionally excited to add another band underneath in just a short hour. “He’s had it for years. From before the war, back before the Quarter Quell....he had it since the seventy fourth games.” 

“I don’t think anyone loves anyone else more than he loves you.” There is a wistful edge to her voice that Glimmer tries her best to tamper, though the loss of love still does not sting any less even now, almost exactly one year after the end of the war. “It’s extraordinary.” 

Clove grabs Glimmer by her wrists, wrapping the woman’s arms around her waist so they were half hugging, still facing the mirror. Glimmer rests her chin on top of Clove’s shoulder, careful not to disrupt the soft, free flowing curls that were still cooling at her shoulders. “Thank you, Glimmer.” 

Clove takes a moment to soak in Glimmer, too. She would have laughed, and maybe stabbed, anyone who told her two or three years ago that Glimmer Belcourt from District One would be standing here getting her ready for her wedding. And yet, here she was. 

Looking at their reflection in the mirror she could see there was finally a little bit more to Glimmer, far more like the girl she met in the capitol, and not like the starved skeleton of a girl she found in district thirteen. Her hair was perfectly curled and incredibly shiny. Her skin had the healthiest, most intrinsic glow to it, with the most beautiful pink flush in her cheeks. Even the gold shimmery ball gown– yes, ball gown– that she wore only added to the warm tones in her skin. Oh Glimmer, how she did indeed shine once again. 

“Glimmer? Why did you pick a glittery ball gown for a wedding in my backyard?” Clove raises a dark eyebrow, craning her neck to make eye contact with Glimmer directly rather than with their reflections. “It is summer, isn’t all that tulle going to weight you down.”

Glimmer cracks a smile– a genuine, gorgeous smile that Clove had not seen since a time before the war, a time before Glimmer’s heart was broken, a time long ago on a rooftop in the capitol– and gives half a shrug. “I don’t think I'm going to get many opportunities after this. I always wanted to wear one.”  She steps back, giving a little spin for Clove to truly appreciate her hard work on her own dress. It was solid gold, glitter covering every spot of the tulle underneath. The dress sat just off her shoulder like a princess, and truthfully the dress moved around her like something of a fairy tale. “Cash always got to wear big princess dresses in her interviews and parties and stuff after she won. I was so jealous, and when I won I was so so excited to get my turn. Cash was always in pink and I was hoping I’d get the same..they skipped the ballgown stage with me and went right to the– yeah. I just…always wanted to wear one. They never let me be pretty, it was always sexy and sultry and glamorous. I just wanted to be pretty.  And today is my last chance… Thank you, Clove. For letting me have this.”

Clove’s hand slips down to grab Glimmer’s and gives the softest squeeze. “You look so, so pretty. You look beautiful.” 

“You look beautiful, Clove. Thank you for letting me be part of this. Even though I am your only friend–” Glimmer teases, smile never leaving her face, revealing that it is truly just a joke.

“Oh way to ruin me trying to be nice,” Clove taunts, but turns to face the mirror once again. “Thank you, too, Glimmer. For all of it. The dress. Being here. Buttoning me in.”

“Of course! Now, I think I'm about done…oh! Do you need lipstick, I know you’ll just get it all over him, but–”

“Blood ritual, Glimmer.”

“Right. Freaks. Okay!” Glimmer reaches down to fan Clove’s dress out behind her, gently running her hand over Clove’s bare arm. “Okay. You look beautiful. Enobaria should be in soon to do your hair… I’ll see you out there.” She pauses, taking a moment to appreciate her months of hard work, finally coming to a head on Clove’s body. She lets out a content little sigh, approving of her work, approving of the little victor girl in front of her. “I’m just… really really happy for you, Clove.” She squeezes her arm one last time before slipping out the door, a flurry of gold and glitter.

Clove takes her final moment alone to look at herself in the mirror. She looks more adult than she ever has in her entire life, in a tight white dress, long dark curls free around her shoulders. It is different than any other time she has been dressed like this in her life. There is no Capitol makeup obscuring her freckles, no intricate twists and pins in her hair.  Notably, of course, are the faded scars along her shoulders, elbows, wrists. In a different world her scars would be wiped away, her skin unblemished and holding no evidence of the horrors she endured. Now her skin bears the proof of her survival. 

She had begged Glimmer to give her sleeves to cover them. Glimmer in return had insisted there just wasn’t enough lace for sleeves, and even if it were untrue, maybe now Clove could see that she was right to deny her request. 

Her moment alone is only brief, when the bedroom door in her usually untouched Victor’s Village house flies open again. This time, another blonde flurry of tulle rushes in, this one only half the size of the last. 

Cora rushes in, in her little white dress. It’s gorgeous, too, with layers and layers of tulle with beautiful hand beading on the edges that make her look like she wears snow covered rose petals. Glimmer clearly spent excessive time on this dress, too.

“What else am I going to do with my time?” Glimmer had asked when Clove insisted she didn’t need to go to all these lengths for them. 

Clove turns from the mirror to look at her sister in law, and with the girl’s ever increasing height she doesn't even need to kneel to hug her any longer.  “Oh you look like a princess, Cora.” She pulls her into her arms, leaning down to kiss the top of her perfect, ringlet curls. “An absolute princess.” She does crouch down just a little, holding Cora’s angelic little face in either of her hands to look at her from eye level. 

“Cato’s jeeeeealous I get to see you and he can’t.” Cora gives her a mischievous smile, one that Clove had seen on Cato hundreds of times and hopefully would see hundreds more. “You look soooo pretty Clove..” Cora reaches her hand out and gently touches the lace on Clove’s hip. “This is so sparkly.”

Clove puts her hand on top of Cora’s, squeezing so gently. “Glimmer really knows what she’s doing, huh?” 

At the mention of the blonde woman Cora somehow lights up even more. When Cora met Glimmer it was like the stars aligned for them both. Glimmer, who needed to see this beautiful little girl grow up safe, loved, and far from the grasp of the games and the capitol and Snow’s best clients. Cora, who thinks she has a real life princess in her family, to teach her all the things Clove never got to learn as an orphan girl. “She has a pretty princess dress, too, Clove.”

“You should tell her that, she’ll love to hear it.” Clove straightened herself, afraid to wrinkle the tight fabric of her gown. “Thank you for coming over to see me, since everyone’s probably having so much fun over with Cato.”

Cora gives a little half shrug, bouncing forward onto her toes before rocking back onto her little mary jane heels. “Marvel is lying on the couch saying he’s sick, and he won’t get up. Finnick is telling him to rally.. What does ‘rally’ mean, Clove?”

Clove’s eyes go wide, and she would not be shocked if alarm is written on her face. That is not something she was anticipating explaining to Cora for at least seven or eight more years. “You know, you should ask Cato when you go back, that sounds like a boy thing.” 

The little girl accepts that answer, and nods enthusiastically. “Okay! Oh! Clove! I have a present for you!”

“A present for me?” Clove kneels down to her height again, disregarding the fear over wrinkles and creases in the fabric. There was so much more in life than the perfect press of a dress. “That's so sweet, Cora, you didn’t have to do that–”

“It’s yours though!” Cora digs into the little pocket of her dress, fishing out a little silver pile that she holds out in the palm of her hand towards Clove. “You told me to keep it safe, see? Do you wanna wear it?”

It takes all in Clove not to grab the necklace out of her hand, to snatch it and keep it safe as soon as she recognizes what it is. She doesn’t have to, because Cora unclips it for her and gestures like she wants to secure it around her neck for her. With a nod, Clove pulls her hair out of the way, and blinks hard, willing away tears that would otherwise ruin the minimal makeup she was amenable to wearing. Clove runs the tip of her fingers over the script C, the sterling silver chain tarnished and worn, emblematic of over twenty years of wear. 

Clove pulls her in, both hands around her little shoulders as her hand comes to cradle the back of her head. “Thank you, Cora Jade. Thank you so much for keeping it safe for me.” She kisses the side of her temple as the door flies open once again. 

“Clove lets get this- oh! Cora. Cato is looking for you.” Enobaria warns before she steps into the room. “Something about getting to sample the cookies–”

“Bye Clove!” 

The little girl nearly runs out the door and out the door before Clove can process it, and she is left staring at the doorway where Enobaria enters.

“God damn, look at you Enobaria” Clove calls out, pursing her lips and looking her mentor up and down. Enobaria rolls her eyes but leans on the door frame. She’s opted for a well tailored black velvet suit, except that her skin is completely bare underneath the jacket that is held together with a single gold button. Her natural curls frame her face, tamed only by the gold victor’s crown around the center of her forehead. “You look hot.”

“Yeah, well, were you expecting me to be in a ballgown like Glitter, she looks ridiculous. I didn’t know we were playing dress up today.” Enobaria flashes her a coy grin, a grin that is no longer serrated like a shark, but restored to her natural, blunt smile after the war. No need to upkeep a defense when the threat is eliminated. 

“Oh be nice, she feels pretty, Baria. Let her feel pretty.” Clove warns, holding her hands out to take the bundle of flowers that Enobaria brings her in her left hand. “And it’s Glimmer, You really should know her name if you’re going to continue to sleep with her sister.”

“Chill, I know her name. And I'm kidding, I had to talk Cash out of feathers this morning. You’re welcome.” Enobaria’s eyes roam from her toes to the tip of her head and she gives just the slightest nod of approval. “You look like such a grown up.”

“I’ve been an adult for a minute, Baria.” Clove reminds her, but does turn her head to catch her appearance in the mirror once again. She feels almost vain for the way she keeps looking at herself, but if there is ever a moment to feel that, it’s now. “I feel like I wore a lot of dresses on the tour that showed a lot of skin, too-”

“And you were a child, then. A little girl playing dress up, even if you didn’t think so. Now, you look like such a woman. You are just beautiful” Enobaria comes behind Clove, and brushes her hair back off of her lace capped shoulders. She looks at their shared reflection a little longer, and Enobaria can’t help but imagine Clove’s mother would have looked all the same. 

“Noone uses that word very often for me, but you all keep saying it today.” Clove shifts the flowers in her hands– she isn’t entirely sure what they are but they are red and white and there is no rose in sight– and swallows her pride as she locks eyes with Enobaria. “You told me I was going to thank you, one day. Back when you told me you were pulling us from the same games. You said I’d thank you one day, and I guess that day is today. Thank you. For not letting us kill each other, or die together. Thank you for keeping me alive my entire life. In so many ways, I wouldn’t be here right now, if you hadn’t been there.” 

“Keep telling me I'm right, I like to hear you admit it.” Enobaria teases, but gently squeezes both of her arms. “I’m proud of you, Clove. Do I wish it were literally anyone but Cato, yes, but I'm still proud of you.” Before Clove can refute, she turns her away from the mirror and to face her. “I’m kidding. I’m not kidding about the fact that we all know you should have chosen something other than white to wear considering what you did on national television–”

“Enobaria!”

“I’m proud of you. I mean it. Now. Lift your chin.” Enobaria nudges the tip of her chin up with her knuckle, before reaching to lift the golden band of metal from inside her suit pocket. 

She centers Clove’s head, before gently and intentionally placing her well earned Victor’s crown along the top of her head. Once it is settled she pulls her loose curls to the front, untucking pieces from behind her ear. Once she is happy, she places her hands on Clove’s shoulders and twists her to face the mirror. “There. You’re ready. The last Victor of District Two..”

It had been a debate, how many of the traditions to follow. District Two had enough Victors that they had their own marriage traditions. It was questionable, if in a world without games did it really make sense to wear the crowns and say the lines? Ultimately they decided, yes. Because before they were here, before they were considered rebels, before they were even victors…they were partners. Partners who gave their entire lives to end up here. 

“Thank you.” Clove emphasizes again, nodding at herself in the mirror. The dress, the flowers, the crown… he’ll love it. “I think i’m ready.”

“Perfect. I’ll see you down there then. If you change your mind just say the word, we can sneak out the front.” Enobaria promises, stepping back, giving her one final look over before turning to leave. “Good luck.”

“Wait!” Clove freezes, suddenly overly aware of the pounding in her chest, the deafening sound of her own heartbeat in her ears. She has not done any of this alone, and she will not start now. “Will you walk with me?”

Enobaria pauses, and cocks her head as if she’s debating it before cracking a smile and holding out her hand. “Thought you’d never ask, kid”

Clove is unsure if she blacks out in the following moments or if time skips on her, but the next thing she knows is she is on the other end of a short aisle from Cato. 

Cato. Identical crown on his head, perfectly tailored black tuxedo clinging in all the right ways. She notices the white button down underneath is unbuttoned most of the way down his chest, and if she weren’t so aware of the blood pounding in her ears she’d make fun of him for it. 

She wants to kiss that absolutely infuriating smirk off his face, and she’s about to. When Clove looks up and catches his eyes with her own she is sure her heart stopped. She’s vaguely aware of Enobaria to her right, holding her arm and guiding her the twenty or so steps, but all Clove really can recognize is him.

