#people see me and they remember i exist for the duration i spend in their line of site and then i leave that line

[yaoib0y]

im so fucking tired and stressed. i dont know when this ends. it hasnt ended for the past like 4 months and its driving me fucking crazy

[matan4il]

Buddie 613 meta

We now know that the man who risked himself to get Buck out of the line of fire during the shooting arc is Jeshan, which means ‘clear’ (if you’re interested, you can find more name meanings for 911 characters here). So let me just giggle for a second about the fact that 911 had once again reunited Buddie with a character who can be referred to as Captain Clear Me(h)ta. Coincidence? IDK. But I have to admit, it kinda made me reflect back and feel nostalgic. When I first started watching the show, I had no intention of writing meta for 911, but after going ballistic when 309 aired, I knew I would HAVE to use the s3 hiatus to write down all my thoughts about everything Buddie related so far. That’s what I did, I wrote and shared my baby, my first round of Buddie meta. That’s where it was supposed to end, but then people asked and encouraged me to write meta for the eps in 3b as they would air, too. I figured I could try, and that’s how my Buddie weekly meta posts were born. At the time, there was no one else writing proper weekly meta (I don’t mean a summary/review of the ep, or meta posts that stand on their own, but proper analysis on Buck, Eddie and those who matter to them, organized and serialized for each ep as it aired). And now, I’ve been writing them for almost 3.5 seasons. And I feel like they’ve inspired others to do the same. TBH, I can’t actually remember seeing weekly meta posts in other fandoms (maybe they exist and I just haven’t come across them, IDK). So I got all emotional, thinking about how these posts may be love notes to Buddie and the show, but most of all they’re a love letter to the wonderful people who have been supportive and encouraging, who’ve been reblogging the posts, who’ve been commenting on them and telling me that what I do makes a difference for them. Thank you so much, these posts wouldn’t exist without you. You have a much bigger impact on the fandom than you might have realized! So if Captain Mehta is indeed a nod to the meta, it’s a loving, appreciative nod that belongs to all of you. ~~

When Chim shows up to escort Hen to work, he ends up sitting down for a talk with Denny instead, and I really enjoyed this scene, it was lovely, but it also once again emphasized the difference between the firefam kids’ relationship with their parents’ colleagues and the r/s Buck and Chris have. Chim talks to Hen’s son when he happens to come across the kid, but he only sits down for a proper conversation because Denny implies Hen and Karen are up to something intimate, and Chim shouldn’t interrupt them just yet. Consider how different that is to how Buck intentionally looks to spend time with and dedicated to Chris! And then Chim is impressed by how smart Denny is. It’s cute, but it also reveals just how little they interact that this comes as a surprise to Chim. It’s so different to the intimate familiarity of a parent, which is what we know Buck has with Chris (and that Chris has with Buck, which can even be seen in the kid’s teasing, for example regarding the snoring in 414). ~~

You might have seen that, when the promo came out, I momentarily lost my sanity and posted this. I just couldn’t get over the fact that they actually had Eddie correct the chief on the duration of Buck’s death. It was such a spouse thing to do. It was a declaration about the anguish that each single second represented, when Eddie couldn’t breathe because Buck wasn’t. It was a confession of sorts, on how Eddie felt as he desperately NEEDED his husband to live (I’m not even joking when I ascribe him this title, Eddie said with his whole chest, “THAT IS MY IDIOT HUSBAND THAT I HAD TO WATCH DIE FOR THREE MINUTES AND SEVENTEEN SECONDS AND I WILL NEVER FORGET ANY OF THOSE SECONDS, NOR LET ANYONE ELSE DO THAT”). It was a glimpse into how time must have moved differently for him as each second etched itself forever into Eddie’s mind. And yes, it’s a clear parallel to 413, when we witness time slowing down for Eddie. And I mentioned in my post that in both scenarios, Buck is just out of his reach, so close, but simply not close enough. In one case, this forced Eddie to believe he must now accept his own death. In the other, he couldn’t accept the possibility that Buck would die, so he just fought harder, and if he couldn’t save Buck with one course of action, he tried another, Eddie just had to keep going, 'coz the idea of those three minutes and seventeen seconds turning into an eternity? Unacceptable. ~~

But notice in my unhinged post from that day, I used the word ‘counting.’ Eddie counted the seconds, and this is revealed to us at a poker game where Buck is counting the cards. I already noticed that when we saw the promo, but this connection was reinforced in the ep itself when Chief Williams vocalized what Buck was doing. The thing about counting is that it’s reserved for what matters, what’s crucial. Buck is counting the cards in order to win, and he wants to win because it matters to Eddie. Buck wasn’t the one who initiated the search for a poker game where he could use his newfound skills, Eddie was the one to take that initiative. And he could bring Buck along without telling him where they’re going (I would normally scream for a whole separate paragraph just about Eddie telling Buck to dress nice and there being no need for any further explanation or prompting, but we were so well fed, I’ll have to scream about it into my fist for just one sentence) 'coz Eddie was so sure his husband would go along with whatever crazy scheme he’d come up with. And he was right, even though Buck didn’t think it would end well, he still went along with what his husband wanted. Please let me reiterate: Buck’s counting cards because Eddie is so important to him, and Eddie was counting the seconds because Buck’s his vital sign. ~~

Another thing to keep in mind about the poker game is that the only other time we’ve seen Buck playing poker was in 312. In that ep, Eddie was off to meet Christopher’s school teachers (leading to his eventual lackluster r/s with Ana), so having a free evening, Buck spends it with Maddie, Chim and Josh (and is told he unequivocally sucks at Poker). Jokes were made about setting Josh and Buck up, and it was implied whatever Buck’s sexuality was, that was not the reason why Maddie abstained from making the match. What I find interesting is seeing how far our boys have come! In that ep, they were operating separately, and it led them down the wrong paths.

In this ep, Buck and Eddie were inseparable both as a couple (even sharing the winnings from Buck’s new talent, because what don’t these two share? And I was particularly chewing glass when Chief Williams asks Buck how he wanted HIS winnings, but instead of answering her, he looks at his husband. THEY ARE SO FREAKING MARRIED), and as a family unit with Chris (which is maybe a good moment to point out that all of the romantic couples were paired off in 613, and so were Buddie! Now, one could argue that Buck and Eddie were paired off because, well... who else is left for them to hang out with? But 312 is a reminder that when the show wants to, it can push the main cast and minor characters into the same orbit, so it still didn’t HAVE to pair Buck and Eddie off here. It chose to. On top of that, by showing them with Chris as well, 911 reminded us they’re far more bonded than just two best bros hanging out together ‘coz none of their other friends are single). In short, during 312, Buck lost and Eddie was about to be lost on a detour in his romantic journey. In 613, they ARE a family, they work as one throughout the ep, not just in parts of it, and they’re both winning. ~~

Something that gets to me is that when I first shared the BTS pic of Buddie at the poker game, it was clear that Eddie was just bursting with self confidence. He looked like he would be the star of that game. But when we got the promo, we discovered that it was actually going to be Buck who would shine that night. So what makes me slightly froth at the mouth is that all of that sexy confidence we picked up on in the photo? It was real. We weren’t wrong. It just wasn’t confidence that Eddie had in himself, it’s confidence he has in Buck. All of his swagger? Is a reflection of how much he believes and enjoys seeing his husband be a star. I am gonna need 3-6 working weeks at least to recover from knowing this. ~~

Speaking of things that destroyed me forever, everything about the Buckley-Diaz family in this ep falls into that category. I mean, not only did we once again have incredibly domestic scenes, we had one that was very reminiscent of the lasagna one in 601 (Eddie with Chris at the table, Buck fussing around them only to join in once he brings along something to be consumed), reinforcing that this is THEIR NORM, we also had Eddie and Chris being so cute and supportive when it comes to Buck’s new ability (Chris calls him a superhero, Eddie goes along with it, and when Buck’s upset he didn’t get a better superpower, naming some he would have liked to have, Eddie comforts him by saying those other options sound horrible). 

And then to top it all off, we had Buck and Chris cooking together. Bobby’s been explicitly acknowledged as basically being Buck’s dad by both of them, and we know Bobby’s been teaching Buck how to cook. Now we get Buck doing the same with Chris, clearly marking them as father and son, especially since this is done with just the two of them, this special time that’s allocated just to their bond together. Eddie is not needed as a middleman. I know that this isn’t news, but every single time the show reinforces this truth, that Buck is Christopher’s other dad, that their bond is that deep, I gain 10 years, so I have to mention it. ~~

For 613, I made my weekly gifset about Buck and answers, but I’d actually like to elaborate on what you see there. In 602, at the happiness center call, we see Buck looking to Lev in search for his own answers on what his happiness looks like. When he still can’t find any, he turns to Hen, because she always has them. Along this season, that’s been his theme. He’s trying to figure out what he wants in order to be happy, which is connected to the couch theme we’ve all been screaming about since 601 (and especially after he fell asleep on Eddie’s in 612). In 613, Buck suddenly finds that he’s the guy with the answers and he likes it. But has he really got them? Buck says these words to Eddie and Chris, and in addition to that, while he utters them, he’s literally captured in the same frame together with Eddie. But it’s also essential that we heard why Chris can’t just be given the answers. It’s in order to learn, Eddie tells him. That’s exactly what Buck has to do, he has to find his answers in order to learn from the search process. He’s not just there yet, but the framing of the whole scene coupled with the ongoing couch theme is very loud. ~~

What gets me maybe most of all in a whole ep of REALLY GOOD BUDDIE CONTENT, is the way the whole thing wraps up. The storyline on Buck’s new abilities doesn’t end with any commentary on those or on his recovery process. His last scene in this ep is the one with Chris. It follows directly the one with Hen and Karen, a scene which reminds us that we’re never surprised at either woman spending solo time with and caring about Denny, even though neither is biologically related to him, because they ARE BOTH his parents. In the same way, it’s only natural that we see Buck spending alone time with Chris, without Eddie around. It is so meaningful that the last shot of Buck in this ep is not about his story line at all, and neither his abilities, nor having died for several minutes is the point. Instead, the last, and therefore most significant shot of Buck in this very Buddie domestic ep, is him smiling at their son. I feel like that says everything about his trajectory.

~~ (my weekly meta posts) (my Buddie gifs) (all of my content)

~~ My tag list will follow in the reblog, please let me know  if you wanna be added/removed here.

~~ Thank you so much for reading and for any reblog, like, comment or supportive tag! Also, HUGE thank you to @whosoldherout​. On top of real life stuff, she makes her own amazing gifs AND helps make these posts so much better. She’s the one with the real superpowers!

[drdemonprince]

do you have tips for distracting yourself from thoughts you don't want to have?

As we all know intellectual repression does not work, so I try thinking of a problem that I actually do want to solve rather than worrying about a hypothetical problem that doesn't exist yet or one that cannot be solved.

Like so: "okay, let's stop worrying about this writing project that I am not able to work on right now because I'm not even near a fucking computer, and instead let's worry about making a shopping list and a meal plan for this whole week of groceries."

Or: "Okay, I'm not gonna be able to fix the guilt over my role my dad's death at the moment, so let's think about when I am going to hang out with XYZ person I've been meaning to see for a while, and what I could invite that person to go do."

I also try throwing my brain a challenging problem or intellectual exercise related to a topic that I am interested in, or reading about. Like so:

"Okay, I'm worrying a lot about the future of my job, but that isn't helpful right now, because I don't even know who my new boss is gonna be yet and I won't for another year. But here's something I do want to think deeply about: I am reading this very interesting book by Freddy deBoer right now about how the left fails to build large enough coalitions to achieve real political power, and he makes some fair points, but doesn't that concern of his seem to contradict his earlier point about how the neurodiversity movement is too large of a movement and too big of a tent, with not enough focus on those with really high support needs who hate their mental illness? I wonder what Freddy would say to that question?"

And then I'll spend a good long while pondering that question.

Another way that I cope with intrusive negative thoughts is to ask myself if a line of obsessive thinking or worry is going to bring me closer to the kind of person I want to be. And if it won't, what is something that I could be thinking about that might help me better embody that person.

So if I'm reenacting a fight with my mom over and over again in my head, I might notice this, and tell myself: hey. This thing we are thinking about is only making us a more angry and resentful person, which we don't need any more practice on. We are already good at being angry and resentful. Where do we actually need to grow? Oh! I remember, I wanted to start doing more volunteer work. I'll spend the duration of this bus ride looking up some local mutual aid groups and putting their events in my calendar. And so on.

I really think of using my brain as a form of exercise, if you'll excuse me for sounding a bit sigma male -- everything we think about, we get better at thinking about. Every thought process we engage in with our brains, we make more reflexive and natural-seeming for us. So if I want to be a more compassionate person, I can just sit and think about people in a compassionate light to slowly expand that skill. I'm bored of my own misanthropy, anxious worrying, fault-finding, and work-related stress at this point. Rather than telling myself to stop thinking about those things, I try offering my brain something else to exercise with.

Another thing I'll do is just turn on a podcast that will keep my mind engaged. True Anon, Trillbilly Worker's Party, Anime Sickos are all favorites. Sometimes that's enough to quiet down the noise, especially if paired with a vigorous activity like cleaning or a long walk.

[galvanizedfriend]

I am me so I must ask about the two Christmas fics (Xmas Fic 2 and Other Other Christmas Fic). Also so intrigued by Mystic Tours Not This (and the what is this because smut obviously)!!!

-Amanda

Hi, Amanda bestie! 😊

I love silly Christmas romcoms (as you know 😂) and I spent the entirety of the month of December almost nothing else, so I get all these stupid ideas I end up never taking forward because at some point I realize they're too dumb to come into existence. 😂

Xmas Fic 2 was Klaus being a hotshot lawyer or something and inheriting a Christmas tree farm (because of course) that comes with a sort of Christmas village (obviously) from his biological father whom he's never really been in touch with. There are a lot of complicated feelings there. But anyway, he first wants nothing to do it, and then he is convinced by Elijah to at the very least take a look at what is there so he can sell it. So he heads over to the farm and that's where he meets Caroline (duh), Ansel's former lawyer ("I'm a good lawyer") and who also has close ties with the farm. She ends up convincing him to sell the place to someone who will be interested in reopening it instead of whoever, because there's a bunch of people whose livelihooods depend on it (Bonnie, Enzo, some other folks), and there are some complications halfway because Elijah sells the place to Tristan de Martel, who's obviously an evil asshole. But anyway, Klaus still very much wants nothing to do with Christmas or farms, but he does want to keep Caroline (also he gets to find out a lot of things about Ansel that Esther kept from him his whole life).

Other Other Christmas fic (lol) is one where Caroline gets invited to spend Christmas with Enzo and his new spouse (I honestly can't remember whether he'd just married Kol or Rebekah, but it was one of the two) at their family's ancestral home somewhere posh in England. But at Enzo's wedding, Caroline had an ~~incident with Klaus and she absolutely does not want to see him again, so Enzo ensures her he won't be there because he's the Grinch, so he doesn't spend the Holidays with his family, going on skiing trips instead. Except there's a snow storm and Klaus' flight gets cancelled and so he is, in fact, there when Caroline arrives, and then stuff happens. Very creative. 😂

The 'Not This' part in Mystic Tours is because I didn't really want to keep that title or that name in the story, but I was totally out of ideas so I kept it there provisionally. It's another AH AU where Caroline runs a mystical/supernatural tour agency in Mystic Falls she inherited from her mom (who started the business with Sheilla Bennett, who not only is a self-proclaimed witch but also a professor who teaches a very popular occult and folklore class at Whitmore). Now her mom's dead and Sheilla has retired and it's Caroline, Enzo and Bonnie working together to keep the business aflotat, but they're struggling. So she gets this chance to participate in some kind of contest which will bring a popular influencer to town to promote her business (I think I got this idea from Lovelight Farm, or something like that. Have you read it? It's really cute!), except she ends up adding a sob story about how the heart of her business if her own love story with her fiancé when she submits her application. She does that because she knows this influencer has a thing for love stories, but the issue is she not only doesn't have a fiancé, she's not even dating anyone. So after a strong reluctance she ends up asking Klaus to be her fake boyfriend for the duration of the contest. They've been unlikely friends forever and Caroline has had a major crush on him, but she's convinced he's not at all interested and way out of her league because he's a hotshot gallery owner in New Orleans who always seems to be surrounded by beautiful women. Loads of Mikaelsons, Kol being a little shit, Carenzo friendship, Damon is a douchebag. Major tags here are fake dating and idiots-to-lovers.

