#sam doomed if he tries to save but is manipulated and doomed if he tries to also save and well-intentioned

[shadystranger]

this moment so fucked up💀

[this-is-spn20]

Yandere!Sam Winchester Headcanons

A/N: yes i know I dipped out for a few months but I got inspo for this from browsing another fandom and tried looking for yandere fics of our favorite boys but couldn’t find any! If you want something right, you have to do it yourself lol. Requests are always open! 

Spread Love! 

-Marissa

WARNING: These headcanons are written with an unaware/unwilling reader! There will be the theme of stalking, harassment, unwanted attention, manipulation, and abuse (not sexual). Please do not read this if you are not comfortable with these graphic stories. Your consumption of media is not my responsibility.

***MDNI***

I DID NOT COME UP WITH THE LIST. ALL RIGHTS GO TO @dear-yanderee !

Word Count: 4,428

Suggested song while listening: Be My Queen by Seafret

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Sam may be (slightly) delusional, but he’s smart. And can be a bit sadistic, but he’s smarter than the average person, that’s for sure. Using his computer knowledge to spy on any and all social media you have. Hacking into your account while you were sleeping (he never made the effort of watching you in person, no no doll, you could possibly see him and it’d ruin everything. Just wait for him, Just a little bit longer.). He knew when you were sleeping because your laptop or phone wouldn’t have any activity for a while, meaning he could snoop around for a bit before you woke up. Took him weeks to dig through every square inch of your online life All your records, he’d print them out and clear his history so as to not set off Dean’s alarms or interest. Even though Dean knows something is up. 

Compared to Dean, Sam just knows how to persuade you into liking him. Incorporating himself into your life without you knowing. Making himself ‘small’, a background character.  That dickbag that bumped into you while walking in the park when there was CLEARLY enough room for him to pass by without nearly knocking you down (he didn’t even bother being gentle), well at that time, you didn’t know what a bad day truly was. Hell, if you’d just run up to him and cursed him out, you probably would’ve saved yourself a lot of grief. Probably. (Honestly, it probably would’ve made him more intrigued.) 

Working double, sometimes even triple shifts, are bad enough. But when your job is to stock shelves in the only (and by proxy) biggest store in town, it’s just more strain and stress. So when some big old, lanky, buff asshat shows up in your store and almost completely wrecks one of your perfectly stocked shelves, you get a tiny bit upset. As you take two carts to take all the stuff down, your boss radios you to tell you to have two more shelves stocked up before your next break for the big sale. And to tell you that you’re on call for the rest of the week. Whoever that asshole was, you wished to see him so you could tell him about himself. Or beat his ass. Or both.

Little did poor, naive little you know that over the course of those first five, horrible, months that Sam was programming your mind already. You never saw his face, but he was showing that, while he could make your life so unbearable at a moment's notice, but he chose to do good. To do right by you. He showed how bad it could get before he swooped in and put on his deadly charm. First coming up to you in the store while you were stocking an aisle and asking where the candles were. When you told him, he thanked you and struck up a conversation. Using everything he knew you’d like to hear to rope you in. He made sure the first time you met him, you’d never forget him. Ever. 

Now you’re just his little doll. Doomed to be locked up in the dungeon until you proved to be good for him. Then love, you’ll be allowed in his room! You may even get your privileges back. Only if you’re a good girl for him. Just for him.  He knew it was only a matter of time now before you break. He just had to be a little more patient. Then you were all his. 

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s start over, shall we darlings?

Affection: How do they show their love and affection? How intense would it get?

Giving gifts is his forte. When hacking into your computer, he made sure to make a list of your likes and dislikes. He knows your favorite movies, political views, your full name and date of birth, your blood type, your father’s dog’s name, everything. He saw the things you liked to buy online. Things you saved to your carts but could never afford to buy at the moment. So whatever is in your cart from whatever website, no matter the price, Sam takes it upon himself to buy the items and have them sent as gifts to your house. Anonymously of course. He loved seeing your face light up with surprise terror as you opened your door to yet another package on your porch with more items you planned on buying at the end of the month. If you could afford it of course. You wondered who was sending these packages. Someone you knew? But, you rarely showed anyone these wished possessions of yours. Was someone… watching you? I mean you always felt this… uneasy feeling in your chest lately. Maybe you should schedule a check-up with the doc. 

Giving gifts is his forte. When hacking into your computer, he made sure to make a list of your likes and dislikes. He knows your favorite movies, political views, your full name and date of birth, your blood type, your father’s dog’s name, everything. He saw the things you liked to buy online. Things you saved to your carts but could never afford to buy at the moment. So whatever is in your cart from whatever website, no matter the price, Sam takes it upon himself to buy the items and have them sent as gifts to your house. Anonymously of course. He loved seeing your face light up with surprise **terror** as you opened your door to yet another package on your porch with more items you planned on buying at the end of the month. If you could afford it of course. You wondered who was sending these packages. Someone you knew? But, you rarely showed anyone these wished possessions of yours. Was someone watching you? You always felt this… uneasy feeling in your chest lately. Maybe you should schedule a check-up with the doc. 

First, it was some makeup and a few nice dresses you wanted. You figured you’d still somehow ordered them. Even though your bank account didn't reflect such purchases. Still not convincing, even to yourself but, it was better than dwelling on ‘what-if’ questions. But as the gifts kept coming you got more and more… **concerned.** You’d confronted your coworker later the day after your umpteenth package. You told him that you appreciated his company while stocking the shelves, but you didn’t feel anything for him. To your annoyance, your coworker responded in complete confusion. When you told him to stop feigning ignorance he was positively confused. You and he didn’t know each other that well outside of work, so for this to be coming from you made him a bit angry. When you plainly told him what you thought had been doing, he told you to be careful, but he wasn’t the one doing it. In hindsight, you thought it was nice of him to express his concern. When he offered to walk you to your car that night, you were skeptical, but you let him do it. 

Sam didn’t take too kindly to that.

But Sam decided to cool down on the packages. Now he thought was the time to make himself more involved in your day-to-day life. Small run-ins, nothing alarming but you knew who he was now. It started with him paying for your favorite drink at the local cafe you loved so much. He kept his cool and acted like it was just such a coincidence to run into you! How have you been holding up? He even took to finishing your book collection for your most recent series. Maybe taking to replace your worn books. You didn’t notice until you picked up one of your favorite novels and had to crack the spine. Indicating it was brand new. Things really got intense when you walked out to your car one morning and saw all your tires were replaced. When you got in, a note on your steering wheel simply said, “Your tires we going bald. You’re welcome.”  You started getting more scared as the days passed. This person managed to get into not just your car, but also your house. A safe place. Your heaven. At least that’s what it used to be. 

You were terrified to leave your house every day. 

Blood: How messy are they willing to get when it comes to their darling?

Well, Sam being Sam prefers to keep his hands clean as much as possible. Plus him hurting anyone close to you will make you even more challenging to get. He also knows what losing someone feels like. Even more than you actually. Why would he choose to make things harder between you two if being with you and only you is his ultimate goal? Come on, don’t be silly. It’d do nothing for him to see you so hurt. Who wants to see their soulmate in pain? 

Unless it was absolutely necessary.

Like maybe one day you’re feeling a bit rowdy. You have a lot of fight, Sam had to give that to you. But why are you so insistent on staying apart? He can’t love you from afar, he refuses to live without your love. He’ll do anything to keep you with him. But as patient as Sam could be, there are only so many times you can push his buttons, love. Now if you keep fighting, I’ll have to punish you. We don’t want that, do we? After all, broken bones take a long time to heal… But don’t you worry princess, he’ll fix you right up!

With mandatory bed rest included.

Cruelty: How would they treat their darling once abducted? Would they mock them?

Sam is a very loving person, so he wouldn’t really mock you at all. If you’re not trying to escape. If you are, you can expect to be tsked at and hear phrases such as

“Oh darling, I thought you knew better than to try something so stupid.”

“If you wanted to wear your chain today, you could’ve asked love.” 

“Princess, you can’t get away from me. I will always see through your little plan. Your eyes tell me everything.”

If you’ve managed to piss him off (which takes a lot of effort so… go you?), you can expect him to leave you with more cuts and bruises than you could imagine. Just remember love, the more you fight, the angrier he gets…

And no, your begging and pleading will get you nowhere. But it hurts him more than it does you. You deserved it. It was for your own good darling. Trust him.

Darling: Aside from abduction, would they do anything against their darling’s will?

No. Absolutely not. Sam knows love will come with time. He would never hurt you by doing anything you didn’t want him to. Including simply touching you (but isolation is a bitch babe.). Honestly, the only thing he is willing to do against your will is feed you. Especially if you go on a hunger strike. He will not allow anyone to hurt you. Not even you, and damn sure not him. He’d probably force-feed you through a tube. Same thing with being hydrated. He can't let his good girl starve now, can he? What kind of man would he be to let that happen, princess?

Exposed: How much of their heart do they bare to their darling? How vulnerable are they when it comes to their darling?

Sam gives his whole heart and soul to you. He is a straight sucker for you honestly. He dotes on you a lot. Tries spoiling you with things he knows you’ll like. If you weren't in chains…

He tries to get you to open up to him by telling you everything about himself. To hunting, to what his favorite pair of socks were in middle school. Sam shows you sides of himself that not even Jessica got to see. He doesn't want to scare you so he almost shrinks himself to be smaller. Less threatening. Less dangerous. Honestly, if you’re smart, you could use this against him. You can start slowly opening up to him. Give as little information as possible and start planning your escape. Sam won't trust you to be out of the dungeon, or even your chains, for a while. But you’ve got nothing but time daring. 

Fight: How would they feel if their darling fought back?

At first, it’d be almost amusing. If it didn’t happen so much he’d probably get a chuckle out of it. He hates having to use forceful ways to calm you down but he has no choice. He’s used more chloroform than he’d like but it was worth it. But the chemical burns on your face make him really emotional. He may look into paralyzing spells to quail your attempts. If he does find such a spell, you’re fucked. Not completely, but it's not looking good for you, love. He feels like you both are in some loop. Like a cat-and-mouse game, though it’s getting tedious. 

There is one upside to this though. These attempts of escape and fights give him an idea of how your brain works. Your fight style, and the ways you attempt to run from him and the bunker, give him more useful information and ways to stop your plans. Eventually, you can’t get out of the dungeon without at least 5 alarms tipping off Sam before you can even turn the door nob. Do with this information as you will, darling.

Game: Is this a game to them? How much would they enjoy watching their darling try to escape?

This is not a game to him. This isn't amusing in the slightest bit. Watching you try to get away from him hurts him deeply. You two are soulmates. Why can't you see this? Why run from him when he can give you the world. He waits on you hand and foot. He caresses you with the lightest touch. He gives you almost everything you ask from him. He will bring you the biggest, brightest star in the universe if you just love him, and let him love you. Open up to him. Adore him, like he adores you. Get lost in him and everything he is, like he does with you. You’ll do that for him, right doll?

Hell: What would be their darling’s worst experience with them?

Believe it or not, but your worst experience with Sam wasn't when he occasionally snapped at you for your smart mouth. It wasn’t when he forced you to eat to keep yourself alive for him. Always for him. 

It wasn’t even the time he came back from a hunt gone wrong and an argument with Dean once again, and Sam had come into the dungeon for the first time in a week. When he tried to land a kiss on your cheek, you’d headbutt him. Sam snapped and hurled harsh words your way, and you were struggling against the chains, Sam had enough of your shit so he grabbed your arm and slowly, very, very slowly twisted it behind your back until, through your screaming, you heard a sickening crack from your arm. Your ear-splitting screaming was heard throughout the whole bunker and you collapsed into darkness. Praying that this was your end. But when you woke up to some beige room on an old musty bed with a cast on your arm, you couldn’t stop the sob that ripped through your chest. Only for Sam to immediately wrapped his arms around you and coo at your tears rolling into his shirt. Declaring he’d never bring harm to you again, although the scars covering your skin told you otherwise. 

No, you see, the worst experience for you, dealing with Sam, was the day you realized you needed him. That you loved him. How could you not see it earlier? Sam’s doting nature, his soft smile, the obsession adoring look in his eyes, his velvet touch. Everything that was him. You loved him. You loathed him. He took everything from you, yet had given you so much. He gave himself to you. Trusted you with his very soul. And here you were. Being selfish, greedy, mean-spirited, reclusive, disrespectful, and just plain stupid. Sam could have anyone he wanted. But he wanted you, and you had the audacity to not love him back? Stupid and horrible. You hoped it wasn’t too late to win his heart.

Wait. This… isn’t right. Is it?

Ideals: What kind of future do they have in mind for/with their darling?