She doesn’t absorb their friends line either side of the short aisle, in perfectly floral lined chairs. Johanna making a face, or Annie and Finnick waving with their baby. She doesn’t notice that Glimmer is sitting directly beside Marvel, her dress acting practically as a blanket over Marvel’s hands. Cashmere and Gloss are there, somewhere amongst the florals. She does not notice Cato’s mother in the front or little Cora in her lap. There are others– kids they went to the academy with, friends of his parents– but none of them matter, not now. 

All Clove knows is that the second she’s in reach of him, he grabs her by the forearms and pulls her into a burning, heated kiss with a hand on her face. Clove half heartedly tosses the flowers in her hands in the general direction of Glimmer, and grabs firmly on the unbuttoned edges of his shirt to pull him into her. 

“Hey! Not yet.” Brutus interrupts from his place at the head of the altar and the laughs of their friends pull them out of their locked embrace. 

Even when they pull away, his hands are still on her hips, holding her flush against him. “Hi.” He whispers, a boyish smile spread across his face, a joy in his eyes that she isn’t sure she’s ever seen. 

“Hi.” Clove whispers back, a heat in her face that she is all too aware of as she catches the way his eyes are trailing down the front of her dress and her body. 

Brutus must repeat himself once or twice before finally reaching out and breaking the reverie in which they stare at each other by nudging Cato’s shoulder. 

“For the third time…” He starts, and the distinct howling laugh of Johanna firmly plants them in reality. “I never thought I would be officiating a backyard victor wedding a year after a war ended the Hunger Games.” Brutus explains, before giving a jerk of his head to signal Clove to take a step back away from Cato, who is still holding her body against his. She obliges begrudgingly, knowing the moments they have left apart are counting down by the second. 

As Brutus begins to read from a long book of District Two traditions, Clove feels Cato tighten his grip on both of her hands. “You look incredible.” He mouths, and Clove can’t help but feel the blush rising to her face again.

“Like the lace?” She mouths in response, and sees the recognition fall over his face as his features soften just enough for Clove and Clove alone to notice.  

“Like I was saying.” Brutus raises his voice, once again snapping the two of them back into the moment beyond just themselves. “ In District Two, we are not known for verbal displays of love. We do not have deep professions of love through vows. This tradition is rooted deep in the history of District Two Victors. We are raised and trained in bloodshed. We are also aware of the vulnerability of allowing someone to raise a weapon against us, and trust them so entirely not to cut too deeply. This is particularly special for these two, for many many reasons. As all of us know, they are the only two District Two Victors to marry each other, and they will be the only ones to ever do so. What is most special, of course, is that these two were raised to be partners. I remember the day we paired them up, this giant monster of a boy and this feisty, scary little girl. They hated each other and then when they didn’t hate each other was when it became a problem for Enobaria, myself, and the other trainers. We made them too good of partners, because here we are today. What you’re about to witness is the blood oath of Victors. It is tradition to use their weapon of choice. Cato, will be first.”

Their hands fall as Enobaria comes and first, places the hilt of a sword in his hand, before slipping the handle of a knife into hers. Vaguely, Clove can hear Glimmer go “oh my god an actual blood ritual’ from her place in the front row of chairs, followed by a whispered “fuck I hate blood” immediately after from Marvel. 

Clove takes a step back, making room for the duration of the silver blade of the sword between them, and tilts her chin up to give him space. She does not flinch when the sharp tip slices through the top layer of her skin overlying her heart, she does not unlock her eyes from his when she feels the sticky warmth of blood pooling and dripping down the front of her chest. It’s not deep, but it’s enough to sting. Her eyes are locked on his, never once breaking when she feels his thumb wiping through the blood on her chest.  She feels like prey and a prize at the same time, with the dark look in his eyes locked on her. He breaks their locked gaze to look down at her hand, where he slides a solid gold ring onto her left hand, resting securely above the diamond she already wears. 

She does not even wait for instruction that she is next. She steps forward and the knife in her hand closes the space between them, and Clove cannot help but flick her wrist into the shape of a C as she slices into the skin directly over his heart. She hesitates, for only a moment, watching the blood run down the plane of his chest, before she too runs her thumb over the blood. Clove cannot get her hands to work fast enough as she grabs his left hand in both of hers, and works as fast as she can to get the gold band on his hand, to claim him as hers, hers, hers forever. 

Brutus is talking again, but it doesn’t matter. He’s got her by the waist, and she’s holding his face in her hands. She brings her bloodied thumb to his lips, smearing his own blood along his lower lip as he does the same to her. 

“I love you.” He whispers first, pressing his forehead against hers, pulling her body against his, taking careful care to only touch the bare skin of her back with his bloodied finger, not daring to stain the lace she wears. 

“I love you.” Clove responds, and is somewhat aware of Brutus in the background formally announcing them as married in the rites of victors. Cato Hadley and his wife Clove Kentwell Hadley.

 Her thumb hovers over his lip, before she threads her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck. “You’re my partner.”

“You’re mine.” Is all Cato gets out in response before he crushes his lips into hers. 

The taste of blood and each other is familiar and enchanting and all exciting all at once. 

It tastes like victory. 

Pictures, dinner, all of it passes in a blur. 

It’s nearly night now, and drinks are long past flowing. Cato’s mother has taken Cora to Clove’s house for the night, allowing the adult behavior to come out in full force. 

Clove is pressed into his side, his arm around her hips, hand firmly grasping the top of her thigh, when the sun starts to go down and Marvel makes a point to gather everyone’s attention.  

“Hey guys, you all unfortunately know who I am. Noone asked me to speak, in fact Cato explicitly begged me not to this morning, and Clove threatened that if I did she’d cut off my-”

“Anyway!’ Glimmer interrupts, taking the champagne glass from his hand and holding it at her side and out of his reach. “I also was told not to do this. But I planned this whole thing, and so I think I can say whatever I want. Besides, you owe us this, because we did keep watch while the two of you fucked in the middle of the Hunger Games. Also, the world was convinced for a little while that all four of us were-”

Marvel interrupts before she can continue to ramble on.“Originally, we were going to do this separately. I was going to talk about Cato, she was going to talk about Clove. I’m sure no one's expecting Glimmer and I to be doing this together..this is quite literally as close as we’ve physically been to each other in months.” Marvel begins, and turns his attention directly to Cato and Clove. 

“What are they doing?” Clove gets out through clenched teeth, pseudo-rage flashing in her eyes. Maybe it was the drinks, maybe it was the pure joy she felt, but she couldn’t find it in her to actually be angry with them. 

“Embarrassing themselves.” Cato pulls her closer, and leans them back in their chairs. “What's the worst they could say?”

“Noone expected us to be friends! We all could have so easily ended up in the same games, all of us dead.” Glimmer begins, a giggle escaping her that had Clove not been with her all day, she would have assumed to have been nervous. But no, that was the giggle of a drunk girl, who had been drinking mimosas since sunrise, that is about to recount something horrendous. “But by all accounts..things worked out for us. The stars aligned, fate stepped in..whatever you want to say. And I know Clove didn’t like me the day I met her. I can’t blame her, I looked at her and said we should have a double wedding and look where we are! They’re married and me and Marvel here can’t look at each other for more than five minutes without one of us leaving in tears–”

“He was drunk crying about her this morning. He had three shots and went down, going on and on about how he threw away the love of his life.” Cato leans over to whisper to his wife, who whips her head over to look at him with wide, amused eyes. “Finnick was literally holding his head in his lap like..stroking his hair. It wasn’t even eight a.m. yet.”

“I heard about that… You need to teach your seven year old sister what rally means, by the way.” Clove admits, poking him in the knee playfully. 

“Well one of us wasn’t stupid enough to throw away the best thing we’d ever have.” Marvel gets out, and Clove gasps so loudly at his repetition of the words Cato just whispered that everyone whips their head around to look at her this time. “Anyway! Clove also found me exceptionally annoying, and it’s okay, everyone does!”

“But what Clove has never heard about, is this story. We met Cato during his tour, of course, and he was this cocky kid. We thought he was just a standard District Two victor, nothing special.” Glimmer goes on, this time bringing the glass she confiscated from Marvel to her own lips and draining it. Clearly, the slip from Marvel left her flustered, too. “But, then it was the seventy third games. And Cato would not shut up about how good this girl was. He never looked away from her on screen. He stole all the sponsors talking about how incredible she was. He thought he was being so nonchalant and sly about it…but we all knew.”

“And I remember getting a knock on my door in the middle of the night. It was Glimmer, but I was positive it was someone saying Clove died and that Cato was coming to kill us all. Because I knew, if Clove had died, every single one of us, our tributes, and anyone else he could get his hands on, we're going to be dead.”

“And then it was down to the final few. I remember him sitting on that on that couch, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, rubbing his hands together so so nervous. And she threw this knife and she missed and I saw the color drain from his face. The fear in his eyes when he thought you were going to die, Clove, I wish I could say that was the only time I had ever seen it.” Glimmer shakes her head, the curls in her hair starting to slowly fall and frizz around her face like a little halo. “But then she won. And most of us were there when it happened, most of us remember the way he jumped up. And Clove, without thinking, he pumped his fist in the air and he said “that's my girl.” And we had all known. But the look on his face..I’ll never forget it. That boy was so deeply in love, and today I am so sure he still is.” 

Marvel clears his throat, and it is clear from the way his face drops that there is a serious turn about to be taken. “I mentioned that we were originally going to speak only for one of them. But, it is a disservice to the way they love each other to do that. I went through the worst experience of my entire life with Clove, in the capitol, and Glimmer similarly can speak for what she went through with Cato. We’re so uniquely privileged to have seen the way you both love each other so deeply. Most of you know, or unfortunately were part of, the horrific things we went through in the Capitol. Clove…she had it worse than maybe anyone. We all know that Clove is incredibly stubborn, and incredibly strong. What I am unfortunately aware of, myself, is the extent of what was done to her. It is not my story to tell. But I know that all those fuckers wanted was to get her to scream, and she refused. She wasn’t going to give them that. The only thing Clove ever asked for, wanted, and she’s going to kill me for exposing this, but the only time I ever saw her cry in those entire months of torture…was Cato. It was towards the very end, and I was scared, truly scared, to know they had brought her to the point of crying for him even alone in her cell... because I thought that meant we were all going to die if even Clove was at her breaking point. There is a deep, deep, incredible trust and love between them, beyond anything I have ever seen.”

At some point Glimmer had started crying, because it is through heavy tears that she concludes her aspect. “We are so lucky, to be witnesses not only to today, but to the way you two love. Through multiple Hunger Games and forced separation and a war..there’s never been a moment where I thought of you as separate. You are always Cato and Clove. Please don’t kill me for saying this, but I mean it, when I say you are my best friends. I do not think I would be alive without the two of you feeding me and pushing to keep going. I’m also really really excited for you two to have babies for me to be Auntie Glimmer to, I’m already in my fairy godmother dress, so if you two could like…hurry up with that and maybe give me a girl in like…nine months I’d really love that, thank you. We love you guys.”

Marvel’s hand experimentally finds the small of Glimmer’s back, and she doesn’t flinch away. He grabs a champagne glass off a table and raises it infront of him. “To Cato. And To Clove.”

Glimmer interrupts with a smile on her face that juxtaposes the tears running over her cheeks “to Cato and Clove.”

When Cato turns his head to look at Clove, who’s curled into him, he notices the way her eyelashes are clumped and wet. “Are you crying?”

“Shut up.”  Clove warns, wiping at her eyes with the heel of her hand, before she more properly turns her body to fully lay against his side. 

Enobaria takes the moment, then, to stand up while the attention is still drawn all while drawing the attention away from Glimmer and Marvel, who seem to be heading towards the bar set-up together. She’s also clearly enjoyed her night, her jacket now unbuttoned (and missing the single button), the fashion tape underneath holding it closed, but more notable was the pink lipstick faintly visible along her neck and collarbones. 

“I..couldn’t pass up the opportunity to embarrass you.” She starts gesturing towards Clove. “As everyone here knows, I raised Clove. We can say I was a mentor to her, but in reality, I helped raise her. I met her when I was twelve, and she was two. Her mother was my mentor, and we all know that her mother is not here with us now. I only feel so inclined to do this, because of the fact her mother isn’t here to do so. I remember Clove as this tiny tiny toddler, about the same height as now. I remember the day her bitch of a grandmother dropped her off at my house to teach her how to throw knives. What she didn’t know until right now is I really had no idea, and actually had to ask Cashmere and Gloss how to teach her. But hey, clearly, I made her a victor anyway. And then… there was Cato. This little infuriating prick of a kid, who broke her clavicle the day they met. I knew he was going to be a pest in my life, ever since. They were the best partners though. They knew each others moves, their strengths, and their weaknesses. They were good and then when they were teeangers exactly how good of partners they were became all of our problem. Clove..she was traumatized. A dead teenage mother will do that to you. I was not worried about her…repeating…that statistic. Until fucking Cato Hadley won the games and came home a cocky Victo.  And then…I caught her sneaking out of his house the day he got home. I about killed her. I went home, and I called Cash, BEGGING her to help me figure out how to keep her from getting pregnant too. Cato, Clove, remember to thank Cashmere for all the years of risk free sex, later.” 