[titoist]

my earliest memories of an emotional state i would be willing to call adjacent to 'tranquility' were of extended car rides as a young child. freeways blanketed by prairies & rows of corn, the road goes thirty miles into the past, way out south, and then stretches into eternity. my family not having had a car for the last 5 years simultaneously sharpened & dulled my awareness of this, i think. sharpened it in the sense that it gave me a hyperawareness of the knowledge that car rides allowed me an emotional state that i had not been able to access in a long time, and dulled it in the sense that i no longer remembered the emotional state. i held no comprehension of it, i only remembered the fact that i remembered.

i don't think this strictly 'ate away' at me, but it made me feel uncomfortable. i dedicate myself to being in charge of my memory, at least to the extent that i see memory as being the only method through which moments gain meaning.

i've typed too many words about my relationship to typing. but ultimately writing to me does find it's worth as a strictly alchemic process through which moments gain meaning via memory.

it's not merely a matter of nostalgia, i think. it's not that i am battling death anxiety by attempting desperately to fix memories in the present, reproduce the past. it's just that writing allows the necessary deliberation & care for each individual iota of my past to find it's proper place in my mind, contribute to a sense of overall fullness, awareness. and this feels juxtaposed to a life where i don't take the time to remember via writing: spending time in a constant day-to-day reconstitution of familiar variables where little thought is necessarily given to it's constituent parts, moments slipping, culminating in a sense of time having vaguely & unnoticedly but irrecoverably passed, of lost opportunity. it feels like spending time in a vacuum, lost & unpleasantly silent. but it's so easy to get lost, so much of the time. i wish it was a matter of habit rather than of discipline.

but, anyway, last night, i was in the back seat of my mother's car. and i finally remembered the feeling, because i was experiencing it. it felt so natural that, for some time, i didn't even realize that i was experiencing it. it momentarily brought me back to the experiential procession that people have when they're children. and i specify it being that of a child, because it *is* deeply different, people only forget it over time. it's this diffuse lightness, applied to everything. the best way i can describe it is, if you were in a house, you would not feel compelled to instinctively map out the house's unseen rooms & structures in your mind. there would only be you & the room that you are in, & the feeling of your feet against the floor. it was like that. it was just me & the view outside the window, being taken down roads that neither of us had any say in. even then, in the back of my mind, i was thinking about needing to write it down. for the entire day prior i was having a highly emotionally volatile internal debate about the purpose which writing & memory serve to me. i felt like i had degenerated in some highly novel way. 'degenerated' in a way that wasn't necessarily just 'becoming worse' in this or that way, but called to mind the Franz Kafka aphorism in which he describes the 'True Way' as a path that continually obscures itself & must be constantly paid attention to. but for the duration of the car ride, i was able to put that aside & simply exist, without drawing complex internal operations between the distance of each memory to another.

highly desirable. the only issue is that i've become so deacclimated to moving vehicles that after every car ride i have a kind of subtle, latent motion-sickness headache for at least 20 or 30 minutes.

[abbyindenhaag]

A quick note from Lisbon

Revisiting Lisbon for a work trip and wanted to share some impressions!

1. My taxi driver from the airport said that typically companies spend 1,500 euros per month on a worker’s wages but the worker only sees 800 euros because of taxes. I was shocked to find from Wikipedia that this is mostly true, and much lower than in the US: Portugal’s average gross salary is 1450/month and net salary is 1200/month, while in the US average gross salary is $5,400/month and net is $4,000/month. (We are ignoring exchange rates bc atm a dollar is about a euro.) I knew things were cheaper in Portugal but I didn’t realize average wages were 3x less! I do wonder about medians though. I also didn’t point out that Portugal had a national health system and, presumably, a lot of other social safety net benefits that would increase consumption if not income.

(Other notable things about the conversation were that the taxi driver advocated helping others as a personal belief system but also said there were too many immigrants taking jobs and housing in Portugal — I refrained from citing the economics literature finding that actually immigrants raise native earnings — and that the taxi driver complained both about the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, but didn’t really agree with me that having a bigger difference between taxes on the rich and poor would fix it. I am not a development economist or a macroeconomist so I don’t necessarily think he is wrong on that point — but just noting.)

(Other notable taxi driver conversation was that my taxi driver *to* the airport -- Logan -- said he was from Tajikistan and won a diversity lottery to get a green card. I had forgotten that this program exists - it apparently awards up to 50k visas per year, which is like nothing, and has a 1/200 acceptance rate. The funny thing is that he won this lottery and then went straight to Springfield, MA, of all places, and was stuck there for the duration of Covid. Real out of the frying pan into the fire situation. His main complaint about Springfield was it was a bad place to be single, lol.)

2. When I walked out of my hotel after dropping off my bags, despite it being in a nice ish area my first 2 thoughts were: graffiti on walls. Smells like piss. Did I remember wrong?? But then once I got over the graffiti and moved to a less fragrant patch of sidewalk the “faded grandeur” of the city became more apparent. All the travel guides (well, Rick Steves and the NYT) had this same narrative of Lisbon being “where the crumbling remnants of a grand civilization sit side by side with the energy of the new growth” which felt rather stereotypical, and I actually peaced out of the Rick Steves audio tour because I wanted to see the city for myself rather than be told how to see it. But unfortunately,…. They were kind of right. Crumbly facades, broken-up sidewalks, new buildings, American-bougie brunch places… this place has it all, often right next to each other. I walked down a street (NYT-recommended, sigh) and it was like half antique stores full of probably junk and half expensive boutiques.

3. Speaking of which, I think for every hairdresser in Bergen there is an antique store in Lisbon. Who is buying this stuff?? The tourists certainly can’t take all of it home. <a moment of self-awareness descends from above. angels sing> oh. People who live here. Who don’t make a lot of money. As in point 1. Not everything is about you, Abigail!! Anyway it is nice to see things being reused instead of thrown out.

4. I saw at least 3 shops with a sign in the window saying they were on lunch break and would be back later. The American brain cannot comprehend this. What do you mean you haven’t hired someone to sell something at a time when people are around to buy it?!? (This is supporting evidence for my taxi driver’s statement that in Portugal people have different priorities than in the US, and they are just more relaxed. I have no stance on the matter, just reporting.)

5. Shops where I wanted to buy things but didn’t included a wool store with lots of beautiful merino blankets, and a ceramic store with lots of nice little bowls. Shops where I wanted to buy things and did were a pastry shop where I got a pasteis de nata (actually 2), and a strawberry cart in the real-people part of the city that was selling strawberries that smelled amazing for 4euros/kg. Unfortunately the two I ate ended up being overripe so I might not even eat any more but the joy of the purchase may still have been worth it.

This falls into the category of “shops I didn’t want to buy anything at but am glad they exist.”

Long snoots standing guard in antique shop #562.

The window of the wool shop. Would that the window wool were wmine!

The jacaranda are out and incredibly scenic!

The facade of a museum of a beloved fado singer, which I did not visit. I might go on Saturday night to hear a performance, not sure. But the scooter in the foreground was too Lisbon-y to resist the shot.

[itsnothingofinterest]

Have you heard? Apparently, Horikoshi said Hero Academia might be headed to a conclusion soon. This was surprising to say the least; not just because fans don’t want it to end but because it doesn’t really feel like it’s anywhere close to it’s end (plenty think it’s closer to halfway, with a select few like me thinking it’s closer to the 1/3 point). This has led some to speculate, partially in denial, if the conclusion Horikoshi is talking about is not actually the series’ “conclusion” concussion, but instead a Naruto Shippuden style “new name for the next part” type of deal. (Or if he’s just having the word “soon” put in some serious work.)

So I want to discuss that; go over as many reason I can think of for why the series could end within the next year or 2, or for why it could see another 5+ years to it’s life. It mean it sounds fun, right?

(Going into this though, I would like to state my bias. I don’t want the series to end soon; and if it kept at it’s current pace to conclude Deku’s academic life in chapters 800~1000, I would be a very happy camper. I’ll try not to let this affect my judgement, but I’ve got no oversight but myself here so...)

Anyway, here we go.

Reasons for the series to end soon.

I think a good point to start is that Horikoshi once stated he planned to end the series at around 30 volumes, roughly what’s already been covered, before finding he needed to expand the series further than that. That’s understandable, it’s easy to see how this arc could’ve been the end of the series had things played out differently enough in the last few chapters; but if he’s already said he’s expanded beyond that, what does that have to do with this discussion? Well for this side of the argument, it means 2 things: 1) all that’s left can be considered the ‘expansion’ on Horikoshi’s original idea, so how likely is it that there’s a lot of that, & 2) that Horikoshi likely didn’t intend for the series to last for Deku’s full school life, a major belief for those expecting the series to last a significant time.

And when we look at the actual content of the series, yeah there’s certainly things that could point to the series ending soon; namely all the arcs and plot threads that kinda just got resolved rapid fire. Dabi’s reveal, Mirio getting his quirk back, Hawks launching the attack he’s been orchestrating since his first appearance, Compress’s face, Bakugou letting go of his resentment for Deku; just to name a few. True, this is nowhere near all of the arcs & plot threads; but it’s a sizable enough portion if we’re assuming the rest have the next year or 2 to resolve themselves. A few more arcs like this last one and yeah, the series won’t have anything really tying it down from ending.

There’s also Deku’s rate of vestige quirk acquisition to consider. I mean in the 3 arcs featuring him since we learned about his extra quirks, he has acquired 3 quirks. At that rate, he’d have them all in 3 more student arcs and basically be at all but full power by then. Not that him keeping up this rate of quirk acquisition is guaranteed, but it sure seems like a sign of the series not lasting too long.

It’s also worth mentioning that there are ways for the series to end soon, easy paths to the finish line available to Horikoshi. It wouldn’t be that hard, for example, to get to confronting Dabi & Toga and resolving their arcs in some timely fashion. And AFO’s presence as a bigger bad over Tomura could allow for him to pull a Kaguya to his Madara, allowing for the plot to resolve with his defeat without really needing to address a lot of Tomura’s issues. And heck, that might’ve even become more likely after this latest chapter, wherein AFO acquired his very own army. That would likely involve finding too-easy solutions a lot of the more complicated issues, or worse, brushing them under the rug; but it can’t be denied that this is an option for how Horikoshi could resolve the series in just a few years.

Last piece of evidence worth mentioning is the simple nature of shorter series being the “path of least resistance.” You can argue all you like how the series lasting longer makes more sense or might result in a better story (and I’m basically about to); but in the end it can’t be denied that the less the series has left, the less work it is for Horikoshi. And that’s just gonna make it inherently more likely; a largely equivalent result for less effort is never not gonna be attractive for people.

Reasons for the series to last a long time.

Okay, I’ve done my best to be fair and included as many points as I could think of in favor of a shorter lifespan; but I won’t lie, this 2nd half is gonna be the fun part of this post for me.

Let’s start at the opposite end of the other side’s first point; Horikoshi planned to originally end the series at around 30 volumes. This past arc, ending in Volume 30, took place in the space between Deku’s 1st and 2nd school year, or you could say it took place during the end of his 1st year. This implies that while the original plan was not to go through Deku’s whole school life, he did intend it to end at a point of significance; the end of a school year. And what that implies is that he won’t end the series smack in the middle of the 2nd year, which would be where the series would end if it only lasted less than 3 more years. It implies he’d likely aim to end the series at the end of year 2 at the earliest, a significant ways away. (And before you ponder about a time skip; remember that year 1 had a time skip and still lasted ~30 volumes & ~6 years.)

Another reason to think the series is gonna last a while; it’s quite slow, in an overall sense at least. It’s hard to describe but; It doesn’t always feel that way because the moment-to-moment pacing is very good & it always feels like something is happening and stuff is getting tackled. But this is because it tends to tackle plots one at a time; so while plots make good development while in the focus, they can stay out of focus for a significant duration. For example; the ‘Shinsou becoming a hero’ plot was introduced in the Sports Festival, only saw real development during Joint Training, and has still yet to resolve with year 2 not starting yet. Or for another example, we learned over 150 chapters ago that All Might had his future predicted where he’ll die at the hands of a villain, setting up a plot where he’ll try to twist his future and survive this unknown threat to his life. His life has not once been in danger since. Not even in a broad sense like someone’s targeting him; no, this man has not has one risk to his life since the plot thread was introduced. There’s tons for plot threads like that, I’m barely scratching the surface here. And that’s actually fine...if the series has a long future ahead of it. This system of pacing actually works wonders for BNHA; because while people can occasionally miss their faves and their plots, crying out “where’s Shinsou” and all that, they generally like what’s being focused on when it’s handled and paced well (which it usually is). As long as the series itself has time to get to all of these plots and develop them to their resolution, this pacing system works like a well oiled machine.

Deku especially is a useful measuring tool for how slow this series can be. He’s not like the other plot points see, because he’s almost always around so he’s made to develop at a more even pace until the end. This is in contrast to characters like Shinou, Aoyama, Kirishima, Toga, or Shigaraki; who get bursts of development because they don’t spend consistent time in the spotlight and Horikoshi can’t be entirely sure when he’ll get the next chance to make use of them. So with that said, how slow is his development & how far along is it? Well, not very actually. Aside from in terms of powers, his development has been a bit lacking. Not to say he hasn’t had character moments, but they have been a bit scarce & minimal; and a lot of his major flaws (such as his self-destructive tendencies, his self-esteem issues, and his toxic hero worship) have barely been addressed, let alone resolved. In general, his character feels like it’s barely changed since he got into UA; in stark contrast to characters like Shigaraki, Todoroki, Shinsou, & even Bakugou. And that kind of implies a long road a head of him.

To bounce off another point from the “short future section” I mentioned how a lot of overarching plots just ended. The thing about that is, I actually made a post talking about that and how a lot of how they ended seems to set up more overarching plots then they seem to end. To not repeat myself too much, because this post is already really long; it’s like the series resolved the greater part of 6 years of content only to set-up up to 6 more years of content, and all in one arc. (Goodness that was a busy arc.)

And that’s just the advancement of already existing plot points. There’s a lot it can feel like he hasn’t even touched on yet. Mostly characters. There are just. So. Many. Characters in this series. That are in positions of seeming importance, but have done nothing. For example, Horikoshi’s been known to suddenly focus on class 1A students to make them feel important, and has gotten through maybe over half; but hasn’t really touched on Sero, Sato, Koda, Ojiro, Hagakure, & especially Shoji (who really, really feels like he has something planned, but nothing’s happened yet). And that’s just the guys below Mineta’s development level, which itself is pretty low. To say nothing of Class 1B, or Ms. Joke’s students, or most of the 30 faces known in the PLF, the main antagonistic group of the series! And yeah, this could all just be because Horikoshi likes introducing characters in larger groups than he’s actually equipped to handle; I’m not denying that. I’m just saying it’s also possible that he could be doing this because he feels like he has the time to explore them whenever he wants. (Heck, it could very well be both.)

Conclusion:

...I don’t know dude. I mean a longer series looks more likely to me; but I am very well aware that I’m not unbiased enough to make any real conclusive statement. Maybe I should consider that to mean it’s more even than that.

Perhaps we’re just too far away from the ending to really be able to tell either way. I mean low estimates still give the series at least a year. But even so, I do think this was all worth considering; because if nothing else, I did get a feel for all that’s likely to happen between now and the inevitable end. And I guess it turns out to be kind of a lot. So that’s neat.

[svnflowervol666]

Uncertainty (Frat boy!Harry Styles x fem!Reader)

Word Count: 3.2k

Warnings: Frat boy!Harry, use of alcohol, mentions of sexual assault, Harry being a sweet angel because I can’t picture him being anything else.

Author’s Note: Another request that waranted its own post! I wrote this one with a bit of a possibilty for continuation (if anyone is interested??) Anyways, thank you the anon for the request! Frat boy!Harry makes my heart scream. Let me know what else you’d like for me to crank out for you lovelies! Take care and tpwk.

Of all places Harry had expected to bump into her outside of class, his frat house on a Friday night was definitely at the bottom of the list. One minute, he was taking shots of tequila with his bed buds in the dining room and the next, he found his whole world coming to a halt when he saw her work her way through the sweaty, intoxicated crowd and move towards the kitchen for a drink. He swore the music stopped and everything around him had ceased to exist in the moment he saw her throw her head back in laughter at something her friend said, exposing her neck and chest to the open air.

“Who’s she?” one of his fraternity brothers asked with a nudge to Harry’s shoulder, clearly aware that Harry had temporarily abandoned the conversation he was having to gawk at the party’s newest arrival.

Harry snapped out of his daze in which he was staring at her bare legs that shimmered in the dim light of the frat house due to her lotion and a thin veil of sweat to see his brother staring at him as if he was the dumbest man alive.

“Hmm? Oh, her?” Harry pointed towards the girl in question with the neck of the beer bottle he had been nursing on all night.

“I sit by her in calculus... Just didn’t think I’d ever see her ‘round here is all.”

The boy standing beside Harry nodded hesitantly, though he was far too intoxicated to press him any further. Harry would never admit it to anyone as long as he lived, but he had quite the soft spot for this girl. He had no explanation for the way he felt inside when she smiled at him every time she took her seat before class. He had no explanation for how bummed he was when she’d skip a day, or how relieved he was when she’d burst into the room late with a large iced coffee in her hands. He used any and every excuse he could to get her to talk to him, to say anything to him in that voice of hers that he found to be sickly sweet.

But she didn’t run with the people that he ran with. She didn’t spend every weekend blackout drunk and wake up in a stranger’s bed that she knew she’d never see again. She was shy and quiet for the most part and was very much the polar opposite of everyone Harry went for both in terms of friendships and in one night stands. Which was exactly why Harry could never figure out what it was that he wanted from her. Did he want to shag her a few times and then pretend as if she never existed? Did he just want to be her friend that he could lay around with and watch stupid romantic comedies on Netflix with? Did he want to, dare he say it, date her? Take her out for nice dinners and fall asleep holding her in his arms? He didn’t know the answer to any of those questions. She was simply different than all of the people Harry had associated himself with in college. And Harry, as scared as he was to say or even think it, liked that.

