#quite literally. i can basically guarantee at this point there is no one more dedicated to applying to this specific hyatt than me

[seilon]

yet again I am whimpering and sobbing at hyatt to give me a job at the big fancy hotel. this is like my 7th application to a job at this one hotel specifically. i should really get the job from sheer dedication to applying over and over again for 7 months alone

[6blackfilin9]

I love your Anko fanart! Tell me, what are your views/headcannons on Anko X Kazuku?

hThank you so much for the ask, finally I can answer it

here is my big thank you for the waitng

In a nutshell, the shipp was created by accident while me and my buddy were working on our first Naruto AU in 2019, where Kakuzu and Deidara survived their shitty plotholes end eventually ended up in Konoha

Yeah

so, the shipp’s birth date is july the 1, 2019

anything like classy, aristocracy kind of tension-filled passionate gothic romance with playful, psychological games & hurt/comfort vibes with slight scent of rivalry is KakuAnko

Basically, they are: a very, very old man with absolutely horrendous background who’s trying to finally have his mother*cking 10 or 30 years of peace, and a rather young lady with a rocky youth who’s being good & noble yet has very strong antihero tendencies

You know, I think they do have potential, since, in fact, they seem to be very similar, at the core

They are both very pragmatic realists, the people of logic and reason, yet if Kakuzu’s irritability doesn’t affect him a tiny bit due to his ideal self-control, Anko’s can lead her to quite bad places, sometimes. They put their interests in the first place, and even though she tries to attach them to Konoha’s, she still has ‘personal’ things (I’ll write ‘bout it lower*). Their mindsets are so complicatedly organized that, at some point & way, it prevents them from having many close people, and makes them very hard to see through and predict

Both of them are very flexible & adaptive, independent individuals with similar outlooks on plenty of things and high intellectual level. They clearly can find plenty of traits that they would highly respect and adore in each other

Here I will speak mostly for “why and how” kind of things, bc both of them are terribly tricky to accurately figure out. But there will be some headcanons too

So, there are still some odds about them, due to the strong difference in their occupation, like, in plenty of cases they are really tricky to be brought together, because:

- Of the job

In original, Anko is a Konoha’s special jounin, and she is very dedicated to serving the country. Independently of whether she likes her job or not (depends on the plot), she orienteers at the people, at society’s gain from her work. So, accordingly, in any other AU her job is somehow connected to civil service, whether it’s something police-like, connected to science, or something like CCG in Tokyo Ghoul

Kakuzu, on the other hand, is a hitman and a persona non grata in literally all the five big countries, Konoha too (which makes it barely possible to bring them together in the original universe without hard complications or heavy drama. But still possible). He orienteers on his own gain alone, but, depending on the job, it can include others’ gain, too.

This detail makes him a saint once he holds supervising position in some company or any high position in the government (the better the working conditions of the staff now- the more money in the prospective), and the sheer nightmare once he has it on the opposite side of the law. Him as a mob boss is a complete different topic for discussion, but to get the point, in this case, the trouble isn’t him increasing the level of criminality (its rather vice-versa), but taking hold of too much control in the high and underground structures. Even as an ordinary hitman he’s rather tricky, since everything depends on the case

In most of the stories, they come to some sort of compromise, and how hard it is to reach it depends on how shitty his job is and how attached they are to each other at the moment

Like, in the above mentioned Shippuden AU and Harry Potter AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) everything went like clockwork, because there they are both more or less on this side of the law, in Tokyo Ghoul AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) it is a bit more complicated, with her being in-law and him being very much outlaw, in the Avatar AU (which I also figured out with my buddy, but we never happened to write it) it is also pretty smooth, with both of them being outlaws and then jumping out to the glory after all the shit is done, but in another Shippuden AU of mine, this all would be just a motherfucking bloody disaster

- Kakuzu is actually a hard nut to get attached to anyone

He lived too long to be truly afraid of anything, though. Its mostly because he doesn’t really need to get attached to or become close with someone to satisfy his need for communication. The man can get along with anyone once he wishes to, he can have countless acquaintances and plenty of buddies, but he doesn’t have many comrades and barely can call anyone a friend. Because he is used to lose everything and everyone he ever had or happened to have, because of his inhumanly lengthened lifespan.

It requires time for him to get used to the person, and then, eventually, in some cases, spend plenty of it to get attached

Plus, for him, due to his profession, each close connection is a really great responsibility for him. In most cases, he’d think twice of weather he is ready to take it or not

Though it of course has the personal factor, too

In Anko’s case, she has a grand privilege by being a very intelligent and keen woman, not just in cognitive plane, but in emotional, too. High emotional intellect is actually a rare trait, so she automatically stands out of the crowd for him. Even though it won’t guarantee his alliance, it will grant her his high respect and some sort of sympathy

- Kakuzu is, technically, an asshole

He does have his moral compass, which includes a great amount of common social morality, but he also has that “I am working” state

Even though Kakusu has a set of professional principles, and he still acts accordingly to what he thinks is right, one and the very same situation can be solved diametrically different once the context changes from working to casual and vice versa

This, and him being very independent and quite antisocial, makes the degree of assholeness depend on various factors

This can lead to major conflicts of interests, and if they are possible to have any compromise or not is strongly attached to the circumstances. After all, both are very, very prideful and dignified people

- In other words, the only major issue for them would be morality questions. It’s possible to make the case acceptable for Anko, since both of them ain’t truly squeaky clean, along with Kakuzu being willing enough to watch his borders

- She is provident and doesn’t really need a lot of money on a daily basis, which is much of a joy to him lol

- *they both seek for the stable ground, first of all

Taking in consideration the life conditions Kakuzu had in his youth (despite war state, he still stably had family, friends, grand respect from everyone, home, warmth and food) and how terribly he was torn out of his secured social environment, I believe what he seeks through all his bounty hunt and other money-connected manipulations is stability. Sustainability he had back then. The only way to have it in the conditions of our existent world order is to have money (and a very good mind and luck)

Anko has indeed much more altruistic motives, yet it’s still not that simple. It seems to be, on the first sight, yet considering the “Orochimaru related cases” and her very wayward behavior toward them, it’s clear she keeps her own motives and needs in mind oh so well. The service she has is very well payed, it allows her to do what she likes or believes is right, and to have the living conditions she finds comfortable. And only here, relying on the made sustainable basis, she does what she does

- Thus, they both illustrate the principle “first help yourself, next help the other” just right

- She knows she can keep an eye on him, yet it’s clear for her that her influence isn’t borderless, as well as telling him off some stuff is kind of a not wise thing to do. So in the majority of cases, she never interferes

- This is not common, yet he can actually change some plans if the situation is serious and the compromise can’t be found. He is that kind of person who works on a further prospective, and in this context, this would be the relationship with his loved one

- While Kakuzu is quite conflicted and has very reserved controversial persona, Anko is both controversial, conflicted, and sort of two-faced, on top of that

She is a very sincere, cheerful and humbly honest human being, yet she has some darker natural traits of her character that became rather strong with age and traumatic experience. Cunningness, guile, ways-depend-on-the-case and a bit of ruthlessness, that is. Moreover, she has some unsolved personal issues, which makes her even more twisted.

Like, remember the time when she confronted Orochimaru during the exam? And Kabuto, on the war? Getting rid of them is indeed beneficial for Konoha, but it’s clear that for her it is personal vendetta in the first place. She wouldn’t have tried to do this alone, otherwise, because these two are rather dangerous ones, to say the least.

She uses greater good to cover her real motives (even though it is not truly complete bullshit), and seems to have a terrible habit to keep silence about really important things, which makes her quite prone to lying, in some cases

And sometimes it very badly pisses Kakuzu off, since it makes her prone to doing useless but dangerous shit too

Yet this not any kind of separate hidden side, it is integrated into her personality, and coexists with her bright one. That’s where her violent humour comes from, for example.

But Kakuzu, on the other side, is completely monolith individual, yet sometimes his mindset can create contradictions when it comes to something important to him. but it's another topic

And seeing these layered constructions, and motives, they can pretty finely predict each other’s behavior. Not super-neatly, but they for sure see the basis. This is what helps Kakuzu to prevent Anko from doing some stupid shit, sometimes

- Anko has a role of an indicator for the people who don’t understand and see the changes in Kakuzu’s mood sometimes, since she usually reacts quite openly. Yet, when she has the same unreadable mask of cold, or one of guile, it’s a nightmare for them

- They prefer the non-verbal way to show their feelings, even though Anko is obviously the more chatty one

- They don’t say things such as “I love you”, or other sensual stuff like that really often, believing it to be some sort of cherished words that shall not be spelled mindlessly

- Anko isn’t majorly into PDA, but she fancies it much more than Kakuzu does. She has her whole moments of studying something with her hands, whether it’s a hand, scar or face. He’s more into passive display of affection, like wrapping an arm over her waist or leaning to her or something of this kind; they can allow themselves to (not sexually) kiss in public though

- She knows he doesn’t like to walk hand in hand due to considering it a youthful thing, so there are times when she intentionally walks holding on to his sleeve; generally they walk separately in order not to bother each other, but sometimes they walk arm in arm (like an old Victorian couple lol)

- Being older and wiser, Kakuzu eventually upholds some kind of mentoring position, yet he never considers himself any kind of a teacher or master to Anko, believing her to have a good head of her own. He is just insightful enough to break something through to her or give a word of advise

- This, combined with his highly powerful demeanor, also makes him have the leading position in their relationship

- Anko respects him much enough to fortify this, entrusting with plenty of life questions (like organizing the family budget), even though they make the majority of decisions together. Mostly because he is truly wise and highly experienced individual.

- This makes him one of the very few people Anko would actually listen to and take their opinion in consideration

- So basically they have equal relationship with some tendency to patriarchal order

- And it is, really, mostly economically-based disbalance, with him earning much more than she does

- Yet they never have any financial-based issues, since both of them keep in mind and respect the contributions of each

- There is major power play here, too. He has the absolute might, she has seduction. Anko loves how he makes her want to submit to him, let him have all the power, so she likes provoking him. And she knows he adores it, loves the subtle control she has over him

- They don’t have conflicts in their everyday life. Each knows how to avoid pissing one another off

- He cherishes her playful demeanor, her intellect. Combined with her cunningness, it allows her to rival him, in social sphere. The way she constructs her phrases, the way she speaks, mimics, moves, how bewitchingly it suits her feminine snaky features makes his blood boil and heart melt

- Both of them, actually, have rather specific kind of dry, dark humour. Kakuzu’s is very cynical, satirical, quite often menacing and subtly demeaning; Anko’s is very sarcastic and quite dirty, even gruesome and rather violent

- Sometimes they “fight” verbally as a form of a play. In some circumstances they may sound pretty vile, so some unobservant people mistake this for display of hate

- In general, Anko is the one to heat things up with her playful demeanor, which can include provocation and rivalry, and Kakuzu is the one to keep this energy in borders, accumulating it up to much more intense states

- They both put the comfort in the first place when it comes to household. Everything must be cozy, useful, silent and super clean

- Yet they are both very unpretentious and modest, really

- She absolutely adores when he is showing his serious, severe side, or powerful demeanor. She finds it incredibly suitable for him. She also likes how his real age is sliding out in this or that way. Like, even though he has rather young face (that of 37-40 y.o.), his eyes give away that he’ve seen oh so much more than it seems; the grumpy noises and grunts he makes, the lazy attitude in movements and the way how rapidly he finds a comfy pose once he has a chance to take a seat

- They are both rather patriotic, yet while in the most stories Anko’s feelings mostly lay towards the country she lives in, Kakuzu’s more often lay towards some places, so called small motherland.

- Kakuzu actually could be a source of deep, strong admiration and delight for her, despite all of his bullshit. The unbreakable will he has, mighty burning heart, all the wisdom, talents and mind. Being sent to fight god damn Hashirama, clearly a genius of his times, financial & management genius at the least. And, still, after all the hard times he’ve been through, he maintained the very strong sense of dignity and nobility, even though slightly twisted due to the profession and abnormal lifespan

- And the very same things can serve as the source for her chagrin: with all those traits, he could have been so much more rather than a criminal. With all the gifts he’ve got, he could have been of great use to society. He’s much easier about this, since his prospective is much wider and embraces decades (and in some universes even centuries) instead of months & years, and he knows that he’d be switching sides throughout his life, being on this and that side of the law, yet he still is a bit uncomfortable once it’s brought up

- They are deeply into science, which makes them atheists. He’s into medicine and human biology, she’s into chemistry and reptilian biology; both of them are nuts for physics, history and psychology

- They solve complicated physical and mathematical problems together time to time. She is the first one to have tea-breaks due to losing her temper over it, he tries to figure things out right until you can sense the smoke coming off his head

- Actually, they do have a stumbling stone aside from job & morality complications. And this is Anko’s attitude towards Orochimaru

What she does is basically ruins her life very-very slowly, maintaining the issues she has and planning to make him pay for all he’s done

Kakuzu knows exactly what is really going on with this attitude and why, but he can’t really do anything about it. Like, he knows he can’t make her change her mind or put something into her head

All he can do is really nothing but try to explain how those things are working, and even this option is basically a landmine field for him. At some level she does understand that he could probably be right, yet she just refuses to go back on her mind. And this is actually really dangerous, so at some moments they can fight quite badly about it

- He’s scared shitless to lose her, though; especially like that, even though he knows clearly that he will, anyway, sooner or later

- he knows that losing loved ones ends up with sheer disaster for him, yet he isn’t afraid to pay such a high price for those six, five or four decades of being with her. Because these decades are that of a paradise ones for him. Wife and family, as well as stable job, incomes and life conditions, are some sort of physical definitions of sustainability he craves. Especially family, yet it’s far ahead to plan

- The fact that he will have to bury her one day makes her rather depressed, as well as the knowledge that the only thing she can really do about it is to try to bring him as much happiness and comfort as possible before she dies

thank you, i'd say more, but it's too much already

[chidoroki]

What are your top 5 Isabella chapters? (You're so cool!!!)

Oh anon, you're amazing and I hope you know by asking me anything about this woman means that I'm gonna do more than simply list out the chapters for you.

Okay, sooo these chapters may seem like obvious choices but they're no doubt the first few that came to my mind (which may or may not be because I have their numbers memorized). Unfortunately I don't think I have the heart to rank them because aahh, I love each one a significant amount and for various reasons?? and whichever one I deem as the best could easily change the more I think about it.. so I'm just gonna list them in chronological order instead. Hope that's okay!

1 - Chapter 24: Inspection, Part 1 Part of me wants to cheat and list chapter 24 & 25 together since both cover November 2nd and the major events in said chapters are what make S1EP8 one of the best episodes to showcase how terrifyingly great Isabella is, but if I had to choose just one, then I'll go with ch24. Yes seeing her break Emma's leg and announce Norman's shipment are both jaw dropping moments capable of making anyone speechless, but ch25 also has quite a few pages just solely dedicated to the internal dialogues of the duo, so that doesn't help us here hm?. While Isabella dropping her "loving mother" facade and speaking to the food Emma & Norman directly as an actual caretaker is chilling, her confrontation with Ray in ch24 leaves more of an impact on me, given their mother-son relationship and totally not because they're my two favorites, that's crazy. Not only does she nonchalantly reveal that she had Krone killed at the same time Ray was wondering the sister's whereabouts, but she also labels Ray as a traitor, effectively cutting him off as her personal spy and any safety she once guaranteed him. She then makes the resolve to control the children with her own hands instead from now on, which sends Ray into an absolute panic, because if he is no longer safe, then no one is. Along with the anime giving us that added scene of her tossing Ray aside like a rag doll and every frame/panel that shows the sheer confidence she has on her face, having Isabella knock off her biggest ally is such a powerful move to me. This chapter is basically like the queen setting up the board for the perfect checkmate. And it works.

2 - Chapter 37: Escape Courtesy of all Krone's information in ch20-21, Grandma Sarah's single panel flashback in ch23 and even Isabella's own ID number way back in ch3, it was pretty common knowledge at this point that Isabella also experienced the same false childhood as any other kid at Grace Field, but finally seeing her morals and backstory from her own perspective will literally take any hatred you had towards her and toss it out the window (probably) because you'll feel emotions you didn't think you would've originally had towards this fantastic antagonist. The brief interaction we get to witness between her and Leslie is beyond wholesome, so of course the story chooses to break your heart the next moment by skipping right to his shipment and a heartbroken Isabella (which is portrayed way better in anime as manga literally has a panel of her smiling as she waves goodbye, like..huh?). It's also confirmed that she attempted to escape GF and just how important Leslie's song is to not only her, but to Ray as well as he uses this tune in order to verify that Isabella is indeed his real mother. On top of all that, we come to learn that she excels with her position as Mom for the sake of the children so she can indirectly extend their lives as long as possible and give them all the love she can before they’re unfortunately shipped off. Yes her main goal is to stay alive in this hellish world herself, I know, but this chapter is just a fantastic example showing how Isabella isn't as selfish as she once seemed and does care about her children a great deal (and more than herself later on in the story), even going as far as retrieving the ropes the fifteen escapees used to cross the cliff so the pursuing demons wouldn't locate them as quickly. She accepts her defeat and admits her mistakes, as well as express her well wishes to those that escaped and continues to care for the kids that were left behind while she can. There's just.. a lot to this chapter and it does so much for her character y'all, you know this. Needless to say but the anime handles this chapter wonderfully, especially with the soundtracks and the fantastic choice of having her let her hair down aahh she's beautiful.

3 - Chapter 170: Together As much as I love the very end of ch169 and the pure shock it gave me, I gotta choose the following chapter because it made it just as excited to learn what led Isabella to completely turn against Peter. We're reminded of how frustrated Isabella is with the farm system and its tactics that causes them to live in fear, flaunting freedom as bait as they all constantly fight each other just to survive longer than anyone and prove to be useful, less they get killed for acting out or by simply giving up. She successfully manages to rally every single sister & mother at the GF headquarters together (with barely any sort of resistance or issue) in order to rebel against the Ratri clan, which happens mere moments before Emma & company actually raid the facility by the way, just to avoid any suspicions from Peter about the plan itself. Amidst all the suspense and anger, we hear of Isabella's thoughts about how relieved she is to see her children again and how touched she is at the fact they still refer to her as their mom, even if she believes she doesn't deserve the sentiment. In true "Iron Lady" fashion, she keeps these emotions to herself and expresses that it's just convenient she and the kids share a similar goal. Oh, she also refers to Peter as a boy, which I will always find hilarious. To top it all off, it gives me the best mother-daughter moment ever. This is the chapter where she completely won me over and has been a favorite of mine ever since.

4 - Chapter 177: Mother And this is the chapter that completely breaks me. I'm not exaggerating when I say that whenever I revisit this moment I either start to tear up or get real emotional, so I shall let you know my emotional state after I sit and write this out. So, the wonderful woman I fell in love with just seven chapter ago? Mhhmm, DEAD! By some fucking random ass demon who is no doubt my most hated character in this series. ANYWAYS. This unforgivable event was first teased in the last couple pages in ch176, which officially released on MOTHER'S DAY, so not only is that such horrible timing but THEN we had to painfully wait a full week to see if the Iron Lady would survive this or if the children were gonna lose yet another parental figure. Needless to say, the worst case scenario happened and my heart was shattered into pieces. My emotions aside, the chapter itself is (surprisingly?) one of my favorites out of the entire series and is heartwarming is the most upsetting way possible. Isabella putting herself in harms way to save Emma & the other girl (with no hesitation might I add) speaks volumes about how much she loves her kids and how far she'll go to ensure they can live a bright future, even if it means by sacrificing her own life, which was once the only she cared about. The fact Isabella still possessed enough strength after being stabbed to hold back this bastard demon twice her size is worth mentioning as well. Once the demon is taken care of, the first thing she's concerned with is Emma & everyone else's safety, showing us even further that they now take priority over herself (even since ch37, I’ll argue). Despite literally giving her life to save Emma (along with all her other subtle moments I've no doubt mentioned here & in other posts), Isabella admits that she still hasn't done enough to atone for all the trauma she caused them, even though the kids had already forgiven her a couple chapters ago, she still feels the need to do so much more for them. The hug between her and the majority of the GF kids is sad as hell, especially with Emma's internal & external dialogue, but it is always the final interaction between mother and son that breaks my heart. Isabella apologized to all the kids in ch174, but her tearful apology to Ray here holds so much weight; for not treating him right or loving him as a true mother should to her own son, for all the lies and pain that made his life a living hell which left him suicidal. Her final wish for Ray to take care of everyone hurts in all the right ways because despite their differences, they both care for their family so much where they would literally die and live for them. It's a lot of emotion coming from a woman who once had an unbreakable facade, and seeing her use up her final bit of strength to share all that with Ray gets me close to tears. This death had upset me so much that I stopped myself from listening to "Isabella's Lullaby" for a good year because I knew that hearing that melody would only remind me of this heartbreaking chapter. (and yes I'm making myself emotional right now).

5 - Chapter 181.7: A Mother’s Determination Take everything that made the previous four mentioned chapters so great (her strategic mind/her dedication/her powerful influence/her love for the children) and combined all of that into one and you shall get Isabella's special one-shot. It shows us the very beginning (Jan-Feb 2046) of Isabella's time as Grandma of the Grace Field plantation and how she commits to her plan of helping the escapees when they return. In order to succeed, she first reduces the number of shipments (which effectively spares many children's lives), suspects she might be targeted by the other sisters & mothers and even successfully determines which women might actually try to backstab her, all in the span of one month. She also anticipated the perfect moment when they were gonna strike, flawlessly counters their sad attempt of sabotaging her, then easily taunts them to the point where the four sisters are visibly shaking in fear of their lives. Without any delay, she proposes the idea to destroy GF in such a calm and confident manner and proceeds to tug at their emotions with the reveal that each one of their own kids are still alive, how frustratingly unfair the farm system and how strongly she believes she can tear it all down. This is the Iron Lady at her best, and nothing motivates her more than her children. Of course rebelling to end this endless cycle of hatred and fear is a huge factor in why Isabella is putting in so much effort to change destiny, but fighting in order to secure a bright future where her children are free to live normal lives without any sort of fear is something she has always strived for, and now that she has the power to openly assist them create that future, you can bet she's gonna try her damn hardest to give them the happiness they so rightfully deserve. We started the story off with the children learning from her, so it’s pretty amazing (despite this chapter being released after the main story finished) that we end with Isabella using what she learned from her children in order to take control and unite against the real enemy. The only downside to this fantastic chapter is the last panel because I don't wanna be reminded that this absolute queen is actually dead, damn it!

Alrighty, I think that about does it.. and I have no doubt I repeated myself a bunch too hahaa. I still have no idea which chapter I enjoy most now, even among those I mentioned briefly, but it's clear as day that Isabella is amazing. Thank you again for the question anon! Always a pleasure chatting about TPN and I hope you have a great rest of your day/night!

[canary3d-obsessed]

Restless Rewatch: The Untamed Episode 04 (second part)

(Masterpost) (Episode 04, first part) (Episode 05, first part)

Warning: Spoilers for All 50 Episodes

Continued from the first half of this very long post! 

Lets Go! Gusu

Wen Qing is lovingly exploring the magical wards of Gusu. She tries a little digital penetration on the ward at the waterfall, but gets the hard nope.

Note: Here at Canary3d we don’t ship Wen Qing with any cultivator ladies because we’re too busy shipping her with modern-day infosec-pro ladies, if you get what I’m saying and/or have read my bio.

Meanwhile Wei Wuxian is fishing with Nie Huaisang, using the method of sneaking up and grabbing fish with his bare hands. This actually works, because he is good at literally everything.  His “I’ll be the prodigy” speech to Lan Xichen, isn’t actually arrogant. 

Aw, Look at Xiao Zhan pretending this fish isn’t already dead.