He wants to enable you in all of your passions and hobbies. He wants the not-exactly-white-picket-fence-lifeTM with you. You and the front porch relaxing, watching him work in the front yard and you smiling at him ever so brightly. He wants to watch you take care of your plants and gardens, in a huge house that he worked so hard to get for you. For the both of you. Watching you take care of your many dogs and cats around the house.

And running after you around the living room and kitchen, just to catch you. Him carrying you up the stairs while looking into each other's eyes. Him smirking down at you, knowing it's gonna be another long night of passionate sex and lovemaking. In the morning, waking you up with gentle kisses and licks and biting. Teasing you out of your dreams. Dreams filled with nothing but him. Going into the kitchen to help you make breakfast. You lightly scolded him after him messing up, because he could help thinking how sexy you look in his shirts. Passion-filled make-out sessions with teenage-level humping and grinding. Sam always finds himself in these fantasies, only to snap back into reality all too soon. Then he remembers you must be so cold and hungry in that old dungeon. But he knows that one day he’ll get to live out all of that with you and so much more. Not today, but one day. 

Jealousy: Do they get jealous? Do they lash out or find a way to cope?

Well, he doesn’t have to be jealous because you don't even go outside… 

Though he does keep a close eye on Dean. Knowing how he can be. 

Kisses: How do they act around or with their darling?

Sam is ecstatic when you finally allow him to touch you. His hands have been itching to cover every single inch of your body. He loves the way your skin feels on his hardened calloused hands. Your skin was still a bit rough from the scars Sam’s hands left behind. Those same hands touching you as if you were the best prize on earth. And to Sam, you definitely were. Kisses galore. When you initiated the first kiss, it was hesitant and a bit clumsy, but Sam cherished the way your lips trembled against his. Nothing mattered to him anymore at that moment. Only you. Always you. 

Love letters: How would they go about courting or approaching their darling?

As stated before, Sam relished the fact that you (subconsciously) knew he was always there. Sam always found a way to be a background character in your life. A supporting role. If you will. Always the blurry face in the crowd. But always there. 

Mask: Are their true colors drastically different from the way they act around everyone else?

Oh yes. He is very much different in different environments. He’ll coddle and hug and kiss you near death. He’s almost always in a good mood when he’s spending time with you. Happy BoiTM. When he’s with Dean, he’s pretty normal. They typical brother teasing, the good moments, the bad ones. Sam acts like he always acted before you came along and rocked his world. The same goes for Donna, Jody, Alez, and Claire. The interactions are the same. But when with you, he can't focus on anything else but you. That's also the reason why he won't bring his research into the dungeon/room when you're there. He wants to show you that he can separate work and home life. With you, he lets his obsession love for you run free. He just can’t hide how he feels about you, love. Also, cause he can’t focus with you around. 

Naughty: How would they punish their darling?

Isolation mostly, yet if you show yourself to be resistant to that, he’ll use physical pain and manipulation.

Oppression: How many rights would they take away from their darling?

Almost all of your rights are taken from you. You can’t use any means of communication (unless you found some way to get hold of a spell.), You aren’t allowed to use any electronics unless Sam is practically attached to your skin. The only thing you can do is use the bathroom alone. Sam will allow you a few minutes in there depending on what you’re doing. But he’s taking everything that helps you escape out of there, even the mirror… You can’t be alone when you shower though. Sam will stand there, in the hot and humid bathroom and watch your every move as you shower. When you’re done, he’ll help you dry off and help you rub your lotion on your now rough and scared skin with nothing but utter devotion swimming in his eyes. Your night clothes will be put on by him as well. All of this will be done with the lightest, silk touch. 

Patience: How patient are they with their darling?

Extremly patient. Most days, he’ll put up with you and your shenanigans. But some days, when he’s in a bad mood or just generally tense, he’ll have a shorter fuse. You’ve learned to follow his orders on these days. Lest you’d like to go back into the dungeon…

Quit: If their darling dies, leaves, or successfully escapes, would they ever be able to move on?

Sam would never let you go easily so I’d say death really could be your only escape, and even then, thats not a guarantee. He could always make a crossroads deal, or bargain with Crowley. Hell he’d even try bargaining with Death himself. He’ll torture a thousand demons to get you back. Sam will walk through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven to get to you. Sam will go as far as kill himself in hopes he can follow you to heaven be with you eternally. Sure he’d feel guilty about leaving Dean, but he’d be with you. He can live with that. After all, how many times had Dean left him, only to beg Sam to move on?

Now if you had escaped and were able to stay hidden, either by the help of some angels or demons or the other he’ll search the ends of the Earth to find you. If he wasn’t able to find you by himself, he’d enlist in Dean, Jody, Donna, Claire, Alex, Charlie, and other trusted hunters, hell he’d even ask Rowena to help. If all of them together weren’t able to find you, Sam would never get over you. He’d grieve you every day while you celebrate getting away from him.  

Regret: Would they ever feel guilty about abducting their darling? Would they ever let their darling go?

While Sam would never let you go, he’d feel incredibly guilty about taking you away from your home, your friends, your family, and your life. With him, Dean, and John constantly moving around due to hunting, he knows exactly how you feel.

Stigma: What brought about this side of them (childhood, curiosity, etc)?

Yes, in fact, his childhood and early adult life were a factor, constantly losing new friends to the hunting life, and then losing Jessica, his father, Dean more than once, and more people he could count. This, as one would imagine, would leave an impression on even the toughest people. Not to mention being bullied at a young age and not being accepted in any social groups just for being who he was. So when he first saw you, he knew he wanted you, and he wouldn’t risk you not accepting him, or being taken from him. 

Tears: How do they feel about seeing their darling scream, cry, and/or isolate themselves?

Hearing you scream and cry makes his whole body shiver as tears sting in his eyes. He’d do anything you’d like to see you only smile for the rest of your days together. Hearing your sobs late into the night makes his body feel as if he’s being dipped into the hottest lakes of fire. You could swear one day, you could hear the cracking of his heart as he watched you cry one day. You’d also notice how his tears would fall at the same time as yours did. 

Unique: Would they do anything different from the classic yandere?

On days when you’d been extra good, he’d take you for a ride in the Impala up to his favorite stargazing hill and bring a book and blanket. He’d read to you as you zoned out watching the stars glitter in the skies. Wondering how peaceful the star would be. Millions of miles away from you. You’d appreciate the little bit of freedom, even though you still had to wear a collar. But at least your wrists could get a break from those iron chains. 

Vice: What weakness can their darling exploit in order to escape?

The more you behave, the more Sam takes you out. Not in public places just yet. But it will come with time. Just stick it out and eventually you go to pubic places together and then you can plan your escape and get away from Sam once and for all. But keep in mind, if you fail and get caught, Sam will likely never take you out again. And if by some miracle he does, he will literally handcuff your hands together. 

Wit’s end: Would they ever hurt their darling?

If you piss him off enough he’ll slice your skin to ribbons and remind you what happens to bad girls. If you keep disobeying him he might just break a few of your bones. You can’t escape if both of your legs are broken, can you darling?  He’ll break your mind by either isolation or some sort of mind spell. 

Xoanon: How much would they revere or worship their darling? To what length would they go to win their darling over?

He damn near kisses the dirt you walk on. This man is devoted to you. He’ll bring you every star you desire, he will kill every monster, buy everything you can ever want, hug you for however long to make you happy and feel safe. Anything doll, name anything and he’ll do it. 

Except kill Dean. Nice try love.

Yearn: How long do they pine after their darling before they snap?

Sam would spend no more than a few months to a year pining over you. Using his time wisely before he just couldn’t hold himself back anymore. Even still, he was as calculated as ever in kidnapping retrieving you.

Zenith: Would they ever break their darling?

Yes. You’ll be broken beyond repair if you don’t get out.

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A/N: I hope you all enjoyed these headcanons! I'm back baby! Requests are open!

Spread Love,

-Marissa

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[murfpersonalblog]

IWTV S2 Ep7 Musings - Loumand (Spoilers)

I actually don't have much to say about Armand--I'm waiting to see what he has to say for himself in the finale.

Exactly, Mr. Professional--let Louis talk this out on his own. We'll skulldrag Mr. I Could Not Prevent It soon enough.

"Yeah all right I sold him out"--YEAH YOU DID ARMAND, no sass or backtalk, just STFU. You had your chance to speak up IN PARIS, Mr. I Made My Choice!

NO NOTES.

PLEASE 🙄😒 How? With Sam's dinky little scythe? You can set them all on fire with a THOUGHT, stfu with that 🥺 face.

PLEASE 🙄😒 It was the terms of their agreement--IN CAHOOTS.

PLEASE 🙄😒 It was the LEAST he could do. The key word is to save YOU. Not Claudia. This was PREMEDITATED.

What I'm actually REALLY bummed about is that AMC seems to have kept Armand "held captive" by Sam the whole time, so he wouldn't've had the opportunity to go FRANKENSTEIN on Claudia (I assume they just swapped that for the Rat Box scene). Unless that happened after they beat Louis unconscious. 👀

Madz being dragged into this to implicate Louis, cuz Armand killed Santiago's Maker for doing the exact same thing with him! 👀💀

GO AWF, king! May your reign be short and sterile! 🤴🏼😜

SOOOO hypocritical that the coven is LITERALLY breaking Law 5 by doing this entire Trial, but wtvr; politics is just parlor tricks.

The way Ben delivered those lines; the crazed look in his eyes--this was the REAL bee in Santiago's bonnet & stick in his craw. Eff Claudia; Santiago DGAF about her in the scheme of things. But that persona non grata, who "wasn't even all that attractive," had rejected & offended & humiliated him, and this green-eyed monster wanted Louis DEAD.

NYA NYA NYA! 😝

"It took all my strength," PLEASE 🙄😒

Armand wanted Claudia dead so dang bad, lol.

TWICE OMG, PLEASE! 🙄😒 Louis just staring him down. YOU BUY THAT, LOUIS!? 👀 HAYUL naw, which is why Armand's been in this Grovel Era for 77 years! 😅

NICE save, Santiago!

Here we effing go; eternity in a box.... ⚰️💀

Rolin, whose idea was it to fill it with rocks; that is SAVAGE!

Thank god Lou didn't have to see his baby burn to ash--"and his face turned to soup." He fought, he really tried, but it wasn't enough; he was POWERLESS to protect any of them. U_U But you KNOW Lou had to FEEL what was happening when Madz died, cuz she's his blood/fledgling. So the pain's still there, even w/out seeing Claudia.

THAT'S what karma effing means, y'all! THAT'S what it means to DESERVE pain. Lest had to sit there and watch HIS DAUGHTER burn, "cuz sooner or later, they end up dead." AR said Claudia (read: Michelle) was DOOMED by the narrative, and DIDN'T deserve what happened to her. But Lestat ADMITTED that he deserved everything that happened to him! Les had to PAY the consequence!

CONSEQUENCES, Armand! You don't get to sell out Louis at the price of Claudia, then brag about how "I never harmed you," and whine about how you "atoned" for Paris but can never make up for it.

EFF your apologies--his daughter's DEAD, ffs.

Whew, I'm actually tearing up, this ep's HEAVY; I'm moved, fasho!

Sure, Jan. 🙄 Les crossed the ocean cuz Santiago told him what was going down, so OF COURSE Lestat was gonna go to Paris; regardless! (AMC removed the need for Swamp King to crawl begging for Armand's healing blood.)

Santiago and the coven woke Lestat up by climbing the Eiffel Tower and radio-signalling him to come to them--that lines up with the newspaper clippings Loumand mentioned in Ep6 about "strange crimes" being committed.

STFU WITH THE BAGELS AND COFFEE, TUAN, it shoulda been a CROISSANT! 🥐🤣

STFU ARMAND, we don't need YOU mansplaining Lestat's toxic AF behavior, Master Manipulator! LOUIS can be wrong about his husband he lived with for dang near 40 years ("this is Lestat; what he does over and over"), but YOU can't talk about the dude you only knew for a few months max! Sit QUIETLY and drink your blood soup!

Yeah Armand, you BETTER duck TF out the way! 😤 Lou was aiming right at your dome--eff you, AND all the luxurious golden-spooned Jimmy Choo wearing stolen Rembrandts you've filled this sterile penthouse cage with!

"THIS IS HARD"--bruh, I bet Jacob said that from the soul; I have no idea how any of these actors do this, incredible! AMC I hate y'all so bad for not giving these artists as much shine & accolades as possible; they're being robbed. U_U

(Quick Insider preview for the finale--Ep8 SPOILERS)

Santiago asking "Did Armand tell you what we did with her ashes?" omfg imma be sick.

Armand telling Louis "I lied to you;" chile, we been knew.