One might think that now would be the perfect opportunity for Harry to get to know this girl that he had been tied up over for the past several months given that she was attending a party at his own frat house, but he couldn’t bring himself to approach her. Instead, he drowned his feelings in shots of bitter liquor and half-assed games of beer pong. He figured that whatever had enticed her to come to this party certainly didn’t involve him, and it was best that he kept his distance. She’d passed by him a few times to refill the red, plastic cup she clutched like an accessory, but she never once looked his way.

Several hours had passed since her arrival and Harry, being the heavy partier that he was, had almost completely forgotten about her. The bass-heavy music pumped through his veins along with the icy burn of whatever he was drinking at the moment, and he was too preoccupied with the tiny blonde grinding her backside against his front to remember that she was even present at this party. He had forgotten she existed. That was until he broke away from the buzzing bodies and lager-soaked living room floor to use the restroom.

The downstairs powder room was always taken, so he opted for the one upstairs where all of the bedrooms were. When he pushed open the door, he was greeted by quite the debacle. His blood ran cold and every bit of alochol that worked to keep him at a happy buzz had left his system. The girl from his math class was there, and she was perched on the lip of the bathtub with her arms crossed. She was there, in his bathroom, but she was not alone.

“C’mon, sexy,” the inebriated, smelly man beside her pleaded, “Just come back to my room for a bit. Promise I’ll make you feel good.”

“I don’t want toooooo,” she slurred her words and pouted as if she were a temperamental toddler.

Had Harry not immediately recognized what was going on, he would have thought it was quite adorable.

“Yes, you do, baby. C’mon, it’s just right around the corner,” Harry’s fellow fraternity brother nagged.

He tried to pull her up by her limp arm, but she was dead weight against the porcelain tub, clearly too drunk to be going back to anyone’s bedroom with anyone and certainly not with a man Harry knew for a fact that she had never seen before in her life. The sight of what was going on made Harry sick to his stomach and the hairs on his neck stand up. He knew he had to intervene before this man could take her any further.

“Hey, man,” Harry commanded the attention of his disgusting, vile frat brother that he wanted nothing more than to punch square in between his eyes, “Ye’ ex was lookin’ for ye’ in the backyard. Seemed pretty pissed.”

Harry didn’t even know who his ex was, nor did he know whether or not she was even at the party, but he prayed that his lie was enough to make him leave before Harry had to handle him more aggressively.

“Fuck,” the man hissed to himself before making a beeline out of the cramped bathroom and towards the stairs as if he wasn’t just attempting to drag an almost lifeless girl back to his room.

“Hey,” Harry’s tone was much softer when he bent down to her level and spoke to the girl from his math class, “You alright?”

“No,” she grumbled, “I really want some chips.”

This made Harry scoff and the tiniest of smiles creep onto his lips. At least she was so far gone that the events that unfolded in the bathroom just now had failed to resonate with her.

“Waaaaait a minute,” she paused, “I know you. You’re Henry,” she jabbed her finger against Harry’s chest.

“I know you, too, Y/N,” Harry played along, ignoring the fact that he called her Henry as he inspected her body for her purse, which was, thankfully, still wrapped around her torso.

He dug around the small, black bag for her cell phone, which he, unfortunately, found out had no battery left.

“Do ye’ know where your friend is?” he enunciated slowly and assertively to her a bit like one would if they were talking to a baby.

The girl with smudged mascara under her eyes shrugged her shoulders and sighed.

“I saw her taking shots with some guy named Michael...or was it Matthew... and then I think she went off with some guy from her econ class. Or maybe it was the girl from her Women’s Studies class. I don’t really know,” the girl whined as if thinking too hard about where her friend had gone was giving her a headache.

“Was someone supposed to come get ye’?” Harry pressed her further.

“She was supposed to drive!” Y/N exclaimed, realizing now the predicament she was in.

Harry couldn’t believe how shitty of a friend this girl had. Not only had she disregarded her role as the designated driver, but she’d left her completely alone and drunk off her ass to fend for herself. The thought of what would have happened to her had Harry not miraculously stumbled into the bathroom made his skin crawl.

“Okay then,” he stood up from where he was squatted and outstretched his arms towards her, “Up. Let’s go. I’ll take ye’ home. Ye’ don’t need t’ be here anymore.”

“I don’t wanna go hooooooome. I wanna stay hereeee” the intoxicated girl shook her legs against the tub.

Any other girl and Harry would have just left her be, but he felt something inside of him that compelled him to take care of this girl and see to it himself that she made it home safe and unharmed. He couldn’t bear to think of waking up the next morning and having to listen to one of his fraternity brother’s brag about how good of a shag she was or about how embarrassing it was for her to be that drunk at a party.

“What if I take ye’ t’ get chips on the way?”

//

After about 20 minutes of trying to pressing Y/N to get her to tell him where she lived, Harry was finally able to find her apartment building. He took her through a drive-thru in the sketchy part of town because it was the last place open and he had promised the girl some chips and he was a man of his word. He was reluctant on doing so, seeing as he didn’t want to make this situation any weirder than it already was (him driving home the girl he sat beside in Calculus and only talked to for the duration of the 3 hours per week that they were in class who just so happened to be drunk out of her mind), but his hesitancy quickly left his system when her eyes lit up upon taking a greasy, brown bag filled with the salty snack from his hands.

“You’re my hero, Harry,” Y/N fake-cried (or maybe she was actually crying, Harry wasn’t sure at this point nor would he have been surprised).

“Look at us. Math buddies. Hangin’ out together. Who woulda thought,” she giggled as she stuffed a crispy potato past her lips that were covered in her smudged lipstick. 

Harry chuckled to himself, unsure of what to say to Y/N. He opted to continue driving her home in silence while she munched on her late night snack and sipped on her small cup of water that he insisted she drink all of. She didn’t say anything else either, to which Harry was thankful for.

It took Y/N a bit longer than usual to clank her fingers around her bag to retrieve her keyring, and even longer to figure out which key was the key that would let her into her locked apartment. Harry had done far more than anyone would have, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling like he couldn’t leave her side until she was sleeping peacefully in her bed.

He walked her through her apartment and to her bedroom with one hand hovering over the small of her back in case she lost her balance. Harry wasn’t sure what he’d ever pictured her room to look like, but it suited her, he thought to himself. He noticed some vinyl records in the corner of some of his favorite artists, ones that his friends always made fun of him for listening to. It was a bit messy; there were a few piles of clothes discarded on her floor, but having grown up with his mum and sister his whole life, it led him to believe she had probably been frantic trying to find something to wear to the party at his frat house and just neglected to pick up her mess before she left.

“Ye’ want to take ye’ dress off or somethin’?” Harry asked her.

“Harry, I am NOT having sex with you,” Y/N mumbled as she plopped down onto her fluffy bed.

“‘s not wha’ I meant. Where are do you keep ye’ pajamas? That dress is gonna leave ya sore in the mornin’ if ye’ sleep in it.”

Seeming content with his answer, she tilted her head in the direction of her dresser.

“Middle drawer.”

Harry left her side for a split second while he rifled through her clothes and returned with an oversized university t-shirt that Harry also owned himself. He unfolded it and laid it in her lap.

“NO peeking,” the girl insisted, to which Harry held his hands up in surrender and turned his back to face the corner of her room.

He could hear her struggling to get out of her clothes, but he didn’t dare spin back around in the chance that he saw her undressing and it caused any more strain in their already confusing arrangement. His mind was already flooded with how awkard it would be in the morning when she woke up and realized he had been inside of her home. How she would react when she saw him in class on Monday and whether or not she would yell at him for crossing the line. Really, all he wanted was to make sure she was alright.

Harry was pulled from his thoughts when Y/N called his name in that voice that he adored so much.

“I’m stuck.”

“Can I turn around and help ye’?” Harry treaded lightly.

“Pleaaaaase,” she slurred.

Harry was greeted by the sight of Y/N tangled up in the straps of her dress, not even having been able to pull it over her body. He couldn’t even count the number of times he’d undressed women in the past and how it came as second nature to him when fooling around, but this time, he was beyond nervous. His fingers hesitated to even graze over her bare skin, to untangle her arms from the complicated fabric that trapped her. She was wearing a mismatched bra and underwear, which seemed very much like Y/N’s personality, he thought to himself. Of course, he wasn’t going to deny that she looked incredible underneath her clothes and he wished he was seeing her like this under different circumstances, but that wasn’t what mattered now.

Trying his hardest not to stare, he quickly guided Y/N’s head through the hole of the t-shirt and helped her put her arms through to avoid her getting stuck in her own clothes again. The material fell down below her thighs, so that only the very bottom of her bum was visible to him. God, she looked beautiful.

“Harry,” she whispered to him, as if she were afraid someone would overhear.

“Yes?”

“Why are you being so nice to me? Is it because I help you in Calculus all of the time?”

“I’m actually not tha’ bad at Calculus, Y/N,” Harry snickered to himself as he searched around her bed for her cell phone charger, “’M quite good at it, really.”

“Then why do you always ask me about the homework every time I come in?” she pushed as she watched him pull her phone out of her bag once more and plug it up to the power source.

“Don’t know,” Harry shrugged, “Just like talking to ye’ I guess.”

“Okayyyyyyyyyyyy. If it’s not that, then why are you here? We’re not friends.”

She was still far too intoxicated to comprehend exactly what was going on right now, but the fact that she was starting to sober up and form cohesive sentences was making Harry antsy. 

He figured he had overstayed his welcome and that it was time to bug off before she started to ask anymore questions. That, and he wasn’t sure he was able to answer any more of her questions.

“Just didn’t feel like waking up t’ ye’ passed out in my bathroom floor is all. I’m gonna go now, do ye’ want me to get ye’ anything?” Harry lied as he swiped his thumbs under her eyelashes to wipe away the black smudges under her eyes the best that he could.

“Nope,” she responded with a pop of her lips before crawling back into the comfort of her bed.

She seemed to fall asleep almost immediately, to which Harry took that as his cue to leave. He backed out quietly, shutting the door behind him and tip-toeing down her hallway. He knew it was weird to rummage through her kitchen, but he felt compelled to make sure she would be taken care of when she woke in the morning. 

Harry discarded the wrapper from their little chip excersion into her bin, and filled up a glass of water and placed it on her counter. On his first try, he’d managed to find her medicine cabinet and sat a bottle of pain reliever beside the cup, knowing good and well that she’d need a handful of the small pills when she got up. 

He decided to check on her one last time before he buggered off for real this time, wanting to double check that she hadn’t choked on her own vomit and died whilst he was in her kitchen snooping about. She probably fine and dead to the world by now, but he wanted one last look at her before he went.

As he’d expected, she was perfectly fine. Her hair was tangled all around her head in a messy nest and small, adorable little snores left her parted lips as she slept. He could just barely make out her underwear-clad bum sticking out from the blanket, in which Harry found to be heart-warming for some reason. The girl that had taunted his brain for months and was seemingly untouchable to him looked so incredibly human at this moment.

Running a ringed hand through his now greasy, chocolate curls, he felt his mission was complete and left her alone to sleep and locked her door on his way out. It made Harry’s heart twinge knowing he’d most likely never see her like this again.

When Y/N woke the next day (very well into the afternoon, might she add), she felt strange. She was struggling to remember exactly what happened to her last night having just woken up, but what she did know that she had a headache from hell. 

As she drug herself out of bed to do the only thing she knew for certain would cure her hangover which was cook a large breakfast for only herself, she noticed a glass of water and pain medicine sitting on her counter by her coffee pot. The events of last night were murky, and she barely remembered what happened after her fourth drink, but she was almost positive she now recalled someone else being in her apartment with her.

She was uncertain, but had an inkling that, for some reason, it was the boy she sat beside in Calculus.

[danteinthedevildom]

A Royal Pajama Party “Analysis” - Part 6 (of 7)

We’re almost at the end (hooray - these posts have absolutely killed me to finish), so time to go onto the “platonic” route.

Unfortunately the Devilgram’s ending isn’t 100% perfect if you want a fully platonic route. I may be wrong here - it’s been a while since I actually read the Devilgram at this point, so my memories are a little hazy - but I believe the only way to really end it prior to the screenshots I’m about to show you involve responses that are a little more dismissive (from what I can remember, it essentially requires turning down everything, even the content that could be read as purely platonic). Which means, unfortunately, your options are generally “somewhere between romantic and platonic” and “no interest at all”. 

That said, this route is much easier to read as platonic, and I think is meant to cover ground for players who fall into one of two categories:

- Have no interest in Diavolo romantically

- Don’t want to end on a more suggestive note (since the kiss route leads to implied NSFW)

So you can read romance into it as much as you can ignore it. I like being able to focus on both sides, however, since sometimes you want the Devilgrams to explore more of the friendship between yourself and the brothers rather than an inherent romance - ergo, “platonic” route. 

That’s a much longer intro than usual, so I’ll cut it off there. As usual, this post covers content locked behind Story Keys, so here’s your cursory spoiler warning!

As I mentioned last post, you’re given an option to end the Devilgram in one of two ways: with a kiss (leading you down the more romantic route), or with a hug (by claiming you don’t want any funny business, to which he admits he just wants to hold you). We’re following the hug route.

I can likely guaratee you, after everything we’ve seen so far, Diavolo’s never had the chance to hold someone at night. No-one’s stayed long enough for him to spend time doing “nothing at all” with them, so it’s immediately clear that physical affection likely isn’t something he’s afforded often, let alone for the duration of a night - particularly considering the concept of a sleepover is new to him (as we saw in the first two posts) and just how generally awed he is by your continued presence and happiness being there. 

In other words, the changes of anyone having let him close enough to hold them before this point for this long are extremely slim. 

Which means, in turn, he’s almost definitely never been held. 

(There is, after all, a difference between holding someone who’s just putting up with it and actually being hugged back). 

The only person who might have done would be his father, when he was younger; I’m not wholly sure how close Diavolo is with the Demon King, but considering how overprotective he was, I’d assume he’d have given a little baby Diavolo at least a reasonable amount of hugs. Whether he did or not, however, that’s really it. That’s Diavolo’s list of “people who have held him for an extended period of time”. 

Even more likely, that’s his complete list of “people who have felt comfortable, happy, and content enough around him to let him fall asleep with them”. 

We already know that for a majority of his lifetime, it was just him, his father, and Barbatos - and before that, just him and his father. There really aren’t a lot of people he can put on that list, especially considering his status (and age) when the Demon King went to sleep. When the last of his restrictions were finally released.  

No wonder he’s so desperate for affection. No wonder he’s so horrifically touch- and love-starved. His entire life, he’s had practically no-one. Moreover, his only dedicated friends are:

- His butler (who tends to his duties with utmost professionalism, and with whom it wouldn’t be appropriate to form the sort of friendship and attachment he wants)

- Lucifer (who for centuries has been bitter over the oath, and takes his duties seriously out of pride and gratitude/servitude rather than affection - and has, in several situations, been genuinely put out/underwhelmed by Diavolo’s attempts to deepen their friendship)

- Queen Rose (who we’ve seen relegated to all of one visit per year, with an unknown connection and attachment to Diavolo, and who clearly isn’t important enough to have been given much of a story beyond the one event)

Demons he has no deep connection with, and is granted little to no physical affection from. 

Even the brothers have each other. Even at their very worst - with the issues between Satan and Lucifer, and the treatment they give Mammon - we’ve seen several images of them being physically affectionate. And that really does range from slumping over each other in sleep, to being used as weights for Beel’s training, to diving in close for group selfies. 

It doesn’t seem like much - and honestly, I do enjoy the headcanon that maybe as a species they just don’t tend to be as touchy-feely as humans - but it’s significantly more than we see (and hear) Diavolo get. It’s still physical contact that’s comfortable and affectionate; a physical show of care.

Diavolo has even said in Chats before (specifically in the one shared between you, him, and Barbatos) that he wants to stay at the House of Lamentation because they’re noisy and active. Because he’s used to silence and isolation and he wants to experience a place full of sound and activity and interconnecting relationships. Because he wants to be involved in something he doesn’t have. 

What you’ve afforded Diavolo in this moment is something so rare for him, it’s either happened very little in his life or never at all. 

This normal show of affection - something we can all get simply by turning to a friend, or a partner, or a family member; something we use as greetings and as comfort and often without a thought - is completely outside his typical experience. 

So, it’s bliss; by literal definition, “a state of perfect happiness, oblivious to everything else”. It’s not just warm, or happy, or perfect - it’s a feeling so outside of what he knows, it transcends all positive emotion. 

Your affection narrows down his focus away from the Devildom - from his worries, from his fears, from his unhappiness and his insecurities and his loneliness - and centres it entirely on you.

There’s a reason he wants to spend more time with you. A reason you’re his greatest person; a reason this night is so special to him. 

You give him everything he’s never had, but always wanted - and you do it as easily and thoughtlessly as drawing breath. 

For someone who’s struggled just to keep his desired friends by his side, that likely means the world to him. 

+

As his monologue continues on, we reach a sort of... wavering point.