Nosy Parker Wei Wuxian

Wei Wuxian goes to chat up Wen Qing and none of his crap works on her.

If I want to admire a pretty face I’ll go look in the mirror

His interactions with Wen Qing help to mature Wei Wuxian quite a bit over the months and years. Initially she’s a mystery to him, and he wants her attention and esteem. And can’t get either.

Look how stunned he is to encounter a boundary when she won’t let him touch her needle. “Wards are made to be broken” but she’s not going to let him past any of hers. 

Jiang Cheng, Insecurest Boi

Oh you beautiful sad angry boy. 

(More after the cut!)

Jiang Cheng is angrily waving the laundry around practicing his angry sword moves without a sparring partner, which is noteworthy partly because it shows how dedicated he is, but also because it shows how much he depends on Wei Wuxian for social interaction and cultivation practice. There must be 40 or 50 kids he could go practice with, but he’s by himself.

Camera Operator: Why you gotta take it out on me?

When he bitches to Yanli about his Dad preferring Wei Wuxian, she gaslights him.

Yanli is so gentle and kind, and she’s been the real mother for both of these boys when she didn’t have to be. But she ain’t perfect.

Yanli found this soup recipe on youtube. The ingredients are: water

Jiang Cheng has such a complex about Wei Wuxian he won't take the fish from him directly. He just looks hungry until Yanli grabs a stick and passes it to him.

Look, Jiang Cheng, we know you have reasons to be upset, but you need to get the fuck over yourself.

Aw, look at Xiao Zhan pretending this fish is cooked/palatable. (note: it is not)

Xiao Zhan deserves multiple awards for this performance. With bonus points for gratuitously eye-fucking Wang Zhoucheng into next week.

Wang Zhuocheng is an amazing actor who plays an incredible range of emotions, but selling the “delicious fish” lie exceeds his abilities. Look how he steels himself before he opens his mouth.

Yanli tells Wei Wuxian to be good starting tomorrow, and WWX gives her his patented lying-motherfucker salute.

This one has 4 fingers, unlike the 3-fingered boy scout salute he gave Lan Wangji on the roof in the previous episode. The extra finger is for extra lying.

Lan Lecture: Goofing off

Wei Wuxian is bored and spends the lecture time goofing off or sleeping like any other smart kid with ADHD.

Eventually he draws a bunny while Nie Huasang tosses him a nut wrapped in paper and he eats it. It’s the same kind of nut he eats at the beginning of his second life, when he remarks that they tasted better 16 years ago.

Don’t mind me, just putting Nie-Xiong’s nuts in my mouth

It’s cute how WWX and NHS are so vaguely gay for each other without bothering to be seriously gay for each other.

Several of the rules that are read out during this part of the lecture are things that Wei Wuxian is doing during this part of the lecture, or will become known for doing in the near future.

sitting improperly

causing noise

teasing others

ignoring others and being undisciplined

borrowing money

being late

Lan Lecture: Showing off

The question & answer part of the lecture arrives, which is when Wei Wuxian gets to show off his gifts. 

He is that classic kid who already knows the essence of the material, does not need stuff explained, and is super bored at rote learning.

Lan Qiren makes Lan Wangji show off his skills to the whole class, which would guarantee an after-school ass kicking for the teacher's pet except that LWJ is basically the most aggressive person in the entire Lan clan (thanks Mom for those "I'm going to kill you now" genes!) and is unbeatable. 

Lan Lecture: Going off

Next, Wei Wuxian introduces an idea for sustainable energy.

He starts off challenging Lan Qiren's hypothetical scenario, and as Lan Qiren draws breath to answer him, Lan Wangji starts speaking. LWJ has been listening very carefully and is speaking out of turn instead of letting the master speak, which is...probably not how he usually conducts himself?

From Wei Wuxian’s perspective, this is just the run-up to his next outrageous suggestion, but for Lan Wangji, this has to be an enormous moment. This boy who is unexpectedly a good sparring partner with swords and words is also an intellectual sparring partner - someone who can give Lan Wangji an actual chance to debate something.  

Wei Wuxian’s answer "it's such a waste" is directed to Lan Wangji, not to the class as a whole. Lan Wangji, Gusu’s loneliest boy, is suddenly in a relationship with an equal. The relationship is adversarial, but it's EQUAL.

Wei Wuxian carries on explaining his idea: How about digging up and desecrating corpses? No no no Not for fun, but in order to have massive, unthinkable power? 

Seems like a waste to just leave the dead to their rest when you could be using them for something. 

Lan Qiren: I can see we are going to have to kill you eventually, aren't we

Jiang Cheng: oh my god Wei Wuxian you can't just ask about decapitating corpses

Jiang Yanli: perhaps my unwavering loyalty to Dad's methods with my baby brother should be reexamined

Nie Huasang: my dude, conceal don’t feel, seriously

Lan Wangji: hmmm he’s not exactly wrong

Lan Wangji was a LOT more horrified at Wei Wuxian sticking a note on Lan Qiren’s ass than he is at this whole demonic cultivation thing. Lan Wangji is really really attracted to Wei Wuxian’s talent and intelligence, even when it's completely heterodox. You can see it much later when Wen Ning gets his personality back; Lan Wangji is impressed and congratulatory, unlike literally everyone else in the cultivation world.

Punishment

When Wei Wuxian gets sent to copy a chapter 1000 times, Jiang Cheng and Yanli are both horrified, whereas Wei Wuxian’s reaction is totally chill. 

Basically he knows that he has reached the part of the classroom discussion where he is inevitably sent for punishment, because he is totally used to that being how things go in his education.

Similarly, kneeling doesn't bother him because Madame Yu made him kneel for everything.  Wei Wuxian is the mascot for too-smart bored kids everywhere.

On his way out, Wei Wuxian hits Lan Wangji with this troubled look of yearning. In this moment where Wei Wuxian is sparking Lan Wangji’s interest and tentatively seeking a path toward Lan Wangji’s heart, he is also mapping out the unorthodox path he will follow away from him as they grow up.  

Lan Qiren in his rage does the dumbest and, frankly, most irresponsible thing the parent of a teenager can do in this situation; he sends Lan Wangji to supervise Wei Wuxian’s punishment. 

"This terrible WWX is a one-man bad crowd. Let me send my deeply conflicted, stubborn, intensely private, teetotling, abstinent and abstemious newphew to spend several days in a private location with him, being bored together."

Lan Wangji responds to this order with 100% calmness, not even an eyebrow furrow.

I'm sure no cussing, pornography, romantic portraits, flirty ink grinding, or changes in forms of address will happen.

Lan Lecture: Blowing off

Wei Wuxian meanwhile has fucked off to go make more friends, and is hanging out with Wen Ning. Wen Ning demonstrates his archery by hitting the worlds slowest falling rock in midair and Wei Wuxian earnestly praises him and offers to trade skill pointers.

I love how sweet and kind WWX is to this younger kid who is obviously a little different.

When Wen Qing shows up, Wei Wuxian takes another opportunity to get into her business, but he skips the charm this time. He also 100% correctly deduces what she is up to.

Swords by the Waterfall

Then comes another sexy sword fight as Lan Wangji sneaks up on Wei Wuxian and almost get his face sliced open as a reward.

Now that the swords are out it’s time for...homework, sigh. Summer school is the worst.

Outro

Writing Prompt: Lan Xichen’s letter to Nie Mingjue after meeting Meng Yao

Episode 05 Restless Rewatch is over here!

[brycelahelas]

take care

rating: mature

book: open heart

summary: God. God. It was a bad idea going here. You want nothing more than to head to the bathroom and crawl out the window and just fucking run wherever the hell your legs take you. You want to run until the ache in your legs makes you forget all of your memories tainted with Rafael, until your lungs constrict to the point that you forget what it felt like to have Rafael’s lips on yours.

Maybe Landry had it right. Maybe emotions do hold us back. And maybe that’s your fatal flaw: you feel and care and love too much to the point that it bites you in the ass. It always did, in the end.

word count: 8000+

notes: THIS TOOK SO LONG FOR NO REASON....literally took me four weeks to complete bc i cannot finish anything in a timely manner. but i hope you all enjoy this 8k+ piece. i love to see interaction so pls reblog and like if you enjoyed! and let me know what you think of it! you can also read this on ao3 here.

dedicated to my lover my wife my shawty my life miss jade... happy birthday!!!

tagging: @zadiechoi @zigtheeortega @senatorraines @bigtoughswordboy​ (if you would like to be added to the list let me know!)

Of all the emotions you could be feeling right now, you find that, at the core of it all, you feel nothing.

This feeling isn’t indifference. Because if it were, you wouldn’t have this ache reverberating all over your body. And although you have a heightened sense of the blood coursing through your veins, of your heart pulsating against your chest, you bite your tongue, shake Sora’s hand, and say nothing when she kisses Rafael goodbye.

When she leaves, you look him in the eyes, sharply inhaling as you struggle to say, “You two are cute together.”

“You think so?” he answers, careful with his words as he eyes Bryce warily. When Bryce gets the message and leaves to greet Ethan, Rafael looks at you once again, eyes almost apologetic. You’re suddenly aware of the distance between you two and the tension that has settled in the air. As he moves closer towards you, you instinctively step forward, but upon realizing what you’re doing, you move back, away from the arms that you know so well, away from the man who once loved you.

He notices this and frowns, only slightly. “Listen,” he starts, voice so low you could mistake it for silence. “About us...I want you to know I still—”

You raise your hand, cutting him off. With your eyes squeezed shut, you take slow breaths and hope that the tears would go away if you didn’t look at him anymore. “Don’t worry, Raf,” you say softly, defeat resound in your voice. “You don’t owe me an explanation. I get it. She’s your childhood sweetheart.”

Just as you turn away from him to go into the hospital, you hear him say, tone just above a whisper, “...Okay.”

The defeat in his voice sounds exactly as it did in yours.

“Are you okay?”

You’ve never heard Esme sound so panicked. As you snap out of your daze, you find that you’ve been standing next to a patient, hands shaking as you hold a needle next to a protruding vein. Thankfully, the patient’s eyes are squeezed shut, looking away in hopes that you would insert their IV quickly.

You insert it in one fluid movement, leaving the plastic tube in and pulling the needle out. Once you let the nurses take over, you grab your clipboard and walk out of the room with Esme trailing close behind you.

“How long was I just standing there?” you finally say once you both enter the elevator and you press the button for the ICU. The silence is palpable, as it usually is with Esme, but her eyes betray a sense of concern.

“Too long,” she answers. “Look, really, are you okay? You’ve been out of it all day.”

“I’m fine,” you say, although visibly the opposite. Esme, being Esme, doesn’t push further.

Silent devastation.

Nothing comes close to accurately describing how you feel about this Rafael situation, but that’s what you settle on. There are no painkillers strong enough to dull the ache in your heart, no way of relieving you from the reality that Rafael isn’t yours anymore. But you live with it, day by day, and it’s apparently starting to show.

After shift change, Bryce bumps into you in the atrium and announces that it’s a Donahue’s night. “My treat,” he tells you, smiling wide as he wraps an arm around your shoulders. “You need it. And you can’t say no because it’s doctor’s orders.”

That elicits a small chuckle from you. “And if I do end up saying no?”

“Then you’ll have to sign an AMA form. But, as you know, it’s not recommended to go against medical advice.”

“Well, I guess I have no choice,” you tell him, grinning softly. “To Donahue’s it is.”

He flashes you that thousand kilowatt smile again and steers you out of Edenbrook and into Donahue’s.

On Fridays, Reggie always makes sure to decorate Donahue’s in a specific theme. Tonight is Samba Night, according to the flyer by the door. Mainly Edenbrook employees crowd Donahue’s, but the vibe is jovial as always, with more five dollar margaritas scattered around the place than usual. You spot your friends in their usual booth, joined by a few of the interns, and they wave you over excitedly.

“Over here!” Sienna calls out as she spots you and Bryce at the entrance. She’s sidled up next to Danny but makes space for you to sit next to her.

As you settle into your seat, all your friends suddenly blast you with questions about your day. How was your shift? Did you have any codes? Did you hear about the rapid response in ICU? Did you hear about the code grey in ED? It’s a dizzying array of questions, and something feels off about it, as if they’re saying so many things at once to startle you. You don’t realize what it is they’re doing until you follow Sienna’s line of sight.

When Rafael walks in with his arm around Sora’s waist, you fall incredibly still. Beside you, Jackie scoffs.

“What is he thinking bringing her here? God, I’m gonna need another shot.”

“I’m right there with you,” you say, suddenly feeling a heaviness in your chest. You turn sharply towards Bryce. “Bryce? Your treat, right?”

Bryce looks at you worriedly but stands right away. “On it,” he says and heads towards the bar.

God. God. It was a bad idea going here. You want nothing more than to head to the bathroom and crawl out the window and just fucking run wherever the hell your legs take you. You want to run until the ache in your legs makes you forget all of your memories tainted with Rafael, until your lungs constrict to the point that you forget what it felt like to have Rafael’s lips on yours.

Maybe Landry had it right. Maybe emotions do hold us back. And maybe that’s your fatal flaw: you feel and care and love too much to the point that it bites you in the ass. It always did, in the end.

Either way, you couldn’t bring yourself to care anymore. Rafael made his choice, and it wasn't you. Fucking deal with it. Huffing, you grab Elijah’s margarita (much to his dismay) and down it all in a few sips. You needed all the alcohol you can get in your system in order to survive the inevitable interaction between you and Sora and Rafael. Dr. Yoeun, Elijah’s intern, watches with wide eyes as you slam the completely empty glass on the table.

It’s Sora who spots you first. Eyes bright and lips pulled into a smile, she basically drags Rafael to your table in order to greet you. You feel yourself tense up as the both of them get to your table, but you feel a hand slip into yours and squeeze. It’s a presence that feels reassuring and familiar. As you look down and realize it’s Sienna’s hand, you can’t help but smile at the interaction and squeeze her hand back.

“Hey! Long time no see!” Sora says, diving into your arms and wrapping you in a tight hug. With your free hand, you give her a soft pat on the back, and she pulls away, grinning. “This is such a nice bar! I’ve never been here before.”

Rafael pipes up from next to her, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. “I just got off a shift and wanted to show her Donahue’s. Hope that’s okay.”

“Come on, Raf, you know we don’t own Donahue’s!” Elijah jokes. His tone offsets the tension at the table, which helps Rafael ease up a bit. “You’re welcome here anytime. You don’t need our permission.”

Rafael nods, looking away from the table. “Well,” he finally says, exhaling a bated breath, “I hope you guys have a good one.” Sora quickly waves goodbye, and the two head off to another part of the bar, most likely in an effort to avoid you.

When Bryce returns to the table with the drinks, you immediately down your whole shot. And another. Then another. It’s probably a good thing that you’re off tomorrow because tonight you’re just going to drink to your heart’s content and cease to think.

The thing is, you can’t bring yourself to hate Sora. She always leaves nice comments on your Instagram posts, and she always makes it a point to greet you whenever you run into each other at Donahue’s. There isn’t anything to hate besides the fact that she’s your ex’s new girlfriend. (Or is it old girlfriend? New-old girlfriend? Rekindled flame?)

Well, whatever she is to Rafael, she’s nice to you. And she’s wonderful to him, which is all you can ask for, really. No matter how desperately you want to hate her, you can’t. She’s given you no reason to.

There you go again. Feeling and caring and loving too much. It really will be the death of you.

You don’t see Rafael for a few months after that. At this point, it isn’t him avoiding you; it’s just that your jobs don’t make you cross paths, as is expected. Whatever Rafael-sized ache you had in your heart is gone. It’s just the thought of what could have been that bothers you occasionally.

And you do think of him, occasionally. It’s hard not to. You’re always wondering how he’s doing—if he’s eating enough, if he’s sleeping well, if he’s staying safe. Rafael’s always been such a selfless person, someone who lives by the philosophy that tomorrow isn’t guaranteed. That worries you. For someone who is always taking care of other people, he doesn’t take quite good care of himself, and one day that’s going to bite him in the ass.

Well, in any case, it’s out of your hands now. At least, that’s what you tell yourself. You have your own patients to deal with and a grizzled senior resident to report to.

A low, menacing voice snaps you out of your thoughts. “You.”

Speak of the devil and he shall appear. When you turn around, you see Zaid beckoning you towards him. “Emergency Department. Now.”

As you fall into step with Zaid, rushing towards the Emergency Department, you ask, “What’s the situation down there? Do we have to run triage?”

“Not necessarily,” he answers. “It’s just high census there right now. Lots of virus scares, among other things. The ED physicians are getting overwhelmed so they enlisted our help.”

You nod silently. You were never too fond of the Emergency Department as an intern. Too much panic and frenzy down there with not enough space to think. You worked better on floors like the ICU or Medical Surgical, where you can take time to actually speak to the patients and work on a diagnosis. At the very least, the ED presented a challenge to you that could potentially be useful in building your diagnostician skills.

When you step through the doors of the ED, you see what Zaid means about high census. All the rooms, including the overflow beds, are filled with people, and every room presents a different case. While you definitely wanted to start in the rooms whose patients likely had an infectious disease, your eyes are drawn to an overflow patient who is wearing a very familiar paramedic uniform. As you draw closer to the patient, your walk quickly turns into a sprint when your suspicions about who it is are confirmed.

“Rafael, what happened?” you ask him, panicked. He’s clutching his side, face grimacing in pain. When you inspect him closer, you see that blood has seeped into his blue uniform.

A nurse approaches the two of you with the suture cart and stops right beside you. “The patient got stabbed during a call, but it’s only a surface wound. No pulmonary or great vessel trauma. A suture is needed though.”

The second she finishes, a call light goes off in ED Room 1, and you notice that she eyes it with a sigh. “ED Room 1 is your patient?” you ask her.

“Yes,” she answers. “Sweet old lady. She’s needed water for the past five minutes, but I haven’t been able to get her because of the craziness going on.”

“Go,” you tell her, waving her off. “I’ll take care of this suture for you.”

The nurse thanks you and walks off, leaving you and Rafael alone. After gathering your supplies for the suture, you sit next to him, aseptically clean the area, and get to work. Neither of you say anything until you rub numbing cream around the stab wound. It’s then that he lets out a hiss.

“You need to stop getting yourself into these situations, Raf,” you murmur softly as you finish the preparations for the suture. When you move to change your gloves, you hear a soft, restrained laugh coming from him.

“You, of all people, should know that I can’t do that,” he mumbles, shutting his eyes as you proceed to prepare the needle. “It’s my job to protect people—to rescue people. I’ll keep getting into these situations if it means I save someone’s life.”

“And if it costs your own?”

He answers without hesitation. “Then so be it.”

“We’re stitching in three...two...one...” You enter the needle into his skin, but he doesn’t react due to the numbing cream effectively desensitizing the area. As you stitch his wound together, you say, “Well, for now, let’s make sure you keep yourself safe, okay? You can’t exactly help people if your body is banged up like this.”

He laughs, this time a bit louder, that sound of familiarity returning to his voice. “It sounds like someone’s worried about me.”

Without missing a beat, you answer softly, “You know I am. I always am.”

It’s the first time you’re really seeing him in months, and he is beautiful. His hair has grown a little longer now, with curly brown wisps covering the nape of his neck. But besides that, he looks the exact same. When your eyes meet, it’s difficult for you to look away, but you find that it’s the same for him

“How...how have you been?” he asks you, snapping out of a daze. He gets up with significant effort but manages to sit upright to look at you properly. “It’s been a few months.”

“Yeah,” you tell him. “You know I’m always busy. No new stories to tell.”

He smiles that goddamn smile that made you fall for him all those months ago. It’s just as soft as you remember. But as you admire him, that small voice in your head just repeats over and over that he didn’t choose you, he chose Sora, and suddenly you’re the first look away.

As you put away the items you used to stitch Rafael up, your mouth seems to run faster than your brain, and you blurt out, “How’s Sora?”

Rafael looks confused. And rightfully so. You don’t even know why you asked that question when you weren’t prepared to hear the answer.

“She’s fine,” he answers, mindlessly. “At least, last time I saw her she was.”

“...last time you saw her?”

“Yeah. We’ve been broken up for a while now.”

“Broken up,” you echo. The words sound so bittersweet in your mouth. “What happened?”

He looks you straight in the eyes, thoughtfully regarding you for a second. “A certain doctor was always on my mind,” he answers nonchalantly. “And it wasn’t fair for Sora to stay in a relationship with me if I obviously liked someone else.”

Wait. “Wait. Hold on. What?” you sputter, watching him as he attempts to stand up.

“Huh, good job on these stitches,” he says, admiring your handiwork. “They’ll heal up nicely.”

“Rafael,” you say exasperatedly, but he holds his hand up to silence you.

“Considering the amount of patients you have, it might not be the best time to have this conversation,” he answers you, a mischievous grin on his face. “Let’s expand on this during dinner tonight.”

Dinner? With him? Tonight? Holy fuck, everything is moving so fast that you’re overwhelmed. Before he leaves, he pauses next to your shell shocked body and leans in, placing a soft kiss on your cheek. “It’s great to see you again.”

And he leaves. Just like that. As you watch him walk out of the Emergency Department and link up with his other paramedic buddies, you stand still in the spot he left you, trying to figure out what the hell just happened. In your periphery, Zaid’s shrill whistle alerts you to his presence, and he marches his way towards you in his usual Zaid way—overzealously angry.

“What the hell are you doing just standing there? Get that suture cart out of the way and get in ED 5!”

It isn’t until Zaid basically bulldozes you into a patient’s room that you remember you still have a job to do. As he grits his teeth at you, he grunts, “Why are you so smiley all of a sudden?”

You don’t answer, instead logging into the computer to pull up the patient’s chart. As Zaid sighs heavily and gets on with his initial assessment of the patient, you see your reflection in the screen and find that you can’t bite back your smile, no matter how hard you try.

Whenever you’re tangled in Rafael’s arms, you wrap your hand around his curls and just memorize. You memorize the way he feels so that there’s never a chance you’ll forget. The way his hair feels under your fingertips, the musky notes of his scent, the corded muscles on his back—everything, anything, you touch and feel and memorize.

After all, you lost him once, and once was enough for you to learn your lesson. Now, every time Rafael finds himself in your arms, you take in his warmth, his curls, his lips, his eyes, his touch. Clinging onto him as if he’ll go away one day, as if he’ll disappear despite his promises of forever.

Forever isn’t guaranteed. You’re a doctor. You know this. In all your years working in the hospital, from the very first time you set foot in one as a high school volunteer, you’ve seen enough death and destruction and despair to know that life is finite. But you’ll believe Rafael anyway, foolishly. A more rational person would question this way of thinking because it’s stupid, perhaps even irresponsible, for you to hold Rafael’s promises to such high standards.

But your mother once told you that if two people were meant to be, the universe will let it happen. And the universe, for all your faults and flaws, gave you a second chance with Rafael. While you’d like to believe that he is your forever, you definitely aren’t going to take your chances. For now, you memorize and memorize.

Rinse and repeat.

Since the moment you two got back together, officially, Rafael has made it a habit to bring you to the street market near his neighborhood at least once a week.

He says it’s a tradition at this point. The amount of times you beg him to bring you back to your favorite taco place, just so you can buy yourself your favorite carne asada taco as a treat, almost warrants the street market becoming a tradition for you two. Not that you’re complaining about it at all. Any excuse to get your hands on a soft, doughy flour tortilla filled to the brim with carne asada and cebolla y cilantro makes you a happy camper.

Today is no different. After rounding the market to see what each vendor has, you two decide on what to get: unsurprisingly, three carne asada tacos for you, and two chicken tamales for him. He likes the way this vendor makes their masa, and you like the way they make their salsa verde. So, not so secretly, you stash four sauce containers of it while he orders, just so you have enough to completely douse your tacos and his tamales.