“Maybe she should also be thanking Cashmere for all the risk free sex, look at her right now?” Clove murmurs, and the shaking of Cato’s chest underneath her is all she needs to know he is holding back a laugh. 

“I was ready to kill Cato, because I was sure he was going to distract her from her last year of training. But to his credit, and I hate saying that, he pushed her harder than even I did. I remember telling him to back off, and when he didn’t, I was so hopeful Clove was going to get over him. Clearly..I had no such luck.” Enobaria gives a smile that is so soft without her filed teeth that it nearly does not look like her. “When she was in the games, and Cato and I went through the fear of losing her together…I decided he was okay. If she was going to pick one, at least he was a victor, too. And as much as I hate to say it..he loved her then, too. When they went into the quell..I knew they were not going to come out without each other. I wanted to kill them, and I do mean that literally, when I saw them covered in that blood and going into the cornucopia, but then…everything went to hell. I was in the dark about them the entire war. I did not know if they were alive, I did not know if they were dead, though I assumed that they were. I’ll never forget when one day, when she appeared on that stupid video and she looked..off. One of the worst moments of my life was when I heard her scream for him in the background of that video. Because I knew…I knew he was not there. I did not know if he was alive, but I did know that if he was, he was going to get to her and get her home. And he did. I cannot believe I am about to say this, but I am so happy to see you marry each other. I am also very glad it is now and not because you were seventeen year old teen parents. Above all else…I am so proud of you both. Cato…Clove..you are both my victors.” 

At the conclusion of her speech, Clove pushes herself up just in time to meet Enobaria half way as she leans across the little table to hug her. “Thank you, Enobaria.”

One of the biggest joys of their wedding is to watch their friends enjoy themselves. 

“Annie!” Clove grins, throwing her arms open to offer the redheaded woman a hug. “Thank you for making it, I  know it has to be hard with the–where is that baby of yours?”

“Oh, Glimmer has him.” Finnick explains, taking his turn to hug Clove as well. He nods his head to the corner of the room, where Glimmer is seated at a little table, gently rocking the three month old baby to sleep. “She also gave us the whole Aunt Glimmer Fairy godmother talk this morning.”

Glimmer is in fact swaying in her chair, clearly singing some song to the boy. The longing in her face is evident, even from across the room, from the way she offers her finger to the baby in her arms to how she holds his bronze covered head intentionally above the glitter of her dress so as to not irritate his baby skin. 

“I think she should just have one herself.” Annie remarks, leaning her head against Finnick’s chest. “I think she’s meant for it.”

“Yeah, well, she’s missing half that equation.” Cato recalls, pulling Clove’s back to his now entirely bare chest, his shirt having lost the rest of the buttons throughout the night. 

“I don’t think she will be for long.” Finnick suggests as Marvel settles himself in the seat directly next to Glimmer, reaching out to tickle the bottom of the baby’s pajama covered foot. Glimmer gives him a smile before redirecting her attention to the baby, but Marvel, oh Marvel never looks away from the expressions on Glimmer’s face.  

Johanna finds them as they’re sitting next to the cake, in their own little world, spooning bites of the confection into each other's mouths.

“Okay, Lovebirds, where are all the hot people for me to go home with?” She remarks, slamming herself down in a seat across from the two of them. 

“Nice to see you too, Jo.” Clove murmurs, wiping icing off the corner of her mouth gracefully. “I dunno, I bet Glimmer would be down.”

“Are you serious? Her and Marvel literally snuck off into your house fifteen minutes ago. I don’t want to get in bed with them.”  Johanna scoffs, shaking her head. “I thought Cato would have a hot brother or something here..”

“Wait Glimmer and Marvel did what?” Cato interrupts, holding up a hand to stop her from continuing with her subject change. “In our house?”

“Well, in Clovey Girl’s house I think. Marvel had a plate full of cake and a bottle of the good stuff in his hand too, like the kind of shit Haymitch used to hoard at the games…speaking of Haymitch! You didn’t even invite them? Miss Mockingjay I understand, but after all Peeta went through with us..” Johanna clicks her tongue disapprovingly. “Cold even for you two.”

“We did invite them, Johanna.” Cato defends, reaching behind them and getting another slice of cake for him and his wife– oh he could say it in public now— to share. 

“Katniss is still on District Twelve house arrest. Peeta didn’t want to come without her. He did make the cake though. That kid can bake.” Clove swipes her finger through the ivory icing, before dolloping it on Cato’s nose. “We tried.”

“Ugh, you two are so gross. I’m going back to the bar.” She pushes herself to a standing position, surveying the room before straightening her dress. “....congratulations, I guess.”

“Thanks, Johanna.” Cato calls as she walks away, before pulling Clove fully onto his lap. 

“We did it.” He teases her, pressing kisses along the juncture of her neck and shoulder, “You’re my wife, Clovey.”

“I’ve technically been your wife for years.” She turns so she faces him, her arm languidly draped over his shoulder. Clove strokes his cheek with her thumb, and flashes him a wicked grin. “Now it’s just public.” 

“Are we ever going to tell anyone we did this before?” Cato’s hands come to rest on her hips, squeezing, promising of what is to come later in the evening as he leans forward and once again starts kissing from her jaw down her neck. 

She lets out a delighted gasp at the feeling of his lips on her.  “Absolutely not. This is for them. That? That was for us.”

I gave my blood, sweat, and tears for this. 

It is worth saying that life blooms through the cracks of a broken nation, love takes root in the rubble and ash. It is life itself, it is love embodied, that is a true pioneer species rising like a  phoenix amongst ash riddled towns.

It is the passage of time that lets life and love flourish in the new panem. 

It is friends in District One. Marvel who remembers the way cold aches in the very core of Clove’s body, and always has extra blankets casually lying out for her to take without ever needing to ask.

On a beach in district four, It is Glimmer and Finnick, watching her blonde little girl and his bronze haired little boy playing along the shore, with no care in the world other than their mission to find whole sand dollars and laughing in delight as hermit crabs scurry across their toes. Two children who, along with their siblings and friends, are free. Their childlike innocence intact, their bodies forever their own. 

It is Johanna in District Seven, who finds that she had more in common with career victors than she thought. Or maybe, Cato and Marvel just make her feel like a fucking genius when it comes to women, and thats good enough for her. 

In District Twelve it is a baker and an ex-revolutionary, who are never quite expecting for literal career killers to show up to a tiny little bakery on the edge of the seam. They come looking for cinnamon rolls and maybe tease Peeta a little too much about the status of his relationship. Peeta never turns them away (even if Katniss does pretend not to be in the shop that day, sometimes).

And in District Two. 

It is in the combined efforts of Brutus and Enobaria, in establishing a recreation center for the surviving children of Two. It is far from the training empire it once was, let there be no mistake, but it gives a playground to the ghosts of the victors they once were. It serves as a memorial of sorts to the nearly one hundred and forty tributes who did not come home to District Two.

Cato and Clove, above all else, are happy. 

These days, Clove does not have much use for throwing knives. 

The ache in her body, the sharp pain in her wrists simply isn’t worth it anymore. 

Clove Kentwell Hadley still never misses, but she is so much more than a girl with perfect aim. 

Clove is the friend of the only surviving victors, she is the sister to the most affectionate Hadley she knows. 

They are Aunt Cove and Uncle Cayo to the identical little daughters of their best friends, who wrap their tiny arms around their necks and smother them in honey blonde curls and pure, unfiltered adoration. 

She is half of the best dinner parties– Clove makes the best food, but Glimmer plans the best parties. (It’s a bold statement to call them parties when it’s the four of them and the only other career victors, but Glimmer won’t have it any other way). 

And she is loved. So, so, so loved, by the only man she’s ever trusted, wanted, and needed. 

Clove is no longer just the girl who never misses. 

In fact, three years after the end of the war, the only time Cato finds Clove throwing a knife is in their kitchen. 

Her only goal? 

Trying to earn the brilliant, infectious laugh of their blue eyed, blonde haired infant son in her arms. 

This is the life of a victor. 

The end. 

[batsplat]

i really want to hear your opinion on this. I feel like some people underestimate pecco a lot. most of the people I’ve seen on here are talking like it’s certain that marc will do better than pecco next year, but I’ll be surprised if it’ll be actually like this. pecco has way more experience on the ducati and nobody understands the ducati like pecco does. see race weekends like assen or mugello, he’s literally unstoppable and I feel like he’s even holding back. plus pecco is 26yo and he’s in his prime and probably will be for at least two more years before the decline inevitably begins, and he’s injury free! but the real advantage he has over marc, in my opinion, is that he literally lives under pressure and he already knows that marc will try to hit him on the track and above all mentally. he knows what he is getting into. when he talks about wanting to maintain harmony in ducati it’s because he’s already aware that marc will ruin it. like yeah ppl r saying a lot that marc is going to destroy pecco and all that, but right now the facts state that pecco is a 2 times wdc back to back (probably 3 by the end of this year) and right now on the ducati he’s the best rider of the grid. marc won his last wdc in 2019, it’s been years since he won, and he got his arm fucked up in the process. so yeah marc will try everything to destroy pecco but he needs to be careful to not destroy himself in the process. (this is not marc hate, I’m just tired of seeing people understanding pecco)

first of all, I'm broadly with you on a lot of this, anon, though I wouldn't quite as far as to say I'm predicting pecco to beat marc. second of all, I do think I have a bit of a problem where I have my rational sports brain - but I also have the other less rational bits of my brain. and some of those irrational bits are currently stuck in this mode where I have two different fundamentally contradictory mindsets that are kinda... mental blocks in terms of me predicting what will actually happen next year

mental block #1 is 'you've been following sports all your life and you know how this goes'. like, I've kinda been conditioned to think if you aren't a wunderkind, one of the talents of the century, already a megastar when you were in your nappies bla bla, you're basically fucked? certainly fucked when you are going up against one of those prodigies. you may get close and trick everyone into thinking it's actually possible, but... idk. this is a mindset that broadly stood me in good stead when I started watching motogp, like you just don't bet against fuck you talent. something like 2017, I never really thought marc was going to lose that title. so when I look at marc and pecco, however much I rate pecco there's a bit of my brain that automatically goes 'yeah but marc will win anyway'. it's that kind of... sometimes things that look slim differences in sports, margins that should be small aren't actually small at all, and in a way the end outcome feels like it was always kinda inevitable. I get that same sense when I'm watching 2005 last lap duels between sete and valentino - these are situations where you both parties should have a decent shot, but somehow you know that if you ran the simulation one hundred times, it'd basically always go one way. it's the illusion of competitiveness. one guy's always got something a little bit extra in the back pocket

mental block #2 is that it's actually been really fucking long since I've seen marc win and there's been a lot of false dawns on this front. I thought he'd win the title in 2020. I kinda thought he'd win the title in 2021. I was at least open to the possibility he'd win it in 2022. okay, in 2023... but you could still go 'yeah but he's finally physically fit now' (or, well, you could until the first race weekend was done). and honestly? gut feeling, I was feeling pretty bullish about 2024, partly because I didn't think the gap between the bike specs would be this noticeable. so by now it's a bit? you know, I kinda need to see him win again to believe it? which he probably does too, just a touch, and that makes it a completely different proposition from all those other titles... within this sport in particular, it's really not that easy to recover from years in the wilderness. you never really know if he can get close to handling the field like he did in his prime until he does it again. and... however impressive I've found him this season, which I really, absolutely have, I still haven't seen that from him. I also feel like currently... the magic is still there but his pace is so fragile, and that used to be the really scary thing about him - the relentlessness of his pace. this year, it's one lap pace, it's weekend to weekend, it's how sometimes he's slower in races than you thought he'd be - and yes, there are all these other explanations, but... well, again, if the bike is holding him back, if it's the ducati adaptation period, then that's all well and good. but I'm not really going to feel that's true until I actually see the next step

now obviously both of those things can't be true - and the fun thing about next year is that I don't actually feel it's a done deal. because, yes, people do underestimate pecco. and also because, yes, there's still some real question marks about the version of marc we're getting. just look at this sachsenring situation... obviously 'someone could get injured' is quite a depressing way to look at future title fight permutations, but you can't really treat it as a certainty that it won't happen, no? I feel like one element of last year that doesn't quite get the attention it deserves is that pecco was winning that title a whole lot more comfortably before a bike ran over his leg. the race right after that was misano, where pecco had won the two previous years and there's zero reason to believe he couldn't have done so again rather than take two laboured p3's. that's not a title fight anyone's primarily remembering as an injury arc (cf too the le mans crash) - but it clearly did play a big role and could easily have been decisive, without actually taking out one of those two contenders of competition. marc used to win his titles with a whole lot of throwing himself down the road to find the limit of his bike, but he can't afford to do that any more (if he ever could). we still need to see what version of marc we're getting, if we're getting a version who can just be fast anywhere come sunday - or a very good version of marc who isn't quite that. who knows exactly how much worse the gp23 is than the gp24! who knows how much more there still is to come in terms of ducati potential from marc! we have rough indications, but it's far from definitive. maybe one of them doesn't click at all with next year's bike! we'll only know when we see it play out!