Fire Gift Louis de Pyromaniac du Lac telling Lestat chained up under the Threatre "I'VE COME TO KILL YOU;" get in line, my guy! 😡🔥

[busket]

you know what I just thought about. frodo had pity for gollum because he could relate to what he was going through with the ring, and was probably really afraid of becoming like gollum himself. but at the cracks of doom when the ring finally took full control of him, frodo didnt lose his mind like gollum, he became powerful. After barely being able to crawl up mt doom hes suddenly able to walk straight the final stretch to the cracks, hes able to throw gollum off of him, his voice is described as booming and clear. When he tells sam that hes keeping the ring, its noted that theres more power and clarity behind his voice that sam had ever heard from him

I dont think the ring would give it's full power to anyone that wasnt sauron, but. I wonder if in a last ditch effort to save itself, sensing that it was about to be destroyed, the ring changed tactics and instead of draining frodo of all his energy, it gave frodo a lot of power to try to change his mind?

But the ring overwhelming someone with incredible power isnt unheard of, gandalf refused to take it because he was afraid that would happen. So I wonder if instead of the ring trying to manipulate him, it finally recognized him as a worthy tool, in the same way it would with gandalf or galadriel? Instead of just making him a creepy little weirdo like it did with gollum and started to do with bilbo

And then I remember that the very first time sam puts on the ring he feels incredibly powerful, like he could transform all of mordor into a garden. The ring determined that sam was easier to use and tried tempting him with power instead of making him suffer like it did with frodo. But sam instantly said "....no that's stupid" and was effortlessly able to give the ring back to frodo

[diminuel]

(Warning: this post is messy and gets salty. It’s stream of consciousness not a well formulated analysis. Just let me be salty. You can come be salty with me if it would please you. Or add some sugar to make me less grouchy.)

While making my porridge I let my thoughts drift to Cas’ role in the Supernatural story. He has mostly been a “tool” supporting someone else’s story, though he had some of his own story lines. (And he’s a supporting character, gone main character. I get it. It’s Sam and Dean’s story first and foremost.)

Being the angsty person I am I considered if most of his stories didn’t ultimately fail. And if I see his grand ending as a failure or a win. (Spoiler: it’s not a win for me.) The one thing he wanted to do in S6 is prevent another apocalypse (and keep Dean out of it) and he ultimately fails. (I think his cause was just but SPN at that time works with Dean’s moral compass. Dean decides it’s wrong, then it’s wrong even if it’s technically right. And the narrative agrees with Dean and punishes Cas.)

Cas’ season 8 story line also ends in a failure for him; he is trying to atone for his mistakes (the damage he did in heaven mostly) but he is doomed to fail and does fail, spectacularly, wreaking even more damage on Heaven against his will. Good intentions that blow up in his face again.

Cas’ season 9 story line moves in similar structures; he is cast aside from the main story line and then is guilted and pressured into leading angels in another civil war, only for angels to turn on him (again) and to fail (his one goal, to save Dean, failed too).

Season 10 isn’t much better, the story he’s on with Hannah is pointless; it’s what she wants to do, not what Cas wants or thinks important. Then he gets roped into betraying Dean and that blows up spectacularly in his face again. :3 There is one interlude where he again tries to fix the things he’s ruined and we get some cute episode with him and Claire. Sadly, those episodes are the remain the only interactions Cas has with Claire. All interactions with Claire get shifted to Dean and Jody afterwards, Cas effectively written out of Claire’s on screen story again...

In Season 11 he gets possessed by Lucifer for a good chunk of the season, and again, a failure; he released Lucifer into the world again and now we have the salad as we say.

Season 12 starts the Jack story line for Cas. Even though we like the nougat boy, the whole nephilim story line is littered with failure and mind control and death for Cas. Cas decides to put his faith in Jack, because he was manipulated. Jack showed him paradise on earth and Cas, too trusting once again, believes it. Cas dies when Jack is born and just one case after they are reunited, Jack disappears.

Now, Cas said that being a parent to Jack (or being the tool to enable Jack’s story) has brought him a new purpose and a new sense of self. (And Misha has said that he believed that he was loved by his family because he knew that Jack was loved.) But while I do enjoy Cas’ parenthood arc, it was littered with so much pain and sacrifice and again being punished for “mistakes” that were outside of Cas’ control. (He also spent quite some time written out of the narrative while sitting in Asmodeus’ jail. :I)

So can we say that Cas’ story didn’t ultimately fail? Is it a success story?

Because he gave up his life in the end for Dean. He wanted Dean to know his worth and what Dean means to him, and he wanted him to live. How did that end? (”Ultimately it was all about saving one human, right? Well, guess what. He’s dead, too.”)

Okay, let’s assume Cas’ story was about Jack too. He was so proud when Jack came back and Cas was vindicated because Jack’s story wasn’t over yet, there was still a shot for whatever greatness Jack was intended for. So Cas bargained away his happiness for Jack’s life (not for an end goal of course, but because he loved him) and he defended Jack against Dean and Sam when Dean and Sam were the ones being manipulated. And in the end? Jack ended up being god.

And then he did not bring paradise on earth.

Jack ended up deciding he was hands off. He apparently resurrected Cas and they fixed heaven, but Dean still died. He let Dean die on the most ridiculous of hunts, after not getting to live in freedom at all. I cannot imagine any version of Cas who would be pleased with that. Who would choose to stay in heaven over going back down on earth to be with Dean. I cannot imagine any version of Cas who would choose Dean’s happiness in heaven over a life of freedom. (Cas once asked Dean “peace or freedom”? Why not both?)

(And all this started because I was really mad at Jack because he’s such a dick as a god. Sorry. But fuck off Jack. Did you learn nothing while you were being raised by Cas and the Winchesters? Urgh. What was the point? Jack’s story doesn’t make sense to me...)

[sidecarghost]

Kripke: Family (as a source of trauma)

Sam and Dean’s brotherhood and the dichotomy of loving your brother while also disagreeing with him on almost everything at a fundamental level.

Azazel fostering a group of special children to serve in his holy war, and John raising Sam and Dean as soldiers for his holy war.

Filial piety taken to the extreme where any agency is given up. Meg’s blind faith in Azazel and then Lucifer, and Michael’s blind faith in following through with God’s plan for the end.

John Winchester’s legacy of hate and revenge being passed down to his children, Sam and Dean.

Dean, Cas, and Micheal and the consequences of absentee fathers and their sons hopelessly trying to gain approval from them.

Found family that helps emotionally support each other with team free will Sam, Dean, Bobby, and Cas vs the toxicity of the family you are born to. Similar parallel to fate vs free will.

Gamble: Identity (roles we assume vs our authentic self)

Souls as the fundamental particle that establishes our internal compass, but also capable of being lost or weaponized.

Assuming a role at the cost of being authentic:

Dean and Lisa where Dean tries to be a better father to Ben than John was to him

Cas as God where Cas tries to be a better God than the father he never met

Sam as soulless where Sam tries to be a better hunter than John, Dean, or the Campbells ever had been

And Leviathan becoming better capitalists than humans (authentic chameleons that live their best life by assuming whatever form let’s them be the most effective predator)

Carver: Oppression (being a hero to some makes you a villain to everyone else & the only force strong enough to cure oppression is love or total annihilation of the oppressors)

Abuse of power at all levels: Hell, Heaven, Earth

Monsters are shown to be morally complex and an oppressed population

The MoL is a defunct organization of humans that oppressed monsters.

Sam and Dean as the inheritors of the MoL legacy of oppression. They are never redeemed and carry on killing monsters until the end of the series.

Cain saves his brother Abel from damnation, but the cost doomed millions. His only escape was conquering the mark because of the love of one woman.

Naomi overriding the free will of angels by reprogramming them to keep them kowtowed to her agenda for heaven. Cas is able to conquer Naomi’s reprogramming because of the love of one man.

Metatron ejects the angels of Heaven forcing them to live among the people heaven has oppressed in the name of God. The show frames Metatron as a hero and a villain because good and evil can be subjective.

Rowena as the narcissistic mother that sees Crowley as a failure because of her own failings, and attempts to emotionally manipulate and influence his role as king of hell. Eventually Rowena is redeemed by developing genuine love for her son and team free will.

Styne family as a dynasty of white supremacists trying to make a race of superior humans. Their reign of oppression ends with their annihilation by Dean.

Sam clings to faith and hope in a righteous God even though he has suffered his whole life. Sam’s relationship to faith is never resolved through the end of the series.

Light oppressing the Darkness. God’s only sister was kept entombed by her only brother. Love for each other was the only force strong enough to stop their suffering.

Dabb: Fuck if I know???? (Cw: racism, suicide ideation, rape, incest) Dabb era is the most racist era of a very racist show. Other eras were problematic, but at least they attempted to tell a story based on an interesting theme. I cannot, for the life of me, come up with a theme for Dabb that the season wide plots feed into (calling it plot is a misnomer because there really is none in s12-s15, that shit cannot be consumed serially).

Destiel is shamelessly queerbaited, because Dabb has found that the queer and queer ally portion of fandom responds favorably to these crumbs.

BMoL as oppressive but now also British, and a new bunch of white people are added to the cast, because in the Spn universe Britain is solely populated by white people.

Lucifer keeps appearing to antagonize the protagonists, even though his relevance as a legitimate antagonist ended 7+ seasons ago.

Lucifer rapes a woman by posing as her lover. This results in the birth of the Messiah and death of the woman. No one ever seeks justice for Kelly, instead they endlessly obsess over her fetus.

The actor cast as Jack, the Messiah, is yet another white person in a cast full of white people.

Alternate universes are found that are like the main universe but way more boring.

Crowley is killed because Dabb is out of ideas for the character.

Sam and Dean are only interested in finding a way back to the apocalypse universe because their mom got stuck there. They express no desire to find a way back to help the universe where humans are being exterminated. They have completely given up on altruism and are living it up as privileged white people in their bunker mansion.

Black archangel Michael is villainized and loses any of the moral complexity that white archangel Michael exhibits.

Kevin Tran (one of the few recurring PoC), reappears in the Apocalypse universe just to blow himself up as a suicide bomber.

Archangel Gabriel was being kept imprisoned by Colonel Sanders who moonlights as a prince of hell. Does any of this mini arc impact the overall narrative? No. Just more white men added to the story because Dabb can’t figure out where to take the franchise.

Mary Winchester is fridged, yet again, by another yellow eyed supernatural being, so a singular family member can go into a vindictive rage about it.

Canon bisexual God is villainized. I would say for plot reasons, but I have yet to discover anything in s15 resembling a plot.

Main universe Kevin Tran (who sacrificed everything to devote his short life to helping Sam and Dean) reveals that God sent him to Hell all those years ago. Kevin is then doomed to wander Earth as a ghost until he goes insane. At which point, white guy Sam is probably going to kill him sending him back to suffer for eternity in Hell.

Billie, a black woman, becomes Death, a primordial entity and a stronger force than God (will reap God in the end). She is villainized and killed by white men for being committed to keeping the universe in balance and adhering to the natural order. No one seeks justice for her.

W*ncest is shamelessly baited because Dabb has found the portion of fandom that prefers bros as soulmates responds favorably to these crumbs.

Romanticizing suicide in a meta attempt to inform viewers that this show has lived past its useful shelf life and keeping it alive is a punishment to be endured.

Spn Prequel: ??? Not to jinx the prequel but at least it should not be worse than Dabb era.

[lesbiansforboromir]

(I didn’t finish my sentence lmfaoo. I meant I don’t hate the movies portrayal of D B and F’s relationship but I might’ve preferred it in the books ahaha sry my bad lol) yeah that’s kind of an issue with create movies of book, ppl just assume it’s the same cause it’s an adaptation. The books are a Lot too, so ppl might not even wanna bother cause they’re not easy to read vs watching an Adaption of them, so they’ll never know the og characters.

I only rewatch lotr recently after years of growing up with it and tbh I completely forgot that Gondor was a Thing, it rly is just kinda forgettable in the movies.

This is rly making me want to tackle the books lol. The differences are gonna be something to adjust to.

Apart from the Gondor dudes who would you say gets the biggest change? Or worse in your opinion

Oh no I do hate the dynamic of the steward family in the films jdahkjasd Honestly I think this portrayal of abusive parents being just ugly and easily identifiable as villains is somewhat regressive but No worries no worries.

ANd yeah... Gondor really is so forgettable in the films I-

BUT YEAH UM... I guess I can’t say everyone can I um, lets start talking and see how many we get through.

Merry and Pippin got an absolutely tragic reduction in the films. In the books they’re frodo’s friends long before the film, Merry is Frodo’s best friend, he loves Frodo so much he helps him move house and deals with his obnoxious family. Merry actually organises the whole trip, he figures out Frodo intends to leave on his own and secretly organises to go with him JUST because he’s his best friend. He’s like yo, you’ve got something scary you’ve got to do Frodo? Don’t know why you thought we’d let you do it on your own. Merry saves the whole quest by doing this! Frodo would have died before he even got out of the Shire if not for Merry. 