“Maybe you should get a fifth cup,” Rafael says, voice oozing with faux concern. “I’m sure Delia didn’t notice you taking her entire stash of salsa verde.”

You give him a pointed look. “If Delia didn’t want me to take her entire stash, maybe she shouldn’t have made it so good? Checkmate, Aveiro.”

“Touché,” he says as you two take a seat at one of the empty tables near the tamale stand. Taking the lid off the container, you excitedly drench your tacos in salsa verde, the green sheen of it reflecting against the fluorescent lights above you. Nothing in the world is more mouthwatering than these tacos. Doesn’t matter if you see them every week. You’d eat them every day if you could, and you just know you won’t get sick of them. Rafael’s eyes crinkle as he laughs, and he coats his own food with the salsa. “God, you really love Delia’s salsa, huh?”

“More than anything,” you answer quickly. “Even you. I’m sorry, babe.”

“Guess we’ll have to ask Delia to cater our wedding, huh?”

“Oh my god, can we really?” you ask, taking a bite out of your food. “Man! Have her work with Oscar from the taco stand because these two together are just perfection. Absolute perfection. I don’t care if the people who come to our wedding hate tacos. They’re going to eat tacos. Period.”

Rafael looks at you thoughtfully, with so much affection in his eyes that you can feel butterflies in your stomach. It almost makes you stop eating. Almost. But your food tastes too good, and you’re too hungry to stop, and it doesn’t matter how he looks at you. You’re digging in.

By the time you finish with your first taco, he still hasn’t touched his food. You quirk your eyebrow and ask him, “Why are you just staring at me? Not hungry?”

“What if we got married? For real?”

He asks it so suddenly that you’re caught incredibly off guard. You make a choked sound, almost spilling the salsa verde all over your clothes.

“W...what?” you ask him, embarrassed at the way you reacted, wiping away the sliver of salsa drooling from your mouth. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to get married. In fact, you’ve thought about this very much, to the point where it was almost obsessive. It’s just that you don’t understand how you stuffing a taco in your mouth brought up a genuine conversation about marriage and what that meant for your futures.

“We’re coming up on two years now. We’ve been through a lot of things, tough things, that we’ve survived through together, and we’ve been living together for a while. Marriage is the next logical step, I think.” He licks his lips, looking down as if he’s nervous to continue. “I know how you feel about marriage—how it's an institution that perpetuates gender roles and how couples don’t need to be married to show that they’re committed to each other. But I’d like to marry you, very much. I truly do.”

“Oh, Raf,” you say, but he immediately cuts you off, sounding panicked.

“And I don’t mean to bring this all up to you so fast. My words sound so garbled because I’m so nervous. I don’t even know why. Just know that I don’t expect an answer immediately and that you don’t have to take my last name. Your last name is on the medical degree that you earned, and I don’t want you to think about changing it for me. We can even take your last name. Or hyphenate. I don’t care. As long as I can marry you and be with you for the rest of my life.”

You’re quiet for a while, taking in everything that he’s said. The man really is wordy when he’s nervous, and he looks like he’s sweating bullets. As you take his hand, you notice how clammy he is, and he looks at you expectantly.

“I can’t imagine marrying anyone but you, Rafael,” you answer, genuinely. The words sound so right coming out from your mouth, and that’s how you know it’s true. Rafael’s always been the one for you. You’ve known ever since the day you met him. Doesn’t matter the speed bumps along the way. All that matters is that you’re here now, together, finally deciding what the future holds for the two of you.

You expect him to look relieved. Instead, he looks exasperated. “God, it took you that long to say that? Can’t you feel how nervous I am?”

You grin and squeeze his hand tightly. “I can. And I’m enjoying it.”

He shakes your hand off his and finally stuffs a forkful of tamale into his mouth. “You’re a riot,” he says, low and steady, shaking his head. Although he tries not to smile, it spills out anyway.

A low hum reverberates in your throat. “A riot that you want to spend the rest of your life with.”

“If you keep that up, I’ll uninvite Delia and Oscar to the wedding.”

“Please don’t. If you do that, they might not give me the recipes for their salsa and tacos!”

“Somehow, I doubt they were going to do that anyways,” he answers, finishing the last of his tamale. “Now let’s hurry up so I can buy you the cream puffs you like.”

As you watch Rafael dig into his second tamale, you think back on the things he mentioned about your opinions on marriage. Marriage was something you didn’t believe in, partly due to your gender studies professor in undergrad and partly due to your parents’ failed marriage. People just get married too young, too fast, and divorce is an ugly, expensive thing. As much as you wanted to believe that true love exists, you couldn’t bear to relive through the hell that was your parents’ relationship, which is why you’ve always abstained from the thought of contractually binding yourself to another person. Images of your parents fighting—the passive aggressiveness, the bad mouthing of the other in hopes that you’d take their side—flit in your mind, a constant reminder that keeps you away from readily admitting that marriage was for you. But you are not your parents. And you will not make the same mistakes they did.

You’re glad your parents got divorced. Separately, they’re wonderful people, but they just didn’t fit. And maybe that’s the key to it all. People are like puzzles: their nooks and crannies have to fit just right in order for you to see the whole picture. So maybe that’s why your parents never worked out. Instead of falling in love with the whole person, they fell in love with fragments, only loving the parts they chose to see. To love a person, you must love them whole. And that’s what’s so different about your relationship with Rafael.

As someone who keeps herself guarded due to the trauma of parental divorce, the idea of soulmates didn’t particularly strike you as reality, but perhaps you’re beginning to think that they are real. Because as you sit here across from Rafael, you finally feel as if you’ve found yours.

The birds are chirping today.

It’s pleasant. Especially since you don’t have an alarm blaring into your left ear every thirty minutes. As you roll over, you sling your arm over a sleeping figure, who snuggles closer to you at the first sense of your touch.

“Mmm...five more minutes...” Rafael’s voice is low and scratchy in the morning. It reminds you of how sandpaper feels. You fling your leg over him, and now your whole body is cuddling him. Kind of like a sloth.

“No one’s asking you to get out of bed, silly,” you murmur, giving him a soft kiss at the top of his head.

“Good,” he says, craning his neck upwards to return a kiss to your lips. “Don’t wanna get up. This weighted blanket you bought was a good investment.”

“If it keeps you in bed with me, then I’d say it’s a pretty good investment too.”

He chuckles at that, opening his eyes a peek. His eyes are just so brown that it makes your heart ache. They’re so beautiful, especially in the sunlight, and it’s so surprising that he doesn’t think they’re anything special. As you push the bits of his bangs covering his eyes, you two stare at each other for a moment and share a knowing smile.

You think it’s fair to say that you’ve never truly known love until now.

“You gotta stop buying things that’ll keep me in bed, babe,” he grumbles, closing his eyes for a moment. “I won’t be able to get up for work.”

“Here’s an idea, then,” you begin, closing your eyes too. You listen to his breathing, so soft to the point of silence, and wrap your arms around him more tightly than before. “You and I both call in sick today. We stay in bed. Maybe even kiss a little.”

“Tempting,” he says, a smile dancing on his lips. “But as much as I’d like to kiss you all day, I gotta pay for my half of rent.”

“Alright, alright.” You throw the weighted blanket off you but leave his side intact. “You stay in bed for now, and because I love you so much, I’m going to cook you breakfast.”

Once you slide off the bed and put on your fuzzy slippers, you trudge towards the kitchen in a sleep-deprived haze. But before you can reach the door, you hear Rafael say, “Wait.”

You turn around to find him sitting up on the bed, body leaning languidly as he eyes you. “You know that I love you, right? And that I don’t know what the hell I did to deserve someone like you?”

Bemused, you lean against the doorway with a smirk on your face. “And this is suddenly coming up because?”

He shrugs. “Dunno. I know that I tell you I love you every day, but today feels different. Might be a special day for us.”

“You sound like my Co-Star app,” you tell him. He laughs at that and waves you off, pulling your weighted blanket over his head. As you make your way into the kitchen, you look at your phone.

5:49 am.

Today will be a special day. You just know it.

“What’s going on?” Sienna asks, frantic.

As Zaid and Ines lead a group towards the Emergency Department, you feel a chill going through your spine. There’s no reason to have this many residents working in the ED, unless—

“We’re running triage,” Zaid says, more solemnly than you’ve ever heard him in your life. “Huge fire downtown. It’s chaos in the ED, and we need all hands on deck.”

“Why are they coming here?” asks Jackie. “Mass Kenmore is a Level I Trauma Center. Are there really that many patients that they had to bring some to Edenbrook?”

“I’m afraid so,” Ines answers her, voice trembling a bit too much for comfort. “According to reports, the fire spread so quickly that it was almost impossible to get people out.”

That does not sound good. At all. As Zaid and Ines rattle on about the specifics of the situation, you can’t help but worry about Rafael. Your mind always wanders to him, instinctively. There’s no doubt in your mind that he’s on scene, helping as many people as he can, because he’s always been one to go above and beyond for people in situations like these, even if that meant endangering himself. Rafael won’t let you change that, won’t let you stop him from doing his job, and so you don’t. All you can do right now is hope that he’s safe wherever the hell he is.

The second you fly through the doors of the Emergency Department, a breath gets caught in your throat. Zaid wasn’t kidding when he was saying ED was in a state of chaos. You’ve never seen so many burn patients in your life. As you start giving out tags, you worry that the endless flurry of patients will never end but worry more that the flurry will end with people you know.

Walking into ED 13, you find that your patient is conscious but barely. His oxygen saturation is dangerously low, and the nurses have already put him on oxygen to stabilize his vitals. You take note of his wheezing and the red tinge on his skin. Must have been a terrible, terrible fire for all of this to happen to so many people. You can’t count how many patients you’ve seen today that look like the one right in front of you.

To your relief, he starts perking up the second he sees you. As you approach him, you see a few second-degree burns you didn’t notice before and make a mental note to chart that the second you get a chance to. “Mr. Huston, I’m your doctor for this afternoon. How are you feeling right now?”

“Honestly, I’ve been better.” The man can still joke, but a violent wave of coughs soon takes over him. “Have...have you seen my wife? I been...askin’ around, but...none of the nurses...”

“Take it easy, Jamal,” you caution him. “Breathe in and out of that mask for me, will you?”

He listens. Now, with more oxygen in his system, he takes the mask off and continues. “My wife was in the building when the fire started. Went there to visit her...then one thing led to another...and...”

“Fire broke out?”

Mr. Huston wheezes as he nods.

“Did you breathe in a ton of smoke while you were in the building?”

“Not as much as other people thanks to this nice young paramedic that pulled me out.”

You try to bite back a smile as Mr. Huston tells the story of the nice young paramedic’s heroics. Of course, Rafael’s out there doing his thing, rescuing people from burning buildings, performing CPR on victims without pulses, and being an all-around good fucking human being. From what Mr. Huston tells you, Rafael is doing things that are way above his pay grade, but you didn’t expect any less. He’s always been so selfless.

“Mr. Huston, where did this paramedic go after he pulled you out from the building?”

“I thought he came with me...did he not?”

Huh. You swore you haven’t seen Rafael around. As giant as Edenbrook’s Emergency Department was, you would have seen him at least once, considering that you’ve been rounding the entire unit like crazy. He must have been in and out of the ED to go back to the building site, or he was in the bathroom taking a break.

Either way, you don’t think anything of it. If anything, Mr. Huston’s story is a confirmation that Rafael is safe and alive, and in a day as crazy as today, that’s all you need. As you finish your assessment of Mr. Huston, you move over to the nurse’s station, logging into a computer to chart Mr. Huston’s signs and symptoms.

A bell chimes to notify all ED staff that the next wave of ambulances are arriving in T minus one minute. The paramedics arrive earlier than that, quickly surging through the ambulance bay doors, transporting patients to the very little overflow beds the ED has. One of the paramedics in particular catches your eye, and a look of recognition flashes over his face. It then quickly turns into a look of sympathy.

When you look closer, you realize that it’s Rafael’s partner, Max. He’s got several second-degree burns all over his arms, and his typically freshly-pressed uniform looks disheveled and charred.

That chills that runs down your spine? It returns. Stronger, this time. But you don’t understand why.

It isn’t until you look down onto the gurney he’s pushing that you realize what it is he’s so sympathetic about.

“Raf?”

You hear yourself scream but don’t remember commanding your body to do so. Somehow, your body drags itself from your spot at the nurse’s station, and you try to get to him before several nurses stop you. “Doctor, doctor,” one of the nurses says, eyes flashing in panic, “you need to calm down. We can’t help him if you can’t calm down.”

Despite her pleas, you rip past everyone trying to hold you back, lashing out at them to stay away.

You rush towards him, fat tears beginning to roll down your cheeks in waves. “Raf? Raf, can you hear me?” As you get to his side, you immediately begin to assess, your heart beating so heavily that you feel as if it’s going to explode.

You listen to his breathing, and it’s labored, as if he’s struggling to fill his lungs. His eyes, the very same ones you were just admiring this morning, are dull and lifeless. His skin is crackled, like a burning log, dark flakes peeling off with the slightest puff of air.

All you can do is freeze.

Time slows down when the world feels like it’s ending. This you know because right here, right now, as you stand beside the unconscious body of the love of your life, the world truly seems like it’s about to end.

You can’t even touch his fucking face. You can’t touch his hands, his arms, or even his waist because everything seems so fragile. His mouth is agape, and in it, you can see how dry his tongue is and how soot from the fire has dried on his lips. You can’t bear to look at him, not like this, in this condition. So, as you grip the railing of the gurney, your knuckles paling at the sheer force of it, your eyes flash towards his partner.

You can’t even see Max clearly because your tears blind your sight. This is just so pathetic.

“What happened?” you ask quietly. When he doesn’t answer, you ask louder. “What happened?”

“He...he went inside the building,” Max says, on the verge of tears. “After he pulled out the man in ED 13, we heard a woman yelling for help deep inside. She barely got out before the ceiling collapsed on him.” A beat passes before the tears start flowing down his cheeks, and his voice starts to crack. “I...I promise, I told him not to go, I told him—”

“Doesn’t matter what you told him, he was never going to listen,” you cut him off, bitterly wallowing in the fact that Rafael was too selfless for his own good.

Your own tears have streaked your face a dozen times over, and you can taste nothing but salt. It’s difficult to look down at the body lying on the gurney in front of you. All the parts of Rafael that made him Rafael were dimmed, if not gone completely. There were no more silly grins that you always saw even when you weren’t doing anything inherently funny, no more warm, strong arms to fall into when you found yourself crying over the littlest things, and no more big brown eyes to admire in the morning. As you look down at those brown eyes, hoping to see them once more, you find that, rather than seeing them glazed over, they’re transfixed directly on you.

“Raf, oh my god,” you wail, getting as close to him as you possibly can. His mouth, as dry as it is, twitches into a smile, and he reaches out to cup your chin in his palm.

“My love,” he answers, voice so weak that you can mistake it for silence.

“Raf, what did you do?” you sob.

“What I had to do,” is all he rasps out.

“You’re hurt,” you say, voice quivering. “You’re hurt, and you have so many burns...we...we need to order skin grafts...your lungs are damaged due to smoke inhalation...I just...I can’t do this, Raf, I can’t do this without you.”

More tears stream down your face, all the way to his hands. Although you want to believe otherwise, the damage to his body is severe, and you know he’s not going to make it. Somewhere in his eyes, you can sense that he knows too.

“Let me hold your hand,” he says, after a moment of silence between you both. He grasps your hand tightly, as tightly as he can, and shuts his eyes. Between labored breaths, he manages to say, “You are my forever.”

This is his goodbye. There are no grand exits for Rafael Aveiro. Just simple ones. And of all the things he could have said, he chose to remind you that he will be with you for as long as you live.

At the end of the day, that was the best thing about Raf. He died as he lived—feeling and caring and loving too much. And you’ll take that with you, into forever.

“You’re mine too, Raf,” you answer back, bringing his hand to your cheek.

He smiles one last time. As minutes pass, his grip lessens and his chest stops rising. When a nurse silently walks up next to you, you continue to hold his hand tightly, silent tears rolling down your face.

In all your years working in the hospital, you’ve seen enough death and destruction and despair to know that life is finite, but the finality of life has never felt so painful as it does right now. As you exhale a shaky breath, you open your eyes and say the words you wish you never had to say about someone you loved so much.

“Time of death: 2:34 pm.”

Rafael’s grandmother asked you to speak at the funeral. It was a difficult speech to prepare, considering the circumstances. While you wish nothing more than to send Rafael a proper goodbye, you were in no state to prepare any arrangements of any kind. Just typing “good afternoon” on the Word document brought you to tears.

But you did it anyways. If not for Rafael’s grandmother, for Rafael himself. He, of all people, deserved it.

When you stand up on the podium, you scan the crowd to see familiar faces. Everyone you know is there, including Chief Banerji and Dr. Ramsey. You’re even surprised to see that Sora is in attendance, sitting all the way in the back row with misty eyes and a sympathetic smile on her face.

Clearing your throat, you start to speak. “Good afternoon, family and friends. I want to start off this speech by saying Rafael would not have wanted us to mourn him. That is why I wrote this speech as a celebration of life because we should celebrate the life of someone as beautiful as Rafael Aveiro.

“The first time I met Raf was when we were both on call. He had just saved someone, which is always the way we met up during the first year of our relationship. When I asked him if he really went into a burning inferno to save someone, he answered, matter-of-factly: ‘Well yeah...wouldn’t you?’ And that interaction tells you everything you really need to know about Raf. He cared so much about others, even if it put him in danger. He loved his job, he loved his patients, and he loved pushing himself beyond the boundaries of his job description.

“I think that’s what drew us so closely together, what bound us together for life. Healthcare is a field where you’re fully devoted to strangers, where you’re constantly pushing yourself to be better so you can treat your patients to the best of your ability. And Rafael was so damn good at it, so damn good at his job. He loved people. He loved others. At the expense of himself. But I’ll never fault him for that. Raf’s sacrifice meant that someone else’s family member got to live, and at the end of the day, that’s what he lived for.

“The woman he saved that day was the wife of one of my patients. The two got separated in the fire, and Raf made sure that she would be able to get out and see to live another day. He was so selfless, so worthy of a long, fulfilling life. And while it’ll never get easier to refer to him as the past, I hope he knows that he will always be a big part of my future, wherever it’ll take me. Take care, Rafael, and may you rest in peace.”

As you finish your speech with a shaky breath, an applause erupts from the audience. Rafael’s grandmother is the most visibly shaken by your speech, and when you take your seat, she grabs your hand and squeezes it tightly, not letting go until the end of the service.

The service itself was a long and arduous process. You looked away at certain parts, hoping that Rafael’s grandmother didn’t see just how much you were sobbing. After all, it’s never easy to see the cremated remains of the love of your life. Looking away doesn’t make you forget that he’s gone, but it saved you from seeing another reminder of your reality.

Afterwards, once everyone gives their condolences, his grandmother comes up to you again. She looks at you, sad and mournful, and that’s all it takes for you to burst into tears. Bringing her hand up to wipe your tears away, she hushes you gently and takes you into her arms.

“You know he loved you, right?” she asks you, softly. All you do is nod because you can’t seem to croak any words out. “He loved you so much. I’ve never seen that boy so head over heels for a girl. Even asked me for our family ring so he can ask you to marry him.”

You pull back, surprised. “He did?”

“He did,” grandmother says, nodding to confirm. “He even went to the jeweler to resize it for you, just so it’ll fit on your finger when he proposed.” She steps back to appraise you with a sorrowful smile on her lips. “I wouldn’t have given it to him just for any girl, you know. The universe wanted you two together. I just knew.”

You nod, smiling through the tears. You know it did. Just not in this timeline.

Sure enough, when you finally have the strength to look through his drawers, you find that there’s an engagement ring nestled inside a small box deep within his underwear drawer. It’s beautiful—all jade-colored with gold details. And just as his grandmother said to you, it was a perfect fit.

More often than not, you think back on that day. You think of things you could have done better. Maybe if you got him on fluids, maybe if you ordered a skin graft as soon as you saw him, maybe if you just convinced him to stay home that day, he would still be alive.

But some things are just out of your control. Even if you got him to stay home, he would have hopped in the car the second he heard about the emergency. Even if you ordered a skin graft on time, there was too much surface area on his body to cover. Even if you had gotten him on fluids, he was already at the point of no return by the time you got to his body.

Too many things going wrong, too little time.

Medicine is all quantifiable data and qualitative research. As powerful as that is, it couldn’t go against death, and it couldn’t go against fate. There is nothing that is humanly designed that can go against the universe.

While that may seem terrible, it is what it is. Life is cruel. It is selfish and impatient. It takes as it gives, and it is unremorseful.

But life is also beautiful. It still gave you Rafael. It gave you his warmth in the morning and in the night, his soft kisses, and his comforting hugs. It gave you his empathy for others, his love for Caribbean food, and his dedication to his patients. It gave you a chance at knowing what true love feels like, despite believing your entire life that you’ll never find it.

Life may be fleeting, but that’s why you’ll decide to live it day by day. Because that's what Rafael would have wanted.

And you wouldn’t want to live life any other way.

[yeeterparkersblog]

Last Days | PART 1

Pairing: 6 Underground! Four/Billy x reader

Word Count: 6.1 k 

Warnings: Stealing is bad, kids; Sugar baby/daddy jokes; Mentions of stripping 

Summary: To everyone else, he was a suave young man in a gang of thieves, someone they would rather not get tangled up with. To you, he was a cheeky bastard who wouldn’t get out of your hair and most of all, a rival thief. But one day, Billy decides to reach out to you, proposing that you work together.

A/N: Right. Hello. This is my first fic for the Ben/Borhap fandom. If it sucks I sincerely apologize from the bottom of my cavity. So this story is not taking place during the events of 6 Underground, its more of a prequel to the movie. So basically there might be some foreshadowing, but there are no direct relationships to the movie. Also this fic time jumps a lot, so I hope you guys can keep track of it.

This fic is dedicated to @benhardyisdaddy​ . Faith, you are amazing! No more than a week after 6 underground came out, Must Be A Dream was up and posted. Imagine the amount of dedication and hard work that you give. Congrats on 3k, you deserve all of it.

The Pasteque Necklace. An emerald necklace worth almost 3 million, unveiled at the National Museum 2 months ago, and soon to be yours.

You’ve already knocked out the three guards making their rounds in the museum. Easy enough. And now comes the fun part. You rounded the corner into the large hallway that would lead you to your treasure. You wasted no time at all. You quickly made your way to the showcase room, careful to shoot out any security cameras with a silenced gun.

After the necklace had first been revealed on TV, you went straight into planning mode. Now you knew there was an electric field around the pedestal. It took you time to assemble the proper apparatus that could deactivate the filed. It hadn’t been cheap either. You’ve spent so much time and resources on this heist, and after two months, your hard work could finally bear its fruit.

You jogged towards the pedestal and you were prepared to take out the gadgets, but then as your neared it, you quickly realized you didn’t need it at all. The electric field had already gone, the velvet box had already been opened, and the necklace!? Well! It had already been taken away.

In its place, stuck neatly onto the smooth velvet box, was a small sticky note. Your lips snarled with annoyance. You had a feeling you knew who’d done this.

You snatched the note from the box, ready to get this over with. And sure enough…

“i told you i’d beat you to it  -B” 

—

“You absolute wanker!” you fumed, snatching away the bottle of beer he had been drinking. You slid into the booth opposite him and downed the rest of his drink. “Have you pawned it off already, you cunt?!”

He threw his hands up innocently. “Hello to you too,” He straightened up in his seat and beamed at you. Christ, he was enjoying this a bit too much. “Fancy seeing you here, then.”