This is the part that makes it a little blurry between the lines of romance and platonic feeling. You can clearly see how this dialogue is meant to be vague enough to appeal to both sides; by only lightly mentioning that he’s “feeling” something, you can read it as either romantic feeling or platonic feeling, albeit the second line tips it, initially, in favour of a romantic reading. 

However, I think this scene can still be fairly platonic when you consider that you are the only person to have ever made him feel this happy. 

Diavolo is a demon. He’s a royal demon. He’s the stand-in leader of an entire Realm, with hundreds of thousands of subjects under his command. He’s been alive for a relatively unknown but doubtlessly extensive amount of time. His concerns and worries far exceed that of anything a single human on Earth could fret over - because he’s not just fretting over a kingdom, or a nationality, but an entire race of beings that he holds direct responsibility for. 

A single human life, in contrast to that, is likely nothing more than a split-second blip on a radar. There and gone before he could even have seen it.  

Whatever he expected from the Exchange Programme, the importance of a single human likely wasn’t something he had in mind. Your importance as a whole for the future he wanted, yes; for what you represented, and what you could achieve, almost definitely. But for you, as a person? You, for all the good and the bad, the experiences and memories, the thoughts and feelings, that make you who you are?

In the grand scheme of things, that doesn’t matter. That you are human and alive and perform well in the Programme to ensure peace between the Realms does.  

Because you will fade away in less than a second. Because you will be gone before long, and your existence to him is like fruit fly to us. Short. Uneventful. Insignificant. 

His infatuation with humanity doesn’t necessarily mean an infatuation with individual humans. You can be enamoured with rabbits and set up a sanctuary for them, but that doesn’t mean you’ll see the inherent nature and personal significance of any single one. 

He likely never would have thought that one of the Exchange Students would become this important to him. 

He likely never would have thought that a human, plain and simple as you are, would open up this many feelings, experiences, possibilities. 

(He likely never would have thought that you could change his life as drastically as you have.)

Why would he? After all, you’re just human. Your life is so fragile, it could end with the barest twitch of his finger. How could something so frail possibly have such an impact on him - do things that no demon has ever been able to do?

And yet, you’ve done so much. In a few years at most, you’ve changed his life in ways he’s always struggled with. You’ve given him all the things he wanted; all the things he’s missed. 

You. A human. A tiny, fragile, impossible little human. You’ve done things greater beings have been incapable of. Things even he - with all his power and wisdom and life experience - couldn’t do.

How could he have possibly expected that?

(He might have hoped for it. Hoped that something good would come from the Exchange Programme; hoped that he’d be able to experience those things he’d never been able to with someone new and fresh in his life. But he still can’t have imagined that it would happen so soon, so easily, so naturally. That it would have been entirely because of you.)

As a slight aside, though a very related one, I’m deeply interested by Diavolo’s second line: “Oh, but your humanity only makes you even more captivating”

Here’s an English Lit tip for all of you: if a character says “oh” like this, the utterance is almost always used to emphasise an already-intense emotion. It’s the little oh you see in fanfic; that single sound to release everything a person feels in one breath. It’s used a lot in epics, and especially in 19th centuary texts, when the narrator is lamenting or expressing woe. 

Here, it sounds wistful. Longing. Amazed. Dreamy. Awed. Reverent. This isn’t something he’s saying intentionally. 

These utterances are almost always kept to narration; to the depths of a character’s thoughts, where they can express themself the most in its truest form. They’re used to incite a reader’s emotion, their empathy, and to highlight the sheer emotive weight of a scene. It’s very rarely verbal, unless they’re utterly overcome with feeling. 

The fact that Diavolo’s saying it out loud, therefore, means it’s not intentional. These are his deepest thoughts said aloud, so intense and true it’s impossible for him to keep it locked inside his mind. 

That’s simple fact. He’s purely, utterly enraptured by you. 

The analysis on that sentence could end there. The admittance, unwittingly, that you are captivating as an example of how significant you are to him. However... 

While it does highlight that he already finds you awing, it also notes that it’s your humanity that makes you even more enchanting. Not just the fact that you’re you, or that you’re human and he finds the depth of his feeling surprising - but that the very notion of your humanity enthralls him. 

We’ve already seen his interest in humanity span decades before your arrival, if not centuries. We therefore know that the fragility of your life and the existence of your humanity means something to him in a way it doesn’t - or wouldn’t - to other demons. 

He’s fascinated by the concept of humans, and you are human. Naturally, he’s going to be awed that a human is important to him by default; simultaneously, he’s thrilled by the fact that you’re representative of the World he adores.

+

Moving on from that focus, the next scene. It’s the conclusion of this route, and thus the final shot in the Devilgram if you decide to end it this way. 

This, is mostly just sweet. I couldn’t avoid adding this in. 

It’s a callback to the start of this post - the fact that Diavolo has likely never been able to hold someone for the night, and that he’s thoroughly excited for the chance to do so with you. 

Diavolo wants to cherish holding you. He wants to savour having you in his arms as you go to rest. 

He knows it’s something that won’t happen often, if it ever happens again. So he wants to make the most of it. He wants to ingrain it in his mind, lock it up tight with the memories he holds closest to his heart. 

There’s a little more I have to say about the concept of sleep and especially willingness and comfort sleeping around another person, but there’s a better way to present that in another screenshot - one we’ll see in the next post. It deserves more space than I have left here, so I’ll relegate that to a few screenshots I wasn’t able to fit in elsewhere. 

It’s a bit of a topic change, but a good one. Do you recall the post wherein Diavolo reads his favourite poem to you? In that post, I went over the fact that he reveals you to be - in no uncertain terms - his greatest person. 

I also noted in the post that he doesn’t say this by default. You have to choose for him to say that by picking the option along the lines of, “Who’s your greatest person?”. The devs kindly allow you to decide just how close to Diavolo you want to be, and whether or not he’s comfortable admitting in such open terms how important you are to him. 

In the screenshots below, then, I’ve shown the other route; the one wherein you asked if Barbatos was his greatest person. 

Diavolo’s response?

It’s much more vague. He doesn’t even vaguely state that his greatest person is you. In fact, it sounds very much like he still doesn’t know who his greatest person is. 

At least until you consider that final line.

“Should that day come, you’ll be the first to know”. 

This comment speaks volumes. In a very subtle way, it’s Diavolo showing you that he trusts you most; that, out of everyone he knows, he’d go to you first to tell you who his most important person is. 

This could be because he believes you’d be excited to know. Maybe he thinks you’d be happy for him, and you’d celebrate the fact that he’s found his greatest person. Maybe it’s simply him acknowledging that he’s told you about the concept of a greatest person, and thus, you’d be the only one with the knowledge to care whether or not he’s found someone who fits that bill. 

It might even be him saying you’re just the first person on his mind beyond his greatest person. That when he has important news, the first thing he wants to do is tell you. 

But it’s also, I think, a hint. 

You could read it as dismissive; “I’ve not yet found someone better than Barbatos, but when I do, I’ll tell you.” It’s certainly one interpretation of the line, and what the above covers. Another, however, would be, “I’m not ready yet to confirm my feelings/I’ve lost my confidence since you mistakenly assumed it to be someone it’s not. When I’m ready, I’ll tell you - and you’ll know I meant you.”

It’s a perfectly valid reading to believe he already suspects his greatest person is you. That he’s implying you’ll know who his greatest person is before anyone else because he’ll be saying to you, directly, it’s you. 

It’s a sweet moment, either way. Whether he’s being coy about who his greatest person is or he genuinely doesn’t know yet, the fact remins that you’re important enough to him - that he believes you care enough about him and his happiness to want to know - that he’ll tell you before anyone else. 

You’re his priority, regardless.  

Another fact, one you might have thought I’d cover first, is the surprise of his prior comment: “the greatest person in my life would overshadow even him”. 

Barbatos isn’t Diavolo’s greatest person. From the previous scene - that alternate timeline where he’s more obvious about who his greatest person is - it’s clear that Barbatos doesn’t fill a lot of the requirements. He supports Diavolo, yes; he’s by his side, always, and he can’t leave - but he’s not there for him. Not the same way you are. 

Emotionally, mentally, physically, Barbatos doesn’t click with Diavolo the way he needs his greatest person to. Barbatos doesn’t spend time with him happily and freely; doesn’t let him get close and affectionate. Diavolo can’t be his true self around Barbatos and feel wholly, perfectly accepted. The butler-master divide makes that an impossibility, as does the origin of their friendship. 

Barbatos is still important to him, of course; there’s no denying that. After all, the greatest person in his life at the moment is Barbatos. That’s who Diavolo is using to gauge his greatest person against; whether or not they mean more to him than Barbatos, and he connects with them better than with his closest companion.

Diavolo’s just not fooling himself into thinking Barbatos is that person.

There is, however, something... a little more amazing to think about, knowing Diavolo’s requirements for his greatest person. 

They have to be better than Barbatos.   

Barbatos, the demon who helped raise him in the absence of his mother. 

Barbatos, the demon who’s been by his side since youth, patiently feeding him stories of the Realms he never got to see. 

Barbatos, the only demon who ever stayed, who wasn’t directly related to him.

Barbatos, the demon Diavolo knows best, the demon he’s known the longest. 

And in the timeline he confirms, openly, overtly, that you’re his greatest person, 

You exceed that. 

+++

And thus concludes part 6. I hope this has been enjoyable to read, because in parts, it was not enjoyable to write- I got a bit too picky and ended up editing this twice to add in more because I didn’t like how I’d worded it before, so guess how much time that’s eaten up OTL 

Still, with this post done, we’ve only got one more! Finally. It’s the concluding part, so it’s mostly going to be bitty details that didn’t perfectly fit elsewhere, as well as a better focus on another facet of the reading route - because, yes, not only do you get to decide whether or not you eat fruit or read, you also get to decide whether Diavolo reads to you or you read to him.

I really wasn’t joking when I said this Devilgram was spoilt for choice, before. I’m absolutely not used to these stories containing anything more than a “good reaction”/”bad reaction” response, or maybe a “platonic route”/”romantic route” divide. This Devilgram, though - damn. You end up replaying it like ten times just to see everything. And it’s all voice acted, too - it’s kind of amazing. 

So, if you’d like, please continue on to part 7! And thank you so much for making it through all this wordy babbling. 

[peripapaya]

Cities and Labor

Permalink: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33557203

This city is a gift for Desa from the Webcomics Review discord server! The prompt she gave me was 🦾 . Full story below the break!

----

There is a simple truth, universally known but seldom remarked upon for its sheer mundanity, that all cities must be supported by some laboring of the masses. That is, there must be some hand that lays the pavement, caulks the seams, dusts the statues, and carts away the many tonnes of human detritus that a city exhales each day in the course of daily life.

Exactly how this burden is distributed varies widely from one place to another. For example, one may call to mind the metropolis of Tudoran where the laboring underclasses are banished to outside the city walls in daylight, creeping in only under the darkness of night to perform menial tasks so that the upper classes may pretend they do not exist. On the other extreme, one may remember Oprathet, in which jobs are performed by all citizens in rotation so that all men and women regardless of birth might serve one day a year as Lord Mayor and the next as a sewage sweep.

Uskresh takes an approach that echoes both these systems. Like Oprathet, they believe that drudgery of city upkeep should be distributed equally across the populace, and like Tudoran they desire that such chores not encroach upon their leisure time. Thus they consign such undesirable duties to the one demographic that is both universal and uncomplaining—their own sleeping selves.

The Uskreshi are masters of the psyche, to the extent that they can wholly separate their physical and mental selves. During their hours of rest, they use this skill to dissociate completely, such that their bodies continue to perform the work required to upkeep the city while their minds slumber. This leaves their waking hours free with which to pursue their passions and endeavours of skill, whether that be in learning, arts, sport, or more esoteric interests. Many sons and daughters of this city have gained great renown in their respective fields as a result--and still you will find that every one of them spend a shift each day dedicated to sleep and common labor.

It is common to see these sleeping drones drifting through the streets, working with mindless diligence at their assigned chores. Those of the waking world pay them little mind, sliding by their glassy-eyed companions with little more than a glance. It is a strange sight to behold, as if two cities exist superimposed upon each other, the first vibrant and full of vigor, the other marching forward with mindless focus on the necessary tasks, and nothing more. 

All who enter the city walls are required to take part in this system. Even the rare travelers like myself are issued a daily work quota for the duration of their stay. Unable to perform fantastic feats of dissociation myself, I spent each of my days in Uskresh from morning until midafternoon laying bricks in the municipal district, while sounds of laughter and joviality drifted to me from that second city, the one populated by those wakeful and living. It was hot, heavy work under the beating midday sun, and my fellow workers, all born and raised in the city walls, spent our shift in that trance-like state that came to them so naturally. Hours pass slowly in such company. To be among them, silent and indefatigable with their dead eyes and robotic movements, with sweat dripping into my eyes and my back aching with the strain of keeping pace, was as if to be among damned souls put condemned to work in hell. 

Once completing my grueling shift, I was left each day with just a few hours to wander the city before sundown. Even this time held only limited joy for me, for as I roamed I found it difficult to see the city’s temples and houses as little more than collections of stones, each mined, sanded, laid, and sealed by an empty, mindless hand. When at last darkness and exhaustion would force me to return to my dormitory, I would fall into bed, grateful for a dreamless sleep while around me, automatons rose around me to begin their nightly work.

It would be a discredit to Uskresh to conclude my account without acknowledging the merits of their system. While awake, its people are passionate and generous. Free from the bounds of labor, they have perfected the art of leisure, hobby, and personal betterment. It is easy to make friends among its people, though I never quite got used to the shock of chancing upon the vacant body of a man or woman I had lunched with the day before at work during their assigned sleep-shifts. My discomfort at these encounters amused my new friends greatly, but always left me with a lingering unease whenever we next met.

I have great respect for the Uskreshi, but I cannot live as they do. After a week or so on their relentless schedule, I cut my stay short and took once more to the road, more worldly-wise and weary than when I had arrived.

[meloncubedradpops]

Repo! The Corona Opera: Final Countdown

This is the third and final installment of Repo: The Corona Opera. In the first piece, I made the argument that the surreal events we are experiencing in 2020 remind me of the world in the movie Repo! the Genetic Opera. My second essay compared the characteristics of fascism with the same movie. Here we will tie together ideas in both works to highlight a dark path that America is on, based on what we know about Repo!, in the hopes that we can reject the evils of those who are sacrificing our health and safety for their own selfish reasons. 

When I began thinking about this movie through the lenses of COVID-19, I saw uncanny patterns that just years ago seemed like an exaggerated storytelling. Millions of people dying from organ failure. Yeah, but how? 

Then 2020 happened. Oh, that's how. Sure the disease doesn't affect everyone in the same way, but its wrath and potential to harm are tremendous. The death toll in the United States alone is, as of today, is 231,000. At least, that is the death toll we are know so far. It will take time when the dust settles and we can analyze the excess death data to truly know how many of our fellow Americans have died. 

And while our world does not currently emulate those opening comic scenes in Repo, the impact from the sudden loss of life will be felt for a long time. There are a lot of really great themes in Repo: the concept of the family, drug addiction, the impact of corporate monopolies, and let's not forget it's a gothic coming-of-age story too. I am going to highlight three concepts that weave together our current reality with the world of Repo: the parallels of the Trump and Largo family, the Graverobber as the symbolic "other", and organ repossessions is genocide.

As mentioned in my previous entry, I highlighted the ways that Rotti Largo is a fascist. I went into detail supporting the argument that his company GeneCo holds tremendous and unyielding power in the city we see in the movie. And despite his efforts to save humanity from extinction, his assumed heirs and blood-related children are nothing short of entitled mediocrity. I will draw many parallels between President Donald Trump and Rotti Largo throughout the duration of this essay, but let's take a few minutes to talk about their children. Believe it or not, this meme was made by myself and my friend FOUR years ago, almost to the day! 

But unlike 2016, I had no idea that I'd find multiple comparisons to draw upon. And frankly, if we all knew how bad this presidency would be, for both America and the rest of the world, we might have made less jokes from our complacency. I ask the the real question though, which Trump and Rotti offspring are most alike?

Now, I've wanted to do this thought exercise since the inception of my essays. The surface level combinations would look something like, Amber and Ivanka (since they're both women, obvs), Donald Trump JR as Luigi (oldest child), and Eric Trump as Pavi ("you're just his useless brother!"). 

However my boyfriend raised a great point that had me rethink this: Donald Trump Jr is ACTUALLY Amber Sweet. When I took out the gender aspect out of the equation, it made so much more sense. In my next point, I will go into drug addiction in a much more dignified manner. But let's just take a moment here to consider the following. 

We know that Amber Sweet is addicted to two things in life: surgery and pain killing drugs to make surgery bearable. Amber Sweet's character provides an incredible insight to the daily life of the people in Repo. If you subtract the Zydrate Anatomy scene, you would hardly even know that zydrate is devastating lives of the people addicted to it. We hear about zydrate in the graveyard as a commercial and the media spends its first opportunity asking Rotti about zydrate's "use and abuses". After Sweet becomes a no-show in the presser, we quickly learn that she runs a support group for fellow addicts, or at least she is supposed to. 