and yet I still expect deep down that marc wins that. it's just kinda supreme belief in his fuck you levels of talent, the belief that he'll figure it out somehow because I've seen him do it so many times. and of course, the other big problem is we don't know what version of pecco we're getting! I have talked before about how historically unusual pecco is as a champion in many ways, which for me always makes it quite tricky to figure out what he'll do in basically any situation. like, where is his ceiling? is he still going to get better? is he going to get his act together? my problem is that I feel like I enter every single season going 'yeah I reckon this year pecco will get his act together, ugh he's going to dominate the field' and then it's just a bit? is this just who you are as a rider, or is this something you can still change?

the thing is, with my fullest respect to pecco's titles, however much I enjoyed those train wrecks, obviously you cannot do this against a version of marc marquez that is remotely up to scratch. like, you just cannot. pecco cannot do a 2022 and expect to win the title. against an even slightly serious version of marc marquez. on the same bike. pecco can't really do a 2023 either. I'll give him a pass for some of those late season results, but if you're chucking it down the road that often early on then, yeah, no

that being said... low key if you ignore all the little numbers, this year is actually a serious title fight...?

like I am always aware that acknowledging this could make them both dnf five times in a row but...? there's one sunday race one of them haven't won, and cota is its own thing. everything else...? whisper it softly but this is a good title fight? 2022-23 were sort of accidentally good because everyone's errors and runs of good forms and performance trajectories just kinda coalesced so you got late season drama, but this? consistent high level of performance from both blokes, decent wheel-to-wheel action between both title rivals at several different races (definitely more than in 2015 and everyone remembers that as a classic, also on course to be more than in 2013 and most years 2007-12). idk, at what point do we just have to acknowledge these guys are pretty good at what they do? sure they're on the strongest bike, as are the vast majorities of blokes who win titles historically. but bastianini's reasonably highly rated and he's not even gotten particularly close to winning a sunday race this year on the exact same bike - one p2 on merit snagged on the last lap and another one less on merit when vinales was highsided to the moon for mechanical reasons right ahead of him. yes, the title contenders have had some howlers... pecco's portimao and catalunya sprints were... well, y'know, and martin's jerez race and mugello sprint were also... y'know. but apart from that?

idk man... we can cry over photos of casey on his gp7 all we like, but at the end of the day these twits have come out with some class performances these last two years. and at a certain point you've just gotta hand it to them. they've become more experienced at how to manage a title fight, which is how you get a version of martin this year who is still fast but is less likely to phillip island it. some of those performances late last season were great! for every martin qatar and pecco india, you also get a martin thailand and a pecco indonesia. maybe they'll stop chucking it down the road so often, or maybe they'll keep chucking it but so will marc, because these days they have ridiculously many opportunities to do so! I also think it's worth pointing out that minus some questionable early season form from pecco, those two are basically always on the pace! they're always there or thereabouts! that's how marc used to kill his title rivals, not necessarily by winning a bunch of races but by making sure he was always picking up points - because he didn't have any truly slow weekends. these guys don't either at the minute! we are seeing them actually get better in front of our eyes, it's great

the other stuff... oof, I don't know what pecco's prime will end up being - remember, actually he's low key already edging out of title-winning age. he's now 27. this century, only two riders have won titles when they were older than 26 - valentino twice and jorge once. obviously, that's partly happenstance, and you don't suddenly get struck down by 'being washed' lightning when you turn 27... plus on the flip side, I also think the fact that pecco has only reached his prime relatively recently means he could have quite a few more years to go. who knows! who knows if marc being increasingly more breakable becomes a big factor! recovering from injuries gets tougher the older you get and the more knocks you've taken! on the other point, the ducati is a bike pecco knows very very well and has a lot of time riding... but broadly speaking I do trust marc with a year's worth of experience get as much out of that bike as he ever will. just the fuck you talent again. we don't know what that performance level looks like, but I don't think it'll be a question of familiarity any more at that stage

so where does that all leave us? do I really want to be making motogp predictions this far in advance? yeah, sure. if I had to put money on it, I'd still back marc, I think? but I really do hope we get a proper fight, and I really do think we might! I'm far from convinced in writing off pecco. basically *grabs the crystal ball, aka checks the races we've literally just watched* let's say pecco absolutely dogwalks the field at a few circuits. like maybe a mugello, an assen, a cute qatar, even a catalunya now he's faced down his demons (though maybe jorge on that aprilia goes bye bye at montmelo). then give marc his races where he laps the field twice in cota and sachsenring. and we're going to get a few classic duels, for the fans. if those duels happen at the mugello's and catalunya's of this world, pecco's might be in deep shit. if they happen at the misano's and aragon's and maybe even jerez's, we can get something going. they both have at least one silly early season crash (also kinda tradition for marc outside of his peak peak seasons lbr) and everyone gets to call pecco a bottler and crank out the good ol' crashquez. and then hopefully we can massage those numbers enough that pecco isn't crashing three times to marc's one and we actually get a proper title fight. and hopefully they don't get injured too badly. I've said this before, but I could easily see a title fight where pecco wins most of the big duels but his inconsistencies let him down. if his bad days are p3's, however, or if marc himself is a bit flaky at times, then we're suddenly having a very different conversation (also don't feel that comfortable in writing off aprilia/ktm and their respective star riders, especially in year two of the factory ducati partnership)

one thing about pecco (that you do also bring up anon)... if there's one trait in his competitive makeup that most reminds me of marc, it's his resilience. he's very good at bouncing back, he's very good at dealing with adversity, a lot of the times he's at his best when he's under ridiculous amounts of pressure... if anything, he's worse when he has reason to feel confident. it comes through both in what a class defensive rider he is and how good he is at dealing with title fight pressure. if there is ever a time where he mentally gets his act together at the very start of the season, surely it's going to be when he has the famous marc marquez in his garage. if that doesn't do it, literally nothing ever will. and listen, knowing marc will try to mess with you isn't quite the same as being able to stop him from messing with you. wanting to maintain harmony doesn't mean your chances of maintaining harmony are necessarily great. but... you know, pecco got his first ever win by defending against marc lap after lap, facing essentially the most stressful situation imaginable with the 93 on his tail. marc made him a better rider that day. marc might make him a better rider next year too... you never know

[soupthatistohot]

BSD: An Absurdist Analysis - Chapter 5

Atsushi and Fatalism

[Masterpost]

This chapter is an interesting one, partially because a school of philosophy is literally included in the title: “Sorrow of a Fatalist.”

Atsushi wakes up from his altercation with Akutagawa, during which the latter had claimed that Atsushi brings calamity upon those around him simply by living. At the beginning of this chapter, Kunikida is anxious about the Port Mafia coming for them and even tells Atsushi that it is basically his fault. Then, Atsushi sees the fallout of an attack by the mafia’s Black Lizard and decides to leave the agency so as to not drag them into his mess.

Atsushi is very much falling into a self-pitying spiral at this point. Although I presented him as our absurdist protagonist up until now, this is one of his weaker moments where he does not fill this role, and as the chapter title suggests, his behavior aligns with the idea of fatalism. This school of thought claims that no matter what one does, the outcome will be the same because life is predetermined. Here, Atsushi leaves the agency because he believes that he’s fated to always be alone, that there’s nowhere that he belongs.

Despite this, the Black Lizard still attacks the agency, and we’re given somewhat of a parallel to what happened in the prior chapter, albeit a bit different.

In chapter 4, Atsushi should have not succeeded in his fight against Akutagawa, who was set up as an incredibly dangerous force, but he does. Similarly, the Black Lizard are presented as this strong elite group of mafiosos, and the audience and Atsushi are made to think that the agency doesn’t have a chance, and yet… 

… the agency is totally fine. 

They’re so fine, in fact, that it’s played for comedy. The underdog has succeeded once more. 

I think this is less dramatic than Atsushi’s success, though, because its meant to show that the agency is a much stronger force than they appear to be, that even the most intimidating enemies presented in the story so far aren’t any match for them, whereas Atsushi’s fight was a lot less sure. Regardless, its clear that the audience is supposed to think its funny and a bit absurd that the agency took down the Black Lizard so easily considering they appear to be a ragtag group of detectives, some of whom are literally minors. Kunikida tells Atsushi that they’re pretty much used to raids like these and even scolds him a bit for not helping out with work that much. To some, this may appear harsh, but I think this was Kunikida’s way of getting the message across to Atsushi that the agency is his home now and he doesn’t need to leave to protect them, that they’ll protect him. This is why I think he starts crying — this is the first time in his life he feels wanted.

I think this also allows him to break from his fatalist perspective for a moment, because he previously believed that he did nothing but bring pain to the people around him, and this is proved false since the agency treats the mafia raid as a slight inconvenience at most. 

I hadn’t considered before this point the idea of Atsushi as a fatalist and only did so because of the chapter title. From here on out, I’d be curious to see if this mindset surfaces again in moments when his self-esteem is low. I think the chapter where he faces Kyu would be another instance of this, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there!

[Previous] [Next]

[kingdomoftyto]

Ah, POE has entered its Murderstuck phase. (Seriously though I'd be interested in seeing your classpects for the detectives after you finish the game)

AT LAST I have beaten the game and can answer this ask!!

Short answer:

Long answer:

[Reminder that in addition to the canon info on aspects from the Extended Zodiac, I also like to take into consideration the excellent old theories {aspects} from bladekindeyewear, a lot of which seem to have made their way onto the MSPA wiki {classes}!]

I'm going to try desperately not to overthink this too badly by psychoanalyzing the characters and their growth over the course of the narrative, because for past attempts at this sort of thing I've had people tell me my choices are way off base lol. As a result some of these will be a little more straightforward than my usual fare.

And, it JUST SO HAPPENS that when I go with my gut instincts like this, the full cast (minus Senior) lines up pretty perfectly with the full set of 12 aspects! That's too beautiful to ignore, so I'm sticking with it. >:)

Anyway, let's get into it:

Incompetent/Ideal Detectives: Heir of Mind

This one's kind of a no-brainer. The Denouement is without question a Mind power, anticipating possible outcomes before they happen. Not to mention Mind's general association with rationality and logic--necessary traits for any detective worth their salt. Mind is also all about your choices and how they change you, echoing the themes of growth and optimism for things to get better, even in the face of despair. It feels right to me if Wato and Saika to share a classpect, particularly the Heir class considering each of them literally inherited the Ideal title from the other. Heir is also thought to be a passive class, which suits their shared tendency to guide the other detectives to finding the solutions rather than solving every little mystery by themselves.

Doleful Detective: Rogue of Doom

Oh boy. In a brighter world, Doleful could have EASILY been the Light-bound of the group. His entire shtick is being supernaturally lucky--even to the point of tragedy. He would have been the group's Vriska, except with troubles that were no fault of his own. HOWEVER, clearly, the reality of who Doleful actually is paints us a very different picture. What we get instead is someone whose entire existence circles around the ideas of sacrifice and suffering. It becomes an obsession for him, both as a detective (as seen in his primary contribution to the group being putting himself in harm's way) and as the Duke (as seen in... his entire outlook on society). As a Rogue, his purpose is to "steal" the suffering of the masses, in his own twisted, pessimistic way, and because this is a passive class, he does it in the most indirect way possible.

Renegade Detective: Bard of Rage

This fucker is Gamzee Makara. I mean just look at him. He has the hair and everything.

...No but seriously, I'm not even joking with this. Go read the Extended Zodiac's description for Rage and tell me that's not Renegade in a nutshell. "Contempt for falsehoods, including the stability those false ideas can impart." "Would rather tear down a system and live in anarchy if they think the system is built on faulty premises." "Difficult to convince otherwise once attached to an idea." He's SO single-minded in his beliefs that he dies with a grin on his face just because his death follows his twisted worldview (which, wouldn't you know it, is another thing he shares with a certain purpleblooded troll). He also incites literal chaos and anger among the other detectives, particularly Workaholic, pulling them into similar delusions of there only being a single, violent way forward.

Armor Detective: Knight of Space

This man is pure physicality. He's simple, in every sense of the word. Just a huge, solid wall, an impenetrable barrier to all threats. He has a single solution to every problem, and that's to position himself in between danger and the people he wants to protect. And of course he's a Knight: his greatest asset--nay, his very essence--is the material suit of armor he's equipped with at all times.

Rowdy Detective: Maid of Breath

What is Breath but the embodiment of movement? As the athlete of the group, Rowdy definitely does plenty of that. But Breath also implies direction, bringing to mind her hanafuda cards, which she consults not to seek external guidance but to reinforce her own decision. Once she's pointed herself at a target, there's no stopping her. (Plus also, y'know. There's literal breath, and she has a pretty good sense of smell lmaO.) Maids, at least in the theories I follow, are an active class, and Rowdy is a prime example, manifesting her own forward momentum and allowing no room for doubt.

Downtown Detective: Thief of Heart

Heart is the aspect of identity and, relatedly, of facades--something Downtown knows all about. Outwardly, she presents a cheery, playfully snarky personality, but this is only one of many layers of masks. Her mastery of these countless faces are what makes her so skilled at manipulating other people. She sees effortlessly into what makes people tick, steers the conversation to revealing the info she wants, and then, like any good Thief, snatches up the resulting spoils. Heart also, however, refers to the unchanging core of what makes a person who they are, and to me this is highlighted by the way Downtown holds so tightly to the memory of her friend Miyuki, no matter how far she sinks into the Duke's web of lies and death.