“Please!” I spat. “You know I work here!”

“Yeah, shouldn’t it be your shift right about now?”

“Well I took the day off. Thought I wouldn’t need the extra money.” You leaned in, giving him a wicked scowl. “But of course you know all that, don’t you?”

“You seem like you’re in a bad mood” He pointed out. “Let’s have a drink. My treat! I’ve recently come into quite a bit of money.” And the fucker winked cheekily at me.

You groan exasperatedly. You fell against the seat and ran your hands through your hair, defeated. You probably invested a thousand pounds or so into this heist, thinking you’d get millions in return. But nah, all you get to do is to beg your manager for extra shifts.

Your hands were covering your face, slightly muffling your words.

“Out of all the heists that you could have hijacked-”

“Hey you were the one who challenged me.”

True. You really should know better than to wager your most important heist. The smug blonde had more experience than you had, with his little pack of trapeze thieves.

“Yeah?” You shot up straight. “You had help. That little gang of yours.”

“Oh no I did it alone. Like last time.” You didn’t think his face could get more pompous. You wanted to wipe that shit-eating smile off his face. “So this is on you, yeah?”

Ugh. ‘Last time’. It was what had started this whole thing in the first place.

—

3 MONTHS AGO

It was your first big heist. After years of petty theft, pickpocketing and larceny, you wanted something more challenging. A lot more challenging.

Go big or go home, you went for The Blasé. A diamond ring from 15th century Germany. The Blasé will set you up quite nicely.

Standing at the very end of the large hallway, you could see it from here already.

The Blasé, its large gem glittering in its glass case. The moonlight hit it through the glass ceiling overhead, and the diamond seemed to beckon you in with its shine.

Now you weren’t daft. You knew there were additional security measures set in the glass case. If you were to smash the glass and just snatch the ring away, that wouldn’t do. That would just set off the weight sensor below, and blaring alarms that would alert the police of your presence immediately after. You’d rather do this a bit more discreetly.

You chuckled, remembering how proudly the museum director had bragged about having attained the ring. “The Blasé is in very safe hands. Our security will make sure of it. No lowly thief would get their hands on the jewel,” he had said to the interviewer. “Hundred percent guarantee.”

You scoffed. Bet you wish you didn’t boast about the weight sensors now huh, Mister big shot Director?

You took out a small glass cutter, but before you could make a move, someone cleared his throat behind you. You whipped around and pointed the glass cutter at the man. But instead of a burly security guard whose knock-out gas had worn off, you were met with a fit young blond, who was staring at you intensely with the greenest eyes you’ve ever seen.

You froze in place, not really knowing how to act. How would you?

Now he was definitely good-looking. If this were anywhere else, say a café, you’d make a move. But no, you were trying to steal a 2-million-pound ring here. And how would you know that someone would be stealing the same thing you wanted to steal?! And on the very same date and time too?! And on your first big heist. What were the fucking chances?

“How cute.” The blond chuckled, pointing at the mask around your eyes. He took your mask off faster than you could react. “You know you don’t need this if you’ve already turned off the security feed?”

“Hey give it back…” It came out more of a plead than a command. You mentally cringed at how you sounded. But what’s more was that the man was acting so casual, as if this was a friendly conversation and not a crime taking place.

The man squinted his eyes and took a closer look at you, and you couldn’t help but divert your gaze. His eyes suddenly glinted with recognition.

“Hey you’re that girl from that pub!” he laughed. “When I saw the knocked-out guards up front, I knew someone was in here. But I didn’t know it was the waitress from Ritter’s Bar.”

You rolled your eyes. A chat wasn’t what you came for. You turned your attention back to the case, getting ready to slice it with your glass cutter. However, the man put a hand out to block you.

“There’s no need for that, love. I have a more efficient way.” He gave you a sweet smile.

In one swift move, he had smashed the glass case to pieces. The case shattered with a deafening clash and fell to the ground in tiny fragments. He had grabbed the ring and sure enough, the alarms came blaring.

“Shit! What did you do?!” You scolded. “We gotta go NOW!”

“I couldn’t agree more!” He grabbed your wrist and dragged you to wall, pointing up at the tiny window high above it. What the hell was he trying to pull?

And to your surprise, he put the ring on and started to climb up the wall like fuckin’ Spiderman. He got to the window and broke out.

“You arsehole! What am I supposed to do?!” I screamed at him. The front gate has definitely gone to lockdown and you were hearing sirens in the background. He was your only way out. 

“I have a name, you know? It’s Billy.” He threw down a rope. “I didn’t quite catch yours?”

“Oh sod off!” You pulled yourself up the rope. “Give me back the ring!”

“Sorry no can do. If you’re gonna be like this, I’m going to have to let you go, literally.” He dared to wink at you. You were only halfway up the wall when the rope suddenly went loose. You grabbed yourself onto a ledge before you could fall back onto the ground. You looked up to the window to see him smiling at you.

“But if I ever change my mind about the ring, I’ll know where to find you.” And with that he ran away. All that stared back at you was the moon in the night sky.

Godammit.

You used the ledge to push yourself up to the window and got out. You looked around and saw that he did in fact give you back something. But of course it wasn’t the ring, it was your ‘cute’ mask.

“JESUS CHRIST, BILLY!” You groaned in frustration. You couldn’t do anything else after that, the cops had come at that second and you had to flee before your night could get any worse.

ONE MONTH AFTER THE RING HEIST

Ritter’s Bar. Not exactly the best job in the world. Not exactly in the best part of town either. No scratch that. Civilians would actively avoid this part of town. The only people here are your own. Like a twisted and tight-knit community of thieves.

“Let me guess, Meg.” You said to a regular sitting down at the bar. “Whiskey, neat.” She gave you a small smile and you poured out some liquor for her. Just as you were setting down the shot glass, a blur of blond passed by you.

Your eyes darted to the image. It was him! Billy! The man who stole your fucking ring!

You watched him as he headed for one of the booths at the very back. He turned back and gave you a little wave. A little smirk to indicate that he knew you were watching him. You involuntarily let out a low growl of anger.

“You can let go of my glass now.” You looked down to see that your hands had gripped tightly around Meg’s glass, knuckles white. You promptly apologized, giving her the drink. “But hey. Blondie, huh?”

“What?”

“You were looking at the blond.” She shrugged. “He’s easy on the eyes but I wouldn’t do anything about it. His trapeze friends are fucking feral. Don’t trust them one bit.”

‘I’m all ears.”

She told you a little bit more about Billy and his gang. You would listen to her, but you could feel Billy’s gaze prickling the side of your neck.

You knew he was here to talk to you. Every time you took a glance at him, he would be staring right back. But he wasn’t initiating the conversation. He was waiting for you to give in. You weren’t going to. But then your manager saw him there sitting for 30 minutes without ordering anything and he ushered you over there.

“Order something or get out.” You folded your arms. “Dipshit.”

Billy smiled at you. “I’ll order a beer if you sit down with me, love.”

“Get out.” You started to walk away but he held you back by your wrist.

“Okay alright.” He pursed his lips and gave you a twenty. “I’ll buy a beer. But I want to talk to you, alright? It’s about the ring.”

You glared daggers at him, trying to see if he was just playing if you. Maybe he’s finally come to his senses and has decided to give you ring.

“Fine.” You said. “Hold on.”

You came back with a warm bottle of beer and sat down, pocketing the change. It was the least he could do for you. You shoved the bottle towards him. “Well?”

He shot you a look before he started talking. “Look I’m very sorry to have left you behind like that. I’m glad you got out fine, yeah?”

“Good, thanks.” You mumbled. It was nice, but not quite what you wanted to hear. “So I’ll be taking the ring now.”

“W-What? No?!” Billy looked almost baffled. “I already pawned it off! Where do you think the money for this disgustingly warm beer came from? And the ring is rightfully mine, by the way.”

“Am I to believe you’re just here to apologize?”

“Um. Yeah?! I’m not giving you the bloody ring!”

You scoffed. “It should be mine. I was there first.”

“That’s exactly what a child AND a bad thief would say.”

“I’m not a bad thief.” You shot back. “YOU just happened to be there!”

“Oh so you admit I’m a better thief then?”

“Wha- NO!” You were fuming. Your face was probably as red as a tomato by now.

The chattering of the TV caught your attention. And there it was. The Pasteque. Just brought in from France, and unveiled at the National Museum right now. An idea popped into your head.

“I’ll prove it to you, then!” You shot up, slamming down on the table. “Two months from now, I’ll have stolen something worth even more than the stupid Blasé!”

“I’ll just beat you to it.” He said with an air of confidence.

“Oh please, you don’t even know what I’m stealing!”

You stormed off before Billy could get another word in. But little did you know, Billy had noticed you darting your eyes towards the TV, and connected the dots.

“I’ll see you in two months then.” He chuckled.

—

PRESENT DAY

“Wanker.” You muttered.

“I believe you’ve already said that.” Billy shrugged. “Now, care to admit who’s the better thief? We’ve got an obvious answer.”

“Yeah yeah. It’s you. I’d buy you a beer but you’ve possibly left me broke.” You looked up at him with tired eyes. You were slightly surprised when you were met with worried ones.

“Hey I’m really sorry. Honest.” He clasped one of your hands. You were startled but you didn’t pull away. Yet. “I can help you if you want. How much do you need?”

“Maybe this isn’t cut out for me.” You pulled away from his grasp. “A few things from the supermarket or wallets from pockets? Sure. Jewelry worth millions?” You gave Billy a shrug. “Perhaps not.”

You tried to take another sip from Billy’s bottle but then you remembered it was empty.

“There’s a strip club a few blocks away.” You continued. “Maybe I could get a job there when I don’t have shifts here. I’ve been told I have ‘nice tits’ by some of the customers. I’d bet some rich old white dudes wouldn’t mind throwing some money at them.”

Billy raised his brows, pausing a second before shaking his head frantically.

“As much as I would hate to disappoint rich old white dudes. I think I have a better solution.”

“Better than having strangers grope my arse?”

“(Y/N)… you could work with me.”

It took you a second. “I’m sorry?”

“Honest, (Y/N). I think we’ll work well together.”

You scoffed, waving your hands about. “I thought you had your theatre troupe.” He rolled his eyes. “And I thought I wAsN’t a GoOD EnOuGH ThiEF.”

“Right first of all, it’s not a theatre troupe. Second, I sometimes do work alone. Like the ring and necklace, as you should know.” Now you rolled your eyes. “Third. How about we do a test drive?”

You shot him a questioning look.

“We can try working together on one heist first. See how it works out. And if we pull it off and you think we’re good together,” He shrugged. “Maybe we can do it again.”

Your fingers fiddled nervously with the bottle. The offer did sound tempting. It’d be nice to have a partner in crime. And it would be nice if the things you wanted to steal didn’t get stolen first.

“Well how do I know I can trust you?” You glared at him.

“See I knew you would say that. That’s why I didn’t pawn off the entire necklace.”

…What?

He took out a small box from his pocket and slid it across the table to you. “Consider it a peace offering.”

You accepted the box warily and opened it. Oh…wow.

“These earrings are gorgeous.” You laughed. The earrings were a pair of studs, with beautiful little emeralds on them. “I’ll assume the emeralds are from the Pasteque?”

“The very same.” He gave you a contagious smiles. How cute. “It was the least I could do. You could even wear them to the test drive if you’d like. That is, if you agree to do it.”

You held the earrings up to eye level. “Why would I wear such bling to a heist? Wouldn’t want to draw attention.”

“This time it’s to blend in.” He explained. “There’s going to be a gala at a country club down south in a month. Snobby rich trophy wives will be waltzing around with millions around their necks.”

You held the earrings up to Billy’s eyes and you couldn’t help but notice they were the same brilliant green.

“I think they’ll notice if we steal it from right under their noses, Billy.”

“That’s not the entire idea. But, I won’t go into detail until you’ve agreed. And I understand you’ll need to time to think this through. If you agree, we’ll get right into it.” He stood up from his booth and brushed himself down. “I’ll be back tomorrow for your answer, yeah?”

He stuck out his hand. He looked at you expectantly, his own pair of emeralds looking back at you. You clasped his hand with both of yours, as he did moments ago and returned his smile.

“No need. I’m in.”

The corners of his lips hinted at a smile. “I’ll pick you up after your shift tomorrow.” He paused to give me a wink I knew so well. “Feel free to quit.”

—

THE NEXT DAY

“So what’s the plan?” You slammed the car door shut, fastening your seat belt. “Better have a 100 percent success rate if you had me quit my job.”

“There’s always a certain risk involved, (Y/N).” Billy put the car into the drive. “If we succeed, we’ll be living lavishly for quite a long time. If not, then I guess you’re left to fend for yourself then. I’m not doing charity work.”

Your head snapped towards him so quickly you swore you heard a crack. “You shithead!” You took a jab at his shoulder. “I don’t have a job anymore. And I can’t go back to Ritter’s.” You sunk down into your seat in embarrassment. “Certainly not after what I’d said. And I don’t have money now! Imagine unemployment.”

“Didn’t you mention that stripper job yesterday?” He chuckled as he swatted and dodged at your feeble attempts to jab him again. “But look on the bright side. The necklace we’re stealing is gonna be enough to free you of your troubles.”

“Easy for you to say. You have money from the Blasé ring to hold on to.” He gave you a sideway glance that you brushed off. “Wait. Necklace? As in singular?”

He nodded. “Just the one.” He paused to think. ‘Well, two necklaces. But we only get to keep the one.”

“A bit stingy, innit?”

“Hey trust me a bit here! Besides you said it yourself. They’re going to notice if we steal it from right under their noses.”

“I’m still not aware of the plan.”

“Patience, love. I said I’ll explain it at my place.”

“I wasn’t aware of that either.”

“Oh pipe down, we’re here!’

He pulled into a small driveway. You took a look at the house while you stepped out of the car. Not the prettiest house, but certainly better than your apartment. You still felt the need to insult him, though.

“You couldn’t get yourself a better crackhouse with all the money you got from the jewelry?” You sassed, crossing your arms.

“Christ! You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

“You’re bloody right I’m not.”

“Oh just get in the house!”

—

“So basically the whole reason the gala is happening is because of one necklace.” Billy explained. On his laptop, he looked up the country club’s website, pulling up an article on said necklace. “One of the country club members recently got his hands on an artifact. Apparently the necklace used to belong to a Russian Czar. ‘S called The Ruza”

“I assume he wants to show it off to his snooty friends?”

“Like a little boy with a brand new toy train.”

With a little more digging and scrolling, Billy finally found a picture of the necklace.

“Oh I see why you’d gone for this one.” You pulled the laptop closer, squinting your eyes at the small picture. “It’s blurry. But I can definitely see the gold.”

“It’s probably blurry on purpose.” Billy said. “Rich fucks trying to get more hype for the reveal.”

“Right so I believe this is the necklace we’re keeping?” He nods. “What about the other one. What else are we stealing?”

“Oh any piece of jewelry, really. But it needs to be a piece whose absence will be noticed when it goes missing.” You look at him questioningly, trying to get him to elaborate. He catches your look and sighs.

“Fine. You’ve ever watched Ocean’s 8?”

You tried to fight back a grin by fiddling with your cup. You weren’t looking at him but you were sure he was slightly red. “Yeah, sure.”

“Oh don’t laugh. Helena Bonham Carter was brilliant in it.”

“Bloody brilliant.” You chuckled. “But I get understand the plan.”

“Recite it to me.”

“Get into the gala. Steal someone’s bling. There’s an evacuation. And when everyone’s out, you perform gymnastics and steal the Ruza.” You shrugged.

“Right. Let’s get to work.”

-

A/N: Okay so the next few scenes are like a montage. It is not taking place on the same day. It is taking place during the days leading up to the heist. So basically it’s happening over a month long period. I hope you understand what I just said lol. I’m not really good at explaining things? Oops

-

“What about the funding.” You asked. “I haven’t got any money. I’m pretty sure banks won’t lend us any either.”

“I’ll use the money I got from the Pasteque.”

“You’d really do that? That’s your money.”

“I’ll just consider it an investment.” He thought out loud. “For an even better necklace. And for your sake too.”

You smiled to yourself.

-

“We’ll have to dress the part, won’t we?” Billy asked. “Snobby gala and all.”

“Does that mean I get to take you shopping?” You smirked. “Probably get you some fancy shoes and all.”

“Oh I think I can choose for myself, thanks.” He’d interrupted before you could get anymore ideas. “And don’t you forget about the earrings.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

-

“Coffee break?” You asked, offering him a cup.

“Thanks.” He graciously accepted, sitting down next to you. “Hey can I ask. Why are you in so much debt?”

You sipped from your cup. “Went to uni so, student loans.”

“Ah, understandable.” He put down his cup. “But why were you working in a bar? You could have been working in something in your field.”

“I majored in accounting and graduated with good enough grades.” You said nonchalantly. “Really thought I’d get hired immediately. How naïve of me.” You scoffed.

“Doesn’t explain why you ended up being a bartender.”

“I was broke. Didn’t have any family to ask for money too.” You swirled the coffee in your cup. “Tried stealing food at a store but the owner had me fucking arrested. Then no firm wanted to hire me at all because of that little record.”

“I’m sorry.” He gave your shoulder a friendly tap. “Well sucks on them right? Now you get to be a millionaire.”

You let out a light-hearted laugh. “I’m not sad about it. I don’t regret at all, really. I’m glad I’m plotting a heist, and not working 9 to 5 for the rest of my life.”

“I’m glad too.”

-

“Hey what’s wrong?” You nudged his knee with your heel.

The two of you were on his couch with you taking up most of the space. You were laying down and had your legs sat on Billy’s lap who was sitting at the other end. Billy was staring at phone, troubled. Seconds ago, he had been fine before receiving a text.

“Oh get your feet out of my face!” He playfully swatted at them, putting on a smile.

You put away the floor plan you were observing and sat up next to him. “Don’t try to change the subject. What’s wrong?” He opened his mouth to object it but you interrupted him before he could. “I can see it on your face. It’s quite obvious.”

“Right.” He sighed and threw his phone into the couch. “Remember my ‘trapeze friends’?” You nodded. “Well they just completed a heist that I helped plan a few months back. And they said that I’m not getting my share because I didn’t actually do anything.”

He threw his hands up in a rage, standing abruptly from the couch. “Didn’t do anything?! I was the one who got the blueprints and shit! I came up with the heist too!” He massaged the bridge of his nose, trying to calm down.

“Why didn’t you go?” You asked. But you think you knew the answer.

“(Y/N), the two of us only had one month to plan this out. It demanded my full attention if we wanted it to succeed.”

“Oh, Billy.”

“But the other heist was done. The only thing left was the execution. They said they were fine without me. They said it’d be okay and I’d get a small share for helping out.” He crossed his arms, the veins in his head were prominent with anger. “Apparently not.”

“Billy I’m so sorry. If I had known about the other heist, I wouldn’t hav-”

“Hey it’s alright don’t apologize.” His face had softened up looking at you. “It’s not your fault. I just didn’t think they’d cut my share. Alright, look.”

He grabbed his phone. “I’m gonna talk to them. Make sure there’s no bad blood.” He headed for the kitchen to talk in private. “Don’t worry, alright?” You heard him call out.

His words had put you at ease for a while, but you couldn’t help but feel worried for him. The fact that his so called ‘team’ would cut him off so willingly was unnerving.

You grabbed the floor plan you had put down earlier and continued your study. Billy had already suffered a loss helping you, might as well make sure it’s worth it.

-

“I need money.” You nudged his shoulder.

“Who am I? Your sugar daddy?” He didn’t bother to peel his eyes from his phone. “If food’s what you want, I already bought lunch. It’s on the table right there.” He vaguely waved in the direction of the kitchen.

You rolled your eyes. Oh well, if he’s gonna be like this.

You propped yourself in front of him, pouting and giving him the biggest puppy eyes. “Yes, daddy. I need money for a new dress and shoes.” Oh dear Lord this was killing you on the inside. “So you can show me off at the gala. Please, daddy?” That caught his attention.

“W-What?” He finally looked up from his phone to you with widened eyes. “Are… are you? Is this actually happening?” To your amusement, his voice was choked up and he had gone red.

Your face did a 180 and you scoffed. “I need money, you horny cunt!” You doubled back with laughter and slapped him on his shoulder. “God! How long haven’t you been shagged?!” You gripped your stomach in pain from the laughter, ignoring his mumbled protests. He curled into a fetal position with his hands over his face. If it was possible, he was even redder.

“Let’s never talk about this.” He sighed. You watched as he shifted awkwardly into the couch, desperately trying to hide his front from you. Why would he- oh. OH!

“Bloody hell!” You stood up, your fit of laughter returning immediately. “Did I give you a bo-”

“I SAID DON’T TALK ABOUT IT!”

You couldn’t help but burst out laughing once more, dropping on the ground with hysterics. He pushed himself off the couch and marched himself to a room, coming back with a few wads of cash.

“Take it and go. I’ll even give you extra for your silence.” He shoved the money into your hands without looking at you. You giggled, despite your best efforts to hold it in. You settled for a cheeky grin when he shot you a dirty look. “Can you go already?”

“Right, fine.” You started to walk away. But, oh what the hell.

You couldn’t help but turn back with a smile, blowing a kiss in his direction.

“Thank you, da-.”

“OH, PISS OFF!”

-

Tomorrow would be the heist you had been preparing for. Everything was already prepared and gone over a billion times. You could recite every detail of the plan word-by-word without an error. And since everything was ready, Billy had given you the day off. A possible ‘last day’, he had said.

“The day before a heist, I’d do something I’ve always wanted to do but never did.” You remembered him saying. “I’d have that ‘last day’, you know, in case something goes wrong, or I get caught by the pigs the next day.”

It was your first day to yourself in weeks, you could do anything! You could have slept in. You could have gone out. You could have had that ‘last day’ Billy was talking about.

But instead you were where you’d been for the last month. You didn’t know what brought you here. You had no legitimate reason to be here. You stared at Billy’s front door, unsure whether you should knock or not.

“Christ.” You mumbled to yourself. “What am I doing?”

Just as you were about to turn and leave, the doorknob twisted open and out stepped Billy. The car keys in his hands jingled when he hastily put on his coat, still not noticing you standing there.

Oh well, too late now. You cleared your throat.

“Heading somewhere, then?”

Billy jumped and whipped his head to you. “(Y/N)!” He proceeded to stutter, the words coming out of his mouth barely intelligible. He looked like a deer in headlights, caught off guard. “What are you doing here? We uh… had the day off.”

I gave him a look that mirrored his own- deer in headlights. “Well I just … I um.” You adjusted the strip of your bag uncomfortably. You could feel his piercing green eyes on you.

“I had questions about the plan?” You looked up to see him confused. Yeah, you weren’t convinced yourself, either. “But I can see that you’re going out so I’ll just… go?”

“Wait no.” He gripped you by your wrist. “I was actually going to see…”

He trailed off when you looked at him. He put his hands back into his pockets awkwardly, clearing his throat. “I was going to see a movie. Do you want to come?”

“Oh I don’t really fancy a movie right now.” You mumbled. “Sorry.”

“Oh okay.” He caught his bottom lip between his teeth. “How about coffee? You said you had questions about the plan?”

“Oh I um. I just thought of the answer, so.” You cringed inwardly, unable to bring yourself to look at him. You never really had questions in the first place. “I’ll just go. Wouldn’t want to disrupt your ‘last day’, right?”

You had only made it to the sidewalk when he called out your name. You left out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

“How about a ride back to your place then?”

You spun around and were met with a small smile. Billy fiddled with his car keys, expecting your answer.

“Alright.” You smiled back.

—

HEIST DAY (yay!)

You stared at yourself in the mirror, smoothing down any wrinkle in your dress, or any stray strand of hair.          