Gimli’s portrayal, also a tragedy. Peter Jackson saw dwarf and immediately decided ‘comic relief’, despite the fact that Gimli is more polite than Aragorn or Legolas, is a poet and has one of the longest monologues about art and culture in the whole book. It guts me thinking about it. 

Eowyn has a severe reduction in her feelings and character, her monologue is sanitised away from a much more bitter and angry condemnation of her people’s culture around women. We got a more patronising image of her relationship with Merry too. 

FRODO, oh god Frodo I’m so sorry, Frodo was clever and masterful and adult and!! He was funny! And sarcastic, he was philosophical and cunning. Films tell you that Merry and Pippin were like thieves, NO Merry and Pippin were very upstanding young gentlemen and Farmer Maggot thought very highly of them both. FRODO is the criminal in this group who stole his mushrooms! Frodo asked questions and made plans and tried to figure things out by himself, he wasn’t this strange melancholic ring box to be ushered places. Frodo saved the world by TAKING the ring’s power on mount doom after planning how to do that and cursing gollum to essentially drop the ring into the mountain of fire LIKE. Frodo had agency! SAM TOO fsfdgsdfgs I skip frodo and sam’s scenes in the films but i love them in the books. 

Aragorn and Gandalf are vastly different characters in the films in that they’re likable. And this is... better for Aragorn I think. Although I miss him being a little more snarky and self important and sharp, but it’s better than Aragorn’s likable which he thoroughly isn’t in the books in my opinion. I MEAN... he’s- he’s very complex in the books and there are likable moments amongst him snapping at people and talking about himself. But for Gandalf I think it was a thorough detriment. Which hurts, love Ian Mckellen, that’s my grandad, but Gandalf was like genuinely manipulative in the books and literally could not stand being wrong despite being wrong quite a lot. Constantly Gandalf will angrily and rudely snap at people who rightly critisise his choices (Boromir for one) and this is good because you don’t want an infallible morally irreproachable dad for this whole adventure. It’s much more interesting this way. 

Eomer, miss him being a little more young and fiery and a little out of his depth but proud and confident even so. Like I know Karl Urban was exactly 27 in the films but he felt very world weary and kind of ‘I’ve had it’ when he’d only just become Third Marshall like barely a year ago. AND OF COURSE, this is compounded by the way Theodred’s death is portrayed like... askjdas like oops! Our 18 year old prince just died in this lil stream in this small lil battle huh weird- NO!! Theodred was 41!! And had died in a MASSIVE battle against Isengard! He was assassinated in fact, the whole point of the battle was to assassinate Theodred because he’d been so influential to maintaining Rohan’s stability despite all Grima and Saruman’s efforts. Eomer was a man who’d just lost a mentor, an adopted elder brother! Anyway...

Um... honourable mention for Hama... our dear doorward... miss you being relevant and telling Aragorn to fuck off babe. Farmer Maggot, miss you being relevant and like the literal best. Haldir, miss you NOT being relevant dwarfist bastard but I love to watch you die. Galadriel and Celeborn, not enough she pegs him energy, not enough of her being scary and unknowable, not enough of her laughing. Bilbo! I’m sorry they didn’t let you go back to the Lonely Mountain that’s miserable my guy.... Gollum’s alright... I think that’s everyone who exists in the films and books both. 

So this still ended up as everyone :)

[theinfinitybucky]

Undercovers (Bucky Barnes x Reader) - Part Five

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Reader and Bucky are on an undercover mission as husband and wife, but she hates him and by accident begins a game of “Who Can Fake Better”.

Warnings: very brief nudity, cannon typical violence, minors not allowed to interact!!!

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

You woke up the next morning hating yourself for every bit of what you had let Bucky do the night before. The regret panging through your chest was nearly unbearable. You sighed and pulled the white shirt off the floor to slip on over your bare chest. With feet hitting the cold marble floor of the hotel room, you walked to the bathroom.

Bucky was still passed out in the bed, taking in deep breaths as he slept. The man looked remarkedly peaceful for what you had done the night before. Right now, he was winning the game. What he had willfully manipulated you into doing was unspeakable. Even worse, what would the team say when they found out about what happened during this mission.

This was all Steve’s fault. He had forced you into this “situation” and not stopped it when another twist came. It had to be this with the target or his men watching the hotel room. That didn’t make this any easier. It was difficult to admit that you might actually enjoy Bucky’s presence. His rare smile. The way he kissed you like nothing else was left in the world but your lips.

Would it really be that bad if you liked him?

You brushed off the tough thought and began to brush your teeth. You met your own gaze in the mirror and shuddered with self-hatred. He hadn’t forced you into it. By the time the two of you were back in the hotel room, it felt right. The lingering regret was all about how you could go back to hating him.

“You okay, Sarah?” Bucky stood in the doorway, fully clothed unlike the last night.

You looked back at him and nodded. A wordless response. He could tell by the regret in your eyes and determined that it would be best to not push the boundaries that were being set. After getting ready for the morning in silence, both of you were discreetly slipping your gun into the blazer pocket when another text rang from Steve. A reminder to not forget about the meeting where you would be seeing the target today.

You would be going into separate meetings for the first two sessions then rejoining each other for lunch at the same table as the previous night. This was an unexpected moment to breathe after last night. The plan originally had you together in the sessions, yet this made more sense after the change in your job description.

           After the two slow sessions, you met for lunch. Taking a seat at the table where you had sat last night, Marcus was already sitting when you arrived. It took to seconds to recognize who was with him, Eric Miller. This was concerning at best. A total nightmare at worst. Bucky, where are you?

           Almost as if you had called him, he appeared behind you. You hated how he could appear out of nowhere without a sound being made. You glanced up to him from the chair you were seated in. You glanced to Eric Miller which received a tiny nod from Bucky. This was where things began to get dirty. Would you risk taking Eric and Marcus down in a room full of people or wait until the meeting time later. Or had they already exchanged the codes and doom was only impending.

           The lunch dragged on forever with white lies being told back and forth between you and Marcus. No intel was gained after the hour-long lunch. It was almost as if they were playing with you and Bucky. An uneasiness continued to settle into your chest. Something was off here. It was only an hour before the codes were “supposedly” being exchanged in the hotel parking lot.

           When 1:00 pm came, Marcus and Eric both excused themselves as if they were on a timer. You waited for them to be out of earshot. They both exited through the tall conference room doors.  Things were about to get messy.

           “I think I left something in the car, Chris.” You took Bucky’s hand and murmured. His eyes locked with your own. He inferred exactly what you were saying. Truly, you had been dropped off and there was no car in the parking lot. This was only a ploy to get you out of the next session and into the parking lot where the codes were being exchanged.

           “I’ll come with you.”

           You both got up out of your respective chairs and headed towards the parking lot. You were too far behind Marcus and Eric. You broke into a running pace with Bucky right on your heels. This could be too late already. You drew your gun and headed out the door. The hotel security guards were right behind you. Great… only making this more difficult.

           Bucky ignored the presences as they called to the both of you.

           Marcus and Eric stood by a black SUV. Marcus was taking a suitcase from Eric when you approached them. Marcus took the suitcase and Eric drew a gun quickly. Your blood ran cold. He didn’t even waste a second and fired a shot at you. Bucky jumped in front of you and blocked the bullet with his vibranium arm. It ricocheted off and hit the SUV with a metallic ping.

           You didn’t take a chance and shot Eric in the knee without a second thought. Marcus dropped the suitcase and raised a gun in one swift movement. Bucky fired towards Marcus, but missed by about two inches when he dodged it. You ducked behind a random white sedan as another shot came towards you. The security guards began encroaching in with their own guns drawn. Breathing heavily, Bucky yelled to the security guards to back off and listed off credentials.

           As he was distracted, you noticed Eric moving. His gun was too close to him from when he had fallen. You stepped toward him to disarm the man. You weren’t fast enough to get there before he would shoot you. The next moment shocked you. He didn’t aim for you. He aimed for Bucky who was not ready for a bullet. As if in slow motion, the gun fired. You screamed and jumped to take it. You were expecting it. He wasn’t. You could make it miss vital organs. You moved in front of Bucky and it hit your shoulder. The bullet lodged underneath your clavicle. You yelled in pain and fell to the ground. Everything went red for a few seconds… Then black. 

_______

           “What the hell happened?” Sam asked as he entered the waiting room where Bucky with his head in his hands. His face was red as if he’d been crying. His clothes were tattered. Dust and ripped holes scattered the fabric from his altercation with Eric and Marcus after Y/N got shot. Y/N had been in surgery for thirty minutes where they were pulling the bullet out of Y/N’s chest.

           Sam tried to push his anger down with in him.

           “You were supposed to protect her!” Sam grunted.

           “The hotel security got involved.” Bucky tried to explain. “They-.”

           “She still has a bullet in her!”

           Bucky went still. He knew that this was all his fault. Y/N had jumped in front of a bullet to save him. He’d noticed it the moment the guards tried to disarm him. The bullet hit Y/N’s chest and he was left to take down four people. He went into semi-Winter Soldier mode when you were shot. It brought out a rage in him that he hadn’t felt in a long time. This was all supposed to be a game. It wasn’t a game anymore.

           Your eyes opened slowly. You looked to your left and saw Bucky asleep in a chair next to you. A sharp pain radiated through your shoulder where the bullet had ripped through your skin. An IV was hooked up to your left arm. You shifted in the bed. Bucky’s eyes fluttered open.

           “Y/N!” He gasped. “I’ll go get a doctor.”

           “No, I’m okay.”

           “You nearly died.”

           “One bullet isn’t nearly dying, Bucky. You of all people should know that.” You smirked. “Where are Steve and Sam? I know you’re not here alone.”

           A bit of what Bucky thought was distain gleamed through your tone.

           “They are downstairs getting some food.” He muttered.

           “Oh, oka-.” You were about to continue when Bucky interrupted you.

           “Why’d you do it, Y/N?” He paused for an infinite moment. “I’m awful to you.”

You thought about it for a moment. Did you save him because you might actually love him after the mission? You may have regretted the sex. Was it because you thought it was just for show? Or because you truly liked him and wanted it to be something more.

“I would never let anyone die. You might drive me insane, but I see that there is good in you."

Bucky took in the words for a second then leaned over the guard rail of the hospital bed. He caught your eyes and noticed you weren’t pulling away. He lips fell onto yours. The kiss was gentler than what you had shared in the hotel room and on the dance floor. His lips formed over your own and your tongues collided. He moved together as he carefully avoided your shoulder. Bucky laced his fingers in your hair.

You heard a gasp and pulled apart to see Steve and Sam standing in the doorway with cups of coffee.

Sam chuckled, “Told you it would work.”

Thank you for reading. This is the last part in this series and I enjoyed writing it sooooooo much <3 Please give a like, reply, follow or reblog for more content in the future. Also, you can request to be added to the tag list! I also am taking one shot requests go ahead and  send your idea in to see it brought to life!

Tag List: @steveharrigntons @thebadassbitchqueen @farfromjustordinary @mela-noche @sstanbarnes @justab-eautifulmess @spideyycents @furiouscopshepherduniversity @sottisesreine @wintersoldat1943 @fookinsuckmecockmate

[shirtlesssammy]

4x02: Are You There God? It’s Me, Dean Winchester

Then:

Dean Winchester is saved

Now:

Olivia, a hunter, wakes to cold air and flickering lights. She runs for her shotgun just as Bobby leaves a message on her answering machine. 

Her EMF is going nuts as she patrols her house. Suddenly ghosts that she recognizes give her the one two punch and she’s a goner.

At Bobby’s, Dean is vehemently denying that he was “groped by an angel.” Bobby’s got lots of lore on angels, though. It seems they’re the only thing that could pull a human soul from Hell. 

Sam thinks it’s a good thing that Dean was saved “by one of the good guys.” And Dean wonders if there is a God. BABIES. Dean’s having a hard time believing there’s a god out there that personally believes in him. Oh, buddy, he cares just a little too much, I’d say. Dean’s self-loathing is off the charts though. And this is getting way ahead of myself here, but even though Chuck cares in the sense that Dean is a fun little puppet for him, it’s Cas that really cared all along. He believed in Dean so much, he gave up everything for this man. BIG SIGH. 

Dean demands pie before digging into the angel lore.

Sam runs off to forget get the pie, when he sees Ruby lurking. She wants to know if the angel stuff is real. Ruby’s scared for her demon life and takes off.

Sam gets back to Bobby’s in time for all three of them to take off to investigate why Olivia isn’t answering Bobby’s calls. Also, he forgot the pie.

They find Olivia disemboweled on her bedroom floor. And Bobby can’t get a hold of any nearby hunters. They check them out to find everyone dead. 

They need to get back to Bobby’s to regroup.

