#she can work!? she can still interact with her colony!? she can communicate with the nearby kraken and her Melusine sister?!

[witchofthesouls]

I really like the idea of a Selkie bride having a good time as G1 Soundwave’s spouse because he's generally hands off due to his hectic schedule and massive workload and hasn't demanded any "spousal rights" from his new "roommate" that keeps breaking into his habsuite.

There's a new half-naked weirdo that somehow, someway, at some point in time, had managed to bypass all the security systems and everyone's sensors. She's haunting the halls of the Nemesis in repurposed sails, draped in oily-slick pearls, carved sea glass, and painted shells, dripping seawater and kelp everywhere. There's a faint whiff of fish guts, smoky meat, and salt when they're around. Out of everyone, the Selkie is the only one who made significant progress with massive damage in the blocked corridors and sealed sections from the crash landing. The immense pressure and saltwater doesn't phase her.

And out of everyone to figure out that it isn't a Cybertronian, it's not the telepath or Starscream's paranoia, it's fucking Skywarp because he still remembers the tales of his tribe before he was stolen away.

[skydaemon]

so we (and by we, i mean the very specific overlap of jews and nerds among whom i make my home) talk a lot about how tolkien's dwarves, in both the books and movies, were likely influenced by certain jewish stereotypes. obsessed with gold/wealth, secretive (especially about their language and religion), refugees from their ancestral home, portrayed with big, sometimes hooked, noses and interesting facial hair, and most specifically: the favourite little meow meows of one particular god, causing them to be shunned and persecuted by other races and creeds. this is likely unintentional, coming from the subconscious of tolkien in the same way orcs were "based on mongols" (ew colonialism) and activating subconscious biases/stereotypes in the people who designed the dwarves for the movies. it's subtext, albeit subtext that influenced the next eighty years of fantasy.

but what i don't see much discussion of is the fact that in terry pratchett's discworld, it's intentional. terry pratchett's dwarves are, more or less, jews.

carrot is a human adopted by dwarves, based on human standards. but within dwarf culture, he IS a dwarf. specifically, he has undergone specific rituals and memorised certain passages, making him LEGALLY a dwarf. this is basically how conversion works in judaism. indeed, as in judaism, it's considered rude to even mention that carrot is six feet tall and obviously wasn't born into the culture he has adopted.

the dwarves also have internal rifts - there are a group of 'orthodox' dwarves who consider the dwarves in ankh-morpork (who have adopted other customs and don't follow traditional roles) not to be dwarves at all, and don't recognise carrot as a dwarf for the same reason. they believe that the way to be a dwarf is to live in an all-dwarf community and follow their traditional rules, while other dwarves believe they need to change with the times and integrate (at least somewhat) with larger society. jewish as fuck.

there's also the interaction of dwarves with gender. when cherie comes out as female (which isn't a recognised gender by dwarvish society) she is ostracised for taking on the feminine roles common to other discworld races. however, she could never THINK of cutting off her beard, because she is still a dwarf. i see parallels with women in judaism taking on roles traditionally considered 'masculine' (e.g., as rabbis, wearing tallit and kippot) and the acceptance of queer people into jewish communities. there's lots of great discussion about cherie as a trans character on tumblr, btw.

finally, something that particularly strikes me is the line from carrot in tfe, where he says that the biggest dwarf city on the disc is ankh-morpork. obviously all diaspora communities can relate, but it's really something to know that new york is the city with the most jews in the world (960k to jerusalem's 570k. btw, 3rd is LA!).

i just love that, again, consciously or unconsciously, pratchett incorporated more positive elements of jewish culture into his portrayal of the dwarves.

[shwaesar]

Some Caesar x Reader HCs

SFW (for now :3c)

You would meet between the events of Dawn and War, but in a timeline where Cornelia was unable to be saved after giving birth to Cornelius. The humans still tried, they tried so hard, but she eventually succumbed and this left Caesar in a perpetual state of grief that he could never fully heal from. He had to stay strong for his sons, for his people. Mourning properly was a luxury he just never awarded himself.

Koba used her death to manipulate the masses into distrust of those that had tried to help her. Caesar knew this was wrong, but a part of him was irrationally blaming them too, so he didn't step in to stop Koba until it was too late. All of this lead to him still being shot, found by the same humans, nursed back to health, and found again by Blue Eyes. (With his mother being killed and later believing Caesar dead too, he was even more easily convinced of the need for war. But his father thankfully managed to bring him back down to earth once they reunited.)

Because of the traumatic events that proceeded you, he's distant at first. It's nothing personal, just how he became with almost everyone after what happened. Especially humans.

But he's not a monster. When you're found in the woods, on the verge of starvation and vulnerable to the elements, he only hesitates a moment before declaring sanctuary for you within his colony. He has his best healers work tirelessly to bring you back to full health while not tending to others, goes on his own hunts to feed you without dipping into the apes rationed meat and foragables, wanting there to be no reason for anyone to object to your stay.

Not that anyone would, mind you. He's their leader, their king, and his word is law. But tensions are still running high, and it's just not a risk worth taking before he can be sure you won't bring trouble to his tribe.

Your first conversation tells you as much. You only meet properly once you're sitting up and eating on your own, the only ones interacting with you before that being his healers.

"You are... getting better?"

Doesn't bother trying to sign, since he's learned to assume humans no longer have the unspoken language.

"Good. You will.... stay. Here. Only here. No leaving this spot, and... only eat what is given to you. Understand?"

It's also the only conversation you have with him, at least for the first few weeks.

Initially, his only motivation is avoiding more death. If he can help it, he never wants to bear witness to death again, his heart just couldn't take it, not yet.

But then you had to go and make yourself at home. Slowly, you start to acclimate. He watches as Maurice takes initiative with you, offering a guiding hand into the rest of their world. You couldn't realistically stay in a healing nest for the rest of your life, after all.

You're taught basic sign, how to weave baskets, how to skin meat and then do the tanning process for furs.. You're better at some things than others, same as most apes, but you take pride in being able to contribute to the community that's housing you, and he definitely takes note of that fact.

Seeing you interact with his sons is what ultimately warms him up to you though. You notice Blue Eyes take an interest in Lake and proceed to tease him about it before offering advice. Obviously courtship and romance work differently with apes than with humans, but you would've caught the gist of how their 'dating' works. You tell Blue Eyes to give her a gift, a small one at first, and if she reacts well to it, to give another that's more meaningful at a later date. He does, and it works, and Blue Eyes is very grateful for your help but HATES that you were right (affectionately).

But then Caesar finds you with Cornelius one day, holding him, telling him human stories to keep him entertained while his father and brother were supposedly busy. It means more than you could possibly know, to be providing an almost maternal presence to his youngest, who was admittedly in need of one. After that, you're officially a part of his colony as far as he's concerned, and god help anyone who tries to suggest otherwise.

Attraction though, that's something not even he was prepared for. It makes sense to a certain extent - Caesar was raised by humans, had only interacted with his own kind when he'd already reached adulthood, so human standards of beauty were something imposed on him from an early age. He knew what it meant to be an attractive human or an unattractive human, and you were definitely the former in his eyes. But to be feeling that attraction himself, this unnatural taboo among apes and humans alike..