The bright emerald dress was simple yet it had a dash of elegance to it. It had no lace or complicated designs. The silk dress hugged your torso and cascaded down smoothly. The plunging neckline and the slit along the dress brought a teasing element to it, leaving just a right amount to the imagination.

Your hair was tied up, showing off your neck and of course…

“How could I ever forget you?” You picked up the velvet box, admiring the emerald studs Billy gave you. To tell the truth, the only reason you chose this dress was because of the earrings. They matched perfectly.

You smirked as you put them on. It didn’t hurt that the dress matched Billy’s eyes too.

Just when you were finishing up on your makeup, there was a knock at your door. Right on time. As you made your way, you impulsively smoothed down your dress.

God, why were you such an anxious mess? This wasn’t senior year prom.

You shook off the oncoming jitters and opened the door.

“Hey.”

“HI!”

Your response came out a bit more enthusiastically than you had hope. But to good reason. You discreetly checked him out, head to toe. Impeccably dashing and smart, he pulled off that white tux effortlessly. His hair slightly slicked back and a lazy smile present on his face. You suppressed the butterflies that were fluttering about in your gut.

“You look g-”

“Ready to go, then?” He cut you off, pointing at his watch.

Your face fell. Why do you care what he thinks? You roll your eyes, grabbing your coat before stepping out and locking the door behind you. You don’t care. You don’t care. You don’t ca-

“You look beautiful, (Y/N).”

There it was.

A grin involuntarily made its place on your lips. “Thank you.” You hid your face, saying it nonchalantly as if it wasn’t bothering you for the past minute.

You suddenly hear him laugh. “Is that what you wanted to hear?” Your grin dropped. “Is that why you’re all moody? That I didn’t compliment you?”

You shoved him back, the blush on your face now of embarrassment. “Dickhead.” You muttered, walking hurriedly towards the elevator before he could make another comment.

“No hey (Y/N)-”

“Shh!” You pressed on the down button of the elevator, impatient. You hear him make his way towards you.

“(Y/N), I’m-”

“SHH!” You hushed him louder. You frantically pushed the down button. Come on come on come on.

Ding!

Christ, finally. You step into the elevator, now repeatedly pushing on the ‘close’ button while maintaining direct eye contact with him.

“Oh for fuck’s sake.” You hear him mutter. He runs towards you, just barely making it in before the doors close. You lean against the banister and glared at him with crossed arms.

“Watch your mouth next time.”

“Sorry.” He mumbled out, scratching the back of his neck. He made his way beside you, leaning on the banister as well. You chose to stare at your shoes. The two of you stood in silence, only the occasional ding of the elevator cutting in.

It was times like this you wish you had rented a room on the lower levels.

“(Y/N).” You hesitantly turn your head to him, but he points at the elevator doors instead, a silent instruction to look at them.

You see both of your own reflections staring back. He had his head against the wall, but he was without a doubt, looking at your mirrored image.

“See all that?” He pointed at your reflection. “I’d be a fool to not notice how good those earrings look on you.”

You sputter out a laugh, finally filling out the awkward atmosphere. You manage to muster a grin and look into his eyes. “Thanks, my sugar daddy got them for me.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “He has nice taste.” You reply with a hearty laugh. “Suppose he paid for those too.” He gestured at your dress and shoes.

“I’d say it’s money well spent.” You mockingly give him a twirl, showing off the dress. “So generous of him.”

“He’s a lucky man.” A playful smile poked at his lips.

And the two of you shared a laugh, glad to diffuse the tension, even if it was just for a while.

But it was short-lived.

The elevator doors finally opened with a final ding! And it rang like a bell to bring you back down to earth. To remind you there was a necklace made out of £5,000,000 waiting for you.

The two of you regained your composure, stepping out of the elevator. Your heads turn towards the sleek BMW that Billy rented just fort the occasion.

Beside you, Billy takes out the car keys. “Well let’s get to it then.”

A/N: I hope that didn’t suck, for any of ya’ll who made it to the end. Also would anyone read a Bucky Barnes fic if I wrote one.

[artificialqueens]

The mistakes we're going to make (Jan/Jackie) - Meggie

A/N: Hey all! I had the pleasure of writing this little gem for Molly for our gc’s gift exchange. I really enjoy writing this dynamic, and I hope you all enjoy it too! Thank you to Mac, Mia, and Alex for prereading for me. Y'all are the real MVPs.

Summary: when i look at you, all i can see are the mistakes we’re going to make (the future’s so bright)

They’re graduating high school tomorrow night, but all Jan can think about is her calculus final and whether or not she can scrape by with an A.

She’s done the calculations approximately 47 times (and had Jackie check them over nine more because Jan’s shit at math now apparently), and she knows she has to make an 82 on the final to pull an A in the class. And that will get her an 89.5 which rounds to an A. She’d rather not cut it that close, thank you very much.

To anyone else, a B would not be the end of the world, but it would be Jan’s only B. Ever. To get out of high school with a perfect GPA, an unblemished transcript, a perfect record… That’s been her goal ever since she graced the hallways of R.P. Charles High School three years ago.

So after finishing Ms. West’s history final, she pulls out her calc book and dutifully studies her notes. They’re meticulous, her rounded penmanship in stark black ink. She purses her lips and wonders if she has enough time to redo them in colored ink according to her color-coding system.

Behind her, Brita mutters to herself and furiously erases a sentence in her essay. Written responses have always been her downfall. To Jan’s right, Gigi takes a mirror out of her purse and retouches her lipstick.

“Why are you studying?” Gigi whispers. “You literally just finished a test, and it’s a half day. We’re done after this.”

“Yeah, but my calc test is tomorrow, and Ms. Hytes is not as lenient a grader as Ms. West.” Jan sighs and runs a hand through her hair.

Gigi pulls a face. “God, why’d you even take calc? You didn’t need the credit.” Gigi had taken personal health instead of a math class. She said their final was about sexually transmitted infections, which apparently is the new name for sexually transmitted diseases.

Jan shrugs. “I wanted to be—”

“—valedictorian, yeah, I know,” Gigi finishes. “Well, anyway. That didn’t work out the way you planned, did it?”

At the front of the room, Ms. West clears her throat and widens her eyes at the girls. Gigi sits back in her desk and primly folds her hands. Jan is free to once again study her notes, but Gigi’s last words still sting.

She had only taken calculus because it was an AP class, guaranteed to get her extra GPA points she would need to wrap up the valedictory. What she hadn’t counted on was being terrible at calculus.

Sure, geometry hadn’t been a walk in the park, but trig had been a piece of cake. So she figured that with a little bit of extra studying, she could carve out an A and stake her claim on the title of valedictorian, something she’d wanted ever since she had learned what the valedictorian was. (Kindergarten. When her parents had taken her to see her cousin graduate. And the pretty girl at the front had gotten up to make a speech in front of all her classmates, and everyone had to pay attention to her for a whole ten minutes while she talked about things that were important to her. Jan wanted that.)

But in March after third quarter grades were calculated and the honors had been announced, she’d ended up salutatorian, literally two hundredths of a point behind Jackie Cox. It had been a two-man race between her and Jackie all throughout high school, but the difference had been that damn calculus class. Jackie had an A; Jan had a B.

Jan’s parents had doted on her just the same as they would have if she’d been valedictorian, taking her to dinner at her favorite restaurant, celebrating with cake and sparkling grape juice out of the champagne flutes usually reserved for New Year’s Eve, but Jan couldn’t help but sense a little tinge of disappointment behind their smiles. Close, but no cigar. She’d still give a speech, but it would be shorter, and no one really cared what the salutatorian had to say. She’d worked so hard for four years to achieve the top honor and now she had to stand back and watch someone else deliver her valedictory.

Even if that someone was her very close friend.

There’s a certain closeness that develops between students when you take all the same classes for four years, and Jackie Cox had been in all of Jan’s classes since freshman year. By design, their schedules had ended up being very similar. It helped that they were into the same extracurricular activities as well. They were both athletic, both involved in student government and the debate team. They even both participated in the spring musicals: Jan onstage in a lead role, Jackie backstage as part of the tech crew.

But as their friendship grew so did their rivalry, at least on Jan’s part. She’d always seen Jackie as a reminder that she had to work harder to be her best. With Jackie, everything always seemed so effortless. Her poise, her perfection, even the way she spoke and carried herself. Jan felt like she herself was constantly obsessing over everything she thought and said. When she looked at Jackie, she felt like the other girl just had a natural ease about her.

She’d tried for years to be more like Jackie. But the feeling grew especially deep after they’d received their first calculus quizzes in October and Jan’s was emblazoned with a fat, red D. Jackie’s, on the other hand, sported an A.

Ms. Hytes had asked Jan to stay behind after class so she could encourage her to either drop the class or consider hiring a tutor.

Failure was absolutely out of the question. So Jan asked for help. She asked Jackie for help.

Honestly, if it wasn’t for Jackie, she wouldn’t be pulling a B in calculus. Not at all. In fact, she probably would have failed out at semester.

So now that there’s this final that she has to prepare for, there’s only one person she trusts to help her study for it.

Jan catches Jackie in the hallway (their lockers are nowhere close because that’s the way life—and the alphabet—works, but Jan is good at getting what she wants), and asks her if she feels ready for the final tomorrow.

Jackie sighs, the exhalation blowing the dark curtain of hair off her forehead. “I mean, I think. I might look over my notes again tonight. You feel good about it?”

Jan laughs, high-pitched, a tell-tale sign of her anxiety. She hates that she wears her emotions like an oversized sweater. “No, actually. That’s kind of why I’m here.”

So anyway, that’s how they end up on Jan’s bedroom floor, calculus books open in their laps, a plate of chocolate chip cookies and glasses of Dr Pepper set aside because Jackie is a Professional when it comes to this whole studying thing.

(That’s probably why she’s the valedictorian and you’re not, a hateful, nasty voice whispers in the back of Jan’s head. Because she’s dedicated to studying and you’re worried about whether or not she likes your cookies.)

She won’t think about the fact that for the past six months, she’s also been concerned about whether or not Jackie likes her.

It’s not exactly something she’s prepared to deal with.

Jan’s dated before, of course, but they’ve always been boys. And now, all of a sudden and by some act of whatever god exists, she finds herself having a massive crush on Jackie.

So she’s bisexual. It’s fine. She’s had years to deal with this, and she’s always kind of wondered.

Honestly, she’s chalking it up to academic jealousy.

Jan just wants to be like her, that’s all. It has nothing to do with the way her long, dark hair cascades in waves down her back, or the way her eyes sparkle when she laughs, or the way Jackie had caught her backstage right before opening night of Carousel and grasped her hands and told her to break a leg and knock them dead and basically be the best Carrie anyone had ever seen before kissing her cheek.

Except it totally does.

“So to compute the three-by-three you have to multiply A by the two-by-two determinant of the matrix,” Jackie says, marking something in her notebook. “Now, how do I get that?”

“Huh?” Jan asks stupidly, brought back from her reverie by the question. “God, I’m sorry. I’m just…” She scrubs her hands down her face then immediately regrets it because her eyeliner is now definitely smeared. “I’m out of it.”

Jackie nods and presses her lips together. She breathes in quickly like she’s going to say something, but changes her mind at the last minute. She taps her pencil on her notebook.

“Sorry I’m wasting your time,” Jan says sheepishly. “You can go if you want…”

“No!” Jackie says quickly. “No, it’s not that. I just… I’m just wondering…” She sighs. “Things have been kind of weird between us ever since spring break… Since the honors were announced, and I just…” She shrugs. “I guess I just want to know if you like, hate me for being valedictorian over you.”

Jan gasps. “I could never hate you.” She hadn’t known that her disappointment was quite so palpable. Then she decides that Jackie deserves to know the absolute truth. “I was disappointed. My parents expect a lot out of me, and they… They’ve been pushing for this since, like, forever. I just didn’t want to let them down.”

Jackie’s eyes widen. “Salutatorian is letting them down?”

Jan shakes her head. “You don’t know my parents.”

“No. But I think I kind of understand. ” Jackie closes her book and pulls her knees into her chest. “You know my parents immigrated from Iran, right? So like, the American dream? That’s all they want for me. And that includes college. A good one.” She laughs. “My mom wants me to be a doctor.”

“What do you want to be?” Jan asks quietly.

Jackie’s quiet for a moment before she shakes her head. “I don’t know. I don’t think anyone’s actually asked me that before. Isn’t that wild? I’m 18, and I have no idea what I want to do with the rest of my life.”

Jan shrugs. “We’re 18. I don’t think we’re supposed to know what we want to do with the rest of our lives.”

“I know one thing I want to do, though,” Jackie says, smiling. “When I get to college, I’m going to kiss a girl. I’ve always wanted to. I mean, I know I’m gay so like. That’ll be nice.”

“You can’t do that here?”

“Are you kidding?” She scoffs. “My mother would kill me. And that’s before my dad finds out.”

Jan shrugs. “You could kiss me. If you wanted.” Her cheeks fill with color. She’s never this brash, this forward. But the opportunity had presented itself and she’d taken it. “I mean, or not. Whatever. It’s fine—”

“Jan.” Jackie’s looking at her, dark eyes narrowed as her hand creeps up to cup her chin gently, and Jan has just enough time to gasp in a shock of air before their lips meet softly, tenderly, slowly meshing together. Kissing Jackie is so much better than kissing any of the boys she’s ever dated before.

Jackie pulls away far before Jan wants her to, and she’s left wanting more. She shudders a sigh and opens her eyes slowly.

“Wow,” she says.

“Yeah,” Jackie replies, brushing the hair off her shoulders. “That was… Umm. We should probably study, though.”

“Right. Of course.” Jan blushes again. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to… Distract you.”

“Jan…” Jackie’s hand falls softly over her knee. “We can kiss more when we get through matrix determinants, okay?”

Jan isn’t sure what it is, but something about this new teaching method suddenly makes perfect sense.

She makes a 93 on her final and finishes the semester with an A.

[marlahey]

Hi it’s the person “making assumptions”. Not making assumptions, but when I see someone being praised for using a condescending tone in relation to something that I, as a black woman, care deeply about I take issue. Didn’t say people were right to send hate, but his response was poor and misjudged. Just making my judgment off the behaviour I see as we all do. I do expect better from a white guy with power who demeans the legitimate concerns of those who were asking for more politely. Be kinder.

Hi anon, while I appreciate an important discourse, I am surprised that you’ve come to my blog when I see that the same message you seem to have copied and pasted into multiple asks in the skam tag and have gotten support for your claims. just so there’s no confusion, I’ve copied you entire message to Chris below. I’m also kind of riled up today so this will probably be stupidly long.

_Not true, when people with approx 400 followers post links on social media for protests it usually generates 3 more signatures. Imagine if someone like Maxence, with 500k followers, posted a link to a petition. His silence is privilege, his silence is choosing the side of the oppressor. He stands for no one but the white man if he can’t do the bare minimum. Coming from a black girl who works in charity, and knows first hand the impact that social media can have on protesting. Don’t make excuses.

(2) I’m just real tired of white people excusing themselves with “I was learning” (axel) when the black community don’t have a CHOICE. This is our reality, and you’re either with us or against us. Silence means you’ve chosen the side of the oppressor, to paraphrase Desmond Tutu. Not aiming this just at you, but all Skam fans defending their behaviour. It is bad. Don’t excuse white men for being lazy and ignorant.

(3) Maxence wants to scold people for not going to a protest? His tone is condescending, and shows more of his privilege and ignorance. Oftentimes it’s unsafe for PoC and queer people to go to protests. His safety is guaranteed, he’s a straight white man. The whole point of BLM is to fight for the safety of the black community globally, including France which is racist as fuck (Burka ban?!), so for a white guy to not realise why some people don’t go to protests is just ignorance. Educate him.

(4) it’s not shifting responsibility btw. People are allowed, especially minorities, to ask for white people to do their bit. People with large influence should do better, especially if their career is made on a show that supposedly address social problems through TV (mental health, islamophobia, homophobia etc.) you really can’t sit there and scold people for asking for better. Sometimes the language and approach is poor, but the point is often correct. Please think before you defend them.

no one is excusing maxence, especially when he did exactly what you asked: posted a link to a petition for all of his followers to see. that’s not silence. I’m east-asian and I have a masters degree in media studies and communication. while I agree social media can be a great tool, I would argue that posting on it is more of a ‘bare minimum’ than anything else; without anything actionable (petition signing, donating, self-educating, voting) then it’s just virtual signalling. it’s not concrete. since maxence was literally at a protest tonight, he seems to be on the right track with his support. he’s not against you.

the systemic and historical roots of racism around the world are awful. no one denies that, including in france. canada in particular is no exception. I agree that the pasty men of the world have more work to do. but to deny them the time and opportunity to educate themselves seems counterproductive. I’m not sure what sort of timeline you have that everyone must meet, but it takes a long time to learn new things, and longer to unlearn everything you thought you understood about an issue or yourself. I literally have cerebral palsy and I knew so little about disability studies and activism prior to taking a class on it. am I a bad cripple? I didn’t start coming out as bi till last year and don’t do much activism there yet either. am I lazy and ignorant?

more precisely, how are you or I supposed to dismantle racism or oppression without their help? in my opinion, your tone here is equally if not more condescending towards them, and chris. quite frankly, if I were maxence I would’ve probably said something very similar. I don’t know how it feels to be inundated with strangers telling you what to do, and how to feel, and how much of an asshole you were being because of something as ridiculous as instagram posts. 

I’m a former teacher of junior high and high school. that’s not education. it’s being a dick because the internet protects you from real repercussion. the person axel replied to wasn’t asking, they were demanding and being rude as hell about it. you’re free to dislike his or maxence’s tone as you will, anon. but you are assuming that maxence doesn’t understand why people may not attend protests. he’s not an idiot; all of s5 of skam fr was dedicated to disability awareness and representation. he literally plays a queer, mentally ill character. pretty sure he has basic human decency and knows not everyone can go marching into physical danger. to call him ignorant because he’s not writing an academic essay in his stories about the struggles of every minority group is a bit of a reach and frankly just mean. you also seem to assume he’s not done anything else because...what? he didn’t post about it?

I also have to disagree with the idea that  “sometimes the language and approach is poor, but the point is often correct.” you’re not going to get anyone onside by belittling and insulting them. that’s just a fact. just as you didn’t draw chris onside, you’d never bring maxence if he wasn’t already here, protesting. if you allow all these people on his socials that grace of a poor approach, why do you not give it to maxence in his response? because he’s right. copy/pastes and hashtags are not enough. there is more work to do and everyone’s capable of it. I truly respect your position and I empathize deeply with the enormous struggles that you and your community face daily. you’re free to expect whatever of maxence, but it doesn’t mean you’ll get it. he does not have to document and prove his allyship to anyone. if you’re unhappy with it, then I’d suggest stop following him or blocking his name. venting your anger at other people doesn’t affect him. 

your anger at him in general doesn’t really affect me either, despite this essay. you ordering me to do or feel things doesn’t seem kind. but I’ll never have the same stake in this fight as you do, so it’s not up to me to tell you what to do or how to feel. you came into my inbox expecting a response, so here’s mine. I hope that this renewed rage and energy around the world is the turning point of all of this. I’m sorry you even had to send any of these asks in the first place. 

[mountphoenixrp]

We have a new citizen in Mount Phoenix:

                                         Hodr, the God of Winter,                      whose origins stem from Ancient Scandinavia.                                     He is now the owner of Nysnö.

FC NAME/GROUP: Kim Jaejoong | JYJ/Soloist GOD NAME: Hodr PANTHEON:  Norse OCCUPATION: Tailor, Owner of Nysnö HEIGHT: 1m80 DEFINING FEATURES:

- Porcelain complexion, very easy to get tanned or sunburnt

- Big, watery, and expressive eyes with natural eyebags  

- Tattoos:

+ Two quotes on the left chest: Deferto Neminem (Accuse no man), Always keep the faith

+ A pyramid with an eye and a set of horns, with three dots above on the left wrist

PERSONALITY: Just like what the last season of a year would offer to the world, Hodr’s got that quiet yet immense power to free, to freeze, and to frighten.

More often than not, he is the literally coolest individual found in any place he’s been to, and his too-cool-for-you resting face with porcelain complexion won’t help. But no, he’s not just a walking ice statue, and yes, he knows how to socialize and even tell jokes – the ones that would help listeners not to try so hard for a pity laugh. He looks aloof and is aloof most of the time, until the situation calls for what he can contribute. Although he may not be the fastest to offer a hand, Hodr would only offer what he’s best at. And actually, after thousands of years of trial and error, the winter god is confident to say that he’s a well-qualified player in quite many different fields in life. And does that make him cocky, sassy, savage at times? Yes dear, all checked.

On the more serious note, this icy god would be often seen alone, being absorbed in a book, something on the screen, or just in his own thoughts. It doesn’t mean he’s unaware of his surroundings at those times; in fact, the reverse is true. Hodr has a keen eye for detail, which would make him the perfect go-to person if you want your new hair cut, new glasses, or even a tiny pimple near your hairline, to get some attention. The god likes to give honest compliments, moral support, physical support, basically what it takes to help others feel more confident in themselves. In some senses, he could be seen as an amateur life coach. And a great drink buddy. He himself isn’t really confident in his flirting skills, but if you’re looking for at-least-acceptable courtship, relationship, or situationship advice, Hodr can manage to give you some.  

However, Hodr would take his sweet time to warm up to others, not because he needs to consider if they would worth his time, but the exact another way around. Despite his well-put-together demeanor, insecurity and fear of abandonment are some of the challenges he’s still striving to conquer. Also, Hodr’s developed this odd determination to make as few mistakes as possible, hence his over-meticulousness and indecision, also explains why he might take months to finish a suit. Yet, if one gives him enough patience and understanding, guarantee that they would get the best-customized suit on earth, and probably a (some sort of) friend in this Norse god of winter.  

HISTORY:

  Before Ragnarok

What was the fun of being the forgotten son of Odin? Nothing much - or should it be phrased almost nothing at all – except for the plethora of aloneness, which equaled to ultimate freedom in Hodr’s book.

The God of Winter was born with eyes that could only see the depth of his own soul and not one of the universe’. At first, it was a curse, then a blessing in disguise, for it gave him the privilege to stay away from the frenzied dance of life and death, of battles and romances, of wisdom and stupidity, those that most other Norse deities had always relished. Hodr preferred, almost thrived on, his blissful solitude. He loved it when he could turn not only one, but both blind eyes, to the surrounding chaos. And it was like a seed planted on barren land, the desire to be at the center of attention and adoration like his dear brother Baldur was. From the first day of existence, Hodr had already understood this. His brother was born to be loved, and he was born to be left alone.

In the serendipity sang by the winter breezes, Hodr had heard his final. Or finals, to be exact. That yes, he was born to with a cursed blessing like no others, that he could make use of it to keep trouble at least a winter away, but that wasn’t meant to last forever. Nothing supposed to last forever, especially when – no matter how different they were – all the Norse deities have been waiting for the Ragnarok since the beginning of their fate.

“I, too, shall die,” he informed one night at the gales caressing his porcelain cheeks. The gales, reminded of the anticipated farewell, hurled in despair. Hodr smiled, the warmest a god of winter could muster. “Behave yourself while I’m away, won’t you?” The winter gales laughed out their response.

And they kept wuthering. Their mighty roars got deafening the day Loki showed up with a mistletoe spear; the sound so deafening Hodr could not really hear what they were trying to say, but the spear had already been thrown away, aiming at a target even his wildest imagination could not let him to see.

When he knew was when it was too late to know. Baldur’s death came much faster than his belated realization. He abhorred Loki, with just one tenth the hatred he had dedicated to himself. Loki’s natural couldn’t outshine his exceptional gullibility; his wrongdoing couldn’t be anything else but a proof of foolishness.  