How does this relate to Trump Jr? Quite simply, many are speculating that Trump Jr abuses cocaine. The most compelling evidence is his speech during the Republican National Convention. Now, obviously we don't have solid evidence that he is indeed consuming and abusing cocaine, and quite frankly if he is, that would not be incredibly surprising or even a huge deal. 

But the conversation doesn't end here. President Donald Trump did not hesitate to bring up former vice president Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden and his battle with addiction during the first Presidential Debate. It was a low jab, especially considering that the United States is going through a crippling opioid crisis, which he even admits is exacerbated by covid-19 and related lockdowns. Both Donald Trump and Rotti Largo exploit their own children in this manner. I mean, Donald Trump helped fucked up the Trump Foundation where his children were held prominent positions, which was caught stealing from a charity intended to help children with cancer! Every time we see Donald Trump Jr on our doom-screens, we get another glimpse into Jr's downward spiral. And with every additional crime that all of president Trump's children become implicated in, the more and more we can see that this family is rotten to the core. 

If Trump Jr is Amber Sweet, then Ivanka is Luigi. In Repo, Luigi can be described as nothing short of a homicidal maniac. I am not saying that Ivanka commits murder, at least not directly, but she does hold a lot of power in the White House. Spend any time learning about the machinations of the White House, particularly in the early days, and you will learn Ivanka competed with Melania for a voice in the administration, and still works for the White House today. Even if you exclude all of the shady business ties, such as the dozens of Chinese patents (including for voting machines!!!) Ivanka has filed, clearly the boundaries of nepotism do not exist for this family. Luigi somehow kills multiple people in the movie and faces no consequences for it. How can this be? Obviously corruption, but that is too simple. If there were multiple checks and balances at one point that would have forced Luigi to face justice for his crimes, they have obviously failed to come to roost in the movie. The obvious common denominator between today and the world of Repo is that those who want power will do anything to obtain and maintain it. Does the public know about every murder committed by Luigi? Does the public know about every crime committed by Ivanka (and also by proxy her husband Jared Kushner, who by the way, failed to pass mandatory security clearances but still has access to the intelligence of our government)? Jared intentionally made it difficult for many of the states hit hardest by covid-19 in the early weeks to acquire the necessary medical supplies because the electorate did not vote for Trump in 2016. That. IS. MURDER. Just as Luigi calls the common citizens in Repo "filthy mice", “Jrvanka” (and the Right at greater) frames the nation as two groups: us and THEM. Luigi is much less calculated, but the comparisons are there. If given the chance, the Trump and Largo family will kill because of their sociopathy, greed, and egos. 

Admittedly I don't have as compelling of a comparison for Eric Trump and Pavi. However I will say that both Pavi and Eric do the bidding for their father's empire, and I would also argue that both feel like they have to compete to get a modicum of attention and love from a paternal figure devoid of basic empathy. And at the end of the day, they do not reject their father's tyranny. And honestly that is enough of a comparison for me. 

Last but not least, I can't ignore the fact that the official Republican Party platform for the 2020 election is loyalty to Trump in the absence of any other political or philosophical idea. A majority of the speakers at the Republican National Convention were members of his family. Their pitch to Americans is “Just Trust Us”. However, a quarter million Americans aren't here to agree or disagree with that statement. With each passing day, more and more Americans are getting sick, to the tune of tens of thousands of cases a day on average currently. The Largo family and GeneCo are not much different. Remember that scene in 21st Century Cure where Shilo and Graverobber are in a mass grave where we can see truck loads of humans being added to the pile of corpses? 

The only real thing separating the corpses from the rest of the city is a poorly constructed brick wall and the years of propaganda that normalizes what I imagine would be a terrible pungent smell of death. 

The entire Trump family came into the first presidential debate without masks. The president was literally sick with a virus that statistically speaking, could kill his opponent; and he was on stage shedding this incredibly contagious virus screaming and shouting, spreading his droplets everywhere. The Trump family failed to show up early enough to be tested for covid before the debate. 

This was not an accident. Jared Kushner bragged to journalist Bob Woodward back in April that Trump was going to take the country "back from scientists". As of this past weekend, we learned that Trump is floating around the idea of firing our nation's leading disease expert Anthony Fauci in a time where our cases, deaths, and hospitalizations from covid-19 are surging. It is almost grotesquely poetic how similar this is to GeneCo. GeneCo is a company in the healthcare industry, but they exploit the worst parts of society, which I will go into very soon. And in its effort to achieve maximum quarterly profits, the ends always justify the means, even if that results in fascism and excess death/suffering. Rotti's body guards kill the doctor who gives him his grim diagnosis. Trump didn't kill the doctors treating him during his recovery with covid, but information we got from the White House doctors were straight up WEIRD. We witnessed a Gentern being killed by Luigi in the Mark It Up Scene for no other reason besides existing in the proximity of him. Trump has spread misinformation about how there's more money to be made when a doctor declares a death as a covid death. I am finding it hard to see the difference. I think I've made my point regarding the parallels of the Trump and Largo family quite clearly, but you may see additional points I bring up as the rest of my essay unfolds. 

Society is complex with more nuance than we give it credit to. The different ways that various groups of people interact with are endlessly interesting, and one of the reasons I love Repo so much is because there's an incredible amount of unpacking that you can do, even in the absence of written dialogue about it. 

If you don't know, Repo started out as a story originally penned as "The Necromerchant's Debt", which gave the Graverobber character a more active role in the world crafted by Darren Smith and Terrace Zdunich. When watching the movie Repo! The Genetic Opera, the Graverobber is certainly a character seen in multiple scenes, but in a lot of ways, his importance is left out. An entire scene was cut from the film, see Needle Through a Bug below if you're interested. 

Regardless the parts that we do see are still greatly impactful. Graverobber is essentially the symbolized "other" living in a world that is greatly stratified by social class, and he's doing what he can to survive. 

Now if you have been living on this planet we call Earth and have ever paid attention ever, you probably have noticed that there are a lot of power structures that influence the resources and opportunities that aid in our development and maintenance of our needs. The access to being able to elevate ourselves above basic survival are typically contingent upon a few things, one namely our ability to draw a paycheck. As I mentioned in my last essay, so many things went wrong to have what would equivalently be either a drug trafficking felony in today's terms or maybe theft, result in permissible extra-judicial murder. And I am not saying that Trump's bragging of the extra-judicial murder of an ANTIFA activist is at all related, but look at the way Trump compares his dissidents with the way GeneCo treats Graverobbers.

 We are experiencing the early stages of economic collapse, millions of people are hungry, soon-to-be evicted, jobless. And yet, the Republicans in power just HAD to rush through a Supreme Court justice. When arguing against lockdowns that would have saved lives, the Right spent countless hours arguing about increase suicide, drug use, poverty, domestic abuse, blah blah blah, you know all the things that were there and as equally as important pre-pandemic? And they did NOTHING to help mitigate this disaster beyond the bill that was passed this spring. The house passed the HEROES Act back in May, and senate majority leader Mitch McConnel declined to take a vote on it. 

Never mind the fact that landlords are still expected to pay the banks their mortgages on their investment properties. Never mind the fact that rent wasn't cancelled. Never mind that the Trump administration sought to prevent any oversight into the first bill passed previously to prosecute fraud. So you know, we can make sure the money went to small business owners, and not instead to the many, many crony ties to the administration who were approved for huge amounts of money. Honestly to think about this is kind of sickening, particularly when you relate it back to Repo and my essay I wrote on fascism.

I could probably talk all day about our failure with the "War on Drugs", but I feel like you can probably see based on the efficacy of its policies that drugs still exist and people are still abusing them. I bring this up because the Graverobber's occupation is essentially a drug dealer. However he sells a counterfeit of zydrate derived from the body of a bug who naturally borrow in a corpse's body, which is and also isn't stealing from the corpse / their estate, but is somehow still "bad" enough that you can legally be killed "on site" if a Gene Cop thinks you're harvesting the blue brain goo. I mean this entire concept makes my brain hurt. 

The Graverobber, as a concept, is a perfect example of the enemy who is simultaneously the biggest and the least threat, and the only way to stop them is to kill them before they can appeal before the jury of their peers or go to prison to pay for their crimes. And I am sure the propaganda that justifies this is beautifully orchestrated. It literally mimics Russian propaganda, AKA the biggest foreign intelligence threat since, I don’t know, the Cold War? I can picture authoritarian stump speeches now: 

"Here the Graverobber who comes in the night, tempting your children. They sell the promise of a good time, but did you know they are raping your daughters for this drug?? They can get your husband hooked on zydrate, and you won't know it's coming until he comes home unrecognizable. These thugs are stealing your grandmother's ring off her corpse, and you will find her half-rotted corpse thrown askew across her tombstone when you go to pay your respects."

And yet Graverobber defends himself:

"Industrialization has crippled the globe (Enjoy GeneCo's day and nighttime formula of Zydrate) Nature failed as technology spread (Ask a gentern if Zydrate is right for you) And from this wake a market erected (Buying Zydrate from an unlicensed source is illegal) An entire city built on top of the dead! And you can finance your bones And your kidneys For every market a submarket grows But best you be punctual With making your payments Lest it be you on the concrete below It's quick! It's clean! It's pure! It could change your life! Rest assured! It's the 21st century cure! And it's my job To steal and rob GRAVES!" 

He then goes into detail about how this is just the cost of doing business with his modern world. How many of our current and future stories by those who will not make a single sentence in our history books will be casted as enemies of the state who were ultimately just trying to make end's meet? You can deport the illegal immigrant but neglect to prosecute the American company who hired them to work here? How is that much different? If the people in Repo need this drug to cope with the deaths of their loved ones and their livelihoods, then what does that say about the soul of their nation? 

If you are still with me at this point, I want to thank you so much. I am going to conclude on a fairly heavy topic, but it is one worth having. Organ repossessions in Repo are genocide and in America, we are currently also committing genocide. 

The whole premise of the film is the justification that those who fail to make payments on their surgeries deserve to have their organs repossessed, because what other reality is there with unrelenting end-stage capitalism? People are losing their whole lives as I type this, through no fault of their own. Most Americans cannot afford a $400 emergency expense pre-covid-19. Millions are unable to pay for basic life expenses, such as rent, healthcare or food. Our president specifically shoved a Supreme Court justice because he wants the American Healthcare Act to be deemed too unconstitutional for public policy. Never mind the 100+ million Americans with pre-existing conditions. Never mind the millions who acquire their healthcare through the ACA marketplace. Never mind the fact that we are in a once-in-a-century PANDEMIC. Never mind that we spend more per capital on healthcare than anywhere else in the world. Never mind that the Right does not have ANY sort of plan to replace something in its place. How could MILLIONS die in an organ failure crises in Repo anyways? We already know that the Trump administration already stopped caring about covid deaths when we learned it was hurting people of color disproportionality than the general population. 1 out of 1000 black Americans have died from covid. Reread that sentence. If you don't believe me, go out and seek those facts for yourself. When we think of genocide we think of Hitler killing thousands of people via gas chambers. But there are SO many other steps that lead to the normalization of that. 

Undesirables, aka the "others", are easy to discard. Is it a surprise to anyone that ICE gynecologists are removing the uteruses of detainees? I almost made my whole essay about that one controversy alone. Genocide is insidious like that. 

"Oh but if she didn't want that hysterectomy, she shouldn't have tried to come to America for a better life, even if that's what my ancestors did." 

Of course not, she's the "other", and you're the law-abiding citizen. You were able to afford the extra $30 a month for the upgraded booby package that gave an otherwise unremarkable kidney transplant a fun twist by including breast implants. The orphan who works the streets because his parents died during the plague who needed a new pancreas because insulin became too expensive is threatening your suburbs. Bonus points if the orphan has a hint of melanin in his skin or if your daughter shows favor towards his antics, completely ignoring the fact that his mommy and daddy were killed by preventable disease. I have no idea if this was intentional or not, but look at the makeup of people who get their organs repossessed in Repo and try not to tell me there's a trend. Yes it could have been the coincidence of casting, but nevertheless it is worth mentioning. We don't see many people of color in this movie, but of the few we see, they get murdered by GeneCo/Wallace. And I don't care how stupid coincidences are because that is exactly what is happening with covid-19. The so-called essential, working class citizens (who are disproportionally POC) are putting their whole life on the line to serve everyone else who works at home. 

The ends justifies the means, kill enough elderly and the federal government won't have to pay out on social security. Force everyone to get back to work and fuck you if you think you deserve money for the hours you weren't allowed to work (oh and by the way we want to make it so you can't sue for covid-19 related liabilities). Oh you lost your job, "try something new", as told by Ivanka Trump earlier this summer. 

My main point is if you let fascism get control, they will normalize genocide and put you in jail for even making the connections of corruption. "Millions of people dead from organ failure, what's adding a few more to the pile in the name of law and order?" "The only good Democrat is a dead Democrat". Once again, I am failing to see the difference. 

Okay I threw a lot at you just now, and the fact you made it to the end is a miracle. If you skip around because you have a squirrel brain like me, I thank you as well. The fact we get out of bed everyday and do anything right now is a miracle and I know attention can be finite. 

I am writing this on the eve of the United States General election after having wanting to write this since June of this year. I am tired. We are ALL Shiloh right now. Our lives have been on pause. "I must be brave", "I'll capture it", "Run back inside". Yeah girl, same! I haven't talked about her much throughout any of my essays, but I have to give credit where credit is due. 

Humans are a resilient creature. We have millions of years of experience on this Earth, and much of our survival has been based on pure dumb luck. But we have blown so many other species out of the water in one way alone, and that is our ability to communicate. 

We don't have to let people who exploit our weaknesses control us. The sociopaths who try and run our society did not historically aid in our survival. They didn't care if we ate the mushroom that killed us or would have protected us when threatened by wildlife, it was our tribe. The Right has successfully hijacked that bond between the self and the tribe so that it can fit the needs of sociopathy and greed. It is not normal for a president to tell a nation that "it is what it is" when over 100k citizens die from a preventable disease. Do not let the sociopaths throw us in that tiny pine box in a mighty small drop in a mighty dark plot, hastening the trip to our epilogue. Because every inch you give, they will take a mile and charge you by the hour. Never forget that.

[frooopsen]

Kyalin - part 4

thanks to @linguini17 for beta-reading again. :)

Communication

"Kya.“ It was dark outside and the moon shone into their bedroom through a gap in the blinds. They had both drifted in and out of sleep and the sun would rise in a few hours. "Kya,“ she whispered once more.

"What is it?“ Kya didn’t sound sleepy at all, which confirmed Lin’s suspicion.

"You can’t sleep,“ she sighed.

"Very perceptive, Chief.“ Her smile was audible the next time she spoke. "Are you going to let me in on why you felt the need to tell me that?“

"I‘m having trouble sleeping.“ The moonlight accentuated Lin’s smooth skin and Kya let her eyes wander, taking it all in.

"You know this is hard for me, too,“ she said smirking, her fingers stroking along Lin’s arm, "No teasing you for a whole day.“

"I know. You’re doing so great,“ Lin sighed with a smile making its way onto her lips. "By the way, if you tell Bumi that you got me all mushy and analyzing stupid nightmares, there will be consequences.“ She tried to sound at least  vaguely threatening but that notion was discredited by the grin that travelled between their faces.

"Well don’t tempt me.“ Kya gasped leaning in for a kiss. Before letting go, she captured Lin’s lower lip between her teeth, as the metalbender took the opportunity to pull her in by the hip.

"Speaking of tempting,“ Lin hummed, searching for another kiss. Their lips met again, as they started feeling down each other’s backs. "Maybe,“ she said while trailing kisses along Kya's tan skin, "And I’m only throwing ideas around – we could have a different kind of communication for a change.“

Kya felt desire kicking in and this time knowing that the talk was not going to be avoided, she didn’t care how much time passed until said talk came around. "Oh, I love this non-verbal communication,“ she smiled before placing a long-lasting kiss on the side of Lin's throat.

"Maybe you’ll get a taste for it after all,“ Lin answered jokingly.

"You are a smooth one,“ Kya admitted before sliding her hand down Lin’s stomach, a clear goal in mind. "However, my tongue is just fine, tasting different things for now.“

Lin arched her back as Kya made her way down her body. Kya did have the best comebacks, no matter how good Lin's ideas were, Kya had never lost a teasing match. Lin didn’t really mind. She did like it, most of the time. She was quickly ripped away from her thoughts as her focus was drawn in by lips wandering the invisible trail that Kya had already left with her fingers.

------

"I‘d almost forgotten how fun this is,“ Kya joked as she took the cup of coffee Lin had just made for herself.

"It hasn’t been that long,“ Lin said, turning around just to find the empty spot on the counter. That had been her coffee. She sent a piercing look Kya’s way.

"Well I’ll be needing that if you keep me up when I’m supposed to be sleeping,“ the waterbender murmured while sipping her coffee with a knowing look on her face.

"It’s not like I woke you. And if memory serves me well, you enjoyed yourself,“ Lin answered, making herself another cup.

"Still got my coffee, didn’t I?“

They sat down at the kitchen table. Kya watched the spirits floating by the window. They usually came by during the early morning hours and she was always mesmerized by their ease. Lin read through the newspaper and sipped her coffee. The weekends were when she spent a little more time on the things she usually did in a hurry. Showering, getting ready, making coffee – weekend coffee was always better. She even flipped through the news, since she didn’t spend a lot of time doing that during the week. The most important news travelled fast – especially at the station – and she spent enough time reading police reports already. At some point reading had turned into a chore, rather than a relaxing activity. The occasional article sparked her interest, nonetheless.