It freaks him out a little bit, in all honesty.

You would've just started talking to him more, brief but meaningful conversations here and there, when he starts actively avoiding you. You go days at a time without even spotting him from a distance, and you get this awful feeling that he's upset with you, that you've done something to unintentionally antagonise him. You haven't. He's just feeling a lot of complicated feelings and needs space to sort through them all.

Desire. Embarrassment. Lust. Shame. Guilt.

But once again, Maurice is there to make sure everything works out. He knows what Caesar is feeling, catching him in habits of courtship. Leaving more food than usual at your bedside (you continue to live in the healing nest, even when fully recovered), grooming himself more attentively, his fur bristling when another male gets a little too close for comfort. Maurice doesn't get it, to him you're a close friend but you're still a human. You're weak, hairless, slow, your body shaped in ways that he finds fascinating but odd, and all of those are things apes specifically don't want in a mate. But he cares more for Caesars happiness than understanding it, and decides to provide some much needed mediation.

He talks to Caesar first, calling him out on his obvious infatuation, knowing better than to think the chimp would ever admit it without it being forced out of him. They spend a good while discussing you, and Caesar goes on to list the things he's come to adore about you. Your kindness. Your strength of heart. Your smile, your laugh, your eyes - and slowly, Maurice sort of starts to see what he's talking about. Even if unusual, there's no denying that, hypothetically, you would make a good mate for their leader. The tricky part would be how you respond to the proposal.

Because you are, at the end of the day, human. Even if you feel the same way, there will be a multitude of differences and challenges to overcome if you wanted to make it work. He warns Caesar of that.

But for you, Caesar would climb the tallest mountains. He would scour deserts to bring you water never before drank. He would happily lay down his life so you could wear his pelt, if it meant protecting you from the cold. And, if need be, he'd never bring it up again if you decided against it. Against him.

And that's even more of a big deal than you might think. Because love like that is a human affair.

Before the flu, apes were promiscuous by nature. With their heightened intelligence came the establishment of monogamy, a single mate you want to provide for, to bear children with, to share a nest and resources with. Fondness and affection was their standard for love, in the emotional sense. Biologically, it was a result of territorial instinct. This person is mine, and no one else can have them. Only I will make them happy. Only I am worthy.

Caesar feels all that for you, but the type of intense, all encompassing love he describes is an extremely human thing to feel. He recognises that, and it's one of the reasons he's so scared by it. But Maurice is supportive as ever, and ends up being the best wingman an ape could ask for.

The orangutang ends up instigating subtle conversations with you the next day, under the guise of curiosity. He asks about human relationships. About your customs and standards. About what humans like in a partner. And he takes all the information you give him, to report back to Caesar.

A lot of preparation is made, all in an effort to make you as happy and comfortable as possible. A private fire is set up by the river, away from prying eyes. Maurice grooms Caesars back for a good while, plucking out any dirt or twigs that might have gotten stuck in his fur. Caesar even goes scavenging in the remains of the human city, returning with an assortment of things he believes will help him.

He shampoos himself for the first time since he was a boy. He ends up fluffy and smelling like lavender, a few patches here and there not fully rinsed off and sticking together in clumps. He considers shaving his beard, but ultimately decides against it in favour of using a broken comb on it instead. He even finds an old tie, but he doesn't know how to tie it, so it ends up as a lopsided knot at his throat.

He's desperate to not be repulsive to you. He would be to most humans after all, at least in this regard. In his mind, if he's willing to adjust enough, to be human enough, only then would you even consider him as a potential mate.

But then it happens.

He has Maurice bring you to the river late one night, where he's waiting to greet you with a small bouquet of wildflowers.

You've never seen him so... awkward. So sheepish, so unsure of himself. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what he's trying to do, but you let him play it out as he sees fit.

It takes more willpower than you'd like to admit not to laugh, but you manage to bite it back.

The two of you sit by the fire for hours, as he goes on a small tangent about how appreciative he is of you, how grateful he is to have met you. You reply in modest thanks, returning the sentiment. But of coarse, you eventually have to ask-

Why all this?

Why change himself so much to have this conversation?

"Because.... you are human. And have changed yourself, to live with apes."

He takes your hand, so small and delicate compared to his own, and lets his thumb trace your knuckles.

"Wanted you to know... I could change too."

The realisation of his mindset horrifies you at first. You take both his hands in turn and tell him you don't want him to change. That you respect and accept him for who and what he is, that the changes you've made are different because you're the one becoming a part of their life.

He gets a little defensive. Suddenly, he's very self conscious of the fact that he might look silly to you, like this. His nostrils flare and he looks away, letting you finish before huffing.

"Respect.... accept... but could you.... love me? For what I am??"

He asks it in a more accusatory manner than he intended, but the tone makes you snap back at him.

"I do love you for what you are!"

The silence that follows is almost deafening. You stare at each other in incredulous surprise, and he watches as your cheeks flush, your mind finally catching up with your mouth. You open it again, as if to say something else, but nothing comes out.

He searches your face, trying to get a sense of how you wanted him to respond. Internally, the words make his heart flutter, but he doesn't dare express anything before your own emotions are readable.

But your expression just mirrors his. You're blinking dumbly at one another, unsure of how to proceed.

Then.... you laugh. The faintest snicker escapes you, soon building into proper laughter. You just can't help it, the situation is so tense and he's gaping at you like a fish, with a crudely attempted tie around his neck and fur making him look almost like a pampered poodle. You're about to apologise, not wanting him to think you're laughing at him.

But he's laughing too, the ridiculousness of it all not lost on him, even if he'd been trying to do what he thought you'd sincerely want. And your giggling is so infectious to him, even if it's a sound that only a human can really make. He adores it, because it's you.

And there's no denying the wave of relief that washes over him. Unabashedly, he reaches out to cradle the back of your head, and pulls your temple to his own as your mutual chuckling slowly fades. Again, you're left staring at each other. But this time it's in a much more comfortable, intimate way.

"Can... try this again? Tomorrow?"

You agree, under the condition that he let you help get all the product out of his fur.

He's more than happy with that arrangement.

[sepublic]

            I’ve already brought up how the loss of glyphs is deeply tragic for Luz on an interpersonal level, given her relationship with the Titan as being kinda found family in a spiritual successor to Manny sorta way…

            But on a larger, cultural level? It’s straight-up genocide. Because glyphs were an ancient practice; They were a tradition at one point, as Eda explains. The earliest witches used to learn glyphs from the Titan on her knee, and eventually stopped when that became redundant with the more convenient source of their bile sacs.

            But it was still an important part of their history; It was how witches and demons first communicated and interacted with the land and nature, and their ‘god’ in a mutualistic way. It was how they respected their world.

            So even if glyphs were evidently forgotten by the Deadwardian Era, they were still available for those who needed them… And in comes fucking Philip, the racist colonizer, and because of his possession of the Titan’s heart, she finally dies and glyphs can no longer work. They’re obsolete now.