The forgotten outcast was now the greatest sinner. Hodr melted into an epitome of guilt and agony.

The mighty Odin went berserk, of course he would. Hodr could tell what was coming – a decision, a revenge, exactly what he was expecting to. It was another blessing that he did not have to wait for long. One day after Baldur’s death, Vali was born. Just as great as their father, he had completed his sole duty of showing Hodr the way back to nothingness with utter ease. There was no sign of protest from Hodr.

But no one could rest in peace.

Winter did not keep its promise to its God. The freezing gales kept hurling their inconsolable anger. Ice and snow waged war against all gods and men, buried three summers under their thick white blood, and no living left undamaged.

That was how Fimbulwinter started, and how the world began to end.

After Ragnarok

Hodr couldn’t tell how long it had passed between his death and his resurrection. Probably a Ragnarok apart, or that was what he had heard from the survivors. How could he return to life? Why him and not some other much more deserved warriors? No one, including winter, could give him a convincing answer.

What he’d known was that Baldur had also come back to life – the best news Hodr heard since his existence. No blames, no cries, only understanding, and family bond were shared again between the two Odin’ sons, which, until now, still surprised Hodr somehow.

Asgard and the other eight worlds were quick to recover, teeming with life. The winter gales had stopped wuthering. Yet, there were still so many questions left, to which if he did not find the answers, no one - even his greatest of a father - could.

Is this all the reasons why I have been here on earth?

Is there anything else I should know? Learn? Master?

Is there any other place I should go? Anyone else I should meet?

Is there really something called ‘true love’? What is love though, anyway?

Hodr spent the next millennia on self-discovery and re-discovery. On learning and un-learning. On growing up, getting wiser, bolder. On figuring out that actually, his hands were actually much more skillful than they were thought to be. On being a god, then being a god in a human vessel. On falling in, then out of love.

It turned out that true love was real. Hodr felt lucky that unlike humans, whose single-use lives might be too short to find one or too long it was hard to tell it apart of the false ones, he was really deep in it a couple of times. All of the romances he got the chance to co-create, some faded into memories, some into scars, some into a holy mess. But Hodr had learned that just like everything else on this universe, true love wouldn’t last forever. At this point of his seemingly endless quest of knowledge and self-improvement, Hodr was pretty sure that he had raised an army of those who loved him, and an equal-size one of those who hated his guts.

Winter wasn’t meant to be adored by everyone, was it?

But now, let’s get back to a couple months ago, when Hodr was chilling with a long-term fellow god at a corner of a bustling bar. Both were in their newest human vessels, drinking cold beer and talking about what on earth they should try next for this human lifetime. At some points in their unplanned plans discussion, his friend raised a random question.    

“Have you tried out Mount Phoenix?”

“What is a mount phoenix?”

“No, it’s the Mount Phoenix. A magical island of gods and their half-human kids. Some of your kids are there as well, I think. Go figure it out!”

So, in the next morning, Hodr woke up sober, packed his bags and himself, and cruised to the Mount Phoenix to figure it out, first and foremost for the thrill of new adventures. Soon, the universe once again showed him that there were still so many things in its pockets that he hadn’t even heard about just yet. Hodr was intrigued, so he chose to stick around the island probably a little longer to seriously figure things out.

He’s also been mastering the art of making suits, by the way.

POWERS:

Winter Manipulation: Able to induce the intensity of winter and that of other elements in its realm, including cold, death, and solitude to some extent.

Water Manipulation: Able to create, shape, manipulate water in solid, liquid, and gas states, also change water from one state to others. Able to create ice objects, including weaponry.

Cold Manipulation: Able to create, shape, and manipulate cold, making everything (including living things) colder with direct or close-ranged contact, ranging from mild coolness to freezing point.

Cold Immunity: Be immune and completely invulnerable to both cold’s direct and indirect effects.  

Cold Empowerment: Will be quickly energized or become physically stronger, faster, more durable once in contact with cold.

STRENGTHS:

Hodr is an epitome of the phrase ‘aging like a fine wine.’

He’s very much open-minded, quick-witted, and is a diligent learner. Learn best by trial and error.

If one can withstand the cold, they would get a compassionate, reliable, and loyal companion in him.

He’s pretty much dexterous, and likes to make things with his hands and not his power.

He’s got good taste in fashion. Surprise, surprise!

WEAKNESSES:

He’s cursed with bad eyesight, no matter how good the condition of his vessel’s eyes is. Can’t live without medical glasses or contact lenses.

High heat is Hodr’s nemesis. He’ll rarely enjoy hot food or drinks, and will become noticeably lethargic during summers.

He’s quite slow to open up to new faces, may let his doubts misguide his mind, and can be frustratingly indecisive at times.

He’s still somewhat gullible to those he loves or considers to be trusted friends.

[tslasvegas]

Finale Episode: “This has been AMAZING.” - Pat

Drama? Caused. Immunity? Mine. (hopefully) Maybe I should've just voted Liv to cause a super messy re-vote but this was an okay outcome I suppose. Now I just need to win immunity OR convince Keegan and Pat to vote with me for one more round. :) Balls to the fucking wall. I'm here to win. 

So final 6 tribal council was a bit of a shitstorm. But I’m still here so it turned out not too bad and Kailyn, the one person I’ve basically never talked to got the boot. Pat played an idol I didn’t know he had, Jaiden played a legacy advantage on himself and Livingston played an idol on me. Bless his heart. Liv is the best. If I can’t win he absolutely deserves to. And now we have a stupid endurance type challenge that requires 6 hours of dedication and I don’t want to do it, because I feel like I could make better use of my day tomorrow but whatever. We’ll see what happens. I would ideally love to have Jeff gone next, and then Jaiden. If it’s a final 2, I’m going with Liv, whether or not he beats me I don’t care. There’s a case to be made for taking Pat out instead of Jaiden. But we shall see how this challenge goes.

....five seconds later

I hate this challenge

....five seconds later

Why'd this challenge have to be 6 hours? I get that we're at final 5 but man this is awful. Sorry Dan, Sorry Jake but I hate this challenge. 

Okay so I don't really remember when the last time I gave a confessional was. So we're just gonna cover the Xavier tribal and hope I didn't already do that lol. This tribal was extremely good for my game, and along with likely the John/Super Idol tribal, will be the time I use as my defining moment in the game, as it shows that I wasn't entirely reliant on Jaiden to get me places, because that seems like the most likely argument against me winning. I could very well see people coming in with a preconceived notion that I was in some way carried by Jaiden, or the fact that I'm alive is because of him. This tribal, where Jaiden thought he could take me out since he knew what the vote count would be with my vote steal, is evidence of that. Luckily for me, I had one more card up my sleeve with the extra vote. And this is why no matter how much you may trust someone, always have an ace in the hole. But on top of that, blowing nearly every advantage in the game, while also being vulnerable at that tribal, is about the best that things could've gone for me. It shows that despite voting out Joey, I still had the trust of Keegan and Liv, and it shows that I had plenty of my own agency in the game. With the next challenge being a logic puzzle, I was not feeling confident going into it. I'm alright at them, not notably great, but when I was practicing, the average times there were something like ~2-3 minutes, which I was just not able to match the pace of. But I did the challenge, and managed to pull off a clean 4 minute time, plenty to spare to win the challenge which I was happy about. This also gave me some breathing room after being to close to going home for comfort. Going into the next tribal, I do know that I have to be wary of Jaiden. The way he talks about him having received legacy from Xavier, saying that Xavier went home with an idol, a lot of his actions there were very sus and I know that I can't take everything at face value. Because of this, I decided to take advantage of being immune, and tried to get Liv on board for a potential F3 of Pat/Him/Me. The caveat would be that Keegan goes home here, just because he has strong potential of winning challenges, which is very true. Liv seemed skeptical, and said he'd sleep on it, which really should've been my first inclination that something is wrong. But I asked him again the next day, and he said "he was open to it". That should've been strike 2, and I'll admit, I was being a little over confident. At that point, Jaiden starts talking to me and is really paranoid about things going wrong, acting like he's going to get voted out. But he insists he has legacy, so everything is fine. I'm just letting him be paranoid, but I also explain that if he's not going to be straightforward with me about what he's thinking for tribal, I'm not particularly interested in exploring possibilities that can hardly be considered possibilities. Come tribal, and what do you know, Jaiden was right. 2 idols and a legacy get played, and Kailyn goes home. Which even if a roundabout way, is what I intended on happening if Keegan had had an idol, so I was not upset about the outcome at all. This also works to my advantage, because it gives Jaiden an "I told you so" moment, and should make him be more confident in going to FTC with me, should I lose these immunities. I just need to get to FTC and I can tell a great story on why I should win. Making it there is the hardest part though

Really gonna go 6 hours posting every 5 minutes. I hate this.

General thoughts on how I think end game should play out from my perspective: My main reasoning for why I think I’ll win though, is just who my alternatives are. Liv won’t win the game. Too small of a player, too defensive of moves. Could be considered an underdog, but in general not pulling much. Keegan, probably too quiet, and like Liv, too defensive. The ideal “contrarian” candidate though, due to general likability and not really doing anything wrong. Pat, should in theory be a budget version of me. From what Jaiden says, he’s less social than me, although admittedly, my social game has fallen off hard throughout the end. It’s difficult to keep up so much though when I don’t have a life to speak of for myself. Jaiden, the clear other option, at least from my perspective. Had had many failed moves, not always a clear direction on what he’s doing or where he’s going, could be seen as second fiddle to me. I think that FTC would mostly come down to, in a me vs Jaiden scenario, which of us people see as the second to each other. People could take my survival as due to Jaiden keeping me safe, but Jaiden calling the shots. People could take me as being the one really in the middle, controlling moreso how each vote turned out. Personally I think the thinking in my favor is more likely/reasonable, but Jaiden has the personality that people will want to support as well. If jury is more game oriented, I probably win. If they aren’t, Jaiden may come out on top. 

I feel like this is my Tumblr Survivor breakthrough. I finally made it to the final four. The finale episode. I'm not on the jury quite yet. The end is so close I can literally taste it. But my work isn't done just yet. With Jeff gone, I oddly feel a lot of weight lifted off my shoulders and I can finally breathe again. It wasn't the primary or even secondary plan I had going into this, but if I want a chance to win this game, I have to take care of him first. It also seemed as though there was an opportunity for me to create a little chaos in the event that this game becomes a final two instead of a F3. People are going to want to cut me at the first chance they get I think, but now that it's a F2 they can hold it off one more vote, no? I tried to plant a seed into Pat's head that Livingston and Keegan are a tight duo and while we could totally get rid of Keegan tonight, we could do Livingston instead and have better odds at the F4 because Keegan/Jeff are going to be laser-focused on going after each other. But then Pat went and told Jeff everything in the chat we have together so I flipped it around and made Pat responsible for going after Livingston. So now I go back to Keegan and tell him that Pat was doing whatever it took to keep Jeff safe and that I was the person keeping Pat on focus to get rid of Jeff. It became way more logical after Pat started throwing Liv's name out there for real for me to get rid of Jeff, because either Pat votes Liv and looks like a fucking shady bitch in the F4, OR Pat votes Jeff with me and we share the blame for getting rid of Jeff equally. Keegan owes me - I just saved him from getting voted out. I could've easily voted out Keegan tonight! I could've left two guaranteed votes in his direction but I didn't. Pat owes me - I convinced him the necessary moves and walked him through two big plans heading into tribal, but I kept him up to date on what he wants. At the end of it, he still begged me to tell him what we needed to do - he flipped back to Liv and then told me, then begged me to tell him what he should do, and I told him to do Jeff. He voted correctly because of me. Livingston owes me - As far as he needs to know, Pat and Jeff were going to vote his ass out of here with me had I not turned Pat's vote back and kept Keegan on close watch. Livingston and I have a decent relationship, but I've now saved him more times than I've voted against him (again, as far as he knows) and that's gotta count for something. This season wasn't about making best friends. It was about winning Tumblr Survivor, so yes, I've backstabbed along the way and voted people out mercilessly. But if I make it to the final two, I kept it real with the friends I made along the way but also put my game first. I feel like I can justify that because I made it this far without anybody ever writing my name down and everything I've done, whether its voting out Kailyn or using the powers of suggestion to drive a deeper wedge between Pat and everyone else, has had a bigger purpose than just surviving one more day. It has felt like a huge house of cards up until this point. I didn't play the simplistic "speaks for itself" game that I wanted in the beginning. Instead, I am going to have to justify every single move if I even make it to the final two. It's crazy. I expected to go home tonight had I not won immunity, and now I'm expecting to go home every night until I reach the finish, but like I said there's no more stress now. I'm fully galvanized here. I've been through the worst of the worst, now all I have to do is close my eyes, exhale, and let go. If I can pull off just two more challenges, I think I'm going to be the winner. You know, it's funny, I didn't come into this experience wanting to play a perfect game. It's so.. unrealistic especially with the type of game that I play, but it might happen? I'm not entirely sure. It would be such a good gift to me on my birthday if I do it because its looking like the FTC will happen on my birthday so umm.. Tumblr Survivor gods I know I've been praying to you a lot this season, but truly, please let that happen LOL

So Jaiden won immunity which is fine. Because Jeff didn’t win and that is all that matters at this point. So after some discussion and some Jaiden freaking the absolute fuck out, we ended up unanimously voting out Jeff. And for some odd reason, Jeff decided to switch a vote from me to Livingston. So I currently only have one vote against me and it was blocked by an idol. Yahoo!! I am in a very precarious situation at this point. Liv and I have a final 2 deal. Jaiden and I have a final 2 deal. Liv and I also agreed to vote out Jaiden in 4th place once Jeff was out. So.... I’m actually hoping that Jaiden wins this next immunity challenge so that can’t happen. And at that point we just vote out Pat and everything is good. That’s the absolute best case scenario at this point because it guarantees I make the final 2 regardless of who actually wins the final challenge. And believe me, if that’s the case I’m throwing the challenge LOL Liv will take me. Jaiden will take me. Why should I win? So yeah, fingers crossed that Jaiden wins this Cards Against Humanity game so we can have the best case scenario happen in this game. 

JEFF IS VOTED OUT AT F5

If I don't go home tonight I will be completely shocked

JAIDEN IS VOTED OUT AT F4

Final 3! One more challenge to go! And I win a fire making challenge. Suck on that! Also don’t come to my DMs whining that I voted for you when you voted for me too. And we’re just playing your game? Honey, you wouldn’t have had a game without us there. There’s this thing called threat level management. Learn it some time. Glad us three undeserving Palazzo members are the final 3. Time to win this final immunity challenge.

Y'all really thought my extra ass wasn't going to write one last confessional? Yeah right! This is probably the last one I'll ever write in a main season so let's make it good. First things first, some acknowledgements. I want to scream this from a mountain top, I really am just so thankful for the opportunity to play and Jake and Dan have my whole heart forever for giving it to me. I can't thank them enough and I really think this will be a positive experience that I hold in my heart forever. So yeah!! If you're reading this (but who is, really?) just know that Dan and Jake are KINGS!!! I also want to acknowledge how lucky I am to have gotten to where I was in this game, because luck did have a lot to do with all of this. I know that my game might not have been as good as it could've been in particular moments and maybe I boxed myself in at the end in a couple different ways, but luck always found a way to get me out of some sticky spots and I am humble enough to admit it. After I got voted out, I wasn't particularly upset with myself because I knew that if I didn't win the immunity, I'd be going out in this spot. I'm surprised that I had to make fire, but I wish that I had spent some time learning how to do slide puzzles really quick because honestly my performance in it was pathetic. Either way, not mad about it, that's just how the cookie crumbled and I probably would've lost to Livingston, too. The relief to all of this is that I got to join the jury full of people that I genuinely wanted to talk to again because I didn't have anybody left in the game that I particularly found great interest communicating with anymore. Keegan treating me like I didn't just spend my valuable time actually being his only friend was probably the lowest moment of the entire game for me. I wasn't even mad that I was losing as much as I was mad that he lied to my face when I confronted him with the truth, then called me a bitch because I told him I would have kept my word to him had he not tried to take me out. For me, that was fucking awful. The petty side of me wants to make final tribal particularly awful for Keegan, but the new and improved side of me wants to just tell him off and let him lose like about a thousand other Tumblr Survivor flops have over the past several years. When I came into this game, I didn't fully expect myself to make it as far as I did and have really had this gigantic transformation like I did. At the same time though, I'm not surprised that I did because I was living the transformation for like two years since I last showed my face in this community. The Jaiden seen in Las Vegas is the Jaiden that I'm finally in love with. It's the player that I've never been stable enough to be for almost five years now, and I am so proud to say that now. Without a doubt, I dominated this season. I know that. So many outcomes went the way that I had set them up, from getting rid of Stephanie to Joey handing me the legacy advantage. Even when they didn't go my way, I didn't become the next big target even though I said I was going home literally every single tribal since the beginning. There's a lot more gamewise that I could say, but I know Dan and Jake are aware of that and they're probably the only people even reading this now. So I guess that part will just stay between me and them. When I made my entrance to the jury, I was a little surprised to see such an overwhelmingly positive response from people like Kailyn, Joey, John, Xavier, and Andrew. It made me feel so validated as a player, a feeling that I have literally never had before in my whole entire time playing these games. It's so great how much that boosted my real-life confidence. After being part of the org community for like seven years by now, I've been able to separate the real world with the online world pretty well, but while devastating losses in the past haven't truly rocked my real world much, this positive reception will have a lasting impact on me for a really long time. I can't say how much it all means to me, because it's so profound and I can't explain it all in words. It just makes me feel optimistic despite being a chronic pessimist. Phew! Although I'm not the winner that I should've been, I am truly proud of myself. I feel like I've finally rolled that fucking stone ball up the hill and thrown it down the mountain on the other side, letting it tumble and kill my enemies on its way down. I think I came into this thinking that I was Sisyphus, but by now I've realized that I'm actually Kratos, the divine personification of strength and power. So maybe my story of never feeling complete from these silly games was never the problem I was looking to solve. My journey was about finding the strength and power I never knew that I had before. The confidence of being able to be at my lowest in games and real life, and somehow finding my way out of the darkness of both realms in tandem. I am basically living in the golden hour of my 23rd year of life, and this game just happened to take part in the midst of that. Good and bad, I am so thankful to have had these experiences shape what this period meant to me. I am living in a world now where the truth is that I am worthy. Not only because of this silly game, but like I said, the confidence gained here affirms that truth. I will never forget it. I'm not at all a religious person, but there's one verse in the Bible that I've always felt drawn to, and more so right now than ever before. John 8:32 - "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." And now, with this last confessional to wrap my journey up, I am free. 

LIVINGSTON IS VOTED OUT AT F3. 

This is it. This is the end. I’ve done everything I can do and now it’s up to the jury to decide. This game was a blast, a true gamble actually playing. I’m proud of what I’ve done and how far I made it. I’m no longer a 5 time flop! 

I cannot believe this season had the end game that it did. Winning final immunity was a check off my bucket list, but getting there how I did was very well done in my opinion. I really hope that’s it’s respected by the jury. It’s nerve racking when the other person winning is valid. I hope o shows my impact on the end part of the game being influential enough to get votes. I may have been messy by being incorrect but I think I did well over all. I just want Jeff to know that that his vote off was really the hardest of the season. I hope lulu really was a benefit to me winning by making a final appearance. Queen lulu. Honestly no matter what happens I am so proud of myself. I know I’m getting at least one vote so that’s means good things, if I win this game I will be ecstatic because it’s been five years since I entered this whole community through tumblr survivor. I hope my game is respected and that I am to be rewarded. Thanks everyone for an amazing game this has been AMAZING 

[meta-squash]

I just saw a post about someone headcanoning that Mickey didn’t have internalized homophobia/wasn’t ashamed about his gayness and like I respect that headcanon and I definitely think that’s an interpretation that people are allowed to have, for sure. But it just made me think about my own interpretation I’ve had and now I wanna write it down because I haven’t properly like sat and thought about it before but one thing popped in my head so.

My immediate reaction to reading the post, aside from “Hm, not the way I see it, but I get where it’s coming from,” is that a big, annoying, whacked out thing about the human brain and shame/self-hatred is that you will do something while hating yourself for it at exactly the same time.

What I mean is, in the early days it would be quite easy for Mickey to be fucking Ian, enjoying the physical pleasure of it, while simultaneously totally hating himself for it. People do that with other things, like food or spending money or whatever.

My thoughts about Mickey and self-hatred/internalized homophobia have always been that up until he had to go search for Ian in S4, it was definitely something he was dealing with. I think, at first, it was simply a knee-jerk reaction for him to say “I’m not gay, this is just a good fuck and it’s easy”. He probably didn’t try to logic his way around anything. He probably didn’t try to convince himself that there was a difference between why he liked fucking Ian vs Angie or y’know whatever. We all know Terry was a monster, and probably some of Mickey’s brothers (beside Iggy) were like mini Terrys. I’m gonna guess he’d had homophobia drilled into him pretty early on. He probably did what I said above: fucked Ian while hating himself for it simultaneously, then tried his best to shove it all away. He’s a dick all the time because he’s terrified of being found out and because he doesn’t really like himself in the first place.

I don’t think his internalized homophobia was any better when Kash shot him; I think he was forward about it because he assumed he had the upper hand and definitely didn’t expect to get shot. At this point, he and Ian are at least kind of like friends, so there’s more of a fwb thing going on and he can excuse it all on that level.

I don’t think he really relaxes about it until after his second stint in juvie. 95% of his need to kill Frank is probably fear that someone in the neighborhood is going to find out, whether it’s his father or someone else, and he’s gonna go down for it. The other 5% is that fear of being seen as gay not because of other people hurting him but because he can’t quite admit it to himself. That’s where the “warm mouth” comment comes from. I think if he had admitted to himself he was gay, he’d have said something just as harsh at that moment, considering how bad he’s freaking out, but I do think it’s interesting that he reduces Ian to something fairly universal, a mouth. Again it’s an attempt to convince, like a “I could get whatever I want, girls too, this is just convenient and easy.” He will not acknowledge the fact that he’s the one getting fucked. Especially after Frank’s just found them in a compromising position.

But I do think he chills out. On coming back, he literally tells Ian he missed him (or his dick, I guess). They fuck in broad daylight, where anyone who knew to go under there could find them. At this point I think he’s managed to admit to himself that he likes fucking Ian (liking what I like don’t make me a bitch), he’s managed to admit to himself that he wants to spend his time around Ian. I think at this point he still doesn’t quite see himself as gay or at least can’t admit it to himself, because he thinks of gay people as much more flamboyant. That’s why he’s flip about using slurs about other people: he sees himself as different from them. But, again, I think he’s slowly warming up and growing out of that.

And then 3x06 happens, and I think it throws him backward in one way and forward in another. I think, after Ian leaves, or maybe even before, probably around the kiss (because it’s clearly something he mulled over after Ian’s comment), he’s realized that he’s gay. That he can’t change, will never change. That’s the forward part: that he’s admitted it to himself. I think, though, at that point, with Ian leaving and Svetlana pregnant, he does hate himself for it. That’s the backward part. There’s a massive difference between Ian and Mickey (obviously) in that Ian has a supportive family: if a Gallagher had walked in on them fucking, there would probably be some annoyed shrieking, but not violence. If Ian ever told his siblings what happened that day (clearly he didn’t), they would have rallied around him if not Mickey to support them. But once Ian leaves, Mickey has literally no one to back him up. Mandy, to some extent, but they’ve never been that close and Mandy’s got her own issues with a) Gallaghers and b) Terry so that’s not great. I think he knows he’s gay but he hates that he can’t change and he also probably hates that he knows he can’t fight back when it comes to Terry.