"I can’t believe it,“ she gasped in suprise. "Look at this!“

Kya leaned over the table and tried to decipher the headline. "Would you look at that! It’s about Uncle Sokka!“

"Not him. His sword. Some kids found it when playing hide and seek. It says here that it was stuck in some tree,“ Lin elaborated.

"I did always wonder where it ended up. It’s been forever since he lost it. Did Toph ever tell you that story?“ Kya asked, remembering how Sokka had never been able to shut up about his space-sword – as he called it.

Lin shrugged her shoulders, "She didn’t, but Tenzin did. It sounded rather boring until Bumi took over. I always wanted to see a sword like that.“

"Tenzin never was a good story-teller. Another point to me.“

Lin glared at her. "I hate when you do that.“

"Too bad,“ she smiled as they both resumed drinking their coffee.

--------

After a quiet lunch, Lin cleared her throat. "Can we finish that conversation?“

Kya looked around the room as though looking for something.

"You alright?“, Lin asked.

"Did you hear that?“ she giggled. "I think I heard someone volunteer to get touchy-feely.“

Lin sighed as she rubbed her forehead. "You are taking it too far, too soon.“

"You’re just rubbing your face now, so I won’t see that smile,“ Kya complained.

Lin let out a unappreciative growl. "Fine. Then we don’t talk about it.“

"Oh, come on!“ Kya said. "Don’t shut off now, I’ll promise to be nice from here on,“ she paused, then added, "For the duration of the conversation, of course.“

"Well, now I don’t even know how to start,“ Lin growled, "Not that I did before.“

Kya lead them to the couch, where she gestured for Lin to sit down. She joined her, pulling the muscular legs onto the cushion, planting herself in between and leaning her back against one of the armrests. "That’s not a very serious position,“ the earthbender noted as she leaned against the armrest behind her back, like Kya had done.

They sat across from each other, legs slightly tugged towards themselves, shins touching lightly. Lin fumbled on the leg of her pants.

"We’re just talking, not having a meeting,“ Kya laughed. "Also, talking about your feelings doesn’t have to be organized. People just…ease into that and don’t declare the beginning.“

Lin opened her mouth to interject, but Kya didn’t give her the chance.

"I’ll let it slide, since you claim to be new to this. I mean we have talked about our feelings together before. Otherwise I don’t think our relationship would have gotten to this point.“

Lin looked straight ahead to meet Kya’s eyes. "You being nice didn’t last very long. Besides the talks you’re referring to were us talking about us or sometimes you. That’s different.“

Kya leaned forward, just enough to cup Lin’s cheek and smiled, "Well, how is that different? They‘re still your feelings.“

"Yeah, the nice ones and I like talking about us and especially you,“ she explained kissing Kya’s hand before she withdrew it from her face again.

"You know, Kya,“ Lin said softly, her gaze still holding the waterbender’s eyes captive, "When you smile at me like that, I am so happy to have you. Your’re so full of love and I get to feel it wrapped around me.“

They stayed quiet for a while. Kya had heard the words come out of Lin’s mouth clear and warm. Yet it felt like the woman‘s soul had spoken instead. Lin’s voice sounded different, when she said things like these and Kya couldn’t explain why. It didn’t happen a lot. She thought it must have been that it felt so surreal to hear Lin – the woman she adored to an extent, which sometimes scared even the passionate waterbender – talk about her in that way. Yet she wanted to hear it from no one else. "Spirits,“ she sighed finally breaking the silence as she lowered her head a little, "I only want to make you feel, like you just made me feel.“

"And what was that?“

"I can’t tell you. I wish I could, but I don’t think the words exist.“

Lin smiled into the room as she remembered a poem. "You know, some poet once said that if lovers were ever able to express their feelings in words, they would be too full of energy for everyone who heard them. He called it the lovers‘ curse.“

"Well, it’s not hard to believe him. Especially when I see you looking at me like that.“

Now it was Lin’s turn to sigh. The past week had been filled with so many emotions, that she could feel the exhaustion flare up any time she took a little time to sit down and rest. The time she spent with Kya had been spent in silence; except for that one afternoon after the panic attack. Her skin still reacted with goosebumps when she recalled the immense fear she had felt; first in the nightmare, then during the panic attack. Now anytime she went to bed, she had to convince herself that she wouldn’t dream like that again. It still lingered around and she knew Kya could feel it too. She had always been more perceptive when it came to that. Even though Lin had noticed that her tension somehow affected both of their sleeprythms, she still didn’t know if Kya saw the residue of fear, that Lin saw anytime she looked in the mirror.

"Can you see it in my eyes?“ she mastered up the courage to ask, "The fear.“

Kya swallowed, because she knew that it would be easier if she couldn’t.

"As clear as the love you claim to see in mine,“ she paused then added. "Not just your eyes, though. You move differently. You have for a while now.“

Lin shifted, drawing her knees even closer to rest under her chin. "I really wish you couldn’t.“

"I know.“

"What if it breaks me? My strength is all I have.“

They both knew that she had more, but Kya understood what she meant. She couldn’t imagine Lin without the powerful elegance she carried herself with. It had been the constant in her life.

"You won’t break.“

"How can you be so sure?“

Kya wasn’t. "Because I’ve seen broken people.“ It didn’t make a lot of sense, but it seemed to help.

"I don’t feel like myself since we’ve talked and I don’t know how to get back to that.“

She hardly remembered the time she had spent at work that week. Like she hadn’t been there but watched her body work on reports and arrests. Her mind had been busy thinking about the panic attack and the helplessness she had felt at the lack of control.

She slightly raised her voice again, "I have always had control until I met you. They aren’t joking when they call it 'falling in love‘. I don’t mind that anymore. But this…this feels like loosing a different kind of control.“

Kya was surprised. Even though it still felt like Lin carefully assembled her sentences before saying something, so as to not disclose it in the wrong way – whatever that meant – she was talking freely, nonetheless.

Kya used the next silence to speak. "I don’t think you lost control. It was rather taken away from you. By your feelings. I don’t know…to me that’s different.“

Lin’s brow furrowed. She didn’t understand what Kya had meant.

"I couldn’t even bend my armor away,“ she exclaimed, changing the course of the conversation. "When I had nothing else, I always had my bending.“ Almost always. As she heard herself say those words it felt as though they had come from Kya. It sounded like something she would suggest.

"Well, fear is a powerful mind blocker. Your qi must have been affected. You once told me how your breathing influences your bending and how you breathe deeply before swinging the bigger rocks,“ she thought out loud, recalling the conversation they‘d had a long time ago about their differences in bending-style. "I was a good listener. Even back then.“

Lin smiled, thankful for the light comment, keeping her from tearing up. "I know. I can only repeat myself: quite the catch I landed with you.“

Kya smiled in response but didn’t want to change the topic. "It only makes sense that you loose the connection to the bending, when your other senses are overflowed as well.“ And back was the tension.

"How do you know what it’s like?“ Lin marveled. "You haven’t had one, have you?“

Kya shook her head slowly. "No, but I’ve read about them. The mind convinces the body that you’re in immediate danger, so your senses are more alert, causing you to feel and perceive things more vividly and unfortunately overstimulating your nervous system.“

Lin nodded as she thought back. "Everything was so bright all of a sudden…and the room started spinning so badly. And time passed so slowly, while it felt…like…like something was wrapped around my neck.“ She put her hand to rest underneath her throat.

"I can’t imagine how scary that has to have been.“

"I hope you never experience that. I sure don’t want it happening again. Imagine if that happens at work. I wouldn’t be able to bend.“

Kya interrupted the train of thought. "How about we don’t imagine that for now. I don’t think it will happen again.“

"But what if it does?“

"Remember when Ammon had taken you bending away,“ Kya began. "You still got all the criminals you set out for. You weren’t helpless. Your strength exceeds your bending ability. And if you find a way to reconnect to yourself you won’t even have to think about that again.“

Lin scoffed, "So you do think it might happen. How am I supposed to 'reconnect to myself‘ when I don’t even know how to express what feels off?“

Kya tried to stay calm. She had no idea either and it wasn’t fair of Lin to keep coming at her like that, but she reminded herself that it was in fact new to Lin and the pain she had accumulated over the years would in consequence spill out of her as soon as she opened up.

"I can’t see the future, but I’m trying to tell you that you’re already stronger than you think. We can all be. Sometimes we don’t even find out how strong, until we’re faced with a stupid situation like this one.“ Her frustration was clear, yet Lin stayed put, not lashing out.

She continued, "I can only rely on the experiences I’ve had, just like you. I’m not all-knowing.“

"I don’t ask you to be. You’re just... So in touch with your feelings. You probably don’t even  have to think that hard before saying those smart things and analyzing.“

Kya felt embarrassed at the underlying jealousy in Lin’s tone. People had always told her to be less emotional and that it was overwhelming when she rambled on about her feelings. Lin seemed to come from a different angle. Kya hadn’t thought that the trait she had found to be a strength, rather than a weakness, could also be seen as such from someone else – Lin of all people.

"You have to give yourself a break. You’re trying so hard to overcome the uncomfortable feelings that you don’t give them enough room to exist for a while,“ Kya muttered.

Lin’s face let go of some of the tension that had built up throughout the past minute. "But I don’t want that. The more fear I feel, the less I can bare.“

"Well, you can’t shut them off. You see how that turns out. I don’t want you to increase that distance inside yourself. You feel it, too, you said. Just give it time. It will fall into place.“

She didn’t know what else to tell her.

"The way people praise 'talking about feelings‘, it just seems like a pill you have to swallow and afterwards everything’s fine,“ Lin growled. "But it’s not. It just leaves you confused and angry at yourself.“

"Talking isn’t the easy way out,“ Kya agreed, closing her eyes. "It’s the hard way through.“

"I’m going for a walk,“ Lin announced, getting up. When Kya stood up as well, she signaled her to stay. "I need to be alone for some time. I’ll be back before dinner.“

Kya swallowed but knew she had to give Lin more space – even more. She didn’t want to.

"See you then,“ she said while making her way to the kitchen.

[ikevampeventarchive]

[ERS] Shyness Melts Into A Cocktail ～ Mozart

Duration: 11/22 (Fri) 04:00 PM ～ 11/29 (Fri) 09:00 PM

While drinking champagne at a party hosted at the mansion, Mozart became drunk and lost his memories. However, a rumor reaches your ear of a song inspired by the sensations from last night; the one he supposedly forgot...? 

The unexpected truth revealed from his own lips is ——

Route Preview

[This is an unofficial work based on fan-translation. Copyright belongs to Cybird.]

Common Route

The story starts one evening, with MC being chased around Mozart’s bed by Mozart himself. He smiles at her then frowns, asking MC to let him drink more. Lamenting the situation, MC thinks back to earlier that night, to the informal banquet with all the mansion’s residents. 

Arthur passes MC a champagne glass, and Theo proudly declares that it was a special champagne that he received from an associate in celebration of a successful exhibit. Hearing this brought MC’s expectations for the champagne up quite a bit and she smiles, gazing at the glass. 

Arthur, still pouring glasses for everyone else, asks Mozart if he’s going to drink, guessing that he wouldn’t since Mozart is known to have a low alcohol tolerance. Mozart fixes him with a sullen look, telling him not to make assumptions before stealing a glass and downing it in one gulp. 

Worried about him, MC asks Mozart if he’s okay, peering into his face when she gets close. Mozart is visibly dazed, but says that he’s fine. MC is reasonably skeptical and suggests to Mozart that he return and rest since his face is already turning red. 

She looks to him again, only to find Mozart smiling. The rare but beautiful expression on his face flusters MC, the woman unconsciously looking away. Mozart leans closer.

Mozart: I’ve already told you that I’m fine. Furthermore — 

Unable to handle him being so close, MC backs away. Unsurprisingly, Mozart follows. 

Mozart: Furthermore, MC, why are you avoiding my gaze like that? 

MC: That, that’s…. 

She clams up, deciding not to say anything since everyone would definitely make fun of her reasoning. After all, who ends up unable to look at their lover because their smile is too pretty? Still trying to get her attention, Mozart reaches out and grabs MC’s chin. 

Mozart: MC, look at me. 

The action effectively forces MC to look at Mozart straight on, and she starts blushing full force. With his free hand, Mozart starts petting MC’s cheek. Poor MC.

Mozart: ….Your face is red and warm. Aren’t you the one who’s drunk? 

MC: M-Mozart, let me go…. 

Mozart: …? What’s so embarrassing about this much touching? 

MC takes a quick look around their surroundings, full of people who are watching while enjoying their champagne (Leonardo and le Comte), people who may or may not tease them with smiles on their faces (Theo and Vincent), and turns to Mozart, telling him as such. 

Still, Mozart would not let go. While MC was racking her mind for a way to get him to understand, snickers reached their ears. That does the trick. Distracted by the sound, Mozart turns towards their source and lets go of MC in the process. It turns out to have been Dazai, who watches the two of them while swirling his own glass. 

Dazai: Mo-kun, I think you really are drunk. You’ve been smiling and in a great mood since earlier. 

Dazai: And besides, you’re troubling Toshiko-san quite a bit in front of everyone, too. 

His words seem to hit something in Mozart and he turns towards MC again, sighing. 

Mozart: So it would be fine if we were alone? 

MC: Huh? 

Dumbfounded, MC nods, but Mozart pays no mind and stands up on his own. He takes MC’s hand and turns right towards Theo, who was pouring another drink for Vincent, and steals the bottle right from his hands. Again paying no mind to the shouts coming from the others, Mozart promptly leaves the dining room, pulling MC behind him. 

They arrive at Mozart’s bedroom, and he wastes no time pushing MC down onto the bed after turning on the lights. MC tries to sit up in confusion while Mozart hovers over her, preventing her from doing so. She again tells him that he’s drunk and Mozart once again denies. 

Mozart ends up taking the champagne bottle and pouring out another glass, telling MC to let him drink more before giving her the glass. MC is confused as to why Mozart said that he wants to drink but turns around and gives her the glass. Mozart frowns and tells MC to just drink it first before he explains, unless she really is drunk, of course. 

Incensed, MC drinks the champagne and Mozart kisses her, drinking the champagne from her mouth. They continue kissing, swapping the champagne between their lips until Mozart pulls away, saying that it’s much better to drink this way. Internally, MC agrees, but thinks that even though it feels good, it’s still embarrassing. She eventually manages to ask why he thought of something like this, to which Mozart replies: 

Mozart: It tastes better when we do it like this. 

MC flushes and goes lightheaded with both arousal and alcohol. Mozart suggests that they make use of the rest of the champagne, and the two of them spend the night together, drinking champagne from each others’ lips. 

The next morning, Mozart doesn’t remember a thing, even when MC asks him and he tries to remember. MC thinks to herself that it might actually be a good thing that he forgot, since she’s still embarrassed about their actions last night. 

There’s still a small part of her, however, that sighs at how unfair it is that only she remembers. 

The scene then skips to Mozart playing the piano around noon. As he lets the melody flow through his fingers onto the keys, Dazai pays him a visit. Mozart stops playing but doesn’t do any more to acknowledge his existence. 

Dazai: Is that a new song? It’s quite the provocative composition. 

Dazai: Perhaps inspired by last night? 

Mozart: ……

Dazai: Ahaha. I’ll stop poking my nose into it then. 

Dazai: It’s all good as long as you enjoyed yourselves. 

Having said his piece, Dazai sashays out the room, leaving Mozart behind to sigh into the quiet air.

Later around sunset, MC is walking down a hallway, thinking about what Dazai told her around noon. 

Dazai: It was quite a sensual song. 

Dazai: The effect you have on Mo-kun is truly impressive. 

She wonders if what he said was really true, and whether it does relate to her or not. Later that night, MC comes to Mozart’s room, determined to say her piece. Though she tried to convince herself that Mozart’s memory loss was fine, it really wasn’t. 

MC: Say, Mozart. About last night.

MC: Were you pretending to be so drunk you lost your memory? Or do you really not remember? 

Mozart: Do you….

Mozart: Do you want me to remember? Or are you hoping that I don’t? 

—

Sweet End

Alone with him, get drunk on a sweet night in each and every way―

—

MC admits that she would rather Mozart not remember, and after a long silence, he says as much. Mozart says that he doesn’t remember anything, yet it seems like his body remembers touching MC and being touched by her, and that impression turned into a new song. He frowns, however, saying that it’s unfair that he can’t remember anything since he has a right to remember how his lover looks in their passionate moments together. MC rages internally, thinking to herself that she doesn’t want him to remember because it’s embarrassing for her. So if anything, she’d rather forget like Mozart did. 

While MC is lost in her thoughts, Mozart grips both her shoulders and leans in.

Mozart: …. Hey.

MC: Yes…? 

Mozart: That song is still incomplete… so I want you to help me in any way you can. 

MC: Help…? What do you mean by that? 

Mozart: … Make me remember last night. All of it.