            They still happened, but now that part of magic, of history and this world, is gone forever. It’s cultural erasure, it’s what Luz alludes to when she mentions how scars from Belos’ reign still remain, like the left arm being permanently shifted upwards; Who knows how many were displaced, how much the local flora and fauna and ecosystems were devastated, with the desert of Palm Stings now colder than even the knee itself?!?

            It’s just so deeply painful because Luz really helped to bring back an ancient, lost tradition and unlike Philip, breathed new life into it; Glyphs could be used to help people without bile sacs, who didn’t utilize spell circles as well. We actually saw Luz experiment with using individual glyphs, and figure out the combos; Things she did on her own. She shared knowledge of glyphs with her loved ones, like Eda, King, Lilith, Gus, Amity, etc.

            There really was going to be a return of something lost, but now it’s gone forever because of a bigoted old white man who was too bitter about things that are different and needed to feel big and important by standing on the shoulders of others. It’s cultural genocide. That memory where Belos' destructive lies about wild magic drive witches away from the knee that they still had the potential to learn from, leaving behind only ruins in the present-day? With some murdered via the coven sigils that cut them even further off from their own magic they forgot glyphs for? It's truly symbolic of the final nails in the coffin.

            And it’s also desecration of the dead, too; Caleb is not the only one to have had his corpse bastardized by Belos, misused against everything he stood for. Belos also misused that corpse, first by stealing the Titan’s name, then misusing her magic, her resources such as Palistrom wood… And finally possessing that body literally, which is what murders the Titan. It’s like colonizers bastardizing and salting the land that locals carefully maintained a proper relationship with, and keep in mind this fucker is a literal Puritan colonist. There’s no respect, not for the dead and/or past. Compare that to Luz, who lives on in Manny’s memory and makes him proud.

            I’m just imagining Caleb and the Titan watching, in agony, as their bodies are used to create a vicious mockery towards their actual kin, who remain totally unaware, and in the case of the Grimwalkers, it’s another lineage that is also abused. Meanwhile the Clawthornes remain unknowing of their past because colonialism erases history, hence Belos hiring Flora, and hell even getting Lilith to participate in her own historical erasure, as both Clawthorne and witch!

            Meanwhile, King remains oblivious and unconnected to his own heritage. And most of that can also be attributed to the Titan Trappers and Archivists, themselves perpretrators of genocide. So King and Eda go without knowing their heritage for so long, in Eda’s case she may never find out entirely, because it’s part of the many voices who are lost and silenced due to genocide, buried in the past to be forgotten.

            And you know one thing more that fucks me up? It’s that I genuinely suspect that Philip initially had it easier with glyphs than Luz, and that he made them more difficult for her. Because based on his dialogue by finding the Ice glyph in a snowflake, and his diary and memory portraits showing him arriving in the isles via Eclipse Lake, at the Knee…

            Philip was probably shown his first spell on his first day in the Demon Realm. And it makes sense; The first human, the precedent that the Titan would’ve known by this point, was Caleb; Himself Philip’s brother, who was also raised to be a witch hunter, yet learned better. We know people can view both worlds from that in-between realm, but the Titan still isn’t omnipotent and can only watch through a limited number of cubes at a time, while having to know what and who to look for.

            But even so; With Caleb’s precedent, there could’ve been hope that Philip would follow in his footsteps, that he would learn and be more, and actually choose to be better instead of defaulting to Puritan predestination and the like as an excuse to stay the same and absolve him of responsiability. But we know what happened; Philip started off easy, but then made things difficult by rejecting the Titan’s compassion, by misusing her magic for evil and murder and genocide. The Titan showed Philip compassion first and this was how he responded.

            I really feel as if there’s an implicit reluctance with how Luz is taught glyphs, one at a time, in separate scenarios, usually as a result of character development and/or engaging with the world around her, which are things the Titan would really need to see to start trusting another human again (and if he knew Luz gave Philip the last glyph, that would also add to the wariness that Belos caused by manipulating her). Luz didn’t learn her first spell until a few days into her journey, and Luz had already had a few perilous encounters by that point! But she continued to brave her way through everything, continued to accept the isles and its messier side.

            And so the Titan showed Luz her first spell, and only that, in response to Luz needing it, wanting to learn magic, and most of all humbling herself to be kind to the Titan’s own son, and listen to him; Because neglecting King was what low-key led to Eda’s transformation placing everyone in danger, since he only told Luz about the elixir and agreed to steal it for the sake of getting her attention.

            So that makes Luz listening to the Titan for the first time, intentionally, with her second spell –Ice, Philip’s first- so much more hard-hitting. The way she wanted to live out her dream so she went for the wand behind people’s backs, but then recognized and owned up to her mistakes. And she really was just a lonely kid in need of guidance, and not a stubborn adult committed to his cruelty; Luz always had an open mind! She always wanted to learn!

            And she got to! She learned each glyph at a time… And that’s all the Titan could do for her, something the Titan had already done for so many others, long ago, before they realized they had bile sacs and didn’t need to rely on the land around them as much. Luz still experimented even when she just had one glyph; She understood how intent mattered. She and Lilith built off of each other’s knowledge to collaborate and create combos. Meanwhile Belos, he agonized because he made things pointlessly difficult by refusing to adapt to the ways of another land, and only got his first and last glyphs by taking the compassion of someone who knew them and betraying it.

            Plus there’s what I said about Lilith, her whole thing as Caleb’s descendant, directly abused by Belos and belittled by him, made to participate in her own erasure loss of past, separated from that… Really, one could argue the Clawthornes are like the Boiling Isles equivalent to the Irish; Yeah they're white but that doesn't mean they aren't victims of British colonialism that sought to 'conquer the land' and all that.

The Clawthornes are generally known for big orange hair, with Lilith's curly hair being straightened and dyed dark-blue in an attempt to assimilate within the Emperor's Coven's (AKA Philip's) standards of conformity. They worked with the land via the Palistrom carving and began to lose that because of the trees being endangered by Belos' gluttony, as well as the curse disabling Dell; The very curse created by the Archivists, who also invaded this world, the very curse cast by Lilith because the coven system influenced her to feel shame over wild magic and embrace hierarchy instead.

The curse leads to Eda's loss of bile magic, something very important to her and witches in general, and Lilith loses her own trying to mitigate her own mistakes. So not just glyphs are taken from witches, but even their own bile magic they initially replaced them with, and the other resources of the land. And Lilith is cut off from her family, her real family, as she's taken in by an ancestor who has deliberately distanced himself and loathes her on multiple levels as something to be 'fixed'.

But Lilith gets her hair back and re-embraces it, she gets her family back. She still manages to somewhat retain her past; After all, Lilith gets to go to the Deadwardian Era herself! And she meets, as much as it loathes anyone to acknowledge it, an ancestor, and influences history in a subtle yet personally meaningful way. And Lilith helps re-establish contact with the lost practice of glyphs by figuring out how to combine them, which goes hand in hand with her passion of being a historian, and her additional function as both parallel and especially foil to Philip.