Bookworm Detective: Mage of Light

I said I wasn't going to get too into character growth in these analyses but HEAR ME OUT. The obvious aspect for Bookworm would be Void, right? Her manner of speech literally obfuscates her emotions behind the detached wording of a third-person narration. Plus she's goth as hell. But much like with Rose Lalonde before her, I argue that this is because she starts out with her aspect "inverted", and that her self-actualization comes in the form of her embracing her true nature: Light. Light can mean fortune, as I mentioned in Doleful's entry, but it is also knowledge and clarity. Bookworm's greatest weapon is her encyclopedic recall, and this is put to best use only when she begins to open up to and cooperate with the other detectives. The sense of triumph Wato (and I) experienced every time she felt confident enough to speak in first person should be more than enough to prove that the Void clinging to her psyche is only holding her back from her full potential.

Posh Detective: Seer of Hope

The aspect of Hope can best be summed up as "fake it 'til you make it", and if that doesn't encapsulate Posh as a person, then I don't know what does. Even with her family fallen on hard times, she relies on a carefully constructed facade of wealth and influence to convince others of her abilities. Though this performance isn't always the most convincing to the other detectives, her stubborn refusal to abandon it is no accident on her part. She has convinced herself that her aspirations of rank and prestige (both within the Detective Alliance and in society at large) will manifest if only she can inextricably associate herself with the role. As a Seer, her job is to passively guide others with insight related to her aspect--which brings to mind her naively confident guesses that fail to be correct on their own but can and do divert the discussion indirectly toward the solution.

Mystic Detective: Sylph of Blood

With a name like Van Helsing, he had to be Blood, right? It just feels right with his occult proclivities. But even on a metaphorical level, Blood first and foremost represents the bonds between people, an appropriate theme for the group's resident father figure. Mystic is known for solving his cases with exceptional compassion and patience, emphasizing how the primary source of his success is his ability to connect with those who had otherwise been abandoned. These helpless clients, along with his more direct ties like his adoption of Bookworm and his gentle mentorship of Wato, bring to mind how Sylphs are specifically known to be a "healing" class.

Workaholic Detective: Prince of Time

Time can be a difficult aspect to explain. Like Space, it tends toward the literal, though even in that sense I feel Workaholic is the best fit for it, what with his fixation on past wrongs and his relentless, sleepless march toward his target like a clockwork automaton. In a more figurative sense, Time can be associated with inevitability or even entropy, which evoke Workaholic's single-minded pursuit of justice despite knowing his own destruction was likely to occur alongside Renegade's. Princes are famously referred to as the "destroyer" class, and he certainly fits the bill, both erasing time with the sense of urgency created by his betrayal and also directly cutting short the "time" of those he killed.

Gourmet Detective: Witch of Void

The Void aspect represents both literal nothingness (like the hunger that plagues Gourmet even years after the tragedy that nearly starved her) and also secrets (like the undercover role she played for the FBI). Even Gourmet's facial expressions tend to be vacuous, revealing nothing of her true thoughts or motivations unless she reaches a breaking point. Witches are a vaguely defined class but are thought to be an active one, perhaps breaking the rules of their aspect to their advantage. If so, this could be connected to Gourmet's superhuman gastonomy and sense of smell--imagine an all-consuming black hole, where our very understanding of physics starts to break down--but either way she definitely wields both her hunger and her secrets with deliberate precision.

Techie Detective: Page of Life

Techie's is the classpect I am least certain/happy about, but to be perfectly honest I don't think ANY of the aspects are a clean fit for him. That said, of the ones that do feel related, Life seems like a decent choice for a few reasons--not the least of which is his well-established habit of anthropomorphizing inanimate gadgets and robots. One could say he "imbues them with life". I would argue that, like Bookworm, Techie is still early in his growth, and this is reflected in my assigning him as a Page. Pages are known for being the slowest to bloom but with some of the greatest potential of all the classes, which rings familiar when one considers the sections of his profile that describe him "stagnating" in the rankings and apprenticing under a capricious dandy. With proper support and guidance, Techie would certainly be on track to do great things with his future. While Renegade accuses him of relying on others too much, Techie's willingness to sacrifice his chair to save the others--even when that would mean giving up his own independence--serves as proof to me that he's well on his way to embodying the quintessential Life-bound trait of putting others' needs before his own.

...And, uh, that's everybody! Unfortunately these assignments mean the party's session was doomed the moment Workaholic fried himself. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ No frogs for you, detectives!

[lady-corrine]

This is a rant abt the black and how people defend them so easily, you don’t have to read if you don’t want to,

Btw I’m teamless, I don’t support either side but I really don’t like how everyone depicts the blacks as the beacon of light (the heroes) especially in the Aemond situation

The fight between the kids was started by Daemon’s daughters and they all literally got Aemond to the floor and were ganging up on him until he picked up the rock (Which he wasn’t even gonna use because it was a scare tactic, he literally put it down until Jace pulled out the knife) and then when he starts to defend himself again luke takes his eye. I know people like to say “Well Aemond deserves it because he stole Vhagar” or “Well he shouldn’t have done it on the night of the funeral” but we are constantly told that dragons aren’t possessions and that the dragon has to bond and choose their rider, if vhagar hadn’t accepted Aemond then he’d be dead (Dragons aren’t family heirlooms passed down either) and while I do agree that it was wrong to bond with Vhagar at the night of Laena’s Funeral, I feel like people tend to block the fact that Rhaenyra sleeps with Daemon (He’s also to blame but I’m just pointing out a character flaw of Rhaenyra’s that people tend to ignore), Laena’s Widow, the exact same night also. Also Aegon, Jace and Luke bullied Aemond for not having a dragon so you can understand Aemond’s desperation because he was tired of being made fun of. Then in the next scene Rhaenyra sees that her brothers eye has been taken and still demands that he be tortured as to find out where he heard that her children were bastards, as if it wasn’t blatantly in your face that they are. Instead of Luke getting punishment (I’m not saying take his eye but this does also have something to do with a further point of mine, maybe taking his titles would have been better) the blacks get off Scott free even after starting this mess and taking a family members eye.

All that lead me onto my second point, Rhaenyra is spoiled. I know not many black fans like to see the truth but she is (I mean I saw that even her dragon is known as spoiled or smth). She’s constantly let off with a slap on the wrist because her father loves her so much he’s willing to look past everything she does, I think the perfect scene that shows this is when Viserys is telling her that Jahaerys would have disinherited her but he won’t because he holds too much love for her to do that. She acts as if she didn’t know what she did was wrong and blames everyone but herself for the outcome. Yet again when Aemond’s eye is taken by her son she gets away with it because Visery’s loves her a lot, his sons eye was just taken by her son and there’s no punishment for it 🤔. I do blame Visery’s for this because he raised her this way but it’s just a flaw of her character. She leaves Visery’s by himself for 6 years, even knowing he was ill and only came back to ask him to secure her son’s position. What kind of daughter abandons their dying father, who has shown nothing but love, and shows up only to ask him to secure her sons place even though he can hardly move and has been asked to rest? Selfish. She also expects everyone in the court to be on her side even though she’s hardly done a single thing to earn their respect. She won’t know what it’s like for Alicent who can’t refuse or go against the orders of the king like she can and just blames Alicent for being forced into a marriage.

I also feel l like if the blacks want to take a son for a son so seriously then they should have done the same for and eye for an eye.

Now don’t take this as me liking team green because I don’t, Rhaenyra would definitely be a better queen than Aegon, + I hate Aegon, I hate Otto and the others I just see a grey characters except for Helaena, she is an angel. The whole point of Hotd ,I feel, is that everyone does morally questionable things and should be seen as grey (except for the very few that are either just evil or good) and the whole reason I wrote this out is because I feel like everyone just makes the blacks the people that do no wrong, I’ve even seen people say that they’re excited for blood and cheese and excited to see this innocent child be killed and that it’s deserved when it really isn’t. If there was a punishment then Aemond wouldn’t have been so bitter.

[volann]

Everyone in tgcf is a foil character

Pt 2: Banyue

(here's pt 1, pt 3, pt 4)

While I'm sure something clever can be said about the meeting between Xie Lian and San Lang, if I do decide to compare them, I’ll do it later. So let's go straight to Banyue. I’ll start with Tian Sheng, and this is why: he is like Xie Lian when the latter was the crown prince. He believes in justice and wants to save everyone. He's also coincidentally seventeen years old. Tian Sheng represents the ideals that Xie Lian believed in his youth – he doesn’t understand why common people should suffer if they’re not the ones fighting. All the people who lived in wartime – Xie Lian, A-Zhao and Fu Yao – can see why this logic doesn't work in the midst of the conflict. There's not much more I can say about Tian Sheng, so let's move on to Kemo. We learn that he was weak when he was a child and people bullied him, so he swore to become stronger. He trained his body with stone mortar slate and thus gained his name (quoting wiki bc I can’t quote the books, I don’t have them in English). This sounds a lot like Hua Cheng, even though his motives might be different. Hua Cheng also gained his name by becoming stronger – the title “Crimson Rain Sought Flower” if taken literally and his reputation if taken figuratively. I don’t know what conclusion it leads to, but the similarity exists. By comparing Kemo with Xie Lian we can see how differently they treat people from countries that caused their respective homelands to fall: Kemo is still cruel to the people from the central plain even though Yong'an is long gone, while the prince, after almost bringing a disease to the same state, no longer wishes harm to anyone. He even protected and trained Lang Qianqiu, the crown prince of Yong'an.

Now, finally, about one of the more important characters – Ban Yue. With Hua Chen, or rather with Honghong-er, she is united by her difficult childhood and the fact that people around them treated them badly because of something they couldn't change - in Honghong-er's case it's appearance, in Banyue's case it's her mixed origin. Xie Lian helped them both survive. But her similarity to Xie Lian seems more obvious to me. During the war, Ban Yue tried to save as many people as possible from both sides, but it was hard. As a result, all of Banyue's citizens died because of her actions. She feels guilty for everything that happened even though it was impossible to save more people. Xie Lian compares himself to Ban Yue when they are speaking near Puqi shrine: he believes that the outcome of his actions was far worse than the consequences of Ban Yue's actions. Both characters don’t try to avoid the "punishment" - Ban Yue does not respond in any way to Kemo's beatings or resist when Fu Yao ties her up, while Xie Lian doesn’t try to get rid of his cursed shackles. They believe they deserve it. Another similarity is that both prefer to remember good things: Ban Yue forgets those who wronged her but forever remembers those who helped her, while Xie Lian prefers to remember tasty food rather than all the times he got hurt. They also died many times: Ban Yue let Kemo kill her to dispel the hatred of Banyue's warriors, and Xie Lian... the list is much longer here and it also includes deaths meant to save other people.

I don't think Pei Xiu can be called anyone’s foil, but it is still possible to compare his actions and opinions with those of Xie Lian. The situation here is somewhat similar to Kemo: Pei Xiu hates people with whom his country was at war. The difference is that he succeeded in getting rid of all the people of Banyue. Yes, it's worth noting that they were going to kill as many people from Yong'an as possible if they lost, but it seems to me that Pei Xiu would have been happy to get rid of them even without that. He talked quite a lot about revenge for what they had already done. Of course, there's still the question of how much he said to justify his actions, and whether the motivation of "I don't like Banyue" was stronger than "I need a better position in the army". Another aspect of his character that is completely opposite to Xie Lian is his treatment of the common people. Pei Xiu sent innocent people to certain death to maintain his position, while Xie Lian, as we know, wants to save the common people.

Perhaps I'll find out something else when these characters reappear, but let's stop here for now. I'll put off Nan Feng and Fu Yao for later again. It could be fun to compare Xie Lian and general Hua – as Xie Lian himself points out, their stories are quite similar, but I don't really want to compare the character to himself, especially when he has already done it. So it's time to step away from the characters for a bit!

In Banyue, you can only save a stung person at the cost of everyone’s lives. Many characters in tgcf are forced to choose who gets to live and at what cost, and I think in Banyue this problem appears for the first time – from General Hua, who saved the common people by interfering with the military and paid with his life in the end, Ban Yue  and probably even Pei Xiu to the place itself and the legends about it. Banyue is like the desert from the question of which of two people dying of thirst to give a glass of water to, and in the stories of many characters this is the central conflict.

[wrestlingisfake]

Supercard of Honor preview

Eddie Kingston vs. Mark Briscoe - Eddie is defending the ROH men's world title; his STRONG men's title is not at stake. This is a battle between friends, and regardless of the outcome here, they are scheduled to join forces on April 21, in a trios match alongside Adam Copeland.