MC feels heat rising through her body but agrees. She asks Mozart what he wants her to do, and Mozart suggests that they switch positions. MC will show Mozart what he himself did to her last night, so that maybe Mozart’s memories will be triggered by seeing his actions in an objective manner. It’s a wild idea and MC is understandably shocked (lol). 

In the end, they did end up getting more alcohol and setting up everything like how it was last night. MC wonders if Mozart will get drunk and forget again as they start. Mozart asks MC what they did last night, waiting for her to make the first move. While repeatedly reminding herself that this is for the sake of completing Mozart’s new song, MC pours a glass of champagne like he did last night and offers it to him. 

After Mozart drinks the alcohol calmly, MC kisses him. She thinks back to how Mozart said that it tastes better when champagne is drunk like this, and comments to herself that he might just be right about this matter. 

Mozart: This taste, I remember it. 

Wrapping a hand on MC’s nape, Mozart pulls her back in for another kiss. MC asks him if he remembers anything else, to which Mozart replies that he has bits and pieces but not much. When they part, MC is once again lightheaded. Mozart flips their positions so that he’s on top and smiles down mischievously at MC. 

Mozart: Tonight, it might just be your turn to forget everything…. 

Mozart: However, don’t worry. 

Mozart: I’ll make sure to impress the knowledge into your body, so that you can remember afterwards. 

MC surrenders herself to Mozart’s capable hands, narrating that rather than alcohol, it’s Mozart’s expressions, words, and body heat that make her drunk.

—

Premium End

As heat pierces through watery eyes, your heart beats faster ――

“Show me. Your face when you’re intoxicated... not from wine, but from kissing me.”

—

MC tells Mozart that she wants him to remember. More than feeling annoyed over how unfair it is that she’s the only one that remembers, she wants to experience everything with Mozart — no matter how embarrassing it is. Mozart drops his gaze, and after a long silence:

Mozart: I remember. 

The revelation is shocking, yet MC recalls the way Mozart said that he didn’t remember that morning and decides that he didn’t seem like he was lying about losing his memories then. She asks as such, and Mozart says that he remembered because it felt good and because he’s looking at MC right now. 

Mozart brings up a hand to cup MC’s cheek, tracing her lips. He tells her that he remembered how her body felt hot everywhere and how she let out such sweet sounds whenever he touched her. Once again embarrassed, MC denies this, saying that she felt hot because of the alcohol they drank. Mozart kisses her, and by the time MC realizes what she was doing, she was already leaning heavily onto Mozart and gripping his shirt. 

Mozart chuckles lightly at the sight, calling MC out on her lie. MC is still lightheaded from the intense kiss and couldn’t quite process what he was saying. Before she could do much, however, Mozart sticks his fingers in her mouth, running them over her tongue and the inside of her mouth. 

Mozart: Even when you’re not drunk, it’s hot inside you. 

Because of the fingers in her mouth, MC couldn’t clearly say anything in denial, embarrassed as she may be. Mozart continues to move his fingers and MC continues letting out moans in response. He soon stops, however, his expression solemn as he asks if MC doesn’t want to continue if she isn’t drunk. Mozart’s expression then turns mischievous, tempting MC with the promise of doing something even better than last night. 

Unable to imagine what something even better than last night would be, MC thinks of twisting away. Before she could do so, Mozart pins her to his bed, promising not to forget and asking her to stay. The resistance in MC goes out after hearing this, and the two of them start getting heated, their touches becoming more and more passionate. 

MC thinks to herself that this is definitely different from last night, most notably due to the fact that Drunk Mozart smiles a lot more. 

MC: I want to see you smile… like how you do when you’re drunk. 

Mozart: …. You want to see how I look when I’m intoxicated? 

The surprise only lasts for a few moments though, before Mozart’s expression softens. 

Mozart: Very well. I’ll show you as many times as you’d like. 

He continues pleasuring MC, bidding her to show him her face as well; drunk not on spirits, but on his kisses.

Note: This is where the paid epilogue starts.

—

Epilogue Preview

When he gazes at you with such heated eyes, even your embarrassment melts away  ——

Mozart: .... Haa....

As our tongues entwine, the hand resting on my nape moves as if to arouse even more desire within me. 

(Rather than champagne, I feel like Mozart’s kisses have the higher alcohol content. I’m getting drunk on them. My body is heating up and my head is getting fuzzy....)

Mozart: ... Looks like this isn’t enough for you either, MC. 

MC: That’s... mhm....

As if in praise, Mozart caresses the place I want him most, and a throbbing ache pulses deep inside my body. 

Mozart: Let me see your face, MC.

Mozart’s tongue crawls up the arm covering my face, sinking his fangs in....

MC: Ah... nhng....

Mozart: Ha.... Even though you said that it was fine if I didn’t remember, it’s impossible. Your taste, I won’t forget it no matter how drunk I get. 

—

Jean Route | Theodorus Route | Event Info

[autumnblogs]

Day 28: Drunkstuck

Alright, lasses, we’re starting this evening with a Vesper already in us, so let’s see how that and a couple other drinks make us feel about Homestuck.

https://homestuck.com/story/3764

Scratch’s Apartment.

Both of these little interludes with alternative narrators take place in a liminal space between the game partitions of Homestuck. I wonder how significant that actually is? I think we should probably take it as significant to the manner in which the story is told. But I’m repeating myself now from yesterday’s musing a little.

More after the break.

CW: Following up on the throughline of the past few, this one does mention suicide again.

https://homestuck.com/story/3771

I think it’s interesting that in spite of his quality as sexless, Doc Scratch is not only definitively masculine, but actually identifies himself as a man. Probably one of those features caused by Caliborn’s hyperfixation on masculinity.

Scratch’s description also tells us a little bit about Luck, and about Light here. What Vriska is doing when she steals her opponents’ luck probably requires that she be in conflict with someone - and then her powers create the most favorable possible outcome for herself, and the least favorable possible outcome for her opponent. Favorable here is the keyword, because Light is about meaning, and favor is a kind of meaning, determined by the one bestowing the favor - people create meaning by desiring outcomes.

https://homestuck.com/story/3789

I enjoy the way that Scratch’s dialogue is characterized by this sort of barely bearable self-aggrandizement.

https://homestuck.com/story/3817

Scratch calls attention to the way that certain imagery is specifically a reproduction of other imagery. Memes as reproduction.

https://homestuck.com/story/3852

Vriska’s conception of morality and personal worth remains essentially transactional - she views her evil deeds as being errors, debts that she racks up against reality, debts which she can perhaps redeem with acts of sufficient virtue.

https://homestuck.com/story/3855

I think it’s hilarious that Caliborn’s infantile view of intimacy causes Doc Scratch to react so negatively to expressions of it in his presence.

https://homestuck.com/story/3856

There’s so much emotion in this pesterlog. Vriska really does yearn to be good, but she doesn’t know how to be, and she wouldn’t succeed - not without a good teacher.

Vriska can talk as much as she wants about wanting to be a better person, but the fact that she sees so many of her evil or “great” deeds as being things that are just necessary would prevent her from doing it.

Just moving to a different mode of existence doesn’t change a thing for the person occupying that mode of existence. You have to make a change to the way that you think, and the way you approach things if you want your life to change substantively.

https://homestuck.com/story/3860

An ignoble end to a pitiable wretch.

Jack’s intervention, I think, doesn’t cause Vriska’s death, so much as it is intended to make it all the more melodramatic. Note that an instant before he strikes, the clock has definitively landed on Just.

https://homestuck.com/story/3866

Dave continues to be extremely pragmatic. He has guessed that Jack won’t hurt Jade, and is willing to use her as a meat shield with that in mind. It’s pretty stone cold.

https://homestuck.com/story/3871

Karkat repeats Gamzee’s dialogue almost word for word.

I wonder why exactly Karkat and Gamzee get along. It seems to be an informed attribute to me, like, it is propositionally true, but they don’t really have any kind of chemistry or almost any meaningful scenes together, they hug once, and have a couple of pesterlogs ever, one in which Gamzee threatens Karkat.

It’s like... a relationship that only exists mechanically in the plot.

https://homestuck.com/story/3879

I really never realized like, the extent to which Rose is pretty much suicidal from the moment that her Mom dies to near the end of the comic. Her fascination with Dave’s dream-deaths are extremely clear, and she spends nearly the entire duration of the meteor trip self-annihilating, attaining to union with oblivion through soporifics.

Rose isn’t talking about Dave, of course, when she discusses suicide missions as not a form of self-sacrifice, but a form of escape. She’s talking about herself.

https://homestuck.com/story/3895

This whole sequence really is a lot of spectacle with not much substantive emotional content, but that’s okay. It’s pretty good spectacle, and there’s a few nuggets.

https://homestuck.com/story/3912

The way that a character’s earliest choices shape the entire rest of their life, irrevocably, is a big part of the identity of Homestuck as a work. You can never, ever, undo anything that you’ve ever done.

https://homestuck.com/story/3923

The gulf between John and his Dad cannot be crossed. His guardian is truly lost beyond the possibility of recall. This is the single greatest tragedy in Homestuck.

https://homestuck.com/story/3900

Dave positively cannot help himself except to destroy things he touches.

https://homestuck.com/story/3945

I have read Homestuck through Three Times, and I’m still not entirely sure what the Denizens are supposed to represent.

I think probably the most obvious thing that they are supposed to represent, and manifest, is fear.

The Denizens represent all the anxiety that the characters possess. The anxiety about their environment. The anxiety about their Guardians. The anxiety about their peers. Their anxiety about themselves. And what we are supposed to take away from the fact that the Denizens are benign is this;

There’s nothing to fear.

https://homestuck.com/story/3953

The Trolls lash out at their Guardians and fight them without listening to a thing that they say, because they expect the Denizens to be hostile. They don’t pause for a second to consider that they might be benign.

It takes someone who is accustomed to the idea of longsuffering and compassion to be able to communicate with them.

Someone like John.

https://homestuck.com/story/3986

So what’s the signifiance of this?

I’ve already delved into like, the extent to which the relationship between Dave and Bro uncomfortably recalls the practice of Pederasty.

So what are we supposed to take away from the fact that Gamzee, who symbolizes Bro, is attracted to Tavros, who symbolizes the side of Dave that is vulnerable and soft?

I don’t think the answer is that Bro is literally attracted to Dave, but that the hegemonic abuse of English’s dupes extends to every part of the person, not just physical or mental, but sexual. Gamzee’s relationship with Tavros could never be anything but one of hierarchical domination.

https://homestuck.com/story/3978

Hey remember when I reminisced fondly about GameBro? This is one of those times.

Kanaya’s fascination with Vampires, and the characterization thereof as Trashy is a Twilight thing! You might not know this if you are An ZoomerTM but back in the late thousands, around the time HS was being written, there was this series of novels called Twilight being written that were just... hated. Check out the TVTropes page, if you haven’t.

https://homestuck.com/story/4002

Karkat can’t help but blame himself for practically everything that goes wrong. If there’s something bad that happens, it’s on him.

More tomorrow.

For now, Cam signing off, Alive, and little pissed. Just not pissed off today.

[canadian-riddler]

Hi Indy! I know Arkhamverse Riddler is definitely your specialty. Do you happen to have a rough ranking of Riddlers that you like from most to least? And which do you think is the most definitive version of the character?

I THINK that’s what my blog description says, anyway

Yes, at all times I have a rough ranking floating around in the back of my mind.  It is going to be very long so I will answer the last question first.

For most definitive version of Riddler I’m going to have to go with BTAS.  No recurring villain really had a distinct personality from their original (1940s) version, and while I am not knocking Frank Gorshin the 1966 Riddler absolutely was a bit Joker-y.  Most importantly (if I am not mistaken, which I could be), BTAS gave Riddler what became his most important trait: his intelligence.  Before that he was mostly an average weirdo who wore a green suit (sometimes) and liked riddles and sometimes built puzzle traps.  After BTAS, though, the Riddler’s intelligence became the driving force of his character.  Batman ‘66 saved Riddler from obscurity, but BTAS made him both relevant and future-proof.  Will we ever see a Riddler of average intelligence who doesn’t specialise in computer programming/engineering ever again?  I doubt it, and that’s because of BTAS. 

Onto the list.  It does not include EVERY Riddler ever because I have not read every Riddler story ever, but it should cover most of them (or at least the ones you’ve probably heard of).

1. Anything Paul Dini wrote.  This actually covers a few different Riddlers, which would be the first two Arkhamverse games, the most notable PI Riddler stuff, and of course the Riddler from BTAS.  Paul Dini can write the Riddler as both being a bad person and sympathetic at the same time, which is actually harder to pull off than it sounds.  AND he does it without using backstory as a crutch, which really is hard.

2.  Jeph Loeb/Jim Lee’s Riddler from Hush.  He only actually appears for two issues, but it’s one of the best Riddler stories merely because it allows him to do all the things Riddler SHOULD be able to do, but can’t because then there would be no Batman comics because he would have ended them.  619C is also, in my opinion, the best Riddler cover of all time.

3. Jim Carrey’s Riddler from Batman Forever.  Why would I put him this high on the list, you ask?  Because some writers forget that the Riddler is half just in it to have a good time and he doesn’t really care about how other people perceive him.  This man is living his best life and he’s doing it in glittery spandex and a light-up jacket.  Is he over the top?  At the time, no, not really.  At the time Riddler kinda just acted like that.  And he should be able to do so, in my opinion. 

4. Current Riddler (James Tynion IV).  While this Riddler has some issues with consistency (though this probably has to do with being shuffled from a main comic story into a Catwoman story), he returns to being almost self-cripplingly paranoid and absolutely losing it when he’s bested, which I think are important traits for Riddler to have.  I’m also actually really amused that they gave him the Batman Forever hair.

5. Batman ‘66.  While it did likely rescue Riddler from pending obscurity - he actually never appeared in a Batman comic before 1965, and before that was featured in only two issues of Detective Comics - and he definitely checks the ‘charming’ and ‘having fun’ boxes, there isn’t a whole lot differentiating him from the Joker he’s playing alongside.  If you watch the Batman ‘66 movie they’re almost the exact same character, just one likes jokes and the other likes riddles. 

6. Hush Returns and its aftermath.  This stuff is weird and doesn’t make a whole lot of sense because it mostly involves Riddler running away from Hush and retcons certain things from Hush, most importantly the part where Riddler got everyone to work together because he gave them what they wanted.  Hush Returns (which also contradicts itself during the story) for some reason has everyone angry at Riddler for tricking them and it ends with him getting the shit beat out of him and puts him into a coma for a year, which leads into him getting total amnesia and becoming a PI.  That’s the reason it’s so high on the list.  The story is weird and makes no sense at all for any of the other characters in it either but it gave us a reason for PI Riddler and that makes it matter.  Sort of.

7. Brave and the Bold/The Batman Riddler.  I’m putting them both together mostly because BatB Riddler features in I think only one episode and he deserves a mention because he’s adorable.  TB Riddler was an interesting experiment into a Riddler that, for whatever reason, never really came into himself as a person and instead sort of enacts revenge for his existence on life.  If I remember correctly he’s also pretty low-key about his intelligence, which is another interesting character choice.  I respect the things they went for but this Riddler overall gives me the impression of a person who always says no when invited to something but gets upset when people stop asking which, while definitely something the Riddler would do, isn’t really my preferred take.

8. Snyder Riddler (New 52).  The problem I have with this Riddler is that I have no idea what his motivation even is.  I was told a long time ago that a backstory for him WAS written but didn’t make it into Zero Year because the story was already too long, which is... not a great look for a professional storyteller.  And because we don’t know anything about this Riddler, this story consists of a dude who wears green to impress women (which he never shows any interest in), gets the mob to work for him... somehow... and decides to spend a YEAR watching the people in Gotham die because... I’m not sure?  If it amused him, sure, I could understand that.  But he just seems super bored during the entirety of the story.  He doesn’t even seem particularly excited when Batman actually shows up in front of him.  Beyond Zero Year his appearances are, to my knowledge, limited mostly to two issues in Batman Eternal, where he’s hiding, three issues of The Flash, where he speedruns Zero Year and is undone by the Flash villains teaming up against him (which I don’t know enough about Flash villains to comment on), and Scarecrow 23.2, where he for some unexplained reason seems to look up to Scarecrow.  And then there’s Detective Comics: Future’s End, which is just the worst thing ever.  Snyder didn’t write all of these stories, but they are based on his Riddler.

9. Gotham Riddler.  I didn’t watch past season 3 so I can’t comment on too much after that, but the arc with Mad Grey Dawn and ‘I knew that you knew that I knew’ was some of the greatest Riddler stuff we had gotten in years and if they had just kept on with that they would have had one of the greatest Riddlers of all time. 

10. Jeph Loeb/Tim Sale Riddler.  Full disclaimer I haven’t read Catwoman: When in Rome, but I have read The Long Halloween and Dark Victory.  The reason I don’t like this Riddler is because he actually bears no resemblance to him.  He’s a literal moron who just stumbles around incompetently for the duration of his relevance to the plot.  It’s like they decided to make an ironic Riddler who is actually stupid and also for the first time in his life does not have the ability to locate a tailor.  I don’t actually understand the point of this Riddler’s existence.  He isn’t even really Riddler, he’s just some sort of vaguely Riddler-coloured person.