             Just… Luz and the Titan. And Caleb. And Lilith. There’s dead people and there’s history and there’s land, there’s bodies and respect. There’s compassion and actually working with people and finding no shame in that, instead of stealing and taking credit. And in the end, even though they manage to regain some things, a lot was still inevitably lost to genocide, and possibly gone forever.

            But the effects and legacy still linger, Luz still remembers and holds dear what the glyphs did; And she honors not just Manny’s legacy, but Caleb’s, by bridging the gap between humanity and witches, and showing both can co-exist in harmony. She helped his descendants, and even the last Grimwalker, find happiness and reconnect with their heritage, even if they don’t know just how close it is to them in particular. Luz honored the Titan by clearing his name, finding his son, and ensuring the last of the Titans is no longer alone and in understanding of his heritage. Luz even made amends with the Titan’s other greatest regret, harming the Collector, by making peace; And she proved glyphs were still useful, they were still kind, and that compassion wasn’t wasted.

            So even if the Titan’s glyphs are gone now, Luz still honored their memory by sharing them freely and helping, teaching, cultivating. The Clawthornes are rebuilding the Palistrom forests, among them is Hunter who as a Grimwalker was one of the purposes for which Belos devastated those natural resources for. And King… King is beginning to develop his own glyphs! And Luz is learning her first one, Light, from a Titan all over again, because she showed King kindness.

            That honors the Titan’s memory by keeping it alive through her son; Who keeps the memory of glyphs alive through the ones he’ll sustain and share with everyone else, and those glyphs will spread to those without and even with bile sacs. And a lost art is brought back, irreversibly different but still intact in the important ways. People are relearning old practices to apply to a new world, because the past is gone but it still lingers and is simply… reborn. Despite the scars and changes it survives and is still itself.

            And with how all of this loops back to Luz’s relationship with her father Manny, who passed away, and how all that was based on Dana’s own relationship with her deceased father, who left her a final gift in Pokemon Red that she chose to cherish to this day, and embrace her own creativity and keep it alive. It’s a story about things dying but still managing to live anyway.

[kaliido-s]

I hate interacting with the wof fandom because I can never find any spaces just,, talking about the books instead of criticizing them and dissecting their themes and how bad they are and how bad the characters are written.

I want to talk about fun headcanons for the dragons and fanon tribes and all the silly ocs someone’s made! I don’t want to talk about how a book series meant for fifth graders doesn’t fully tackle themes of colonialism because it’s a book meant for fifth graders and I don’t expect it to handle that theme well. It’s not meant to be chewed up and analyzed down to the last period on the last page in some big long essay, it’s for a middle schooler to write a book report on.

To me at least, the WoF community on tumblr is a mix of unnecessary criticism and fun headcanons and ocs. You just have to find the right place to look for it, although the negative side of it can still be very loud and annoying. WoF instagram is usually better for finding headcanons and ocs imo.

And yeah, I don’t think WoF does a particularly good job at talking about oppression or colonialism, but at the end of the day, no child who reads arc 3 is going to come away thinking the oppressors were right, and as they age, they’re going to find way better and more directly informative sources on that sort of thing. Tui has always said that she wants her books to get kids to start talking to their parents about issues, and as a jumping off point for them, I think it works.

[spontaneousglitterbees]

Does Kokichi (or any of the others) get a therapy animal? I know that Kokichi has his cane and stuff, but would he ever get a dog to help with the pain when needed along with encouraging him to sleep?

Does Kiyo get a friend to help him through his panic when he overheats?

You've mentioned that Miu basically has to force herself to take breaks so would she get a little assistant to help pull her away to take a rest?

Part of me believes that if they do get one, Ryoma would be the one to arrange it with our beloved Overlord of Ice (or in Kokichi's case, beg for Gundham to help)

[DRV3 TAPP AU Masterpost]

This is just what I needed to help focus some of the ideas I’ve been having so tysm anon:

I love the idea of Ryoma working with Gundham in the animal shed! I have a concept building that there’s a group of students that hang out there and volunteer. In my mind, it’s somewhat of a safe haven from the rowdier activities on campus and almost doubles as a hangout spot for some of the ND students to decompress and form friendships between classes; Peko, Gonta, and Gundham himself are in there a lot, to name a few.

Kokichi does get a cat, but she isn’t a licensed therapy animal. Gundham breeds animals that go into high-profile training programs, but this cat… is not one of them. In fact, as runt of her litter with a chip on her shoulder bigger than her whole head, he was starting to worry she might not even be adoptable. The little beast doesn’t like other cats, only tolerates the affection of her human caretakers before taking off and hiding, and eventually she escapes captivity entirely.

Now, recapturing a housecat can be anywhere from simple as opening the door for them to a complex multi-month scouting, trust-building, and eventually stealth-catnapping mission (provided all goes well). This is not for the faint of heart. The shed crew absolutely does care about her safety, but also can’t chase her all day (and even if they did, she would just be scared further into hiding.)

There is a TDP bonus mode interaction between Gundham and Kokichi where Kichi gets scratched, so I can’t fault anyone for deciding he might not like cats. In another scenario where he’s not actively talking to people, though, I think Kokichi would vibe with the way cats communicate. They’re very particular in their body language regardless of personality, something he’s notoriously good at analyzing in people; they’re creatures of habit that form communities and express their connection and trust of one another through specific behavioral cues.  Eye contact, for instance, is a sign of aggression for cats, and one way to signify you are deliberately not a threat is by going out of your way to blink in their direction and keep your eyes closed a few seconds. Cats will do this at one another and at people. No matter how common the perception of cats as loners, standoffish, and otherwise unfriendly is, they still form colonies that communally hunt and care for kittens. They’ll eat together and occasionally turn their backs to one another to signal good-faith (‘I will not take advantage of you while you’re off-guard’, which can look to some like ‘I am making sure you know I am ignoring you by refusing to look at you’), only flipping onto their backs when fully relaxed and trusting. Cats will show just as much affection as dogs, but it’s occasionally from across the room. They’re social animals. They just also value their independence, and some of their social cues are frequently misinterpreted by people expecting them to be something they are not.

Hmm.

If DICE is anything to go by, I don’t think he’d hesitate to take care of a stray. He sees her once in an alleyway, and leaves some food for her. Even though he doesn’t see her the next, he comes back around the same time and leaves it in a sheltered corner. And the one after that. Even if it hurts to kneel down. She starts to notice the way he winces after several days of his coming around to feed her, and it coaxes her out of her hiding place.

The two establish a rapport pretty quickly. Shuichi will occasionally see Kokichi stuffing something in his pocket or his bag, and is positive he’s scheming. Little does he know, had he actually followed Kokichi, he’d watch him sneak behind one of the science buildings and. Sit on the rickety fire stairs, pull out a few colorful feathers, and play with a lonely kitten. Diabolical.