I think that a huge factor in Mickey’s internalized homophobia, his self-hatred, his irritability and aggression and anxiety, is the fact that Terry is around. We see this fairly well in the show, that Mickey genuinely is a lot more relaxed, more talkative, kinder, etc when Terry isn’t around. So once Terry gets sent back to the can for violating his probation, it seems like Mickey has a lot more space to think about his feelings and stuff.

By the time he goes to find Ian in S4, I think he’s kind of reached a point where the self-hatred has turned to exhaustion and the internalized homophobia has kind of fallen away. He still is absolutely in no place to confront his issues re: Svetlana and 3x06 judging by like every interaction they have with each other, but I think he’s been worried about Ian this entire time and once he knows Ian’s back there’s not a lot that’s gonna prevent that pull between them.

Again, I think a lot of his self-hatred isn’t just homophobia. There’s a lot, psychologically, that goes on growing up in an abusive household like that and in a financial situation like that where literally nothing is guaranteed, not even basic necessities.

But I think his time staying with the Gallaghers helps monumentally. Because he gets to see the way Ian’s family doesn’t even bat an eye at them sleeping in a bed together, that Carl is asking about their relationship in a purely innocent, curious way rather than a “can I fuck this guy up” way. Fiona interacts with him basically like he’s almost part of the family. The Gallaghers integrate him into their fold fairly easily. It’s very different from the “every man for himself, watch your mouth and watch your back” vibe of the Milkovich household.

I think the worry about Ian plus their mutual experiences and the fact that Ian is the only person he’s comfortable being out to (at the point of season 3 ending) is a huge factor. By the end of S3, we also know that Mandy knows. I think Mandy’s reaction helps some: while she doesn’t really have Mickey’s back, he knows she’s not going to snitch and also now knows she doesn’t care. I think all those factors and the time apart while Ian’s gone means that when Ian does come back, Mickey is fully ready to throw everything he’s got into this.

The other thing I think that helps is the extreme loyalty. Mickey and Mandy are both this way, and we don’t know anything really about the other Milkoviches, so we have no idea about them, but Mickey and Mandy both definitely completely dedicate themselves to people they love. I think to some extent they’ve even done that each other, though there is a little distance there just due to like a) being siblings and b) having to grow up in the Milkovich house like at all. But by the end of season 4, Mickey has definitely like fully dedicated himself to Ian. He wouldn’t have come out in the Alibi like that if he wasn’t 100% in it. He probably would have told Ian to fuck off and stormed out if he was anything less than totally dedicated to Ian. Somewhere between Ian leaving and the fight at the Alibi, Mickey decided that Ian was what he wanted.

Which is how we get to the Alibi. And, consequently, a direct line from the end of season 4 into Mickey’s growth in season 5. We don’t get to see Ian’s depressive episode except for the beginning of it in the last episode, but we know from throwaway lines at the beginning of season 5 that it lasted quite a while, and that he presumably stayed with Mickey the whole time. So I bet caring for and worrying about Ian during that time solidified for Mickey his dedication, and probably made him realize (if he hadn’t already at the Alibi) that he was straight up in love with Ian. Which, again, then makes the rest of S5 storyline track easily.

Basically, this is a long-winded (because when am I not) way of saying that in my interpretation, I do think that season 1&2 and even early 3 Mickey had internalized homophobia and/or self hatred. It would be somewhat difficult for him to not, in the environment he grew up. I think it’s also probably mixed up in other not-gay-related self-hatred he has as well. But I think eventually he admits to himself that he’s gay and kinda stops hating himself for it, and it turns into a fear of being caught and hurt/killed (S4), a fear of outside homophobia, rather than a hatred of himself, and then once he confronts that fear (Alibi fight), he’s able to really grow as a person and dedicate himself to Ian and really realize the full extent of his love for Ian, as we see in S5.

[starsailorstories]

So! Given, uh, everything, any chance you could talk about how various Astraea cultures deal with sicknesses and quarantine? Especially since some (especially Bell Town) are extremely or entirely genetically identical, and so more at risk?

Also, how would the cast members react to self isolation and social distancing?

FIRST OFF, sorry this took 10 years to answer, I was super busy and there’s kind of A Lot Of Spec Bio to discuss here

Also, this question made me feel very Seen lol…why yes i DO use worldbuilding as a coping mechanism for the stress of watching the wet tissue paper my country calls a social safety net dissolve

Most sickness that astraeas deal with day to day isn’t actually contagious*, but more a result of individual reaction to the environment (in terms of public health response, think seasonal allergies, although physiologically speaking it’s nothing like that). Communicable, infectious disease tends to be a less frequent problem but purely for that reason is more feared, especially as the most common source for novel diseases is interplanetary shipping (like, astraeas on one planet who have immunity to something unknowingly ship contaminated goods to another planet where people don’t). All that is nowhere near as devastating as it could be in a human context–for one thing astraeas’ bodies are hella dry compared to ours, so if a microbe isn’t airborne it’s almost a non-issue (on the other hand, infection is almost a guarantee if you have an open wound)–but most planets, stations and orbiters have a list of OTHER planets, stations and orbiters categorized by how long it’s been since first contact and how long shipments need to be in quarantine based on that, and that kind of thing runs the same gamut from “rigorously evidence-based” to “completely political and petty” that it does on earth.

Speaking of which, the issue of genetic similarity as a disease risk is as politicized as you’d expect in a society where people said “oh, with our genetic technology we can just design the working class to be however we want.” The Hyperians, being, you know, A Rigidly Hierarchal Interstellar Empire In A Space Opera as they are, tend to present the genetic homogeneity as sort of a good thing, what makes Us Us and Them Them, and the royal family themselves subscribe to the very historically royal (and also very eugenicist) idea that genetic “purity”–which for astraeas mostly just means having children in a very chemically controlled environment–helps keep em’ royal or something. Spoiler alert: it doesn’t it just makes hemophilia, and the more conservative Basileans minimize the environmental variance that keeps them from wiping each other out like some kind of aggressively graceful banana monocrop, the easier it is for epidemics to escalate in general because whole colonies become vectors together.

You won’t read about it in your galactic history book til after the revolution, but the dangers of genetic homogeneity were actually observed by lux units, who noticed that “variant” and “off-order” clones were a bit more likely to survive outbreaks of disease. Supervisors in clone factories have tried HARD to excise the superstition that variant units who remain un-decommissioned into adulthood are good luck to have on your cabin crew or manufacturing-plant shift, but it’s never completely gone away, and once Bell Town goes topside their medics and scientists immediately get to work testing, peer reviewing and proving the mechanics of diversity as a factor of public health because it’s a helpful argument for legitimizing their seizure of the means of their own reproduction and fighting the prejudice against “defective” lux that don’t fit the mold.

To really get into your question, Bell Town at least has the advantage of being small and having a busybody mom friend for a de facto head medic, so I don’t think they’ve ever had a quarantine situation get much bigger than four or five people just because Bolt is very up on how everyone’s doing and very very persuasive–the medics know that that’s just a matter of luck though, and I’m sure a factor in the push to go topside is the potential for tragedy involved in having a settlement of mostly/nearly genetically identical people in somewhat adverse and scarce conditions. That’s not to say there’s no plan–the shortages in Bell Town tend to be of immediately consumable raw materials, like air and fuel and very basic multi-use medicines, whereas raw materials for manufacturing specialized equipment are a lot easier to get because organized factories in DT’s network can have them smuggled out. And a majority of the town’s population, at least by vol. 2, are former manufacturing-plant labor with working radio receivers in their heads, so it’s fairly feasible to expect even a small portion of them, with an emergency push, to manufacture A Lot of vaccines, or intensive care equipment, or whatever was needed practically overnight with the direct guidance of the medics to ensure as much safety in the process as possible (they do just that with medical and defense supplies in vol. 2 for various spoilery things).

Up top, the aula’s responses to any and all large-scale social crises tend to be erratic but sweeping. There are some advantages–in terms of expertise, there are certainly things that well-paid doctors with fully equipped research hospitals can accomplish that a dedicated crack team of self-educated medics can’t, including proactive study of new strains of disease. There’s also feudal insanity–technically individual hospitals/institutions aren’t supposed to issue info without the aula’s permission, though legally local nobles can give it on the Hyperians’ behalf if they’re willing to risk Drama. The internal weirdness of the court both logistical and interpersonal (which I need to make a post about) can sometimes mean, in any emergency, that different parts of the empire receive conflicting information, or an edict followed after a day’s delay in the satellite network by a retraction. Public trust (among citizens of relative status at least) that the Hyperians know what they’re doing tends to decline exponentially as you move out from the inner Rings for this exact reason.

Derafior City on Caesura B dealt with a wave of multiple epidemics a couple hundred turns before the official rise of the empire that still affect how the city is laid out–leaders at the time issued quarantine orders in cooperation with individual colony matriarchs, and as those orders became enforced in physical “zones” neighborhood identities, reputations, and rivalries became increasingly defined (Crater culture being what it is, quarantine boundaries were often pretty literal battle lines as the situation became desperate). A lot of historians trace the factionalism of the Crater to this era, although outside imperialism was also a major instigator of both factional conflicts and disease exposure. Keep in mind too that while outsiders like to portray Derafior as violently fractured and there’s a grain of truth to that, there are just as many deep loyalties between neighborhood/colony factions as there are rivalries and as we see in vol. 3, Caesurans are certainly not allergic to closing ranks when shit really hits the fan. 

I don’t have specific canon examples from other ante-dome cultures but another thing of possible interest that I’d like to talk about is that in places touched by Basilean culture, a lot of what we consider “social distancing” is just normal because cleanliness is highly ritualized and valued. Although platonic adult friendships tend to be very cuddly by American and British standards, at the same time, hand touches between strangers outside specific social rituals are seen as quite inappropriate, so things are more thoroughly designed to prevent them–for example, most trading of goods is done purely on paper at the point of sale and nothing actually passes from hand to hand, you go get it out of the crate or pick it out of the field yourself (which is also a practicality of the relative non-ubiquity of flexible currency–and actually, one of the complaints about the use of currency among more traditional astraeas is that it spreads germs). Basically everyone who can afford it wears gloves in public, which are changed and washed every time a person re-enters her home (disposable gloves are mostly limited to medical and laboratory settings, although it’s not unheard of to use them in a pinch if you don’t have a place to launder gloves at home. Side note, if you’re translating directly Altamaian actually refers to manual labor that makes it impractical to wear gloves as “barehanded” labor and the summary conceptualization of such as unhygienic represents a MAJOR vein of classism among Basilean citizens). The reason for the glove thing is that for a species with an exoskeleton regular hand washing can be kind of involved (You know how sometimes it takes a lot of scrubbing to get the dirt out from under your fingernails? Now imagine you have fingernails all over your hands). 

Oh and to answer your second question: out of the main cast the one you’d think would suffer most with self-isolation is Bolt, but being a healthcare worker she’d still see people. Rugsy would complain the loudest but also paradoxically be secretly kind of relieved to not have to worry about People for a while. DT experiences virtually no change from her normal lifestyle lmao

*There’s two kinds of disease that can affect astraeas–what they call “miasmic”, and infectious. Miasmic disease (which as you might guess I named after the precursor to modern germ theory–it’s kind of true in this instance!) is basically when an individual’s body and light chemistry can’t maintain its normal balance in certain atmosphere conditions. A big reason for the kickoff of the artificial atmosphere industry after the settling of Altamai is that the cloud cover tends to trap a lot of carbon dioxide, and for i.e. Basillans and Sitherians (who have come to be based on G-type stars, like the sun, and K-type stars, slightly smaller and cooler than the sun) there’s just not enough hydrogen atoms in there to run their bodies optimally. This mostly affects very young children, the elderly, and those whose cores were formed in suboptimal conditions (comparable to a human who has a chronic health condition because of a birth defect) and if it can’t be remedied by a move to more hydrogen/helium rich air, it’s treated by sucking the pure hydrogen out of a water electrolysis device through a hose on the daily, which side note, is also a reliable hangover remedy for them.

[artnerd1123]

DTRH!AU Masterpost

Moving into a new post since I’ve got stuff actually organized!!! It’ll likely get an update from time to time. Apologies to those whom the read more breaks for ‘^^

Everything to do with this au will be tagged #dtrh!au or #down the rabbit hole au Individual characters are tagged with #dtrh![name] 

Here’s an AU PMV for starters! 

Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?

Putting this up here so it doesn’t get super buried- Here’s the fic(s) set in this AU! All Moving Pictures End 

The AU crash course: The premise behind the au is that everything takes place in a pocket dimension controlled by a black magic script. Joey Drew is the one who’s writing/editing this script, and his rewrites affect the world and the characters within it. His constant reshaping eventually twists the world from a sitcom genre to a horror film- hence the horror esque setting, creatures, and plot. The characters didn’t escape the rewrites’ effects either. They’re warped into corrupted versions of themselves. However, these characters end up becoming sentient after awhile. The first one of these to become entirely sentient is Henry. He’s currently the only one who’s all the way out of alignment. A toon gone rogue, if you will. He still goes along with Joey’s “plot,” but it’s more so he can try to reach the other characters than to keep Joey happy or unaware of his actions. His goal is to basically “wake up” the other characters, so they can all stop living in a hellish nightmare studio and actually try and make something nice out of their home. He’s extremely dedicated to his goal. 

Character time!!! toon trio refs / corrupted refs  butcher gang refs / corrupted refs  toon henry ref  toon sammy ref / corrupted sammy ref  toon susie ref / corrupted susie ref  toon allison and tom refs / corrupted allison and tom refs  joey ref / toon joey ref  toon norman ref / corrupted ref  toon bertrum ref / corrupted ref  toon and corrupted grant refs  toon jack ref / corrupted jack ref  toon wally ref / corrupted wally ref  toon and corrupted lacie refs  toon and corrupted shawn refs 

Character relationships/orientations 

Concept art, anyone? toon trio concept work (w/ bonus corrupted bendy n alice) corrupted boris/alice concept work (ft bonus hen) butcher gang concept work (w/ corrupted forms) henry concept work sammy concept work (and more henry) susie concept work joey concept work corrupted norman concept work toon norman concept work  throwing around lost ones ideas 

Misc stuff Henry, but Goop™  Susie and Studio Tea™  Hey Henry, how do u feel about Joey?  Yo hold up, hen and polk are a thing???  Henry’s glasses saga  Regular studio shenanigans 

FAQ: 

How many of the employees are gonna show up? Hopefully all the named ones in the game! Once they’ve got a design, they’re guaranteed to show up somewhere.

Are they really carbon copies of the employees? Is there nothing different about them and their irl counterparts? They started as carbon copies! Latching onto their old traits and their old selves does help them come to their senses. However, different character development happens in script than IRL, so they end up different. Henry, for example, takes up the last name “Ross” when he wakes up (instead of his IRL counterpart’s “Stien”) to differentiate himself :0

So is everyone corrupted on purpose? Yes and no. Yes, because Joey chose to rewrite the script so much that it mangled characters, but no, because he didn’t intend to mangle them in the first place. It just kinda happened.

What makes them corrupted? Corruption is what happens when you can’t hold onto the core of what your character is, and get dragged into what the new script is telling you. It’s when you lose sight of who you are among all the chaos. People who are drawn farther away from their actual selves end up more monstrous. Susie (aka “alice” angel) is a great example of this. Bendy is too! Far be it from his real nature to be a murderous monster.

So can the toons be uncorrupted? Yup! Henry’s our model citizen this time. He looks more like a toon than a normal person, sure, but there’s nothing monstrous about him. That’s because he’s latched onto what makes him Henry. He’s not letting the instability of the world around him shake him up. Otherwise he’d be a goopy mess of ink.

Why’d Joey write everyone so differently that they corrupted? He’s actually very out of touch with people once he starts rewriting the script. Since his memories are getting foggy, he fixates on details that he can remember, and exaggerates them as needed. In fact, he’s hidden tape recorders around the script studio as built in reminders of these character traits.

How’d Henry wake up? And how does he plan on waking everyone else up? Ok… this is a longer answer. It all comes together, i promise. Jus hang with me. Whenever henry dies, he gets sent back to a sort of “first draft” stage. In order to get back to the world he’s supposed to exist in, he has to get through all the layers of ink Joey put down to get to his current script. As one can imagine… there’s a lot. So much so that Henry has to essentially swim to the surface. As he passes through all this ink, he can hear whispers of previous scripts. The deeper he is, the closer these whispers are to what the world used to be like. Seeing as Henry is the protagonist, he ended up dying… a lot. Like, a lot a lot. Joey had a lot of snags in the script to work out. All these times sent into the draft-y ink soup made made Henry slowly realize what was going on. He wasn’t mindless anymore. He knew what was up. After realizing that the world wasn’t right, it didn’t take him long to push for the rest of his consciousness. He plans on using what whispers and memories he can gather to bring everyone else back. He’s not dying on purpose, mind you, but he gathers as much information as he can to help everyone else realize that they’re not who they’re supposed to be.

Wait, memories? Does Henry remember the past scripts now? Not quite? He’s got a good enough memory stockpile to keep himself centered, but he doesn’t always know what’s up ahead as he heads through another studio loop. If Joey happens to rewrite or change around the script, those patches of Henry’s memory blip out of existence. Or at least get hazy. Hen can often tell if Joey’s changed something by how many holes he has in his memories.

Can anyone in the pocket dimension get out? Henry’s the only one who can get out! Joey literally wrote him a back door to the script. It used to be so he could talk to Henry whenever the “story” was over, but nowadays it’s just to judge how fast plot goes via how quickly Hen gets back. All Henry can manage to do is walk around and stare silently. And he can’t even stay out very long. Ink’s unstable in the real world. Gotta go back in n start the horror show over if u wanna live :/

Can Joey go in? Nope! Since he’s not made of ink, he can’t go in. He can watch tho!!! He does so via writing POV shifts into the script, and watches through whatever character it shifted to. Who needs cameras when u got the eyes of black magic toons n inky monsters ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

Does Joey know Henry is sentient now? Nnnnot quite? He thinks the magic is being screwy with him. He can’t switch POV to Henry anymore, since the toon’s taken control of himself, and that’s real confusing since the writer doesn’t know what’s up. Plus, like mentioned above, Hen can’t exactly give Joey a sign once he gets out of the studio. Bummer :/

Is Joey gonna majorly rewrite the script any time soon? Nope. He’s to attached to his current plot to change the genre or anythin, so it’s gonna stay as is. With some changes here and there. One musn’t underestimate how many times u can change the order of scenes, or improve dialogue... 

AU Background:

((this is long as shiz, so get some popcorn slfkjs))

Y’all probably wanna know how this whole horror show started. I’ve got two words for ya: Joey Drew. Unsurprising! But he’s our starting point nonetheless. Joey Drew is the retired owner of Joey Drew Studios, a cartoon studio that ran itself into the ground after a decade or two of fantastical cartoons. Money problems aren’t kind to the entertainment industries. However, the studio was still his pride and joy! As are the friends who stuck by him or met him during the time it was open. He kept up with all of them through the years. They were like a little family. Unfortunately, time has a way of changing things. With his friends drifting away, living their own lives, getting up in years, or a combination of the three, Joey wasn’t doing too well. He was lonely. Feeling washed up. Missing the glory days, where he helped work on cartoon scripts instead of submitting horror and mystery shorts to local magazines. Not all that surprising that he turned to something else to cope. This thing being none other than occult magic. Because… of course it is. It’s a habit he’s had for years. Nothing like some demonic rituals to spice up the life of the creative mind behind kids’ cartoons! Especially fun when you’re a man with poor impulse control and a wild imagination. In any case, Joey summons the three main characters of his beloved cartoon series. Bendy, Alice, and Boris! (I refer to these three as the “toon trio.”) He was just as happy that he’d managed to bring them to life as he was to have them around the house. It was like having slightly unruly grandkids with toony superpowers. In other words, they were absolutely delightful!!! He took care of them and admired their antics. It was a great time. … until. Well. It wasn’t. Turns out things that don’t belong in this world get rejected eventually. After a few months, things started go go wayward. The toon trio had difficulties maintaining their forms, moving, engaging in tropes, and a ton of other things. They were miserable. Joey was understandably heartbroken to see this happen to his poor toons. So, like any good person, he tried to do the right thing: put them back on the paper they came from. It didn’t end up working exactly how he’d expected. Everything comes with a price when you mess with demonic ink. The magic not only created a stack of paper instead of a series of drawings, but latched onto an old fountain pen and Joey’s closet. If the closet thing seems odd, it is. But it’s a convenient place to hide ritual pentagrams! So, closet it is. Upon frantic examination of the papers, Joey discovered it was a script. A black magic infused script. Three names up top told him the toon trio were the only characters. A bit of experimentation led him to discover that the magic-infused pen was the only thing that could interact with the script properly. Further experimentation showed him that the script had made his closet into a pocket dimension. The contents? Whatever was in his new script. This is where the real fun begins. The new magic script practically floored Joey with awe. He had a world he could shape however he wished! He could run all those scripts he’d never gotten to put in production! He could watch his toons frolick! He could even use it to play with ideas he’d never gotten to explore. The possibilities were endless! 

((Of course, you might be wondering if Joey… y’know. Knew the toons were still alive. Because they were, they were just living in a pocket dimension now. In short? No. He didn’t. He carefully tested a few things with the script, just to make sure. All the toons did was what he wrote down. They moved like they were alive, but didn’t act that way. Plus, the dimension made them blank slates. They didn’t have any characterization in there to make them truly alive. So! For all intents and purposes? He saw them as you would any other character you write. A visual extension of his imagination. Ok mini rant over, back to the story--))

Playing with the toons was amazing. Joey hadn’t had fun like that in years! It was his little secret world, populated by his cherished toons. He could make believe whatever he wished. Eventually, though, loneliness started to catch back up to the old man. His friends… his family… life… it all went on. He just felt left behind. And what does Joey do when he doesn’t feel good? Not cope healthily, that’s for sure. Onwards to more occult magic! Only this time, he tries something… different. The toons were lonely. They deserved company. They deserved someone to take care of them. A familiar face. Maybe someone who helped Joey create them in the first place. Someone who’d just sent Mr. Drew an old letter and a card, since he hadn’t seen him in awhile… … someone like Henry. Using the magic pen, Joey traced over Henry’s note. Far from ruining the precious letter, it transferred “Henry” into the script. It’s not the real one! Basically a carbon copy, fresh from the time period that Hen first wrote the note in. Seeing as Henry’s letter came from around the time the cartoon studio was going strong, it’s an old version of him. But it was still Joey’s old friend. Just… toony. Toon Henry reacted just as his living friend would. If he wrote dialogue? He spoke it like Henry would. If he wrote some action? The toon put a classic Henry twist on it. Delighted, Joey returned to his script with renewed vigor. Toon Henry got to spend plenty of quality with the toon trio as the days went on. Thus began a trend of toonification. Missing one of his old friends? All Joey had to do was grab something with their old handwriting on it, and trace them into the script! There’s a carbon copy that acts just like the real deal! A fine compromise, right? … Right? Not exactly. It was fine at first. Joey made what could probably qualify as a sitcom-style story for the toony world to run on. His friends, at this point, all populated the studio. The premise was that the toons (now including the butcher gang!) had been summoned while he was still running the studio, and got up to hijinks with the rest of the employees. A hefty dose of actual studio drama- turned comedic, of course- kept the whole thing almost real. Joey even featured himself once or twice, but only in allusions, or a disembodied voice. He wasn’t about to let a carbon copy of himself have all the fun. It made him feel less lonely. More included. A fantasy world of never ending fun and heartwarming moments. How unfortunate it is that life doesn’t follow this pattern. Morality is a hard thing to come to terms with. So is sickness. Especially that of a friend. … it was just one rewrite at first. One alteration on a bad day. After all, using writing to cope is perfectly acceptable. One bad episode in the midst of sunshine doesn’t discount it all. One uncanny occurrence, though, doesn’t usually stay singular. It didn’t take long for the solitary rewrite to become two rewrites. Then three. Four. Six. Ten. Twenty. Fifty. More and more and more. Until the happy honey colored studio slipped into sinister sepia. This wasn’t the old script anymore. Not by a long shot.