Mark is an ROH original, going back literally to day one, but most of his career was defined by teaming with his brother Jay. Even when Jay won his first ROH men's world title 11 years ago today, and carved out a role as a top singles guy, Mark was still mainly known for their tag matches. Jay's untimely death in January 2023 changed all that. Although the outpouring of sympathy helped make Mark a bigger star than ever, he's likened 2023 to his "rookie year" as a singles wrestler, so you can argue that he's in over his head here. He failed to win the men's television title a year ago, and plans for him to chase the world title last summer fell through due to a knee injury. It's hard to tell if this is finally his time to win the big one, or if it's just another step on a long road.

For Eddie, the story of this match is mainly about giving an opportunity to a respected peer, and promising to set friendship aside to fight as hard as he can. Deeper down, though, Kingston is still reeling from losing the AEW continental title on March 20, to Kazuchika Okada. Being a triple champion meant a lot to Eddie and his fans; losing a second piece of his crown so quickly could be a huge setback. Everybody wants to see Mark Briscoe "finish the story," to use a popular phrase, but Eddie can't let it happen, so something's got to give.

I've seen ROH pay-per-views where the Briscoes headlined, or where Jay closed the show. However, I can't remember Mark ever being in this spot on his own, so that's an intriguing x-factor. I'm sure he'll do great, but will it be great like those wild tag team brawls, or something completely different?

I could see this one going either way, but I've got a feeling it's time for Kingston to part ways with the ROH scene. I'm sure he's loyal to the brand, but he's also never there because he's always figured into big AEW storylines, and I expect him to keep moving up the ladder there. Mark, on the other hand, is just a guy in AEW but still a big deal in ROH, so he's perfect to be the franchise player for a while.

Athena vs. Hikaru Shida - Athena is defending the ROH women's world title, which she's held for 482 days. If she retains here, I'd say she's very likely to make it to the 500-day mark. By the end of 2023 she had cleaned out the Ring of Honor women's division, so I figured they'd send her up to AEW. Instead, they've been sending AEW regulars to ROH--first Nyla Rose, and now Shida. Athena has never beaten Shida, who won their only singles encounter back in 2014.

For months I've been expecting Athena to finally meet her match, put someone over, and go kick ass in AEW. It could happen this time with Shida, but it could have happened in December with Billie Starkz, or in July with Willow Nightingale, and it just didn't. Shida brings more of a "final boss" energy than Athena's previous challengers, but she doesn't have to be the final boss--they could always do, say, Athena vs. Thunder Rosa, or Athena vs. Kris Statlander. It just comes down to how many of these matchups Tony Khan wants to do in ROH, where most people aren't paying attention, or on the nationally televised product everyone actually watches.

I'm in favor of Athena dropping the belt and getting the epic run she deserves in AEW. I'm in favor of Shida getting a title run in ROH if she's not going to hold AEW gold anytime soon. But I'm wary of betting against Athena at this point. This is a match that'll keep me guessing right up to the finish, and that's the way I like it.

Billie Starkz vs. Queen Aminata - This the final of a 16-woman tournament to determine the first ROH women's television champion. Starkz defeated Robyn Renegade, Diamante, and Mercedes Martinez to get here. Aminata beat J-Rod, Taya Valkyrie, and Red Velvet on her way to the final.

I was in favor of Starkz winning the world title from Athena back in December, but it didn't happen, and they announced this new TV title on like the very next show. So there's a sense that they created this thing specifically as a silver medal for Starkz. She's been my pick to win the tournament from the beginning. However, I didn't expect Aminata to get a bit of a push, what with the sit-down interview about her life and officially signing with AEW in February. So yeah, maybe they're setting the stage for giving her the belt.

I think both of these women are in line for big things. But only one of them can win tonight. I guess I'll stick with my original pick and go with Starkz. But I like that they have me thinking Aminata could really win.

Kyle Fletcher vs. Lee Johnson - Fletcher is defending the ROH men's television title. I like both guys, but it's telling that the most interesting thing about this matchup is that Johnson is married to Julia Hart, whose tag team partner Skye Blue is dating Fletcher. Hopefully these two put on a match that gives people a reason to talk about them in their own right.

I'm not a fan of Fletcher being the #2 men's champ on ROH and the #4 guy in the Don Callis Family on AEW. If he's not going to drop out of the Callis faction anytime soon, I'd like to see him drop the belt. But I get the feeling Fletcher will retain.

Matt Taven & Mike Bennett vs. Shawn Dean & Carlie Bravo - Taven and Bennett are defending the ROH tag team title. The two teams went to a ten-minute draw on April 4, which was enough for Dean and Bravo to get a rematch for the belts.

From what I've seen of them on ROH, the Infantry (Dean, Bravo, and Trish Adora) are money. I don't think that's come through from what little they get to do on AEW. I was hoping they'd make more of an impact in the AEW tag title tournament, but oh well. I'd settle for an ROH tag title run, and I don't think Taven and Bennett need the belts that much now that they're in the Undisputed Kingdom stable. I'm kinda thinking the champs will retain, but I'm 100% in the tank for Dean and Bravo.

Dalton Castle vs. Johnny TV - This is billed as a "fight without honor," which just means the match can't end by disqualification or count-out. I think this feud started in November, maybe? I barely keep up with the weekly ROH show anymore, but I'm always seeing an interview where Johnny is all "Ha ha, I'm a heel!" and Dalton is all "I can't sleep and I'm INSANE!" and Johnny and Taya freak out like they're scared and Lexy Nair is like "stop interrupting my interviews >:(" And it just keeps going and going and nothing ever changes.

It seems like it should be important that Dalton put custody of The Boys on the line just for a chance to wrestle Johnny, and then Johnny won, but then Johnny and Taya lost The Boys so Dalton is despondent. Except AEW legit released The Boys earlier this week--they couldn't even wait until after this match to make it seem like The Boys might play into the climax of the story. So that makes the whole thing seem even more pointless.

Adding to the trainwreck factor, I saw Johnny wrestle on yesterday's Bloodsport show and his right elbow was heavily bandaged up. I don't know what's wrong with his arm but I'm sure it's gotta be miserable gutting it through a busy weekend like this. Hopefully he can work around it here without too much trouble.

At this point I don't even care who wins as long as the feud ends. I guess Dalton has to win to end the feud. But I'll take whatever I can get.

Maika & Mina Shirakawa & Mei Seira vs. Tam Nakano & AZM & Saya Kamitani - All six of these women represent STARDOM, which has recently been growing closer with AEW/ROH since the promotion fired its founder, Rossy Ogawa. I keep meaning to get up to speed with Stardom and I just never get around to it. I remember seeing Nakano and AZM wrestle for New Japan and that's about it.

Maika, Stardom's world champion, and Shirakawa represent Empress Nexus Venus, which broke away from Nakano's Cosmic Angels group. I don't know if there's a reason Nakano is teaming with two women from Queen's Quest instead of her own faction. It also seems odd that Shirakawa and Maika hold the Stardom trios title along with Xena, but for this trios match they're instead teaming with Seira, who isn't affiliated with a faction. Maybe if I followed Stardom this would make sense, but as it is I think they just grabbed six women who were in town and could put on a good match, without any real storyline or context.

I don't think it makes any difference who wins, but since Maika's the world champ I'll go ahead and pick her side to prevail.

Mariah May vs. Momo Kohgo - This is scheduled for the pre-show. I guess these two had a rivalry in Stardom before May left to join AEW six months ago. I know May was on the Stardom show yesterday but I didn't see it, so I don't know if they did some kind of angle with Kohgo to set this up. I assume Mariah May wins, but I'm not sure they're protecting her for any particular storyline, so I'm not confident about that pick.

Josh Woods & Tony Nese vs. ??? & ??? - More pre-show stuff. Woods and Nese were a tag team for a while and now I suppose they're back together again for some reason. They're facing a mystery team and I sure hope it's a really cool surprise, because otherwise there's really no point in doing this. We're in Philly so maybe they bring in a couple of ECW guys? Are there any ECW guys left to bring in? Well, whoever it is, I'm picking the mystery team to win.

Griff Garrison & Cole Karter vs. Serpentico & Angelico - This is another pre-show match. I think these two teams were pissy with each other over losing an eight-man tag match or something. Last time I looked Griff was a babyface slowly going heel from the influence of Karter and manager Maria Kanellis. I'm genuinely surprised this is considered important enough to run on the PPV, even if it is just the pre-show. I don't care who wins.

[tokiro07]

Cipher Academy ch.38 thoughts

[Horseshoes and Hand Grenades]

And so Iroha has been named Gradewide Leader of Class 1, which, as the only class in Cipher Academy as of this moment, makes him the de facto Code Emperor of the academy, though they don't seem to be making it quite that big of a deal yet. I'm willing to bet they'll cover that sooner or later, likely elaborating that "technically Code Emperor" does not actually mean "Code Emperor," and Iroha will need to earn that title more definitively later

In fact, this chapter made it very clear that Iroha's win wasn't anything all that impressive. The game was extremely close, and choices were made without the full understanding of what the goal actually was, so had any one circumstance been different, whether it be awareness or time, the tide of battle would almost certainly have changed. The thing about that, though...

THAT'S LOSER TALK!

Boohoo, we would have won if we had more time! Waaah, they didn't tell us the rules so we played wrong!

This is a military school. Would you say that in a real war? With your allies' lives on the line, your people's lives on the line, would you bemoan that the battle wasn't fair?

Simply going to war is to risk defeat, that you will be outclassed and outmatched in every possible way. Failure to account for every possibility, to see every available avenue for victory, is entirely the fault of the general, not the soldiers. What good is it to turn to the graves of the fallen and ask why they didn't fight harder?

Iroha wasn't the only one to see the correct path to victory, with Rikukeito claiming to have done the same, but only Iroha had the will to stay on that path. I do think it would have been more impactful for Iroha to save someone he had no sense of allegiance toward, like perhaps someone from Class E if he'd allied with them like everyone else in round 1, but there are two reasons that the outcome works regardless

First, the one he rescued was Anonymity, the single most antagonistic member of Class A whose allegiances are still up for debate, so if that doesn't show his willingness to make amends with his enemies, nothing will

Secondly, this chapter is literally about his sense of allegiance to everyone. No one at this school is Iroha's enemy, they're not even really his rivals in his mind. Iroha's main motivation for becoming Gradewide Leader, aside from learning the location of the dancer, was to bring everyone together, something he probably couldn't trust any other CLP to do. His first act as GWL being a cake party doubtlessly created a sense of camaraderie that no one else would have even attempted, they probably would have tried to influence the activities of the others to suit their needs if anything

Iroha is a benevolent leader, one who has made it clear he would sacrifice himself long before even considering sacrificing any of his allies, and that's why he was the one most deserving of becoming GWL

So now that the school has been unified, we'll be entering the next arc, where presumably the student body will come up against an actual threat (likely spearheaded by Kogoe if I had to guess), and with how this arc concluded, I am even more certain now than ever that it will be a Victory arc

As I said, everyone was talking about how Iroha could easily have lost here, undercutting the weight of his victory in this battle. We even saw Iroha only barely defeat Yonakiuguisu last week, ending the fight on the ground while she stood tall, which I now realize was meant to show that while he achieved his goal, Iroha didn't actually win, at least not in a way that really proves anything about his skills

He has the best-fitting personality for the role of GWL, but he's not the most physically or mentally gifted of the student body, and it's this distinction that likely means he hasn't actually earned the respect of his contemporaries. If he had, they wouldn't have walked into his party griping about how things should have gone differently. Next time, it won't be about how hard Iroha works or on how good of terms he is with everyone, it will be about results

Can Iroha bring about the results that everyone expects of him? Can he succeed where the other CLPs would otherwise fail? Can he prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was the best choice for his position?

Or will he fail? To Iroha, victory is assuring that everyone makes it home. Will he lose someone along the way? Will he fail to protect the people who are allied with him, proving that he never really did have what it takes, that someone else should have won the title?

If I'm being honest, probably. The thing about Cipher Academy utilizing the Friendship, Effort, Victory structure like this is that it implies that it only needs to cover Victory at this point and then it'll be done, but Nisio Isin don't play like that. Even if it's short-lived, Iroha is almost certainly going to fail; the next arc won't simply be a straightforward Victory arc, it will be the inverse, a Failure arc, and likely one that will spawn an Isolation and Impotence arc as well

Once Iroha has been faced with and overcome a situation where his worldview has failed him and everyone he cares about, then he will be able to enter his true Victory arc

Or he'll get the win in the next fight and he'll have a heroic low point in some other way, I don't know

But honestly, who even really cares about all that? Did you guys see that face Anonymity made when looking at Iroha??? That is a girl in love, I know it!

To finish up, I want to talk about the bulk of this chapter, the party. This really was a great chapter to finish up the Friendship arc, as everyone is getting along surprisingly well!