[littleredlie]

Lieutenant - Part One: 1943

Series Masterlist | Master Masterlist

Marvel x black!OC, Bucky Barnes x black!OC Jackie wakes up to an empty bed and an unexpected visitor at her door. A visitor from not so long ago in her past. Is this the start of Jackie’s new adventure. Based off of Captain America: The First Avenger

3.7k+ Words

Featuring: Jackie Johnson, Bucky Barnes, David Wilson, Andre Wilson, Steve Rogers (mentioned) Warning: Maybe bad writing, no clue. Cursing. Mentions of cheating. Domestic abuse A/N: Finally! I have finally brought you Lieutenant, after promising for a long ass time. I got stuck somewhere. Let me know how you like it! Part two will be updated shortly after.

__________________________________

The nap Jacqueline had taken was for compensation for staying up late last night and waking up early that morning. The afternoon sun reminded her that she wasted a few hours away, but at that moment she didn’t care because Jackelin woke up to an empty bed, yet again. When she realizes the situation, she rolls onto her back, a soft sigh escaping her mouth. She knew where he was.

He was with her.

David would deny it, of course. But she saw them together a few months ago, back when she was still pregnant with their son. She saw the way he caressed her, held her hand, smiled at her… kissed her.  It tore her apart, but she did not necessarily want to go back and live with her mother as she was already dealing with much. And although David hadn’t been the ideal husband, in more ways than one, Jackie loved him.

Before she could delve deeper into her husband’s affair, as if on cue, soft whimpers erupted from the bassinet on the other side of the room. Slowly rising from the bed, Jackie sees the white bassinet, her baby’s hand peeking over the edge. She makes her way over and looks down at Andre, his eyes are open and the pacifier is laid abandoned next to his head.

“Hi baby,” Jackie brings him up and places a soft kiss on his cheek. She was absolutely in love with the small bundle in her arms. When he was born she couldn’t take her eyes off of him and she had also hoped that his birth would bring her and David closer. When it didn’t Jackie just focused her attention on Andre, letting David distance himself from the family. She didn’t understand why he would do that though, he was shipping out overseas in a few days,  fighting in a war started by people who did not care about people like them. People with melanin on their skin, big lips, and curly hair. 

Andre’s skin was still light, but she knew that soon he’d get darker. Maybe dark enough as his father. It worried Jackie; because at first she didn’t want kids, not when black boys and girls had a target on their back. But when they first got pregnant and her belly began to show, she was amazed and prepared to be the best mother she could be even when her military nursing career had just begun to take off.

With Andre in her arms, she walks out of the bedroom, rubbing his back slightly and a small sway in her step. He wasn’t a fussy baby and he preferred his mother’s touch to his father’s, but that could be because David was out almost every day of the week. She gave him a kid, she loved him, why was he doing this to her? All that mattered to Jackie, however, was the promise she had given Andre. To always be there for him, to never abandon him. With her career in the military and the war going on overseas, it made her promise seem easy to break, but she wasn’t going to let that happen.

She promised.

There’s a crib in the kitchen that Jackie puts her three month old baby in, his eyes are focused on the mobile behind her head and a small smile shows on his face. The view alone almost brings her to her knees and tears cloud her eyes. She’d only felt this type of helplessness once before, when she fell in love for the first time. 

A knock at her front door pulls her out the soft trance Andre took her in. She covers him with the blanket, pats his belly, and retreats to the door. She doesn’t bother peeking out to find out who it could be, but she just pulls her door open. Her breath is pulled out of her when she finally notices who it is.

“James?”

“We’ve known each other for years, Jackie. Call me Bucky.” 

There’s a smile on his face as he looks at her, she shivers at his look. Jackie hesitates, marveled at how handsome he looked and stunned at how a white man was standing on her porch that sat in the middle of Bedford-Stuyvesant. Nothing would happen to him, of course, but what would happen to her if the gossip started. 

“Um, come in,” she mumbles, stepping to the side. He does so, and before closing the door behind them, Jackie peers outside, noticing minimal traffic. Still someone could’ve seen. She closes the door, her hand on the knob momentarily, before she slowly turns to look at the brunette clad in a military uniform. “What are you doing here James?” She slightly distances herself, her back against the door and her hands folded in front of her. She avoids eye contact with him and he keeps looking at her, silently begging that she would look him in the eye.

Bucky and Jackie had met when they were children. It was an accident, as Jackie had ended up lost and on the wrong side of Brooklynn. She actually ran into Steve first, and the small child offered to walk her home. But those two were underdogs, a beacon for trouble. Steve, a frail and sickly child, and Jackie, a black girl in a white neighborhood. Jackie tried turning Steve down, but he wouldn’t let her walk by herself, she didn’t understand why he didn’t treat her like other whites did. They made it a block and a half before somebody decided to bother them. Steve being Steve, he tried to fight them off and that ended being horrible, but before they could harm Steve more or even lay a hand on Jackie, Bucky came to the rescue. He scared off the bullies, helped Steve get home, and walked Jackie from the white neighbourhood. 

Jackie thought she’d never see either boys again, but that didn’t happen. A relationship that was unheard of blossomed from there, the three kids weren’t stupid though, they kept it a secret. Passing notes and sweets in the alleyways, playing in the secluded parts of the park, rendezvousing at a hideout that sat inside an abandoned house after everyone in their households went to bed. As they got older it was harder to meet, but they still tried. When they hit 18, the boys went to college and Jackie began studying at a hospital training school. Jackelin grew even more distant from the boys when she left in 1941 to become a nurse for the Army Corps, a once in a lifetime achievement for a woman of her color. 

She’d been in North Carolina  serving when she met David. The two had gotten married a few months after meeting and soon after she was pregnant. Jackie had decided to come back home and stay for the duration of the pregnancy so that her mother could help during and after. She knew that eventually she had to go back to duty, it was sooner rather than later and she was dreading it. After spending countless days with her son, she didn’t want to go; but her mother was going to gain custody until she could come back. So she was going to leave New York again, and although she had been here for almost a year, she hasn’t been able to see Bucky and Steve. Or she purposefully avoided the two. They were older now and it was a lot easier for them to fit society’s standards in order to keep herself out of trouble.

“I heard you were back,” he answers, stepping a little closer. “ Got yourself married.” At that she finally looks at him and he looks like he wants some sort of explanation from her. The look makes her ashamed for some reason, but she shrugs it off.

“Yeah, I am leaving soon though. Just here to have my babe.” Her arms cross against her chest and she shrugs, still avoiding his eyes. It’s silent as he looks at her in astonishment as he hadn’t heard about the baby, she’s looking at everything but him. “Do you wanna see him?” She whispers, bringing her eyes back up to him and actually keeping them on him. 

“Sure,” he grins, following her footsteps as she makes her way back to the kitchen.

The two of them are soon looking over the babbling baby, Andre’s eyes focused on the white man in front of him, almost looking like he was studying him. “Why didn’t you come and see us?” Bucky asks and Jackie scoffs out a laugh.

“That’s unfair, James, you know I can’t do that. You, Steve, and I cannot go around acting as if the world is alright, you know I’d be suffering the consequences more than you would.” Jackie traces her eyes over the delicate features of his face, sad about the truth, but also accepting. Now that they were older and fully blossoming into society, they couldn’t act like children. Appearances mattered for men like Bucky and safety mattered to Jackie, and by default Steve would go with Bucky as well. That’s the only way the world would let it work. “I’m sorry,” Jackie whispers the apology, her hand softly patting the top of Andre’s head. 

“It’s okay,” James replies, pulling away from the crib and leaning his body against the kitchen counter. “I just wanted to check on you, make sure you were alright.”

“Yeah, I am doing alright. I’m expecting my orders soon, probably’ll be sent back down to North Caroline, treating POWs. How about you?”

“Shipping out as well,” he nods. “Two days.” 

Silence again, the sound of vehicles rumbling outside and of Andre’s soft coos. Until she remembers, “how’s Stevie!?” The nickname brings a chuckle to Bucky which then brings an immediate smile to Jackie’s. She always loved his laugh.

“He’s okay, a little bummed he can’t join. But you know Steve, he’s not gonna stop trying.” Bucky’s hands are in his pockets as he shrugs his shoulders. Jackie is now leaning on the kitchen counter as well, an arm length existing between her and Bucky’s body.

“True, I worry for him just a little bit. Maybe before I leave I will try to stop by before I go back to North Carolina.” At that a sigh of relief is released from the soldier’s lips and he runs a hand through his hair, his face beaming. The space between them was getting smaller, neither of them were sure if they were necessarily responsible.

“He does miss you.” Bucky missed her too, but he didn’t want to make her uncomfortable. Their relationship was always complicated, especially when they became teenagers. But now, as they were young adults, the air around them was almost suffocating. They couldn’t act around each other like they used to.

“It’s not that I don’t miss you,” she looks up to Bucky, they are so close that they’re basically breathing into each other. “It’s just that –” Jackie is interrupted by her baby’s cries. Quickly abandoning her space beside Bucky, she scoops Andre in her arms, hurriedly trying to hush him.

Bucky looks down at the empty space Jackie left behind, breathing out and then looking up to see her softly singing to her son. Jackie looked so delicate, especially with the sunlight peering through the blinds of the windows. She looked a little sad and a lot tired, if only they were as close as they used to be then he would ask her. But he saw the way she was surprised at finding him at her doorstep and how she placed so much distance between them.

“Maybe, I should go.” Bucky speaks up, getting ready to make his way out the door. Jackie didn’t know what to say, she wanted Bucky to stay but she also wanted to take care of her baby.

“How about you sit down in the living room? He’s probably just hungry.” Jackie leads him to the living room and urges him to sit down, which he does. When she sees he’s settled she remarks a quick ‘be right back,’ and turns to take Andre back to her room to feed him. His cries continue, still audible as Jackelin walks further down into the house.

Bucky isn’t sitting in the room for more than ten minutes before the front door opens again. He abruptly stands up, understanding that a white man in a black man’s home wasn’t necessarily the norm. The man who steps through the door doesn’t notice Bucky at first, but when he does he stiffens. He faces the door to close it, trying to gain some resolve before turning around and putting a tense grin on his face.

“Sir, what can I do for you?” David says, his back straight and his arms balled at his side.

“I’m here to see –” Before he could finish his sentence Jackie walks back down the hallway, unaware that her husband had returned instead her focus was on the spit up stain Andre left on her dress.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, James.” She’s finally in the room and when her eyes land on her brooding husband’s figure, the smile slowly disintegrates off of her face. “David.” She huffs out, like she’s scared. David was intimidating and he lost his temper a lot, and sometimes Jackelin would become collateral damage.

“Honey,” he says with an apprehensive tone behind it. “I didn’t know we were having a guest over.” He turns to his wife, ignoring Bucky. The look on his face was alarming and Jackie felt like she couldn’t breathe. She opens her mouth to try to come up with some explanation as she hadn’t exactly told her husband about the relationship she had with two white boys from the other side of Brooklyn. Her eyes flicker between the two men from the same role but from  different aspects in her life. Bucky sees the panic rising in his friend’s eyes and he comes to the rescue, a smile coming up to his face.

“Actually, sir, I stopped by unannounced.” Bucky holds his hand out and David reluctantly shakes it. “I am a colleague of your wife’s, we met at Fort Bragg,” the lie rolls off of his tongue as he looks David in the eye. Jackie’s heart still hasn’t calmed down and the room still felt suffocating. “She was an excellent nurse, worked almost as well as a doctor,” David’s eyes flitted over to his wife and she tried to put a calm smile on her face but she was sure it was tense, it didn’t help that Bucky’s eyes were also on her.. As her husband turns back to  James, the latter sends a quick wink to the nurse and Jackie’s sure that she’s going to faint. He used to always do that when they were younger and it pleased him to see that he still had that effect on her. “I stopped by because I heard you two had a baby and I wanted to offer my congratulations.”

“Well thank you so much.”

“I insisted that I stay and meet you as well.” David tries to not gawk at the white soldier in front of him, but Jackie can see that he was surprised. This was unusual as hell, but Bucky was offering some sort of out for Jackie. “I’m Sergeant James Barnes of the 107th Infantry Regiment.”

“Nice to meet you, sergeant. I’m Private 1st Class David Wilson, 332nd Fighter Group, shipping out in a few days.”

“I understand, I am shipping out soon.” He pauses and takes another look at Jackie, who seems to have calmed down now. “How about you and Jackie join an old friend of mine to the Stark Expo that’s happening tomorrow night?”

“Ja–” Jackie starts but stops herself, remembering the situation she was in. “Sergeant Barnes, we don’t want to impose.” She pleads with her eyes for him to drop the invitation, but he doesn’t listen.

“I insist, it’ll be like a farewell to your husband,” ‘and to me’ ghosted at the end of the sentence while he looked at her. Jackie did owe it to him, she left New York abruptly and didn’t talk to him, or Steve, when she got back. The bond that they had built over the years did not deserve to be treated the way Jackie was.

“It’s up to you David,” Jackie pulls her eyes away from James to David, and the second man looks to be pensively thinking.

“Of course, we couldn’t deny such a gracious invitation.” His words did not match his face, he did not want to go, but he didn’t want to oppose the higher ranking white man that stood in the middle of his living room in 1940s New York.

“That’s great,” he smiles, shaking David’s hand again. He discloses the location of the expo before taking a few steps to the door. “I believe I should be on my way, my mother’s trying to hog all my time before I leave.” He chuckles a bit, but David is stiff and Jackie hides the soft smile on her face.

“Of course, Jackie will show you out.” He nods to the sergeant before walking down the hallway towards the bedroom. Silence follows momentarily, but Jackie’s movements bring a soft sound to resonate in Bucky’s ears. 

“Let me let you out, Sergeant Barnes.” 

“Of course Lieutenant Johnson.” The tone of endearment makes the black woman’s heart jump and she actually smiles at him. He follows her out to the porch, placing his cap onto his head, and they stand there for a moment, a mere moment of coexistence and nostalgia.

“That was risky, James.” Her hands are folded in front of her again and she stands next to him, their shoulders touching slightly. “But thank you.”

“Not a problem.” His feet move forward and step down two steps before he turns back. The brunette looks at Jackie’s stern face, she’s not as hectic as she was before, but the walls have slowly begun to build back up. It’s like she knew what was going to happen when she stepped back into that house. “Steve will be excited to see that you’re back. Even if it’s a short time.”

“It’ll be a proper goodbye for us.” Jackie softly says looking at him, a little sadness with peace. It had to be this way.

“I’ll see you tomorrow Jackie.” Bucky says it like a secret pact made between them, as if they are the only ones to be attending tomorrow evening.

If only.

The brunette proceeds to walk down the steps and Jackie watches him as he retreats. She stays on the stoop until he has turned the corner. Maybe she was stalling for time before stepping back into her home to face her husband or she was relishing her and Bucky’s last private moment together. Jackie slowly retreats back into her home to find her husband sitting in the spot Bucky inhabited minutes before.

Jackie ignores him, not wanting to provoke him or argue. But it’s unavoidable, especially since David noticed the obvious chemistry between his wife and the stranger.

“Didn’t know we were letting white men into our lives so freely.” He says, his body leaned forward with his forearms on his knees and his hands meddling with each other.

“He was a fellow soldier, and he was one of the nicer ones. I didn’t know he was stopping by.” She kneels in front of him. David looks at her for a moment, before ripping his hands out from her grasp. Jackie’s shocked at the action, but keeps a calm look on her face and puts her own hands in her lap.

“What would’ve happened if I hadn’t arrived?” David asks, causing an insulted look to arise on her face. She scoffs, an anger arising in her.

“Just because you want to back out on our vows and fuck anything with two legs, does not mean I will too.” The words tumble out of her mouth before she can even stop herself and the minute she’s finished, she holds her breath. Jackie can see David’s refrain dissolving and before she can defend herself, her husband’s hand is raised and a second later, a sharp sting resonates on her face. Her body lands on the floor and she cradles her cheek, tears building up in her eyes.

David says nothing, he just gets up and walks out of the house leaving his wife on the floor. Jackie has tears dripping down from the corners of her eyes as her warm cheek throbs. David’s never hit her like this before, usually there was never any evidence left behind.  Jackie lays on the floor a little bit longer. The sound of reality outside continues as she silently sobs to herself. She doesn’t rise out of her retreat until she hears Andre’s soft cries coming from the room. She wipes the tears off her face, her touch getting gentle when she reaches where David’s hand had landed. 

When she gets to her room she hides how she feels before confronting her baby. It wasn’t like he knew what had happened, but it was another one of her promises. She’d never show a weak side to her son because she had to be there for him; he came first. Always.

          ❦

The rest of the day goes on. Jackie is able to finish the list of errands she made for herself when she first woke up that morning. Andre has fallen asleep, easier than any other night. It was like he knew that his mother needed a break. It’s late when David returns. Jackie can smell the faint and bitter hint of alcohol accompanied by the sweet and soft presence of the flowers in his hand. He smiles at his wife, apologies stuck in his throat but evident in his eyes. 

And she forgives him.

She takes the flowers, he gives her a kiss, and they lay beside each other in bed. No other words pass between them and Jackie wants to say something, because she knows that in the morning he probably won’t be there again. He’ll be with her.

_____________________________

Part Two: 1943