The setting? A studio of shattered dreams.   Your protagonist? Henry. His goal? Survive long enough to escape.

~It’s quite th͝e̵͞͏ ͠M̕a͘sţe̛̕r͘p̕i̵͝e̡ḉe̡̨͜~̡̛

[sparda3g]

Attack on Titan Chapter 126 Review

The apocalypse is here; slowly expanding across the globe. All hell breaks loose, and everyone is either celebrating or crying. The past chapters have been depressing albeit stellar and very interesting in content delivery. You would think the trend would continue forward with the end of the world at sight. Surprisingly, this chapter was more light-hearted and entertaining with some laughs. This was a welcoming treat.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbow however. There are some dark tones in this chapter as well. From the start, it enters a flashback prior to the event where Hange confronts Marleyians. In her time spent protecting Levi, she was forced to kill some Survey Corps members. It could have been a simple protection scene, but the added tear running down on her face made it impacting. It’s sad that it has to go down this way. As crazy she can be, she still holds a soft spot for them.

Supposedly, Levi was set to transform into a Titan; however, because he’s an Ackerman, he survived. Same for the injuries. Does that mean the syringe won’t work on him? I always like their comradery. Hange treated his wounds, stitched him up, which needless to say looked pretty rough. His fingers are lost, which is more troubling due to the necessary use for the gear. How he’s going to fight would be interesting to see when that time comes.

Hange has been struggling for quite some time. Now, the future seem to be set for them that reminisce a similar path as Uprising Arc. In other words, they’re criminals or outlaws. The best thing they can do is count on Pixis, who is now deceased, and Armin, who has recently left to search for Falco. You can sense defeat from Hange, and that’s sad.

I like the small consistent detail on the sequence. Everything happened before the Rumbling began. The moment when they were in PATHS is when you learn their decision was made that led to the last chapter’s ending. Levi woke up and the first thing he thought was to find Zeke and kill him. That’s a hell of a dedication. I admit, I laughed at that.

He was able to survive the blast by placing the sword in front of the explosion. That explains the fingers. Although his vengeance on Zeke is his personal goal, he asked if running and hiding was all they will do. Pretty much, he listened everything Hange said. Despite the struggling, she wasn’t going to stay out and Levi knows that all too well. Again, I like their companionship. It’s more needed than ever.

Shifting back to present, in a strange turn of event, Levi and Magath’s interest happen to align. Both share a similar goal to kill Zeke, so in theory, it’s enough reason to form a pact. Magath is doubtful, seeing him in a bad state. Even Levi admits to be in a weak state that he can’t dodge a bullet, but he is willing to give him an ultimatum. That’s when you know desperate time calls for desperate measure.

Hange doesn’t know much of Founding Titan, but it’s easy to say it’s going to be incredibly tough. Therefore, the simple solution is to form a pact. With the world ending, they might as well work under one mission. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Otherwise, everyone is guaranteed to die, aside from Paradis Island.

It’s a bit eerie to see people sleeping during the apocalypse. It’s not to say no one should be sleeping, but how one can sleep when they know the world is ending. Some are seen to be awake. Jean looks so depressed at everything. Mikasa can’t fathom Eren to be the one to end everything. Annie wonders if her father is safe. Reiner is still down and out. It’s kind of depressing. Armin and Gabi are still searching for Connie and Falco, which is the next focus.

While I don’t like Connie’s action to use Falco to save his mother, I still respect him, especially when he now have second thoughts on the matter. His target is set, but the guilt is beginning to haunt him. He’s not a bad guy; just a poor soul that was sent to a hellish environment. I pity him. Asking Sasha makes it worse. Her death really stung him. The loss of a best friend can make a man feel lonely. Once they arrive at Ragako Village, the tension rises.

As they draw closer to the destination, Falco quickly realizes what’s happening. I’m surprised that he caught on quick, though I like the fact he’s not so careless. He’s well aware of the situation; from Gabi killing Sasha to Connie pretending to be a friend. It would have been easier if Falco remained clueless. Instead, it only added more pressure.

Connie’s mother is still in the same place for years. I can’t imagine the feeling of unable to move at all. The sensation plays off like a horror film, where a stranger (Connie) is about to harm the innocent (Falco). Hilariously, Connie puts a horrible poker face on and tells him to brush a Titan’s teeth. It’s so random, it’s hilarious. It’s like a spoof writer wrote this. Still, Connie’s intention is set and he won’t back off.

Armin and Gabi arrive in time to stop Connie. Falco doesn’t know he’s a Jaw Titan or what happened to Porco. Connie is completely desperate to save his only family; won’t listen to what Armin has to say. It saves the time from saying typical lines about what’s right and wrong. Even so, it’s pity for Connie to what essentially forced him to stoop this low. It’s not like he’s a real douche; just lost in the matter.

Armin has no word to say. Remembering the integrity of Erwin, he recovers and goes for a literal suicide approach. Before Connie finish climbing, Armin reaches on the ledge, contemplating the action he’s about to do. The scene rapidly grow unnerving. The fact he’s actually going to suicide to calm the situation is disheartening. I actually like this because it’s two guys who basically hit rock bottom confronting. In a twisted way, it’s like seeing who can hit the lowest first. Fortunately, Connie won’t let it happen; saving Armin from fulfilling his dream.

Gabi and Falco are back together, but it must be hard for him to learn what happened, especially his older brother. That even stings me. Connie has a second thought. It’s best to not make his mother into a weapon. Most importantly, it’s best for him to remain as a soldier his mother wanted him to be, not as a backstabber. Therefore, he wants to return and save people. It’s a good heartfelt moment. I don’t know if Armin’s mind is straight again, but Connie looks to be back to normal. Only time will tell.

The mystery of the missing scarf ends here. It was Louise and sadly, according to her, she’s on her literal death bed. Mikasa had a hunch that it was her. I appreciate the characters not playing dumb or rather, not bright enough to think the likely possibilities. Louise only wore it because she truly admired Mikasa. I have to say, it’s a little sad to see her dying. She does have a history as a kid who witnessed a role model.

The real interesting piece lies from the moment before she took it herself. She spoke to Eren about Mikasa, but his response was to get rid of the scarf. I’m still perplexed on why he’s so hell-bent to break all ties with her. I know there’s a lot more going on that is not on display. The closest we got is during his time in the memory trip. Something is definitely up. Mikasa takes it back and leaves her alone. Kind of sad for her last day to be alone without her idol. This series isn’t kind to anyone.

The army of Colossal Titans is almost gone, so it’s time for the Yeagerists to celebrate the supreme victory. Quite the disgusting nature of people all cool about destroying the world. It gets more disgusting when you learn Floch is the representative. His death must be gloriously satisfying for enduring his crap. Jean is depressing to look at. You can tell he’s lost in this cruel world.

The next scene is pretty hilarious. Armin and others arrive at the feast. While the kids eat, Armin and Connie discuss about Annie’s possible return. It just so happens that next to them, Annie was casually eating a slice of pie. They all look at her like their mind couldn’t register her existence. I can’t blame them when she has a silly face. Never would I expect this is the way they would reunite. Next to the famous betrayal scene, this is Isayama-sensei’s way to get to the point, now done in a humorous way. Four years later and her first move in the reunion is gobbling down a pie. Definitely didn’t see it coming.

I did enjoy Hitch and Annie hanging out in the last chapter, but sadly, it has to end. Annie left with others with a letter for Hitch. It’s basically a thank you message, but coming from her, it’s special. She may be cold outside, but she does have a heart. The message speaks out her gratitude for Hitch’s action; saying goodbye for one last time. It’s sweet that the panel doesn’t show Hitch’s reaction, but you can draw an idea that she was touched by Annie’s message. A shame that it ended here, but the friendship won’t be forgotten.

The sensation returns to crap when the scene shift back to Floch and his regime. It is execution time, and the criminals are Yelena and Onyankopon. Executing them will grant them the reign over the island; at least according to Floch, but the man is a whack job anyway. He calls Yelena out on her crimes; marking her as the worst criminal ever. The spouting nonsense from citizens paint them as racists, vile creatures. Who needs Titans to cause destruction when you have human. Yelena is out of her mind; she is waiting to get shot to get it over with. I’m beginning to feel a little sympathy for her. If that is the case, then Floch is doing something right.

The calling on Onyankopon’s crimes frustrate me a lot. He will be executed because he doesn’t want to work with them. The worst part is, his past actions were only for the sake of everyone. He thought he was helping his homeland as well as theirs, and this is how they would repay him? Pathetic. The series did a good job to keep his hands clean. While I can understand the reason to execute Yelena, his is unwarranted. I felt generally bad when he cries out; expressing his frustrations on everything. He’s a simple man who wanted peace one way or another. It feels rather close to home; that’s life for you.

Jean is his executioner, preparing to shoot him. Earlier, he looked like a shell of his former self. That contribute to this moment to give fans an impression that he has stoop this low to execute an innocent man; at least compare to everyone there. He shoots four times, but miss. He looks so out of it, I would have bought the idea of him completely disarray from life itself. Floch is sadly not a fool to notice something is odd. Well, forget about that, because Cart Titan appears out of nowhere and start attacking. Talk about real-time event.

It goes after Floch; soon, Pieck will become the best character ever. Sadly, Jean will become the worst for saving his life. Even in death, I will be upset. However, it’s all part of the plan. The attack wasn’t intended to kill Floch, though I would have been all in. Coincidentally, it ate Yelena and Onyankopon as well. It’s a ruse to escort them and Jean out of there and group up with others. The four shots was a code to continue the operation. It would have been funny if he was a lousy shooter, but this is neat nonetheless.

Mikasa is with Armin and others. I’ll talk about the pacing later. They’re stealing the supplies from the Yeagerists, or more like taking them back. Before departure, someone looks outside from the window and only Annie notices. I’m not sure where this lead to, but I doubt it is Zeke. It could be possible, but why would he be there though? It could be Shadis, though again, not sure the ploy behind this silhouette mystery.

As previously stated, Cart Titan escorted Jean and the two out of there. I laughed at Hange’s insult on Pieck and the Titan’s hygiene. I suppose the punchline is Titan’s teeth. The twist is, Jean has turned to their side since last night. He could have stay with the Yeagerists, even if it’s with the king of douche. Hell, he could have locked himself inside; ignoring everything. But his heart told him to never forget the fallen. A grim reminder is to remember the ashes. He’s slowly recovering, so hope for the best. Saving Onyankopon is a good start.

Surprisingly, Yelena was spared as well. It was only because of Magath’s request. Plus, they want her alive for some reason. Perhaps it’s to obtain Intel on Zeke’s whereabouts since she has a connection. There could be a personal reason, but we’ll see where this lead to. All in all, the faction is growing; only one is missing.

Reiner is still sleeping; supposedly for another 2 or 3 days. That won’t do, so Annie does the favor by kicking him hard. That’s funny and so in-character of her to do something like that. Imagine waking up to see an old friend that was crystallized for four years. Imagine waking up to see two opposing forces unite. That’s Reiner in the nutshell. I bet he was hoping to wake up when everyone is dead.

Connie, now with a newly determined face, sets the record straight and tell him to get ready. Their mission: to save the world. Only he would phrase it the way it sounded; straight-up heroic. This is written by a guy who used the magazine cover to draw a meme reference with his characters. It wouldn’t surprise me if that’s the case. All it was missing was the theme song playing.

Before closing the review, as much as I enjoyed this chapter, the only issue I have is the pacing. It’s a weird feeling because when I read it the second time, it felt natural. However, it feels fast when compare to other chapters. In a weird sense, it’s too fast for this series while another would feel right. The part with Armin and Connie could use two or more pages to conclude. The rest, I believe it would be explained in the next couple of chapters. Supposedly, this is the last chapter of a volume. The intention was probably to end strong and leave the explanation later. This is how the series roll sometimes, so don’t be surprised if that’s the case. Regardless, it was fast, but no time for minor stuff I suppose.

Overall, I thought this was a pretty entertaining chapter. It’s different in tone in compare, but delivered a good quality content. It doesn’t hurt to lighten up. We have an apocalypse already; we don’t have to go deeper into the abyss. There were plenty of good light-hearted moments. As quick as the pacing was, the moments were felt and certain mysteries continue to pique my interest. Everyone is coming together to prevent the massacre. Recalling the audio from the event, it won’t be simple. For all we know, this could be the last bright spot. Hopefully not, but you never know.

[abkdkzine]

A Guide to Making Portfolios

Contributor applications are open, but I noticed that there’s a few people who may be confused or don’t know what certain parts of our guidelines mean. So, here’s a simple guide showing how to make a neat portfolio that obeys our instructions and requirements!

(I kind of refrained from making a bunch of lighthearted jokes or comments though, so I might’ve missed my chance on showing just how dorky I can get, haha!)

I’ll be covering both art portfolios and writing portfolios in this guide, but I also hope this helps out anyone who might need this sort of information in the future because this information doesn’t apply to just our zine! With that said, I’ll start with the very basics: getting to know cloud storage and sharing services, or in this case, Google!

Technically speaking, portfolios are basically any and all of the platforms you post your content into (like Tumblr, Instagram, DeviantArt, etc.). But, when you’re applying for something that requires you to show your works in a professional manner (such as in fanzines or IRL jobs), knowing how to organise your works can help you out in the long run!

Google is such a versatile platform which allows everyone to have access to all (if not almost all) of their organisational and work-related products! As such, if you have a Gmail account, you should also have this wonderful privilege. One of their products, Google Drive, lets you store your files and organise them any way you want them! There’s a little box icon on the top right of the browser which will reveal all of the products you can use too, so if you don’t know what they are, it’s a good idea to explore a bit on your own time. 

Through Google Drive, you’ll be creating a folder which will serve as the place your files will be uploaded into. Keep in mind though that Google is not the only platform that offers cloud services! Dropbox is an example of another popular platform among others.

In this example, I’ll be referring to our zine’s contributor applications. Make a new folder in your Google Drive by clicking on that big ol’ “New” button, and use that button again to upload 3-8 of your works for our zine’s applications. Or, drag and drop files. It’s surprisingly fun to do and watch!

Be sure that your folder’s privacy settings is open! Just activate the folder’s shareable link (as in anyone with the link can have access to it), and it’ll let us look at all of your examples without trouble!

But, why do you want us to do this, you might ask?

Like I mentioned earlier, knowing how to organise your things helps you out in the long run! But in our case, if an applicant chooses to send us a form with a portfolio that doesn’t quite follow our requirements (such as putting an entire gallery or website with all their works)... 

Well, it’s going to be an inconvenience to the moderators because there are going to be a lot of applications to go through within a limited time frame. We simply won’t have the time to look for your best works in a portfolio showcasing all of your pieces. We set a maximum limit of 8 examples for portfolios for that reason!

Any added works will not be considered in the examples, and any applications with galleries or websites sent to us as their portfolios will have a VERY low chance of being considered at all.

Instead, make that neat little folder shown previously and individually add the files you want to share! It won’t take up a lot of your time, I promise. That way, you can make sure you’ve chosen your most quality works, and we can review your application in a timely manner! This method is the most preferred way for us to receive portfolios.

Writers, if you are unfamiliar with Google Drive, this process can apply to you as well. Make a new folder, label it appropriately, and upload your files! Word documents can be transferred instantly, so fear not for your formatting – you’re in good hands. However, if you are concerned about it, I suggest that you take a look at Google Docs. You can copy and paste your works there instead, either all three written examples in one document or three separate documents in the folder. 

Realistically, not following the rules sets a bad impression on the people reviewing your portfolio. We want to see your best work, and we want you to feel confident in your examples! If you show us that you can’t follow simple and easy tasks such as organising your works, then we’ll get the impression that you’ll do the same elsewhere. Regard this as though you are preparing for an actual job interview because this helps with your reputation as well.

So, what can I do to ensure my chances to be considered?

This is a section that is more for art than it is for writings; but here’s a general consensus for what kind of submissions or examples are expected and what is not expected!

A bad portfolio consists of little variety among the shown examples. If your examples are mostly made of your subjects in several different angles, that’s alright, but if there’s a lack of principles of art (such as rhythm, movement, proportion, variety, etc.) then the portfolio wouldn’t really be very interesting to the judges. Sketches, while some look nice, aren’t good examples because zines require complete pieces!

For written stories, the worst possible examples out of so much more that you can present in a portfolio are: bad understanding of characterisation (out-of-character factor), mediocre understanding of grammar (or unedited versions), and uninteresting.

A good portfolio shows a clear understanding of the elements and principles of art. There’s variety among the pieces which shows creativity and thought. Properties like different colour schemes, addition of environments, angles, and etc. are things that make portfolios interesting to look at.

For writing, having a good grasp of grammar, understanding of characters, and personal style are good indicators that your writing is well done and given some thought! In other words, it allows the readers to feel engaged with, which in turn makes it more interesting.

But, most of all:

Your pieces have to be related to the zine’s theme! It’s different for every zine, of course, but generally, application reviewers look to see if the applicant is genuine about liking the concept(s) behind their projects, and that the applicant can portray or illustrate the subjects of the zine well with the skills presented among the examples.

Wanderlust revolves exclusively around BakuDeku, and so, seeing examples with both of them featured in your works will guarantee you, one-hundred percent, a spot for consideration.

Sounds good to me! But, can you clarify what to avoid?

As previously suggested, guidelines are made to make sure the reviewing process goes as smoothly as possible for the moderators or judges. I’ll be using our own guidelines for this example as well!

Since many zines like to request for a number of linked examples in their forms for their portfolios, we understand that it might be a force of habit or something that some people may consider easy to do. But, I’ll say this once again: we require prospective contributors to create their portfolios through a shared folder (lots of cloud services exist!) because it saves us, the moderators, a lot of time from copying and pasting every single link!

When you show us your social media links, don’t do it like this:

Tumblr: @ariririsu

Twitter: @ariririsu 

Give us the actual links to your platforms! This also saves us a lot of time instead of typing it down. We would be ever so grateful and happy if you do this.

Keep your examples up to date! We don’t want to see what you could do back then. We want to see what you can offer us now. It’s like selling a bunch of pastries at a bake sale, but you’re selling us pastries made two years ago. Your most recent works gives us the most accurate and best representation of your skills.

Once again, incomplete sketches or written drafts are no-no’s. If you want to know what I’m talking about when I mentioned the principles and elements of art, here’s a neat little roster that breaks down what makes compositions in artworks more three-dimensional and interesting.

Going over the specified number of examples will not affect your chances of being accepted in the zine. So, if you add two or three more works in your portfolio, rest assured that we will not even look at them. For the same reason I mentioned beforehand: there is going to be a lot of applicants, and we want to get the reviewing process done as soon as possible to maintain our schedule. Less mess, less stress.

Some Pieces of Advice:

Have some confidence in your works! If you feel super shy and you’re still building up that confidence, the judges would be more than happy to supply you with feedback if you ask for it. Their feedback will not be destructive, but it will be meant to help you improve your skills. Take whatever advice they give you and at least put them into consideration too!

Zines and other huge projects like these take a lot of your time. One thing that I’ve seen people commonly do is that they miscalculate the amount of time and commitment they can put into these projects, and they often have to leave them. Doing so will negatively affect your reputation. So, when you’re not sure if you can dedicate a lot of time to the zine, we highly suggest that you don’t apply to keep the game fair to others who want to be in the zine as well.

Communication is VERY important in these projects. Never ever disappear on the projects without saying something because it’s going to cause the moderators to have to find ways to contact you and be very worried if something happened to cause the sudden disappearance. Like the previous point, doing so will negatively affect your reputation.

Just so you know, you’ve got time to make your portfolios if you don’t have enough examples! You can literally apply at the last minute and it would still count!

Again, be sure that your Google Drive folder’s settings are shared to those who has the link!

And with that, I hope I was able to make a nice guide which emphasises certain rules in our own zine guidelines as well as how to make a good portfolio! I’m not sure if there are other guides like these around, but I hope I got a bunch of general zine rules correct.

We look forward to seeing your applications! Our zine applications close on January 12, and we can’t wait to see what you have in store for us!

[casual-romantic]

May as well continue what I started. More commentary on Ieyasu and the romantic portrayal of abuse beneath the cut.

SPOILERS for Ieyasu chapter 7 part 2. (I thought I was on 7 before, but turns out I read the love map wrong.)

In this chapter, Ieyasu is starting to change! He doesn’t physically hurt anyone or, indeed, even insult anyone too much! But he most certainly threatens, and he pulls another very classic abuser trick: making his victim promise him she’ll never, ever betray him, at which point it will be her fault that he has to hurt her.

SLBP is very aware which romantic cliches they’re trading in here. Tadatsugu openly hopes that MC will be the one to break the spell get close to Ieyasu. MC herself acknowledges that it’s going to take more time to get Ieyasu to change because she’s only on chapter 7. This is a story, Voltage is telling us in big, blinking neon lights. You know where this is going, you know there will be a happy ending. It will be very romantic if you’re just patient. The abuse is just the prologue to a beautiful relationship.

The problem with that, of course, is that in real life you aren’t guaranteed that happy ending, but an awful lot of real-life stories look just like the beginning of this one. It’s very easy to get the two mixed up, especially when you’ve been conditioned all your life to give men the benefit of doubt (as most women are).

Here, we see where Ieyasu’s actions the other night have proved fruitful. MC now sees herself as special, and someone who not only should but will be able to change Ieyasu. She’s going to dedicate herself to being someone he can trust. That moment of vulnerability is paying off in spades.

This is basically an ideal setup for any abuser. His victim has promised to never betray him. She’s staked her life on it. It will now be incredibly hard for her to later admit if she was wrong and even harder to leave. She’ll feel like it’s her fault. She couldn’t fix him, she didn’t do enough, she didn’t trust him enough, etc. And after all, it was her choice to try. (“Choice”) While hissing at her, he gave her the “option” of backing out, so she can’t blame him, can she? It was her idea.

But the possibility! Forget the very obvious danger to MC and the fact that there are never guarantees on this sort of thing outside of stories. If she doesn’t stake her life on trusting him, she’ll never know what their relationship could have been like!

I feel for MC, I really, really do. I know exactly what it’s like to be in a relationship with someone and you’re just not quite sure if what they’re doing is bad or maybe there’s a good reason behind it that you just don’t know yet. You start playing numbers games like Abraham with God. “If there’s a 20% chance he’s not lying, should I trust him? A 10% chance? 1%?” And you feel like as long as there’s that possibility you should keep giving the relationship a chance.

After all, you’re special. He was vulnerable with you that one time, once did you a very small favor (that you later had to pay back five-fold). That must mean something! But like God concluding no, there aren’t even ten good people in Sodom, sometimes you gotta just leave and not look back (or else you’ll be turned into a pillar of salt and your daughters will get your husband drunk for incestuous purposes and where was I going with this...?).

Anyway, I like that Ieyasu is making actual changes! He’s eating with his retainers, he made a show of properly apologizing to them about the military defeat, he’s asking after people a little. (His retainers are shocked and concerned.) He even, privately, calls MC by her name, which is literally the least he can do but makes her happy. If Ieyasu doesn’t relapse, this could actually work out pretty well for MC and it’s easy to see it becoming quite romantic later. Everyone loves Beauty and the Beast, after all. But the set up...

One of my favorite things about SLBP is how realistic the characters are in terms of their imperfect personalities, but I hate that that’s given us a classic abuser in the mix.