Of course, once Ouma sees the posters the shed crew have put up around the area, he’s immediately conflicted. Someone is out there looking for her (she has people who care about her). She’s let you pet her, but if you disrespect her space and scoop her up who knows what she’ll do (your continued silence keeps her apart from the people, who are real and really out there and demonstrably looking for her, who care about her.) The responsible thing to do is to betray her trust for her own good.

… Tomorrow.

He’ll. He’ll turn her in tomorrow.

When he gets caught, he hands her over before he can look back.

The shy, moody beast hasn’t stopped meowing at every person she’s seen since. She practically hovers around Gonta, who feels a bit guilty he has no idea what she needs. They’ve checked her a few times over; she’s surprisingly healthy despite foraging and forging ahead on her own for so long and thankfully uninjured by the whole incident (if isolated from the other cats for a while just in case, which she hardly minds.) It’s a mystery.

At least, it’s a mystery until there’s an event on campus, and the one-two punch of loud noise and crowding turn huge chunks of campus into active minefields. As much as Kokichi loves bothering his friends, maybe eavesdropping while he’s at it, he just. Cannot handle something like this, anymore. What might have been exciting is totally overstimulating, and he can’t deny that the heat of both the season and the sheer volume of Humanity bunched together is making his symptoms a hell of a lot harder to deal with, let alone hide. The animal shed is a convenient place for him to split off and pick his way into so that, hopefully, he doesn’t actually faint. Hopefully. (Skilled as he is, he can’t hear the pins of the lock over the sound of his own heartbeat, but, thankfully, someone comes and opens the door anyway from the inside.)

Little did he know, but there’s already a small party’s worth of students in the shed also looking to either get away from the crowds, make sure the animals aren’t panicked by all the noise outside, or both. And there’s climate control in here. So Kokichi is Not Going Anywhere. There are plenty of questions, sure, but it hardly looks like a good time for him to answer them; he does, though, answer a completely different line of questioning when the kitty notices Kokichi and immediately nuzzles into his chest.

Gundham is pretty sure it’s illegal to separate them now.

Her name is Bishop, as in “overseer”. Kokichi needs someone to talk at who won’t analyze everything he says, and wax Rantaro isn’t exactly available. More importantly, it’s the third most powerful chess piece: after the King and his s/o, of course. Plus, when she’s surprised the way her fur stands up reminds him of a certain Ultimate Robot; he’s looking forward to telling Kiibo he named his cat assistant “after a competent AI,” the android from Aliens. (Double-plus, I think the scene in that movie where Bishop does the knife trick could be where Kokichi got it from for the FTEs, as a fun little full-circle moment).

Bishop is an emotional support animal. She isn’t trained like a therapy animal, nor has she gone through a rigorous certification and become a medically necessary service animal. She more just… lives in his room, even before he does any of the paperwork to have an ESA in the dorms. That’s not to say she isn’t helpful-- having her around puts him in a better spot than he’d be in otherwise for certain, but she usually stays in Kokichi’s room.

That said, I think she does kind of get to know when he needs her through experience, and on at least one occasion is clever enough to figure out when something’s wrong and he needs someone else (probably Kaito). I think after TAPP tried simulating the poisoning/some degree of nerve damage in him for long enough, it cascaded into an abnormal autoimmune response that's just kept going. It mostly messes with the way his nerves connect to his muscles, leading to things like intermittent weakness, feeling like you’re going to faint even if you don’t fully lose consciousness (presyncope), and having your heart race when you sit or stand up (orthostatic intolerance). Kokichi, hating to admit even to himself when a situation is thoroughly out of his control, will probably not leave his dorm to get someone, if nothing else, to hang out and help him feel slightly less terrified (of dying alone, naturally, even if it only feels that way). Bishop might. 

Seems she's always there when he needs her most.

I honestly hadn’t thought about therapy animals for Miu and Kiyo before, and I think I’m going to have to give it more thought. For reasons I haven’t isolated I just… also want to give them cats? Especially Kiyo, who might also appreciate the way they set up and maintain boundaries with people and each other without caring about them any less.

Miu can hardly pry herself away from her work long enough to take care of herself, let alone another living thing, so she might start with a potted succulent for the lab while she’s working on Kiibo. Once he’s corporeal, he’ll probably be the best at convincing her to step away from things (and consequently stop using projects to avoid actually dealing with her feelings) and possibly get an animal of her own. For now, Kokichi’s trying (not always succeeding) to take that role (for her sake, and also to convince himself he can trust her to be half as vulnerable around him as he feels all the time).

Kiyo also withdraws into studying, but it’s less to distract himself and more that he doesn’t fully trust himself around other people (or, admit it to himself or not, other people around him). He needs a therapy animal that’ll get him out of his own head from time to time. More of a calming presence than an energizing one, and one that won’t wreck the shelves of souvenirs and knick-knacks in his room at that. Some cats might love to knock things over, but others could not care less; all depends on the individual, of course.

More a shitpost than an answer, but I did have the thought ‘what if, rather than there being multiple cats, Bishop sneaks out on occasion when Kokichi’s not there.’

None of them have spoken about their occasional Encounters with a mischievous kitten to one another in detail, and if its brought up in passing they all call her something different. Absolutely nobody is surprised when the cat-loose-in-the-dormitory wanders over to Kokichi’s room.

… Except for Kokichi, who did not know she sneaks her way out through a crack in the wall on a semi-regular basis. By the time he gets back, she’s always sitting prim and looking at the door to greet him. He shouldn’t be surprised, though. They only met because of her history of Houdini-ing out of the animal shed, after all. Bishop will not be Contained.

Something about pets being like their Chosen Person, I suppose.

[zerogate]

An ant is born with all the genetic equipment it needs to take on any role in society. If it is fed one mixture of food by the colony’s nurses, it turns into a soldier—a powerful beast far larger than normal size, equipped with savage jaws, and designed to defend the colony against attack. If it is fed another mixture, it becomes a worker, a small but nimble creature capable of carrying loads many times its own weight. And if it is fed a rare potion reserved for the select few, it can blossom into a queen—the one central creature toward whose preservation all efforts are directed, the only ant who gets the privilege of having children.

Though an ant may have been hatched as a lowly worker, the blueprints for soldier and queen still lie dormant within her. In fact, if the colony’s ruler is killed by marauders or disease, a worker may suddenly blossom with the reproductive powers fate has denied her all her life. She will begin to lay eggs. Leaving her food gathering and housecleaning chores behind, she will exude a substance that instills in passing ants the urge to feed and serve her, for she has ascended to royalty.

In some ways, it is the social organism and its needs that determine the role each of us will play and the many more roles that each of us will never be given the power to act out. How the demands of the larger social beast determine our fate is hinted at by another aspect of the life of ants. Some of these Hymenoptera are lazy and sit around all day doing very little; others work their tails off in the interest of the community. But try separating the ne’er-do-wells from the industrious and setting them up as two new colonies—one composed exclusively of layabouts and the other made up entirely of nose-to-the-grindstone types.