Sam’s getting gas for the Impala while Dean sleeps. He makes a pitstop in the gas station restroom. The room suddenly gets cold and Victor Henrickson appears!

He blames Sam for his death. He starts to attack Sam but Dean comes in with a save and a shotgun.

Bobby meanwhile is haunted by a couple giggling raggedy twin girls. Fun! 

Sam and Dean race back to Bobby’s. They can’t get a hold of him so they enter his house with shotguns ready. The boys separate and while Dean checks out the upstairs, Sam heads outside. 

Dean runs into the ghost of the woman who was once Meg Masters. 

She blames Dean for her possession...and Dean hates himself enough to actually believe it all. It wasn’t your fault, dude. Also, as much as they’ve learned about demon possession and all, if they would have met Meg at any point in the future, they would have just stabbed her with Ruby’s knife and she’d be dead anyway. Idk, saving people is good in theory, but hard in practice for these guys. I also know this is a manipulation. “Do you know what it’s like to be ridden for a month by pure evil?” HE DOES! Leave him alone! 

Meanwhile, Sam’s trying to find Bobby outside. He’s currently being held down by a couple scary ghost twins. 

Ghost of Meg continues to taunt Dean, and pins her sister’s suicide on him as well. MEG. NO.

Outside, Sam finds Bobby trapped in an old scrap car. He helps break him out and together they swing iron through the ghost girls. 

Dean drags himself away from Meg, and aims his gun at the iron chandelier up above. DAMN BOBBY that’s some fancy light fixture work! The chandelier smokes Meg out...for now. 

Back in Bobby’s living room, they realize that all the ghosts had a brand on their hands. Bobby hauls out the lore and leads the Winchesters down to...dun dun DUN...his safe room. 

We get the grand tour because this is the FIRST TIME WE’VE SEEN IT. This safe room has everything! Iron! Salt! Devil’s traps! Lore! Racy posters! Booze! Weapons! The vanished hopes and dreams of Dean Winchester! A cot complete with restraints! The Winchesters are impressed. 

Later, Dean breaks into a theological monologue while making salt bullets. My sweet sunshine! How dare you speak my love language! “If [God] doesn't exist...fine. Bad crap happens to good people. That's how it is. There's no rhyme or reason - just random, horrible, evil. I get it, okay? I can roll with that. But if he is out there, what's wrong with him? Where the hell is he while all these decent people are getting torn to shreds? How does he live with himself? You know, why doesn't he help?” (Because, sweetie, freedom is a length of rope and God LITERALLY wants you to hang yourself with it.)

Bobby finds the brand - it’s the “mark of the witness.” They’re ghosts forced to rise and destroy people. In fact, the Rising of the Witnesses is part of an ancient prophecy. A prophecy of...DOOM. It’s a sign of the apocalypse. Dean suggests coping with a series of wish-fulfillment trips including: Grand Canyon, Star Trek Experience, and the Bunny Ranch. Somebody please write me that fic. Instead of Dean’s plan, Bobby suggests running an ancient ritual to shut down the witnesses. To do so, they first have to race out of the panic room to gather ingredients before the ghosts have a chance to yank their insides outside. 

Ronald from the bank heist greets them at the stairs. Bobby blasts away Dean’s guilt ghost for him, and we cut to a montage of spell preparation. The three of them split up to fetch supplies. Ghosts appear to torment them. 

Meg appears to Sam, only she KNOWS more than she should. She knows about Sam’s fraternization with Ruby. 

In the kitchen, Victor appears to Dean. He reveals that after the Winchesters left, Lilith gruesomely tortured those left in the station for almost an hour before blowing up the place. While Dean absorbs this fun fact, Victor makes his move, plunging his hand into Dean’s chest.

Sam saves Dean just in time with a well-aimed salt round. They start the ritual, Bobby’s living room teeming with ghosts. Bobby chants while the Winchesters play shotgun whack-a-mole with the ghosts. Meg jabs a hand into Bobby’s chest. Bobby drops the bowl and Dean dives for it like it’s a football, then tosses the spell into the fire to finish the job. 

That night, Dean wakes from his slumber.

Castiel stands waiting for him (watching him sleep??) in the kitchen. He congratulates Dean on their triumph over the witnesses, and announces that he has already started doodling Mister Castiel Winchester in his notebooks! 

Dean feels a little raw about nearly dying (again) and wonders why angels are total dicks. “Read the bible,” Cas advises. “Angels are warriors of God.” Oh, and also? He’s not here to PERCH ON DEAN’S SHOULDER. Oh honey sweetie baby. 

Dean tries to read Cas the riot act and rails against God’s shitty parenting. 

Cas: The lord works…

Dean: If you say "mysterious ways" so help me, I will kick your ass

Cas warns Dean that big...no, cosmic things are afoot.

The Rising of the Witnesses is one of sixty-six seals that Lilith is busily unlocking. Each seal is a lock holding Lucifer in his cage. Dean has trouble believing that Lucifer is even REAL. Sassy Cas smiles. “Three days ago you thought there was no such thing as me.” 

Cas tells Dean that Heaven isn’t infinite. Angels have died in the battle so far, and more may be at risk. (Excuse me while I weep for the next twelve seasons. There have been 0 days since the last angel mishap.)

“You think the armies of Heaven should just follow you around?” Cas asks, telegraphing his series story arc. “You should show me some respect. I dragged you out of Hell. I can throw you back in.” Cas flaps out.

Dean wakes up for realsies. WAS IT ALL A DREAM? He asks Sam if he believes in the Devil…

You Should Show Me Some Quotes:

All I know is I was not groped by an angel

If there is a God out there, why would he give a crap about me?

When have I ever forgotten the pie?

Where’s the pie?

I thought angels were supposed to be guardians. Fluffy wings, halos -- you know, Michael Landon. Not dicks

 Want to read more? Check out our Recap Archive!

[zeta-in-de-walls]

is it still asking questions time?

no? um chile anyway-

What do you think of Techno’s and Tommy’s relationship before doomsday? Recently, I’ve been seeing these super in depth analysis of how they both used each other, how Techno was actually using Tommy and even to a degree manipulating (avoiding Tommy’s questions about making sure to not hurt Tubbo, saying he only saw Tommy as first as a tool but then when he tortured Connor he was worthy to join his team, etc) Tommy, and of course takes where Tommy was just using Techno, so I was wondering what you thought? Their relationship to me is super interesting, since they’re both loyal but in different ways, so I’d love your opinion.

Now, ignoring past relationships, what do you predict is going to happen with future relationships? Wilbur is planning something, obviously, and he’s planning on getting Dream out of prison, which means Warden Sam is making a reappearance. Do you have any predictions on thoughts on how that might go down? I feel like Sam has hit a massive breaking point, first letting Tommy in the prison, then cutting Ponk’s arm off, and now Ghostbur “dying” in the prison too, like something is going to happen to his character I think, either in making him realize the prison is horrible or the prison just gets blown up lmao, but I’d love to hear what you think! (Sorry, these are like 2 completely different and random questions haha)

also,,, can we have anon names? is that a thing,,, like,,, can i be pluto?

Of course! Hey there Pluto! ❤

(It's always asking questions time!)

Techno and Tommy's relationship pre-doomsday was pretty nice. The main issue is that Tommy was Not Alright. His perspective on everything had become really warped and he wasn't thinking clearly post-exile. He was acting on emotions and clinging to any sort of stability in his messed up world.

I would describe his time with Techno as a bit of a crutch. He was reliant on Techno for everything until he had gained enough strength to act for himself. He started to regain back his sense of self around the time of the festival. During this time, he had very little agency of his own, always asking Techno for direction and being desperate for both help and affection. The goal of regaining his disc similarly operated as a bit of an anchor, sometime to give him focus while he tried to sort out his feelings on both Dream and L'Manburg.

Techno was good in some ways, being caring and quietly offering his support though it was painful because Techno was so opposed to all his friends and his goals were revenge. Techno ended up enabling him some, influencing him to distrust his friends and to be a bit more aggressive. I wouldn't say this is really Techno's fault, he wasn't actively malicious or anything, like when he expressed his opinions on Tubbo he was being honest - but it still amounted to that scene where Tommy ran into Tubbo and called him a monster after seeing him for the first time since exile with Techno ransoming back his gear from him.

So, during this time, Tommy recovered a bit from exile which was good and Techno was fine for that - Tommy needed someone and Techno was there for him. But the relationship was ultimately doomed as Techno wasn't good for Tommy - Tommy at the festival reflected on his past actions and realised that he was becoming the villain he'd sworn never to be. (He had nightmares about WIlbur saying 'let's be the bad guys'). That's when he cut ties with Techno. It's not mentioned much, but Tommy actually apologised to Technoblade before switching sides, he may have not been good for Tommy in the long run but he had treated him well and he was sorry that he was doing this, but he had to, for his own sake.

I will say, that one issue in the relationship was of course how uneven it was. No one's fault for that really. Tommy was very vulnerable and Techno didn't fully respect him. Tommy is a character hungry for approval and the only approval he'd get from Techno would likely by becoming the very sort of person he wasn't. The value different things. Some of Techno's coments might've had an adverse affect on Tommy but I feel like they were generally meant to be lighter banter from Techno's side but Tommy was in a fragile condition.

I really liked Tommy standing up for himself and leaving at the Festival. It was sucha powerful moment for him to decided things for himself and really confront who he'd become and what he wanted as he regained his agency even though it was painful and meant hurting/betraying the person who'd been there for him at his lowest. It wasn't personal, though and I love that Tommy chose his path for himself. He's fantastic.

Hmmmm.... I'm not sure about the future. I truly have no idea where Dream's character could possibly go. I'm thinking it'll heavily involve Quackity's storyline, I am so uncomfortable with both Dream in general and the daily torture so it needs some sort of resolution. Wilbur challenging the prison system in general would be something cool, maybe challenging Quackity, I kinda see them as potential rivas, as he starts building something new. My greatest hope would be for Tommy to play peacemaker to try and temper Wilbur with these two hopefully starting to become closer again. I want him and Sam to start reconciling if it's at all possible too. I want them to be closer once more. Something like Sam or Wilbur saving Tommy's life and choosing him over power even for a moment would mean the world to me.

But who knows with this SMP? Whatever happens, I trust it will be exciting!

Cheers for both questions!

[deans-haunted-baby]

Lately I can’t stop thinking about Adam, like I’m legit crushed over what this show did to him. I know Supernatural was never perfect but the way it treated this character was so damn vicious, condescending and nasty; no different than a high school bully picking on an injured elementary schooler.

He never stood a chance. The thing is I don’t know what it was that made me latch onto Adam so strongly for over a decade. Maybe I could just sympathize and easily relate to his situation of being discarded and forgotten by family members. Or maybe I saw potential in this character and couldn’t fathom why no one else on that writing staff and the SPN fandom couldn’t.

I want you to take a second and absorb these pertinent facts about Adam Milligan that this show put forward. This is not anti-anything this is all the truth so bare with me:

He was the illegitimate youngest child of hunter John Winchester; a man who treated his older sons Sam and Dean like soldiers on his platoon.

Adam only saw his bio dad ONCE A YEAR and it was only to take him to ball games not to train him so that he could protect himself and his mother from (supernatural) threats.

He never knew the existence of his older brothers nor did they know about him because John deliberately ripped those pages out of his journal. Essentially trying to erase any evidence of Adam and Kate.

Because Adam grew up having no clue what was out there or about the “family business”  he and his mother suffered VIOLENT PRE-MATURE DEATHS at the hands of ghouls which Adam STILL REMEMBERS long after being murdered.

Oh and John failed to kill those ghouls, providing them the golden opportunity of impersonating him and his mother so they could kill John and his half-brothers.

Adam was only an 18 year old pre-med studying medicine. Probably wanted to follow in his mother’s footsteps in helping people as she was a nurse.

Because Kate worked nights as a single mother, Adam had to grow up being his own parent at times; cooking his own meals and putting himself to bed.

Adam was ironically born on September 29th (1990) which is also known as Michaelmas aka the Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel and Raphael. A potential storyline that could’ve gone somewhere but didn’t.

Adam is also by birthright a Men of Letters legacy though his brothers fail to mention that 10 years later.

The last thing Adam was doing while he was in Heaven, designed to look like his Prom, he was kissing a girl Kristen McGee; whom we’ll never know about or if he’ll ever see again.

Adam was ripped out of Heaven against his will by the angels to be used and manipulated as their backup device in the Apocalypse because Sam and Dean refused to comply with their demands.

After being resurrected, Adam was then recovered, kidnapped and held hostage by TFW (Sam, Dean, Bobby and Castiel) where they all took turns mouthing off at this angsty teenager about why he should trust a bunch of complete strangers over those who made him promises.

Adam only wanted to work with the angels in order to stop Lucifer and return to his mother. Highlighting that this character had a sense of justice, responsibility, cared about doing the right thing but also had his own reasons for wanting to save the world.