Nohime having tea with Zakuroguchi, Kubinashi and the Hanranbara twins (notice that Kubinashi has two shadows); Mamushihishimeki trying to flirt with Hokiboshi and Ikishiro by baring a frog tail at them (you can't tell me that's not what she's doing); Yugata and Koshibai showing a lipogram battle to Jigino and Aen; Oboro swapping glasses with Kogecha; Mengatasuzume chilling with Yonakiuguisu; Mokumokuren and Omomuro playing with Eteshite; Hanagoromo watching over Nutaba and Hahakura sketching the scene

So many nice little interactions! Shame Class F is standing perfectly still doing jack all nothing, not even touching their food, giving the impression that if there's a problem going forward, it's probably going to come from them. They're the only ones not making an effort to interact with anyone else (similar to Anonymity who supposedly has ties with them), so I'm going to be wary of them going forward

In fact, I don't really trust Anonymity either. As much as I love her, I know she's up to no good, and I bet she'll be both the major cause and resolution for what I'm tentatively calling the Isolation arc

For now though, this was a nice chapter, and a great arc. I'm so glad we got to see it conclude and that it will get to continue on into the next storyline as well. We're fast approaching a full year of serialization, and it looks like we're going to make it! I suppose it's possible it'll get axed right at the year mark, but with the recent news that all three volumes have gotten reprints, I'm quite confident it's selling well enough that it's not in any danger at the moment. Fingers crossed we keep up this momentum 🤞

[pink-strawberry-kissess]

Rambling Anon chooses 8 and 13 for you to answer!

ty rambling anon! imma answer this one before i forget because the question post was a while ago and im too lazy to go get it again lol

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

that all of the main resident evil characters are all morally good. (this is not true) as every single one has done things that are morally wrong and yet they are not villainized for it as much as other characters that are presented as morally grey. (except maybe claire ig- i don't want any discourse on claire btw, i don't find her character interesting, and her stans are insane)

it's really frustrating whenever i see posts with just the worst take on characterization, or also just people straight up not understanding that morals are different from character to character, so you need to also take that into account for the characters actions.

i've talked about this before in other fandoms but to put it as simply as possible.

a morally good character doing a good thing, is good, it's expected and is a normal thing for them to do. that same character doing a bad thing, IS STILL A BAD THING. Even if the plot allows the bad thing to happen with a good outcome. This does not negate the original bad action.

I've used this argument before when Leon goes rouge in Damnation. Even though what he did was ultimately a good thing, what he did was originally a bad thing to do. A lot of things Leon and Chris do are MORALLY BAD. but they are not villianzed as much as other characters, because they have "morally good" as their titles. BUT PEOPLE STILL NEED TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT THAT THESE ARE BAD ACTIONS.

that being said, Leon (to me) is presented as a morally good character, but he does morally grey things. he will do a bad action (but it will usually result in a good ending) this does not mean the bad action was not a bad action.

now when we use ada, who is a morally grey character, an anti hero, a double agent. she has a very tricky moral compass. we know she won't do certain things, she often chooses the lesser of two evils. but we also know that she will never actively put leon or a lot of people in danger. her choices are very important to understanding her characterization.

continuing on, people who villianze ada so much for the same shit that wesker does. a lot of what ada does is REASONABLE for what she needs to do. i feel like a lot of people dislike ada because she's "in the way" for leon for them. but i literally have not seen a coherent argument for disliking Ada.

13. worst blorboficiation

probably leon, especially with the uptick of re4r fans. people are infantilizing him, sexualizing him, and even worse, trying to find stuff on leon's face model. who LEFT social media because of how badly the re fans were harassing him initially when re2r released.

i won't write his name so it would be easier for people to find him, but the face model for leon is a model, first and foremost. he is not leon. stop trying to find videos of him and making him like he is leon.

[eyeodyssey]

One of the more interesting developments I’ve noticed on YouTube over the past year is what appears to be a subtle shift in its algorithm, more specifically in its recommended videos section. I can’t recall when exactly it started, but up to a certain point, I realized that the site was recommending me random videos that were uploaded either hours or literal minutes before I found them. I think the first one I explicitly recalled seeing was an archive of a failed livestream that was the broadcast of an empty front patio of some church located out in the midwest. Not long after that was Green Acres, a lengthy video where a cheery elderly woman talked about finding a set of lawn chairs in an open field before she then went on to talk about a lonely village where the people only ate cow brains. Another was a man with a deathly serious expression showing a VHS cassette for a 1990s direct-to-video children’s film while remaining uncomfortably silent. After a point though, the videos went from general uploads to being solely music-focused, specifically the auto-generated uploads YouTube would do if an artist put out their album through a label or services like DistroKid. These uploads varied in quality as you’d expect: Some were uncanny lo-fi outsider music gems, a few were hyped-up Turkish pop anthems that sounded like something straight from Final Fantasy, one was a piano ballad about seagulls that would no doubt underscore a shock site video if it was conceived back in the mid-2000s, and a bunch were the clear outcome of someone’s yacht rock-loving dad going “We should make an album!”. Just yesterday, I was recommended a bit of an unusual outlier. A four-track percussive noise album by an artist named after Max Ernst’s LopLop alter ego. Just about all the track titles appear to be gibberish with the exception of the last song, which is the scrambled phonetic pronunciation of “Decapitated Cow Water Dispenser, Wuhan Wai I Shang” in simplified Chinese. I’ve tried to find any information on the artist, and I’ve come up with nothing. There was a French noise artist named LopLop, but they haven’t been active since 2014. I looked up the album, and beyond the YouTube upload and a Spotify page (which was likely also auto-generated), I couldn’t find anything. I thought maybe I could at least reverse-image search the album cover. Nothing, again. It’s just by dumb luck that through YouTube’s near-random selections I was even directed to this album a literal day or two after it was released, and I remain one of the only 20-something people who’ve ever heard it. Congrats to me I guess, I hope it wasn’t A.I. generated.

[liminalpsych]

Equitan live-react (Lais of Marie de France)

Yeeeah. Did you know you're essentially high when you're in the limerent state or in new relationship energy? That early in-love stage that lasts, oh, between 6 and 24 months usually? Sometimes shorter. So many endorphins going absolutely haywire. I can't stand that stage, I want it to be over so I can see the person and relationship clearly.

This better not be another clever competent servant type who I like better than any of the protagonists but is just a side character who disappears midway through the story.

….oh no. Welp. Seneschal's doomed. Equitan's gonna betray his own vassal and go after his wife. It's Igraine and Gorlois and Uther all over again.

Oh good. Our title character has at least some morals.

I'm not 100% sure I understand the next bit:

Are we talking about the kind of courtly love where two people who cannot be together love each other from afar yet don't act on it? I know that was seen as very romantic and chivalric and all that, at one point in time.

Or is he talking about nonmonogamy, some kind of V arrangement?

Or is he literally talking about an affair?

This also seems to imply that extramarital affairs were just... normal. I know I've read about the idea in that era that you did not love your marriage partner, and weren't even really expected to; love was to be found elsewhere, but quietly. Is that basically what this is saying? That it would be a pity if the lady didn't get to have a lover outside her marriage?

…oh! I like this lady:

Well done. Nicely stated awareness of power dynamics and abuses of power! Dang. "The love affair would not be equally shared between us two. Since you are a powerful king and my husband holds his lands from you, you would expect, I imagine, to have dominion in love. Love is not worthy if it is not equal."

The king is currently trying to convince her by basically saying "I'm not fickle like those people you describe, I'm different." And not to consider him a king, but as the lady's vassal and lover, and he's totally going to die if she doesn't get with him.

…really crossing my fingers that the lady and the king don't get together. Because yuck.

…damnit. C'mon now. (Why did I expect anything else.)

I am having a hard time figuring out if the narrative is condoning this sort of behavior and dynamic, praising it, or decrying it. Though in the introduction, the translator did say "A reader who takes the Lais in their Harley 978 (manuscript) order is alerted from the beginning that each lai must be read on its own terms and assessed independently with the help of the reader's judgment", so maybe this is not being presented with the writer's judgment, but left to the reader to judge. That would indeed explain why the writer's opinion of the situation is very unclear. As evidenced in this next bit:

"In the end they died of it" suggests potential negative judgment, but the writer also seems to validate the sincerity of the love between the lady and the king. So perhaps it's an attempt to provide a neutral telling of the situation, and let the reader pass any judgment that they might.

Waters (the translator) also says in the introduction that Marie de France's Prologue "implies the need to read the ensuing stories as an instructive group - without, however, laying out any explicit program for how to do so. It combines the effects of control and receptiveness, authority and flexibility, that are evident throughout the Lais: readers are, to use Marie's famous phrase, encouraged to 'supply the rest through their understanding' of what they read, but without any insistence about what the result should be".

Guigemar didn't hit this tension for me, it felt more straightforward and clear-cut about what the desirable outcome was. But Equitan is really pinging the "reader must supply the rest through their own understanding" element.

The poem continues on: the king and lady are carrying on their affair in private, the king claims he is undergoing leeching privately when they're together so that no one will dare to walk in on them. But he loves the lady above all others, and doesn't want any other women, or to even hear marriage spoken of, which everyone else is Very Upset about and complains to the seneschal's wife about. Which of course bothers her a lot.

She weeps to him and expresses fear that he'll take a wife appropriate to his station and leave her, and then she'll want to die. The king, well… here's where the doom begins:

So the seneschal's wife has the Very Sensible reaction of "great! I'll kill my husband!" But in a more genteel way of course: "arrange for her husband's death", which will be easy, if the king helps out.

Her plan is to… boil the seneschal alive in a bathtub?

No, really. The king is supposed to visit her husband's castle, the king requests his company for bathing and dining, and the wife is going to have the seneschal's bath "so hot and so boiling / there is living man under heaven / who would not be scalded and destroyed / as soon as he sat in it", and then the king should bring his men over and show them how the seneschal just "died suddenly" in the bath. Tragic accident and all that.

Well, as you might imagine, this plan doesn't work. As soon as the seneschal goes off to take his back, the lady and the king start getting physically intimate. The seneschal comes back, breaks down the door, and finds the king and his wife together. The king sees the seneschal coming and jumps into the tub to… "disguise his wickedness"? Pretend he was just disrobing for the bath, I guess?

But apparently his tub was as scalding as the seneschal's, so he dies from the boiling hot water. And the seneschal sees this and shoves his wife's head into the bath so that she dies too.

Marie de France makes a judgment here at last. Not of the adultery or the lovers or any of that, just on "pursuing another's harm". The reader can decide for themself the morality of the affair, but trying to kill people is Definitely Bad.

[shivasdarknight]

what was your WoL’s love interest’s first impression of them?  What about the second time they met?  How long was it between their meeting and their first date?  First kiss?

THIS IS GENUINELY SO FUNNY WHEN YOU LOOK AT THEN VS NOW BUT LIKE

Ooohh god I’m just going to break it down by partner in chronological order of meeting them, and hitting every point with each person.

Which means first up is:

Estinien

Surkukteni is a canon dragoon, so she and Estinien met first.  And genuinely the funniest out of these, because he didn’t think much of her and the absolute most was she was obnoxious.  There is an 8 year age difference between them - 24 vs 32 in ARR - and it’s a 30yo guy dealing with a plucky, obnoxious and power hungry 20-something.  But it wasn’t just that it was a 20-something, Surkukteni’s canon has two potential candidates for that title: Lillith, as well!  It was really unsure who would get the eye, so the two worked together and he just saw them as sort of a joint headache.

But the more it became clear that the Eye chose Surkukteni, the more it forced them to deal with each other.  A few times during the timeline of DRG30-50, Surkukteni actually tried to reach out to him a few times because despite having her own allies in the other eventual Warriors of Light, she’s without many connections and really wayward.  Her allies are Eorzeans, she’s Othardian. So even if it was yet another Eorzean, she still wanted to at least try to make that connection - especially because if she could make it a good one, she’d at least have someone powerful in Ishgard that wouldn’t go after her the way the See went after the Orl.  He’s one of the first people she even tells about her auri nature, as this was when she was running around in that hyuran glamour of hers.  And I have a fic about that exact exchange!  But basically, it was just the start of a slow building friendship and rivalry that took a while to figure out the back and forth with.

So with that in mind, the timespan between first meeting and first date (technically) was almost five years.  None of this happened until Post-Shadowbringers.  Part of that is because they had a major falling out in Heavensward because of how he is during that, and they didn’t reconcile until the DRG70 quests in Stormblood, but at that point they were already in a friends-with-benefits arrangement!  They didn’t start properly seeing each other until literally right before the Seat of Sacrifice.  First kiss was during Stormblood, so two-three years, something like that.  And that was a drunk kiss while traveling together which....also happened to be their first time because fucking oops.  That’s a draft I’m working on, so I’m just going to leave it at that.

But I need you to understand that since DRG50, Estinien has had major feelings for Surkukteni.  The whole fucking time.  So even though it took them until Stormblood to get touchy-feely, and Post-Shadowbringers to get feelsy - he had it bad the whole time.  And he was in major denial over it because this was the first time he’d had strong feelings for a woman as he’s really masc-leaning and had only ever been interested in men prior to that.  Traveling together helped nothing, and he just wound up completely head over heels and a fucking mess.  Yet, he refused to say anything unless she said something first due to the severe trauma she has around this kind of thing.  So, he resolved himself to stay quiet until she confessed in 5.3.