A strange thing happens. In the community of laggards, a large proportion of the lazy little beasts suddenly become imbued with a furious sense of industry. They turn into workers. On the other hand, in the community composed completely of workers, a small portion of the formerly zealous toilers seem overcome with boredom and settle down to spend their days doing nothing. They become the new leisure lovers. Each new colony takes on the shape of the old one.

Human groups go through a similar process. Researcher Richard Savin-Williams spent a season watching summer campers interact. In June, the bunk-mates met for the first time. For roughly an hour, the campers felt each other out, probing each other’s strengths and weaknesses, deciding who would be friends with whom. Then they quickly sorted themselves into a superorganism with a head, limbs, and a tail. One camper became the “alpha male,” the dominant individual, the group leader. Another became the “bully,” a big, strong brute nobody particularly liked. A third became the “joker,” everybody’s good-natured sidekick. And one became the “nerd,” the unathletic, overly eager sort that everyone else felt free to kick around. Like the ants and the embryonic cells, each boy had taken his place in a kind of preordained social blueprint.

Just how preordained that blueprirt was and how much of his potential each boy had to sacrifice to assume his role became clear when another researcher tried an experiment. The scientist assembled a cabin composed entirely of “leaders,” boys who had been dominant, “alpha males” in their old groups. Very quickly, the new cluster sorted itself out according to the familiar pattern. One of the leaders took charge. Another became the bully. A third became the group joker. And one of the formerly commanding lads even became the new group’s nerd.

When the researchers went through the scientific literature to find other data related to their work, they discovered that studies of Chicago gangs in the 1920s had shown these long-gone groups arranging themselves according to an almost identical unconscious plan. The gang members of a bygone era also had their leaders, bullies, jokers, and nerds. Each individual had taken up a position in the superorganism’s unfolding structure. And each had shaped his personality to fit the spot in which he landed.

-- Howard Bloom, The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History

[princesscallyie]

bit off-topic, but how've the cats ray & aya been doing lately🐱?

I haven’t mentioned it that much but last year me and my sister moved out of my grandparents place. We tried to take Ray but he was being so restless (he is in the senior cat age) so we sent him back over there. Luckily we only live like less than 10 minutes away so we still see them.

This is from the other day.

I don’t be taking pics of Aya cause she so’s skittish and likes to hide but here’s a pic from the older sis.

But this is a good time to bring up some new characters. So the new neighborhood has a few community cats. We have tried to interact with them but they are feral and are somewhat afraid of humans (except for the neighbors who feed them). But then one day, this guy came up to us.

We started feeding him daily though some nights he wouldn’t come to eat dinner and I got worried and then he started getting injured so that’s when I made the decision to bring him to the vet so he can come inside.

And 10 months later he’s still here. His name is Guy (I couldn’t think of any and my family already got used to calling him that). I’m thinking he’s not feral cause he was too comfortable coming up to humans and he got adjusted inside very quickly. The vet said he’s young too. He’s very kind 😔. Doesn’t swat, bite, or nothing. Just chills.

After Ray didn’t work out, my lil sis wanted a kitten so she got one from her co-worker.

Calico girl, Yuna. 😔 (Should have named Guy a Final Fantasy name…) Got her when she was young but she lived in a cat colony so probably would have died out there. She’s long haired. Haven’t had a cat like that since my Boston cat Snookums. She was a tortoiseshell.

So yeah, I basically have 4 cats now lol. Think Guy and Yuna are bonded (well Yuna probably is bonded to Guy at least, she won’t leave him alone). Ray and Aya didn’t bond probably because of the age gap (and the fact that Aya has major anxiety and Ray doesn’t like being messed with) so it cool to see cats that are close.

[alexilulu]

Books I Read in 2024 #1: A Desolation Called Peace (Arkady Martine, Tor Books, 2021)

Summary: Following Mahit's return to her home on the heels of defusing a succession crisis in the imperial core, Mahit and Three Seagrass reunite to find a way to defuse the unknown alien threat probing the edges of the Empire along the station's borders, threatening both with oblivion.

This is a pretty damn good book. Theres a few things about it that don't work as well; I find books that have a tendency to jump perspectives have a hard time maintaining a consistent voice and keeping things compelling (this was a gigantic part of my problem with Translation State, a novel from an author I adore that has almost nothing for me to cling to as parts of the novel i enjoy). The POV characters are relatively fine, and I don't think there is a way around it in the way the novel is constructed as a narrative drawing from the first person, but the end result is that the writing can be inconsistent as hell in some of the more secondary character's chapters. You get the best sense for Mahit and Three, and for the admiral Nine Hibiscus (who is honestly a delight to read, a fun compromised character), and child-emperor-clone Eight Antidote, but the others are barely there, mainly existing to give context to actions the primary characters could not see.

The book is primarily focused on the rush to the border by a Teixcalaani fleet to understand and then crush the alien forces revealed in the climax of Memory Called Empire, a long-known threat that has been nibbling at the border of the Empire and its outlying vassal states like Mahit's station for years. The aliens themselves are seemingly implacable, appearing from nowhere and crushing Teixcalaani forces before being crushed in turn by the superior weight of arms available to the empire. The race quickly becomes to try to negotiate a peace between them both, as the alien force seemingly considers humans as not being people worthy of consideration (another connective tissue point between the Imperial Radch novels and their implacable, completely opaque and purely alien Presger who prey upon humanity with impunity and negotiate from a position of absolute strength), butchering an entire colony for seemingly no reason; bodies are abandoned where they fell, untouched.

The aliens are the type of strange you would want from them, a semi-hive mind formed from a fungal substrate that integrates individuals into a shared consciousness and makes them Whole in their cosmology, and cannot imagine a world that cannot communicate in the way they do. They act the way they do because to not be part of the mind is to be screaming meat. It's fun.

Mahit and Three's relationship takes great steps here both forward and backward; I genuinely do enjoy that they have an extended period here wherein Three has to come to the understanding that every interaction she has with Mahit, accidentally or on purpose, is just slathered in references to Mahit's barbarian-ness in Teixcalaani culture. It's great specifically because they so clearly have this incredible rapport with one another from the moment they reunite, but there's some part of Three that cannot help but other Mahit as the Outsider, to view her with this lens that simultaneously acknowledges her skill and brains and beauty, but still as something lesser that she cannot help but bring up. It feels good when they finally connect again and come to greater understanding, and at the same time it's clear that that isn't the end of the road for them. It's phenomenal that they're allowed to be messy and grow over these novels, from the standoffish camaraderie they started with to here, an uneasy pair of lovers, still finding their footing with one another.

The finale is effective, a power-hungry admiral under the commander making a move to genocide the aliens even as they finally reach a proper ceasefire, sure that a decapitation strike on one of their worlds will settle things in the Teixcalaani way, power via might and awe and destruction.