Sam tried to emotionally manipulate Adam with excuses for why their dad never told him about his family. And actually had the gall to say that him and Dean would’ve looked for him had they’d known he existed so they could be a family. Forgive me if I just laugh at this for a moment 🤣

Zachariah was able to get into Adam’s head because he knew how vulnerable he was. Telling him that trusting the Winchesters would only let him down which *SPOILER ALERT* turned out to be true.

Zachariah tortured Adam for hours before the Winchesters arrived to save him. And Dean was only willing to submit to the angel when Sam was just briefly tortured.

One of the last things Dean says to Adam in 5x18 after he was shocked to see his half-brothers come to his rescue was “Cause you’re family”. Again I have to...🤣🤣

At the moment of their escape, Dean doesn’t even help Adam (WHO’D BEEN INJURDED AND TORTURED) out of the room nor does he care about ushering him to safety. Dean just grabs Sam and hurries out the door. So much for being part of the family.

The last thing Adam screams before before being possessed by Michael was “Dean, help!” and then he hears Dean say “Just hold on!”

Adam, not being Michael’s true vessel yet born from the powerful Winchester bloodline, was able to look directly at the archangel’s true form without his eyes burning out. And this is NEVER explained why.

Dean mentions Adam only a total of THREE TIMES after this happens in 5x19, 5x22 and 6x11 while Castiel mentions it to Sam in 5x21. And Sam, WHO’D BEEN THE MAIN EMOTIONAL MANIPULATOR, just doesn’t give a shit to remember him.

Castiel threw a Molotov cocktail at Michael (who was using Adam’s body) to briefly cast him out which Adam probably felt in excruciating detail based on what Michael says in 15x08.

Sam, possessed by Lucifer, pushed himself and his innocent half-brother possessed by Michael into the cage for all eternity.

Castiel somehow managed to pull Sam out of the cage but decided to leave Adam behind.

After Dean bargains with Death to get Sam’s soul and Adam out of the cage. Only to get just Sam’s soul and leave Adam to his fate. The issue is never brought up again between the Winchesters.

Adam sits a prisoner in a cage with an archangel for 10 years our time but thousands of years Hell time.

Michael most likely protected Adam from some of the horrors in Hell which is why he was able to keep his sanity.

Sam and Dean went to Hell to talk to Lucifer in the cage but continue to ignore Adam’s existence and don’t bother releasing him yet they let Lucifer escape.

Dean also went back to Hell to retrieve Bobby’s soul so he could go to Heaven and again doesn’t even bother with Adam.

Season 10 for Supernatural’s 200th episode, Sam and Dean were reminded by SPN fans putting on a musical that Adam was still in the cage yet THEY NEVER DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT.

Mary Winchester STILL doesn’t know about Adam even though she was reunited with John during the 300th episode. He’s never mentioned during their big family get-together. I guess he never counted.

Adam and Michael are finally set free of Hell only because Chuck threw a giant hissy fit at the Winchesters and opened all the gateways.

The first thing Adam wanted to do as a free man in 15x08 was not seeking revenge on his brothers for abandoning him, but to eat some diner food, change his clothes and get a “little job”

After years of imprisonment, Adam actually befriended the Prince of Heaven aka the one friend he has/the only other person besides his mother who actually gave a damn about him.

TFW trapped, kidnapped and imprisoned Adam and Michael at the bunker in order to force them to help against Chuck.

And Adam, though still angry, hurt and worn out over the situation; chose to help his brothers when there was NOTHING in it for him and successfully convinced Michael to do the same.

Despite how his brothers treated him, Adam STILL believed in their best and vouched that they “always try to do the right thing”

Adam went to Hell a cranky, sassy, angsty, naïve teenager and returned a kinder, wiser, more patient, humble and rational-thinking man who still managed to smile and laugh after enduring centuries of pain.

Dean gives Adam his much due apology for not saving him but Sam doesn’t. In fact Sam doesn’t even bring him up the next time the Winchesters see each other.

Adam’s last words on this show are to Dean and they’re “Since when do we get what we deserve?” and “Good luck” 🤓

Chuck Thanos-snapped Adam’s soul out of existence OFF-SCREEN yet Michael somehow remained in his body.

Adam was 90% of Michael’s impulse control hence why he was so dark in his last appearance without Adam because that’s the only way I can cope with that disgusting character assassination in 15x19

Jack supposedly revived Adam along with everyone else after becoming the new God. BUT his current status now reads “Unknown” instead of “Alive” so what the fuck am I suppose to think now?!

Sam and Dean didn’t even think about checking in on Adam to make sure he was okay before they hit the road on their last solo bro-outing.

If Adam really is alive then he’s doomed to a miserable, lonely existence without his best friend (who’s now dead). Broke, homeless, jobless; his brothers STILL DON’T GIVE A RAT’S ASS after he’d helped them in good faith. He’s legally deceased thanks to the ghouls. And he gets to look forward to demon city the moment he dies cause guess where he’s ending up?

No one remembers him even after he’d returned in 15x08

The car and the dog are more important to the Winchesters than their innocent half-brother.

Okay I realize I just unloaded a whole mountain of salt but this is the full outline of Adam’s tragic story on Supernatural. These writers never cared about him and why? What did he do to deserve this gross treatment from the show’s protagonists or just in general? Why was he even introduced if this was going to be the outcome of it all? I don’t know what’s worse leaving him in Hell (cause at least he had Michael for company) or bringing him back and not knowing what became of him after. It’s insufferable 😣 I just want everyone to know that the showrunners and writers may not care about him BUT I DO.

[pandoraborn]

Cruelty of the Beast - Part 15

( previous. )

-----

Characters: c!Puffy, c!Quackity, c!Tubbo Word count: 2069 words Content: major character death (referring to Tommy’s prison death), grief, memorials, manhandling, quackity talks sense into tubbo, talk of war, impending doom, dragons, war is coming

-----

Nothing can ever go right in this place. Tubbo has never felt more angry or isolated in his life, with no one close he can fall back on. It had always either been him and Tommy, or him and Ranboo. Ranboo had already made it clear that he was sticking with Dream, but had left Tommy’s situation vague.

Tubbo is tired of arguing with everyone over it. He’s tired of everyone telling him to move on from Tommy, and it shows in the way he keeps his back pressed against the wall, with a crying Michael clinging to his leg. It shows in the way Tubbo is glaring furiously at Puffy with tears forming in his eyes. He’s seconds away from grabbing a weapon and lashing out at her.

“I can’t watch you do this to yourself anymore!” She cries out. “It’s killing all of us, you need to open  your eyes, please!”

“I don’t know when all of you decided to give up on Tommy, but I sure as hell am not.” Tubbo’s voice is flat as he tightens his grip on Michael. Having to explain to the toddler that his papa isn’t ever coming home was bad enough, Tubbo doesn’t want to have to explain about Uncle Tommy, either. “What’s happened to you, Puffy? You swore you’d protect him. You swore you’d never give up on him. So now that he got into one fight with Quackity, suddenly he needs to be treated like some war criminal? Remember what happened last time we isolated him?”

“Tubbo, I know. I really don’t think this is a misunderstanding this time.”

“It’s always a misunderstanding!” Tubbo snarls. His lip curls back as his hands tremble. “Everything everyone feels about Tommy is one giant misunderstanding! No one ever actually pays attention to him! You think I’m going to turn my back on him? I’ve already done that, I’m not doing it again.”

“Tubbo, he threatened Quackity,” Puffy tries to reason. “He plainly said he wasn’t coming home. We have to assume he’s working with Dream and Wilbur.”

“I’m calling bullshit,” Tubbo snaps. “Tommy hates both of them. He also hates Technoblade. Quackity up and disappeared for months without telling any of us what he was up to. His lands words were even ‘don’t trust anyone’. Why would I trust him?”

“Because he was there, Tubbo. He spoke to Tommy, to Ranboo, to Techno...we have to trust him on this.”  Puffy pulls back to text someone on her communicator. Without thinking, Tubbo snatches it from her hands and tosses it hard against the opposite wall. The noise has Michael crying even more louder.

“Tubbo!”

“I’m not falling for this bullshit,” Tubbo snarls. “I’ll break it again if you dare insinuate Tommy went and allied himself with the people who hurt him the most. We’re his friends. It’s up to us to save him and bring him back.” Crouching down, Tubbo wraps his arms around his son, holding him tightly. Michael whimpers.

“Papa,” Michael whines. “Where’s Papa?”

“It’s okay,” Tubbo whispers. “Daddy’s got you. You’re safe with me.” A pointed glare is aimed in Puffy’s direction. “Puffy was just leaving.”

“No,” she responds. “You need someone, I’m not leaving you alone to deal with this anymore. We have to face the truth.”

“There is no truth,” he mutters. Tubbo at least stands up, gently pulling away from Michael .”I need to put my son to bed, and you need to leave. I don’t want  you here anymore.”

There’s no sound from her as she picks up the communicator. It’s not completely broken, but the screen is cracked and hard to read right now. Puffy tries to brush away some of the dust.

“Tubbo, I really want to help you.”

“Unless your help is trying to find and bring my best friend back home, I don’t want it.” They stare each other down. Tubbo doesn’t hear his door opening and closing. He doesn’t hear the footsteps until a hand snatches him by his shirt and slams him roughly against the wall.

Tubbo winces, stifling back a yelp of pain as he stares into Quackity’s eyes. “Tubbo, I’m going to tell it to you straight. The Tommy we knew died in that prison. As far as we’re concerned, Tommy is dead. You need to open your eyes, Tubbo, and come to terms with the fact that we’re all you have left. Your best friend? Your husband? They’re gone, and they’re not coming back.”

“No.”

“Puffy, take the runt upstairs,” Quackity instructs. “Tubbo and I are going for a walk.” Quackity doesn’t wait for her to respond as he drags Tubbo outside. “I want to show you something,” he continues.

Tubbo struggles to keep up, forcing his feet to keep moving. Quackity had become far stronger in his bizarre absences, and admittedly, Tubbo is scared of him. He doesn’t dare try to pull away though, rather letting Quackity drag him around.

They continue moving until they’re at the memorial Tubbo had built. Tubbo doesn’t want to be here, he wants to go back home. This place brings back awful memories that he’d tried so hard to suppress, and it’s like Quackity is forcing Tubbo to relive all the trauma and agony that had brought them to this point.

“Read the sign, Tubbo.”

He tries to turn his head away. “No, I can’t.” It’s not a stretch, his eyes are already blurring. “Please let me go.”

The older man shoves him forward hard enough that he almost trips and face-plants into the sign. “Read it, Tubbo!”

With shaky breath, Tubbo blinks in an attempt to clear his vision long enough to focus on the sign. “In..in the memory of T-Tommy...” Everything is threatening to spill over. Gripping the edges the stone the sign’s placed on, Tubbo tries to still his trembling body. It’s not working. It’s also not stopping the flood of memories that come back.

From Tommy being exiled.

Dream manipulating Tubbo.

Dream humiliating Tubbo in front of everyone.

Tubbo giving up and accepting defeat...

Losing Tommy to death.

“He...he was take-taken from us too soon.” Tubbo’s breath is barely a wheeze as he finishes. This is just as embarrassing as being told  he sucked in front of the entire server. Back then, he hadn’t cried. This time, he’s barely holding himself together.

“Why did you build this?” Quackity asks.

“Because he was dead...he was killed in the prison.”

Quackity lets down, sitting down on the bench. He does pull Tubbo down with him. “I’ve been poking around Tubbo. I found this, and I found other memorials for Tommy. Statues, that Puffy, Eret and other people built. He was great to all of us.”

“So why...” Tubbo pauses to swipe his sleeve across his face. “Why doesn’t anyone care enough anymore to save him? He’s...”

“He was my best friend too, at one point.” Quackity’s voice is more gentle. “There was a time I’d have done anything for him. But the Tommy I encountered just now isn’t the Tommy I knew. He wasn’t anyone’s Tommy. He was mean and harsh, and he knew exactly what he was doing and who he was siding with.”

“I don’t understand.” It’s as if all the anger had evaporated. Tubbo hates Quackity’s approach, he hates the manhandling, but even Tubbo has to admit it’s more effective than Puffy’s mothering approach. It doesn’t mean he understands anything. He probably never will.

“Tommy died, Tubbo. He died in the prison, and he came back at Dream’s hand. We have to assume that Dream fucked with him somehow in a way we can’t fix, because otherwise we’re all going to be asking the same questions forever, and I don’t want to spend the rest of my life asking why.”

“But...it’s Tommy. We can’t just...”

“Tommy’s dead, Tubbo. You didn’t spent time making this entire memorial for him only for it to be thrown back in your face. Puffy didn’t build a statue of him only for him to threaten me. None of us mourned his death, only for him to pick Dream. He’s dead, and gone, and we have to assume that the new Tommy is some imposter.”