Ysayle

This one’s also funny because they started off as enemies.  Truly, a wonderful enemies-to-lovers outcome.  It’s the canon stuff of course, but Ysayle was always kind of intrigued by the Warriors of Light - Surkukteni, especially.  Part of this is because Ysayle knew about the tragedy of the Orl tribe and wondered why a Xaela would willingly ally herself not only with the Eorzean Alliance, but the See as well?  And so far as to become an Azure Dragoon?  It was curious to say the least, but it did leave her extremely interested - especially after the confrontation at Akh Afah.  But she’d be lying if she denied the fact that her interest came from the fact that Surkukteni was and still remains a very vocal supporter of the Eorzean tribes and frequently took matters into her own hands when it concerned the fair treatment of the many peoples of Aldenard, and were it not for her affiliation with Ishgard, Ysayle got the (correct) idea that the two would be aligned ideologically and was interested in swaying her to her side.

And that actually happens.  Not just in this heretic AU I have (lmfao i love that one), but once the two re-meet during Heavensward!  The more the two talked, the closer they got - and more and more of Ysayle’s suspicions were correct, but she also found herself quickly falling for Surkukteni.  They were history buffs and deeply invested in what was right - a strong morality even in spite of forces that’d try to stop them.  Ysayle found herself falling for Surkukteni - her voice, her mannerisms, her convictions - and was really hoping to convince her to abandon her plight with the Alliance and Ishgard to work with her.

And then 3.0 happened.

It wasn’t until the end of 5.3 that the two were reunited, feelings left unspoken.  For Ysayle, it was a perilous recovery process.  For Surkukteni, it was four years of grieving and heartache.  And wouldn’t you know it, I wrote about this reunion :)  Their first kiss technically happens in a dream during Shadowbringers, but their first in person kiss is right after that reunion scene in Mor Dhona - which is outlined in that fic.  And immediately after is technically their first date - Surkukteni showing Ysayle around Kugane - which is another draft I’m working on.  The two were inevitably going to be together though, because they’re literally soulmates who are destined to run into each other one way or another and fall for each other - yet they’re the first cycle in many years to break the trend of tragedy they were immersed in, and just barely.

Aymeric

I genuinely think he’s the most normal out of the bunch, and that alone is very funny to me considering the circumstances.  When the two first met, this was during Post-ARR and post “Surkukteni discarding the hyuran glamour now that no one could touch her”.  He’d heard about her from Estinien and obvious word about the defacto leader of the Warriors of Light, but to meet her during political talks was surprising, to say the least.  He could see the cockiness and pridefulness Estinien had described, yet he didn’t expect her to be intimidatingly quiet - that is, until the matter of the tribes came up and she immediately interrupted Alphinaud to assert her position on the matter.  Needless to say, Aymeric was extremely intrigued and excited to see what would come of this.  Working with her felt like an inevitability - as a Warrior of Light, and Azure Dragoon - but the true circumstances would eventually morph.

Their meetings were mostly professional at first, but he soon discovered that she was the one to take up the mantle of the new Dark Knight.  But he also knew that if he played his hand too soon, she’d get skittish and stop trusting him.  So began the long game of a back and forth through vague, cryptic letters to ascertain a working relationship where Surkukteni would act as a hitman for him - dealing with problematic Temple Knights that had time and time again evaded punishment for their awful behavior despite his repeated orders to have something done with them thanks to meddling down the chain of command.  ...And transphobes.  She killed a lot of transphobes for him.

I’d say their “second meeting” is not so much literal second, but when he properly invites her to his house to discuss the job in more frank detail in person.  And now that she was honest with herself - and importantly, alone - it gave him a better idea of who she was and that just was all the more enticing and exciting.  Not necessarily enticing in a sexual way, just the prospect of working with someone such as her and getting to know her as layer after layer of nonsense decorum was peeled off and he got to see her for herself.  The dry wit, the sarcasm, an intelligence she kept reined in from too many folks belittling her.  It was definitely a newfound respect that was earned, and the absolute beginnings of feelings he’d develop later.

Their first kiss would happen soon after he confessed, but it wasn’t really a nice one.  Him confessing right after his attempted assassination and Ysayle’s seeming death set Surkukteni into a panic attack - as she was convinced she was cursed to have bad things happen to those she cared about.  To be with Aymeric, she felt, was to sentence him to a fate similar to Ysayle’s.  While she did show that she reciprocated his feelings - hence the kiss - it was more begging him to give her time to think on it and sort through her issues.  She didn’t want to be with him considering how fucked up she was, and wanted time to work on herself before committing to anything.  And to his credit, Aymeric was very graceful in letting her have the time that she needed.  The two still met up to talk and do stuff together - that undercurrent of mutual feelings coloring everything - and....well, maybe stuff happens, but it’s not until 5.4 that they actually get together.  And that also ropes in him and Estinien, so that’s fun.  She’s definitely ripped him out of the office countless times before they were together as sort-of dates, but it was nothing super official as they didn’t want to risk hurting her again and reopening that trauma.

Venat

And this one’s funny because it’s totally backwards in the XIV game timeline.  So Surkukteni meeting Venat for the first time isn’t the first time Venat’s met Surkukteni.  So let’s just start with Elpis.

Beyond the fact it’s just Elpis, there were many things that struck Venat about Surkukteni upon meeting her - most notably, how much Surkukteni was like her then-partner, Charon.  There was that fire, there was that passion - yet it tempered less in the sardonic fashion like Charon, and more tempered from repeated hurt.  Even through all the turmoil that was clearly held within her, Venat still found it fascinating that Surkukteni kept going.  More fascinating to find out that Surkukteni was Charon, just them reincarnated.

And then, everything.  Venat - as Hydaelyn - watched for thousands of years as Charon’s soul (and Khione’s, by the way - her other lover) reincarnated over, and over, and over again - each time meeting worse and worse fates.  The tipping point, truly, was Allag when they were known as Ammut, and Khione was known as Macchi.  To watch those two suffer at the hands of the Empire, executed so cruelly by Ammut’s brother, Amon (worse: Charon and Hermes were siblings), it spurred Venat to do something the next time around.  She kept the souls of them both with her for 3,000 years until the anger that fueled them finally died down, letting them reincarnate into Surkukteni and Ysayle.  And it was then that it struck Venat that things would only grow worse - as this was the woman she’d met all those years ago, who carried such terrible burdens and grief.  And even though Charon’s soul was split in twain - into Surkukteni and Katsuro - Venat would still do what she could to protect them and Khione.  Thus, Surkukteni and Ysayle had her traveler’s sigil placed upon them in an attempt to keep the both of them safe (Katsuro got his by accident, as he and Surkukteni are Literally two halves of the same person).

It’s only until after Endwalker while Venat is slowly recovering from everything - as her soul was fucked nearly beyond repair, placed into an auracite, and had a body built around it by the Great Work alchemists - that the two actually pursue anything.  There is a lot of reconciling the fact that Surkukteni is not Charon - as much as Venat misses them - but among the first things they do is something Surkukteni promised her during their fight: to personally show her around the world she fought so hard to protect.  That gap between 6.0 and 6.1 is mostly that, as they’re both recovering from 6.0 and need a break.  And it’s during this that things begin to build between Surkukteni and Venat - and Ysayle! - and they establish a relationship based on the present and not who they were formerly.  First kiss?  6.2.  Venat went to see the group off as they headed to the Void and gave Surkukteni a conjured scythe for her to use while in there (as this is the start of her shift to RPR).  Completely taken aback and unsure how to thank her with words, Surkukteni surprises everyone - including Venat - by grabbing her and kissing her deeply.  Estinien and Y’shtola don’t let her live that down.

[bells-of-black-sunday]

Not to "I've been laying in bed for 3 hours and can't sleep" ramble, but:

I do think there's a very weird phenomenon in general with f.andom where characters will be released with either a vague backstory or ones you just kind of have to guess and then as soon as it becomes concrete a lot of people utterly hate it and blame everything under the sun for why. "It removes their agency", "It makes them too similar to x", etc. Really I think it boils down to people getting really attached to one idea for a character they had and are now upset that the source material doesn't back it up anymore.

I most often see it with female characters which no surprise there, misogyny is rampant in f.andom spaces. Everyone loves evil male characters and people tend to rush to find a way to justify their actions or make them a depressed sad boy they can coddle, but will tear evil female characters apart for every small thing that usually is either intended for you to hate her for or completely made up. I think I see this a lot in spaces like d.bd or mainly with A.udrey in d.arkest d.ungeon though to be honest I've seen it even with the morally grey female characters there too, because of the above reasons.

I still to this day see people complain about b.hvrs "bad writing" for making Julie not be a helpless victim and instead make her complicit and often times the driving force in the l.egions actions. B.hvr has a lot of bad writing, but their cleaning up of the l.egion and making their lore consistent is genuinely some of their best work. The comics are really fun to read give flavor to members that genuinely had no character to begin with while preventing S.usie from being pushed into this weird "I'm a helpless teenager who has no agency in any of my actions" box the f.andom tends to put her in. It's great, I genuinely loved reading them to the point where it got me back into reading in general.

I really think the writing in D.arkest D.ungeon is fun and purposely ambiguous, but never to the point where you don't know what's going on. I really don't know what people expected from a mercenary whose title is "grave robber", but being mad that she's killed people is really stupid. I don't think making her husband abusive removes her agency if we went by that logic then people should also hate S.armenti's lore, because he was also abused and that should remove his agency too right? So why doesn't anyone get mad at his lore? Aside from the obvious misogyny, I think people genuinely hate female characters that are unapologetically horrible people and I'm going to be blunt: As bad as it is, it feels like people think there is only one outcome from abuse situations and it just makes the person nice and kind.

Her having an abusive husband doesn't remove her agency at all. She could've run away, she knew when he'd get drunk and pass out, she could've left at any moment and she did leave most nights. We are told that explicitly. Instead she chose to poison him, that is her choice, no one forced her to do that. Same with how no one forced her to use up all of her wealth or start grave robbing for money. She did that anyway. Believe it or not, but most resurrection men were poor people, not rich people stealing bodies and selling them to medical colleges. There's many things she could've done to keep her wealth, but instead she chose to go dig up her husband's grave.

It doesn't make her at all similar to D.ismas, she had a choice, he literally needed to do one last job to have money to eat. She's not remorseful at all, it's kind of obvious from her lines and trinkets. I think she's a very fun and compelling character same as J.ulie. People keep wanting more evil female characters, but the minute we get them it's immediate backlash.

Like why do y'all keep asking for things when you can't even handle a murderous teenager or a morally dubious victorian woman?

[darthaddock]

Introduction From The Author

Being next in line to be Alpha can mean a lot of things. But what a lot of people and dragons don't realize is the amount of extra study that you have to do to be prepared to adequately lead a large nest like the Hidden World.

I've been studying the human race, as well as a lot of extra stuff about law systems worldwide, and dragon biology, among other things. But even though I'm only fifteen, I can see a lot of things that other dragons can't see in basic scenarios. The legality of actions performed, whether or not it's a good or bad scenario, etc. I've found myself in my studies, but after I met my boyfriend, John, I've been trying to find myself all over again. It's in these searches where you find your moral compass. And as I look into where human science is going I see a lot of red flags in one area in particular: editing genetic code. I've seen articles and videos about what things like PGD and CRISPER can do. But I can read between the lines and I see nothing good coming out of it if humans go as far as editing babies.

Humans already have norms and practices that I don't like very much. There's nothing I can do about that. But I hope that what you find here will serve as a warning that while knowledge is power, power can also be very dangerous and that we need to regulate boundaries on how far we can experiment into the unknown. Our DNA is so perfectly constructed that it supports large multicellular organisms such as me and you. And if we don't set boundaries on this new science, it could very well result in the destruction of the human race and/or dragons all together. Whether that destruction will be literal or social is yet to be determined by the choices we make regarding these things and the outcome of those decisions.

But we must not forget that gene editing is dangerous. And just “because we can” is no excuse. Because if I were to just go burn a building down and sit in the fire “because I can” it doesn't seem very reasonable. That's why laws and rules are in place: to regulate what we can and can't do for our own safety. If humans can't find reason in that, I don't know if I'll be able to help the human race any further. But I know that I can protect my fellow dragons from suffering the same fate I fear humans are heading for. If they want to throw their species off a cliff, so be it. They've been warned.

I don't mean to spread fear or hate towards this science. It's quite amazing, I only mean to warn everyone, human and dragon alike, about the dangers this new technology can cause and to proceed with caution.

I'm going to say this, even though I know it's been said before by a few people, but even though this is a fiction novel, fiction is a lie that tells the truth over and over. But I want readers to not judge the book by its cover or title, but to judge it by the underlying truths and the content it presents to the world. Because as Neil Gaiman put it, “If someone tells you what a story is about, they are probably right. If someone tells you that that is all a story is about, they are very definitely wrong.” I want people and dragons alike to see these things entwined with a rich, and powerful story that will be remembered for generations to come. Everyone sees and processes things differently depending on their experiences and background, so even I don't fully know everything the story is about. You may see something between it's lines I never did, and that's the beauty in books: everyone applies their life, experiences, and backgrounds to the story to create a unique and one of a kind experience that they will cherish for the rest of their lives.

~ Dart Haddock, 2024