The biggest part of this novel is about identity, weirdly enough. The aliens are networked and bound to one another and yet individual, and a recurring element of the story is that the Teixcalaani Shard pilots are networked in a similar way (based on the omnipresent, semi-human police of the Teixcalaani home world who are networked to the city's AI) and are rapidly discovering the problems with such a thing being rolled out in the middle of a war; pilots across the galaxy are collapsing in howling, bawling pain at the moment another pilot dies, weeping uncontrollably and feeling connected across a further length of distance than has ever been possible before now in the empire. The repeated refrain of 'how broad is the Teixcalaani definition of 'you?', returning from Memory Called Empire exemplifies this; the Lsel stationers are all implanted with the memories of their predecessors sometimes up to 10 generations back, forming a gestalt of the centuries of experience needed to survive in space into a compatible person's mind.

Overall, I do feel that it's a weaker second book than the extremely strong Memory, but that is only in comparison to one of the best space opera sci-fi novels in the last 5 years. It builds on the framework it created, giving us a closer look at the spear arm of the empire after seeing its heart laid bare and the ways it is at war with itself even as it crushes everything outside of itself.

[tehamelie]

Sex, lies and videotapes (Community 1.5)

Previous Post index

I bought my first mouse! Yes, I've worked and played with PCs daily for 22 years and I've never had to specifically buy a mouse before. So nice to not double and triple click on everything I try to click on. I also managed to move my Community DVD from the standalone DVD player I was duped into buying once so I feel obligated to use it as much as possible, to my DVD drive one step away so now we can do screenshots. Now let's catch up with those crazy college kids.

Community rewatch S1E5: Advanced criminal law

We're introduced to Greendale's most famous alumnus, celebrated actor and "model Puerto Rican American" Luis Guzman. Wait, Puerto Rico is already in the United States. Or maybe you can immigrate since it's a colony or something? I'm just assuming there's something off here since it's the dean talking. With a statue of Guzman and a school song due this week, he assures us "this sure feels like a real college to me!"

Duncan tells Jeff he's into Britta, even though he doesn't remember her name. They, or rather Duncan by himself, comes to a gentleman's agreement to let Jeff "finish striking out with her first." I wish more people were this honest about their intentions cause it feels like it would make some people who deserve to be lonely very lonely people.

Troy introduces the concept of messing with someone to Abed, with some hilarious claims like he's Barack Obama's nephew (we all expected Glover to be related to Hollywood superstar Danny Glover) and he invented the Ferrari. (Ferrari did that.)

Starburns wants to be called Alex; Señor Chang suggests he spends five hours carving that into his face. The Starburns story so far fascinates me. This man with his overly elaborate ostentatious facial hair who only ever interacts with a teacher who, while he has a lot of character and he's almost the only teacher we've been introduced to, is still presumed to be a minor side character like teachers are in students' lives. And we can already see he's tired of being defined by his starburns. (Yet he never shaves them off.)

Chang goes off the deep end when he finds someone's cheat sheet and promises to fail the whole class if no one takes the blame. The stakes have never been, okay I don't think anybody thinks he can do that. The study group has a study group moment where they make it clear all of them suspect everyone else.

Then Pierce asks Annie if she's a musician (since she's on the school song committee) and her immediate response is "Ew, no" which has to be one of the more surreal moments in this entire show. Is it Pierce who offends her, or musicians, or music? Only cartoon villains hate music.

Abed discovers lying is fun if you do it with comedic intent. Really, couldn't anything be funny if you want it to be funny? "This isn't a table. Ha!" might foreshadow the symbolically important role the study room table will come to play.

Come on Jeff, you've never studied anything.

Pierce discovers talking yourself up as an accomplished professional genius musician might lead to people expecting you to compose songs in a reasonable timeframe. It's impossible for me to imagine how people can just make up songs, but I have seen it happen on live streams and it can be done in mere minutes. Pierce immediately going into panic mode when they need it done "this Friday?" would be funny if he was even good, but it's even funnier cause he thinks he's absolutely brilliant.

Over in Spanish class, Britta goes Spartacus to save everyone from the wrath of Señor Chang. That sounds so much funnier than it is if you say it like that. But it gets pretty funny when the whole class instantly bombards her with rolled up papers on command. Britta faces tribunal by the swimming pool which affords Jeff an opportunity to gain some attorney-client privilege, if you know what I mean. (Britta sure does.)

Meanwhile Abed pulls the extremely Autism-relatable move of taking things further than anyone expects or even thought possible. He leads Troy to think he still doesn't get how to mess with people ("Did you hear, all dogs are blue now") and makes bleeping sounds while he takes notes in a script that reminds me of the Zodiac killer's little code messages. It's probably Arabic, right? At least Abed says it's "probably Arabic." (It looks nothing like Arabic.)

So the reason Britta's tribunal is in the bathhouse is so the judges get to use the fancy judges table they just got installed. What kind of swimming competition level does Greendale have? Is this another weirdly competent branch of the school like air conditioner repair we don't ever see?

And Pierce promises Annie to write a song that will make the Devil poop God's pants although from what she sees of his process, or "throbbing cosmic womb of creativity," I'd have doubts. I can't tell if he's faking confidence cause he thinks he can bullshit his way through the job like a real fraud or if he's trying to convince himself he can do it.

"I move this case be thrown out of the pool area." Dang, this episode is full of staggeringly good one-liners. Britta changes her story, catching her lawyer off guard (protip: don't ever do that if you have a real lawyer) and is saved from handing the case to the prosecution only because the trial is interrupted by a splash of water on the judge's table. How fancy is this wood?

And Abed makes Troy think he might possibly be a space alien for real, and It's lucky Abed doesn't know how fantastically naive Troy really is yet or this would be much meaner. And he's not done yet!

(Is Troy just trying to act like he's seen it all because he's not yet sure of himself enough to let out all his childlike wonder and enthusiasm, or did they not have his final character figured out at this point? That seems like a silly question once you see him sucking on a lollipop at the end of this scene.)

Here's a distinct core of raw humanity at the center of the episode that I'm not even sure how to approach. Jeff makes a naked appeal to be Britta's friend and I feel I did really judge him too harshly in previous episodes. ("I just didn't want to take sex off the table* without doing my due diligence.") And Britta tells us she's so used to being worthless and fucking everything up it's comfortingly familiar to her.

There's a moment when every great comedy stops being a comedy. . .oh that was it, now we're going back to the trial with a comical insanity defense. "Do we really want to make it a crime to be crazy at Greendale?"

Cue the first appearance of Leonard, naked in the pool yelling that he's not crazy. He may be my favorite.

Britta is exonerated mainly so Duncan can try to sleep with her under the pretext of giving therapy. You know, there's a point in the third season when we get Sucker Punched and it seems Greendale actually was a creepy old mental hospital all along, well, we'll get there in time.

Troy is really not buying Abed's prank and tells him he's gone way too far. Between shooting a greenscreen video to have a conversation with an identical copy of himself on TV in the darkened Spanish classroom, making a T-shirt with even weirder alien writing on it and a costume for Garrett (hey, first time we get a name for him too), it would seem like too much, wouldn't it. They make a pact of no more pranks, we see their handshake for the first time and everyone's friends. I wish my school experience had been more like this instead of people getting creeped out or angry and shutting me out.