For the first time since the prison break, Tubbo feels his heart breaking. He’d been living in denial for so long, always holding out hope that one of his two soul mates would come rushing back to him. Even after meeting with Ranboo, Tubbo had held some tiny sliver of hope that Ranboo would’ve changed his mind and come running back.

But deep down inside, Tubbo had always known. He’d always known that there was no going back, that the prison break had just been the beginning of the end.

Leaning against Quackity, Tubbo swallows back a sob. He’s not going to cry now, that’s better saved for when he’s alone with only Michael to hear him. Right now, he needs to be the tactician. At least Quackity’s pulling him in for a hug.

“I’m sorry, Tubbo,” Quackity whispers. “You still have us. The entire SMP is always on your side, you know this.”

“We need a plan.”

“I talked to Sam already,” Quackity says. Sitting up straight, Tubbo clears his throat, trying to compose himself. “Sam’s already making weapons, and he’s already spread the word to others. Eret’s making preparations to protect the kingdom.”

“I need to fortify Snowchester.” Tubbo clears his throat again before standing up. Priority one is getting away from this stupid memorial. The thought of burning it to the ground crosses his mind. “I can’t let anything happen to Michael.”

“So, talk to people. You have allies, Tubbo. You have Puffy, Sam, me, probably Jack. Eret, and so many others who are willing to pick up a weapon and fight.”

“I have an armory.” Tubbo’s eyes glisten.

“What are you talking about?”

“I have all of Dream’s stuff. His armor, some weapons, and even some potions. God apples.”

Quackity stares at him for a moment.

“I even have nukes,” Tubbo finishes in a whisper.

“They have tons of explosions,” Quackity says slowly. “But I don’t think even they can fight back if we use a nuke.”

Tubbo wags a finger, narrowing his eyes. “No, this is going to be on my terms. I’m not launching one at people we still care about. Just because they’ve decided to start some civil war doesn’t mean we’re just going to kill them. I want care and precision with this.” He turns to walk back toward Snowchester. “I have to think about my son first and foremost.”

“Okay, wait,” Quackity says. “How many people know you have nukes? I can tell-”

“Not many,” admits Tubbo. “Jack knows. T...oh, shit.” Tubbo’s eyes open wide as he stops in place. No, freezes completely. “No, no no no, shit!”

“Tubbo, what’s wrong?” Quackity, alarmed, grabs at Tubbo’s arm and shakes him. “Talk to me! What’s wrong?”

“Tommy and Ranboo,” Tubbo whispers. “They both know.”

There’s a long pause before the realization catches up to the older man. “Tubbo! You realize they could come here a...” he trails off.

In the distance, the prison alarms sound. They had since been rewired to alert Sam of intruders into the SMP, programming them to announce the arrival of hostile enemies. The alarms sounding now doesn’t mean anything good for the SMP or any of the aligning territories.

Quackity slowly turns back to Tubbo, gripping him tighter. With a whine, Tubbo yanks back, turning to march back toward Snowchester again.

Following close behind, Quackity glances in the direction of the prison. His blood is freezing in his veins at the thought of what’s to come.

“Tubbo, there’s no time for care and precision anymore. We have no time to prepare for anything.”

“I know,” Tubbo murmurs. “Quackity, Ranboo insinuated something to me that I didn’t understand til now.”

“What?”

“They have a dragon.”

“How..” Quackity swallows. “How the fuck do you know that from whatever vague words he said to you? You can’t possibly piece-” he’s cut off when Tubbo points. It’s dark as shit and hard to make out anything in the night sky, but Quackity follows his finger toward the prison.

In the distance, barely outlined, is the shape of something that’s only growing bigger. Big enough that Quackity can now hear the roar.

“Tubbo?” He hums as he reaches into his pack for his sword. “Get the nukes.”

[kissingcullens]

Sam killing Dean at the end of the show is so big brained, thank you for sharing it with us

Listen!!

They could never pull it off, but if it was done WELL, I think that would have been amazing. Again, in a perfect world, I personally would have preferred a happy ending and atonement from Dean...

...and TBH my gut instinct is that having Sam kill Dean himself would be too fucking brutal, if only for how much that would fuck Sam up... (haha, unless...? 👀)

...but if the writers “always knew they wanted to kill Dean...” smh! They could have really gotten some flavor and some DRAMA by making Dean Vs. Sam the final conflict??

Maybe under the leadership or manipulation of somebody else, maybe not... idk how it would happen but of course it would have to have a good amount of buildup; a few seasons at least- and it would have to be done in such a way where both men have powerful motivation so that the audience FEELS the conflict and it feels genuine and inevitable.

But what could be more climactic, personal and impactful for the FINAL season than to finally have that battle between Sam & Dean the writers kept flirting with and flinching away from!?

Silver vs. Flint!! Betrayal! Drama!! Tragedy!!! Brothers on opposite sides of a divide too great to cross... Dean knowing Sam so well that it’s easy to anticipate his next move, and vice versa...

Like the way that the central conflict in the series was so often Sam and Dean being pitted against one another- (Lucifer vs. Michael obviously, and they had a whole thing about the goddamn Mark of Cain for gods sakes; the original fratricide)

-and how much of their dynamic is Sam shrinking to fit into this box of acceptable behavior to avoid violence from Dean, while Dean loses sight of his original justifications for his own violence (to protect Sam, to protect people...)

The way that in S1 John told Dean “You will have to either save your brother, or you will have to kill him.”

The way S4 Dean said he’d rather let Sam die than allow him to be a monster... the many Sam stand-in characters that Dean murders or tries to kill, like Amy, Cyrus, Jack, the Rugarou, etc...

And that becomes an overarching theme for the show, and we see a Dean who, for whatever reason, comes to believe that he and Sam are on opposite sides of a conflict... planning to do something SO heinous that Sam finally believes that Dean is out of control and needs to be stopped. (Maybe it involves Jack?? Or even the return of Amy’s young son, who would be a teenager or a young adult by now...)

The way that the show could expand on how Dean’s tragic flaw; the thing that Dooms him, is that he can’t grow beyond the tiny box that Hunting and his father have put him in, and that he would even kill his beloved baby brother to maintain that status quo... as long as Dean cannot accept otherness or ambiguity, he and Sam are inevitably fated to clash.

Dean becomes his father... becomes even worse than his father, because for Dean, Hunting and annihilating the Other becomes THE End Goal in itself, and his motives and moral qualms get obliterated one by one as with each hunt he crosses his own boundaries of morality...

And yeah, maybe there’s a huge fight, or maybe Dean accepts another possession-style bargain, or maybe Sam just chooses to side with the Monstrous and they fall out and Dean hardens his heart against his brother. (“I don’t have a brother.”)

OH and you know how you can compare “first and last scenes” for parallels?

What if the last fight was Dean breaking into Sam’s living space, just like he did 15 years earlier when he was just a young man breaking into his baby brother’s apartment in the middle of the night... but this time it’s with deadly intent.

And Sam’s original goal to escape his abusive family (a family that is unable to accept him, and equally unwilling to let him go) finally comes to its shocking and inevitable, violent conclusion. So good!

It would be tragic of course; maybe Dean has his Darth Vader moment where he flips at the last moment and saves Sam from the villain sneaking up to stab him in the back and sustains a fatal wound himself, and you have that heartbreaking scene dying in your brother’s arms, repenting... the pain!? The DRAMA!!!

[destieltropecollection]

Destiel Trope Collection Day 25: Slow Burn

The difference between living and existing (WIP) | @lucy-is-alive

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6052 Main Tags/Warnings: John Winchester's A+ parenting, College AU, Sexuality crisis, PTSD, Childhood trauma, Recreational drug use, Angst and hurt/comfort Summary: As soon as he got the chance, Dean left his father behind and went to college. However, he never anticipated that the absence of the person who had disrupted his entire life would make it worse. With the help of his friends, he tries to navigate through the emotional hurricane that comes with complex PTSD.

Celestial | @deservetobesaved

Rating: Mature Word Count: 10585 Main Tags/Warnings: slow burn, mutual pining, fluff, emotional affair, bottom!dean Summary: Dean is in a less than stellar marriage, but he assumes things will work themselves out. At the same time, Mr. Castiel Novak becomes his new co-worker at school and Dean has to rethink everything he thought he had figured out.

Welcome to the Badlands (WIP) | @cr-noble-writes

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 15386 Main Tags/Warnings: graphic violence, dystopian au, fusion, into the badlands au, slow burn Summary: The wars were so long ago, nobody even remembers. Darkness and fear ruled until the time of the Barons, seven men and women who forged order out of the chaos. People flocked to them for protection. That protection became servitude. They banished guns and trained armies of lethal fighters they called Clippers. This world is built on blood. Nobody is innocent here. Welcome to the Badlands.

Profound Kisses | @verobatto-angelxhunter

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 20700 Main Tags/Warnings: Destiel, post 8x07 canon divergent, mutual pining, explicit sexual content, angst with a happy ending, clueless! Castiel, pining!Dean, Top!Dean, Bottom!Cas, slow burn, love confessions, first kiss, french kiss, Sammy knows. Summary: Dean knows he's screwed. He discovers he is in love with Castiel in Purgatory, and now he can't even have the angel in front of him, because he knows it's a one sided love. It’s Valentine's day and Dean tries very hard to hook up as always, but he can't get Cas out of his mind. So he drives back to the motel, drunk, and he finds Castiel trying to help him. Then, when Dean asks Castiel for some experimental kisses and the angel accepts, Dean starts a very dangerous game… finding in Castiel's kisses the most delicious experiences, but also, his own perdition. Will Castiel fall in love with him? Or will he stay emotionless as always?

Hate me, but love me too | @notfunnydean

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 23310 Main Tags/Warnings: Virgin!Dean,f hate spell, hate curse, younger!dean, older!sam, Grace Sharing, First Kiss, First Time, Hate Sex, Dubious Consent, Mildly Dubious Consent, Cas is cursed, (not really MCD but Cas isn't alive in the beginning), Castiel has sex with somebody else in the beginning(and Dean sees it), Heartbreakbut I will fix it! Summary: Dean’s whole life changes when his mother tells him that John isn’t his biological father and he needs to save the world from his sibling Adam, who is the King of Hell. But he can’t do that alone, he needs the best Hunter earth had, Castiel Novak.

Starstruck (WIP) | @peanutbutterjelly-pie

Rating: Teen & Up Word Count: 40860 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe, Fluff, Slow Burn, Actor Dean, Single Parent Castiel, Pining Summary: From the outside Castiel Novak looks like a regular guy: a good job, two teenage kids, a nice house and a crappy car he’s way too attached to. But there’s one thing no one knows about him: that, over twenty years ago, he used to live next to no other than Dean Winchester – back then a brash and loud-mouthed boy and nowadays a huge movie star and Hollywood’s sweetheart. Castiel never bothered to tell anyone about his childhood friend because frankly, who would believe him? Probably even Dean himself already forgot about his former awkward and weird neighbor, so Castiel seriously doesn’t see any point in mentioning the whole thing ever. But then an interview on national TV happens where Dean reveals way more about his past than ever before … and Castiel - as well as the rest of the world - suddenly realizes that he left a much bigger impact on Dean’s life than he originally thought.

Letter to Dean Winchester (WIP) | @castielsangel-blade

Rating: Mature Word Count: 44182 Main Tags/Warnings: Past Lisa/Dean, Past Aaron/Dean, Past Castiel/Dean, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, Mentions of Past Cheating, Mentions of Past Toxic Relationship, Gray Romantic Castiel, Asexual Castiel, Epistolary, Bisexual Dean Summary: Castiel writes and sends a letter to Dean Winchester. He wants closure for the toxic relationship they had in high school.

Falling Apart | @cr-noble-writes

Rating: Teen & Up Word Count: 49204 Main Tags/Warnings: minor character death, sam deceased when fic starts, alcoholism, drug misuse, addiction, rehab au, soulmate au, flashbacks, ptsd Summary: Sword & Cross Resident Rehabilitation is a last-ditch effort for Dean Winchester to move past the drug and drinking problems he developed to bury his guilt over the fire that killed his brother. Not to mention the wild visions and smoky, sentient shadows that have plagued him his entire life. It's supposed to be the best Savannah has to offer, but one look at the crumbling tile floors and dangling crown mouldings, and Dean has his doubts. Enter Castiel Novak. He’s rude, aloof, and a total dick from the moment they lay eyes on each other but Dean can’t help but feel a mysterious connection to the man. Maybe he really has lost his mind. But when Castiel starts making appearances in Dean’s vivid visions of the past, he knows there is more to their link than meets the eye. Even if Cas keeps telling him otherwise. It seems everyone at Sword & Cross knows what’s going on except for Dean. Trying to conquer his mountain of guilt and doubt and figure out the connection he is certain he shares with Castiel is only made harder by the “accidents” that seem to follow him. Not to mention his attraction to Gadreel. Whatever secret Castiel is trying so hard to keep, Dean knows he has to uncover it.

Will you be my ten inch hero? | @notfunnydean

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 57468 Main Tags/Warnings: Bullying, Homophobic Language, Abusive John Winchester, Canon-Typical Violence, Smut, giving a baby to adoption (not between Destiel), Rape/Non-con Elements, John kicked Dean out, Virgin!Dean, surprise guest appereance, Minor Crowley (Supernatural)/Bobby Singer, Minor Charlie Bradbury/Jo Harvelle, Minor Rowena MacLeod/Gabriel, two surprise pairings, not Ketch or Mick Davies friendly Summary: When John Winchester kicks Dean out, after he saw him kissing another boy, and Dean sees that Sam has a perfect life at Stanford without him, Dean starts a new life in Santa Cruz. He works at a tiny shop as a cook, has found some friends there, and is overall happy enough. That changes when Castiel comes into his shop and his Co-worker Azara, who has a different man every night, starts flirting with him right in front of Dean. Not that he would be jealous or anything, but there is something about Castiel that makes him weak in the knees. Only that Castiel would never want him back, right?

Roll With It | @saltnhalo

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 72818 Main Tags/Warnings: Fake/Pretend Relationship, Boss/Employee Relationship, Secretary Dean, Alternate Universe - Not Hunters, The Proposal AU, Alternate Universe, Romantic Comedy, Romance, Editor Castiel, Fluff and Angst, Sam Winchester at Stanford, POV Alternating, Geek Dean, Russian Castiel, Sharing a Bed, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Top Castiel, Bottom Dean, Misunderstandings, Tattooed Castiel, Love Confessions, Slow Burn Summary: For two years, Dean’s been slaving away beneath his boss – many label him a secretary, but he fucking hates that and feels like it only applies to someone wearing a pencil skirt, so he insists on his title of Executive Assistant. And for what? In the vain hope that one day he’ll manage to become an editor for Sandover Publishing, and that he’ll see the manuscript that he’s slaved over since college finally realized in print. That’s the dream, anyway. Right now, he’s fucking late. Dean wants to be an editor. Castiel just wants to stay in the country. ‘The Proposal’ – as you’ve never seen it before.

When the Magnolias bloom (WIP) | @flurryflair

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 92951 Main Tags/Warnings: slow burn, angst with a happy ending, mutual pining, human!Castiel, divorce, infidelity, middle aged destiel, explicit sexual content, top Castiel/bottom Dean Winchester, top Dean Winchester/bottom Castiel, POV alternating, unresolved sexual tension, denial of feelings, porn with feelings, anxiety attacks, manipulative relationship, unhealthy coping mechanisms, canon-typical violence, case fic, bisexual!Dean, demisexual!Castiel, semi-canon, minor Castiel/OMC, minor Dean Winchester/Lisa Braeden Summary: It's been ten years since the Apocalypse. Ten years without talking, without knowing one another. Castiel has a company to handle and a wedding to plan, Dean has a broken marriage and a decision to make. They have separate lives, lovers and families of their own, they aren't supposed to meet again, to mess it all up. And yet they do, when they least expect it, and maybe when they most need it. A story about second chances, about hope and resilience, and a love that feels both doomed and inevitable.

Unsung Melody (WIP) | @toomanyships-sendhelp

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 177617 Main Tags/Warnings: Canon Character Death, AU Slaves, Slow Burn Summary: Dean runs a busy bar and grill in Lebanon, Kansas. Semi-retired from hunting, he'll still catch a case when one blows his way or the urge to hunt strikes him again. It isnt until a case that opened decades ago claims another victim and Dean has to get back in the game a little more than he expected.

[dillydedalus]

january reading

why does january always feel like it’s 3 months long. anyway here’s what i read in january, feat. poison experts with ocd, ants in your brain, old bolsheviks getting purged, and mountweazels. 

city of lies, sam hawke (poison wars #1) this is a perfectly nice fantasy novel about jovan, who serves as essentially a secret guard against poisoning for his city state’s heir and is forced to step up when his uncle (also a secret poison guard) and the ruler are both killed by an unknown poison AND also the city is suddenly under a very creepy siege (are these events related? who knows!) this is all very fine & entertaining & there are some fun ideas, but also... the main character has ocd and SAME HAT SAME HAT. also like the idea of having a very important, secret and potentially fatal job that requires you to painstakingly test everything the ruler/heir is consuming WHILE HAVING OCD is like... such a deliciously sadistic concept. amazing. 3/5

my heart hemmed in, marie ndiaye (translated from french by jordan stump) a strange horror-ish tale in which two married teachers, bastions of upper-middle-class respectability and taste, suddenly find themselves utterly despised by everyone around them, escalating until the husband is seriously injured. through several very unexpected twists, it becomes clear that the couple’s own contempt for anyone not fitting into their world and especially nadia’s hostility and shame about her (implied to be northern african) ancestry is the reason for their pariah status. disturbing, surprising, FUCKED UP IF TRUE (looking back, i no longer really know what i mean by that). 4/5

xenogenesis trilogy (dawn/adulthood rites/imago), octavia e. butler octavia butler is incapable of writing anything uninteresting and while i don’t always completely vibe with her stuff, it’s always fascinating & thought-provoking. this series combines some of her favourite topics (genetic manipulation, alien/human reproduction, what is humanity) into a tale of an alien species, the oankali, saving some human survivors from the apocalypse and beginning a gene-trading project with them, integrating them into their reproductive system and creating mixed/’construct’ generations with traits from both species. and like, to me, this was uncomfortably into the biology = destiny thing & didn’t really question the oankali assertion that humans were genetically doomed to hierarchical behaviour & aggression (& also weirdly straight for a book about an alien species with 3 genders that engages in 5-partner-reproduction with humans), so that angle fell flat for me for the most part, altho i suppose i do agree that embracing change, even change that comes at a cost, is better than clinging to an unsustainable (& potentially destructive) purity. where i think the series is most interesting is in its exploration of consent and in how far consent is possible in extremely one-sided power dynamics (curiously, while the oankali condemn and seem to lack the human drive for hierarchy, they find it very easy to abuse their position of power & violate boundaries & never question the morality of this. in this, the first book, focusing on a human survivor first encountering the oankali and learning of their project, is the most interesting, as lilith as a human most explicitly struggles with her position - would her consent be meaningful? can she even consent when there is a kind of biochemical dependence between humans and their alien mates? the other two books, told from the perspectives of lilith’s constructed/mixed children, continue discussing themes of consent, autonomy and power dynamics, but i found them less interesting the further they moved from human perspectives. on the whole: 2.5/5

love & other thought experiments, sophie ward man, we love a pierre menard reference. anyway. this is a novel in stories, each based (loosely) on a thought experiment, about (loosely) a lesbian couple and their son arthur, illness and grief, parenthood, love, consciousness and perception, alternative universes, and having an ant in your brain. it is thoroughly delightful & clever, but goes for warmth and humanity (or ant-ity) over intellectual games (surprising given that it is all about thought experiments - but while they are a nice structuring device i don’t think they add all that much). i haven’t entirely worked out my feelings about the ending and it’s hard to discuss anyway given the twists and turns this takes, but it's a whole lot of fun. 4/5

a general theory of oblivion, josé eduardo agualusa (tr. from portuguese by daniel hahn) interesting little novel(la) set in angola during and after the struggle for independence, in which a portuguese woman, ludo, with extreme agoraphobia walls herself into her apartment to avoid the violence and chaos (but also just... bc she has agoraphobia) with a involving a bunch of much more active characters and how they are connected to her to various degrees. i didn’t like the sideplot quite as much as ludo’s isolation in her walled-in flat with her dog, catching pigeons on the balcony and writing on the walls. 3/5

cassandra at the wedding, dorothy baker phd student cassandra returns home attend (sabotage) her twin sister judith’s wedding to a young doctor whose name she refuses to remember, believing that her sister secretly wants out. cass is a mess, and as a shift to judith’s perspective reveals, definitely wrong about what judith wants and maybe a little delusional, but also a ridiculously compelling narrator, the brilliant but troubled contrast to judith’s safer conventionality. on the whole, cassandra’s narrative voice is the strongest feature of a book i otherwise found a bit slow & a bit heavy on the quirky family. fav line is when cass, post-character-development, plans to “take a quick look at [her] dumb thesis and see if it might lead to something less smooth and more revolting, or at least satisfying more than the requirements of the University”. 3/5

the office of historical corrections, danielle evans a very solid collection of realist short stories (+ the titular novella), mainly dealing with racism, (black) womanhood, relationships between women, and anticolonial/antiracist historiography. while i thought all the stories were well-done and none stood out as weak or an unnecessary inclusion, there also weren’t any that really stood out to me. 3/5

sonnenfinsternis, arthur koestler (english title: darkness at noon) (audio) you know what’s cool about this book? when i added it to my goodreads tbr in 2012, i would have had to read it in translation as the german original was lost during koestler’s escape from the nazis, but since then, the original has been rediscovered and republished. yet another proof that leaving books on your tbr for ages is a good thing actually. anyway. this is a story about the stalinist purges, told thru old bolshevik rubashov, who, after serving the Party loyally for years & doing his fair share of selling people out for the Party, is arrested for ~oppositional activities. in jail and during his interrogations, rubashov reflects on the course the Party has taken and his own part (and guilt) in that, and the way totalitarianism has eaten up and poisoned even the most commendable ideals the Party once held (and still holds?), the course of history and at what point the end no longer justifies the means. it’s brilliant, rubashov is brilliant and despicable, i’m very happy it was rediscovered. 5/5

heads of the colored people, nafissa thompson-spires another really solid short story collection, also focused on the experiences of black people in america (particularly the black upper-middle class), black womanhood and black relationships, altho with a somewhat more satirical tone than danielle evans’s collection. standouts for me were the story in letters between the mothers of the only black girls at a private school, a story about a family of fruitarians, and a story about a girl who fetishises her disabled boyfriend(s). 3.5/5

pedro páramo, juan rulfo (gernan transl. by dagmar ploetz) mexican classic about a rich and abusive landowner (the titular pedro paramo) and the ghost town he leaves behind - quite literally, as, when his son tries to find his father, the town is full of people, quite ready to talk shit about pedro, but they are all dead. it’s an interesting setting with occasionally vivid writing, but the skips in time and character were kind of confusing and i lost my place a lot. i’d be interested in reading rulfo’s other major work, el llano en llamas. 2.5/5

verse für zeitgenossen, mascha kaléko short collection of the poems kaléko, a jewish german poet, wrote while in exile in the united states in the 30-40s, as well as some poems written after the end of ww2. kaléko’s voice is witty, but at turns also melancholy or satirical. as expected i preferred the pieces that directly addressed the experience of exile (”sozusagen ein mailied” is one of my favourite exillyrik pieces). 3/5

the harpy, megan hunter yeah this was boooooooring. the cover is really cool & the premise sounded intriguing (women gets cheated on, makes deal with husband that she is allowed to hurt him three times in revenge, women is also obsessed with harpies: female revenge & female monsters is my jam) but it’s literally so dull & trying so hard to be deep. 1.5/5

the liar’s dictionary, eley williams this is such a delightful book, from the design (those marbled endpapers? yes) to the preface (all about what a dictionary is/could be), to the chapter headings (A-Z words, mostly relating to lies, dishonesty, etc in some way or another, containing at least one fictitious entry), to the dual plots (intern at new edition of a dictionary in contemporary england checking the incomplete old dictionary for mountweazels vs 1899 london with the guy putting the mountweazels in), to williams’s clear joy about words and playing with them. there were so many lines that made me think about how to translate them, which is always a fun exercise. 3.5/5

catherine the great & the small, olja knežević (tr. from montenegrin by ellen elias-bursać, paula gordon) coming-of-age-ish novel about katarina from montenegro, who grows up in  titograd/podgorica and belgrad in the 70s/80s, eventually moving to london as an adult. to be honest while there are some interesting aspects in how this portrays yugoslavia and conflicts between the different parts of yugoslavia, i mostly found this a pretty sloggy slog of misery without much to emotionally connect to, which is sad bc i was p excited for it :(. 2/5

the decameron project: 29 new stories from the pandemic, anthology a collection of short stories written during covid lockdown (and mostly about covid/lockdown in some way). they got a bunch of cool authors, including margaret atwood, edwidge danticat, rachel kushner ... it’s an interesting project and the stories are mostly pretty good, but there wasn’t one that really stood out to me as amazing. i also kinda wish more of the stories had diverged more from covid/lockdown thematically bc it got a lil repetitive tbh. 2/5