Over to Pierce, who it seems manages to independently invent the tune to "Twinkle twinkle little star" and plays it for several seconds before recognizing it. He gives up and admits to Annie he's no more a songwriter than Billy Joel is. (Billy Joel burn count: 1) It turns out the one song he did write (to sell Hawthorn wipes) was just "She'll be coming round the mountain". But after a pep talk from Annie involving a questionable amount of references to being a teenage girl, even considering she's quoting a speech she was given by her mother verbatim, he comes up with a pretty great song (stolen from Bill Hornsby) and we get a grand closing scene outdoors with the statue and the music (and our heroes talking about how they'll definitely get sued.)

The stinger has a sweet gag where it seems the pranks continue with Abed putting 36 pens in Troy's mouth while he's sleeping, but it turns out he's just zoned out in order not to gag as they are taking turns checking to see how many pens they can fit in their mouths. Good, clean, drooly fun.

Learning fact of the week: Ferrari makes terrible vanity cars that you basically don't buy but spend millions of dollars and sign a contract to live a Ferrari-approved lifestyle that fits their brand to be allowed to lease. Buy Lamborghini instead, if you have that kind of car money.

*And then they eventually have sex on the table! In the episode where someone first calls attention to the table. And the whole subplot with the judge's table too. This is either the best foreshadowing in history or a coincidence using a very common turn of phrase.

[gildedwildwood]

While I do agree that Vace and Nems relationship is petty heavy handed, I do think there is some accuracy to the level of agency Sol has in their relationship compared to Instance and Tangents.

Vace and Nem are peers, and (if I’m remembering correctly) in order to break them up you have to have a very close relationship with Anemone, very solid charisma, or both.

You also have to catch it before you hit age 20. While they are still college-age teens. They aren’t married, there aren’t kids, she hasn’t yet been fully isolated from her friends and family (though it’s certainly started).

Sure, it’s probably easier than it is in real life, but it’s also not entirely out of the question that Anemone would heed the words of a very close lifelong friend, and dip while it’s still “red flag”.

Meanwhile- Instance is an adult member of the community. She’s not just Tangent’s mentor, she’s also your doctor, a friend of your parents, and she might be your mentor and/or teacher and/or boss.

Even if Sol does notice (and I do think that to some extent us as players noticing does mean that Sol as character is able to pick up on it.) Sol doesn’t have any agency to oust a prominent community member. It took a year of work to oust Lum and -everyone- hated him.

Because Sol is just a Teen. And Tangent is a Teen. And the other adults are all too busy trying to stop the colony from starving to pay attention to the emotional state that the kids are in.

With Anemone you can stick with her, and keep being friends despite her sliding face first into self-destruction, and if you have her loyalty you can convince her that the her shitty highschool/college boyfriend isn’t good for her.

With Tangent you can give her a hug, and be there when she doesn’t want to be alone, and soothe her migraine and help with her project, or talk with her about her feelings. You might even get her to reconcile with her brother. You can give her support until she has the agency to make her own choices.

For Anemone, Vace is one bad choice in a complex web of self destruction, and getting her away from him doesn’t necessarily stop that path entirely. It moves the needle, but he’s not the center of her story, just a figure in it.

For Tangent, her relationship with Instance on such a stark part of her relationship with science and herself. Her connection to Instance drives her passion for science. We see her through waves of burn out and dilemma, and it seems like at times she’s losing her passion until Instance calls her back to her work. Because Instance makes her a scientist, and being a Scientist is -who she is-.

Without Instance, Tangent would be a completely different person. From the first day we interact with her she’s already set her world view to match Instance. So the amount of influence we can have on it is minimal, we have to help Tang in other ways.

Without Vace, Anemone would still have lost Kom. Would still have come to conflict with Cal over his pacifism (we see this long before Helios drops). Would still fight with her mom about not wanting kids or babying. So we can help her cut him off, but so much of the rest is beyond our control.

In conclusion- I don’t know if I would say that one is better than the other at being a depiction of abuse. I think they both serve different purposes narratively, and the amount of agency we have to change the relationship is reflected in that.

Tangent and Instance thoughts/my Tangent theory. Spoilers for my two friends I just got into exocolonist; wait 'til you've seen the whole women's wrongs plot and then come back. @dillypillars I'm tagging you since you asked to hear my Instance thoughts.

Tangent is an abused child. Before anything else, before she's an amoral scientist or a workaholic genius, she's an abused child.

She's also brilliant. She is capable, at nine years old, of sometimes, if she overstretches herself, gives up even the little sleep she still needs with her augment, producing results on the level of an adult scientist, a habit which becomes lifelong and eventually kills her.

The only praise she cares about is Instance's, and overstretching herself like that is the only way to get that. She's taken on responsibilities most adults spend years of dedicated training to get ready for, as a preteen.

She's isolated from her peer group. In the bar arc, Dys outright tells you that since she started her gene therapies with Instance, she's thought herself smarter and better than her peers to the point that the only ones who try to keep in touch with her are Marz (who's immune to anything Tangent might say to push her away) and maybe Sol (who, if they tried to keep up with Tangent aboard the ship, is also a nerdy science kid, although not (yet) on the same level).

That her isolation is because she thinks she's smart and mature for her age (because she's being held to adult expectations and sometimes succeeding) doesn't make it any less isolation.

Instance encourages this isolation. Instance sometimes even orders it (there's a line when you approach Tangent in late-game where she's like "Instance says I'm not to be distracted by visitors").

Instance also tramples her sense of scientific ethics. Tangent comes to Sol about the engineered plague with ethical concerns about deploying it, but she's not going into that conversation with an open mind at all. She wants her friend and peer to tell her everything is alright; if Sol instead echoes her ethical concerns back to her (or comes at her with new ones), she throws up the same defenses and excuses about how she would do anything for Instance (🚩🚩🚩) that she's doubtless used to suppress those concerns for herself before.

As an aside, I also don't buy that Instance didn't start research on the Engineered Plague until ordered to do so by Lum. Tangent has mad scientist "this could change everything" moments years before in the Strato colony, when you're researching the Shimmer. It might not have been a research priority before Lum, but I don't think the evidence supports Instance not having considered inventing bioweapons to exterminate inconvenient Vertumnan species.

Then there's the epilogue; I've never seen Tangent keep the chief engineer job for more than a year despite everything Instance has done to groom her for the position (wording intentional). She's put aside a lot of her own wants and ambitions to fulfill Instance's goal of having a worthy successor, and then without Instance she realizes she doesn't even want it. If she almost built the plague, that experience is a life-defining trauma for her. She wasn't even 18 yet when she worked on that, but she trusted Instance to know what's best, did as she asked, and suffered a life-defining trauma from the moral dissonance.

One of the most glaring "something is wrong here" moments for me was one of Tangent's colony dialogue blurbs when she was like "only Instance truly respects me," she says to Sol, who she is dating at the time.

I think on some level she really believes that. There's probably some cognitive dissonance between recognizing what she has with a Sol who's approaching her on her level, for the most part, and what she has to believe for Instance (which is what she says out loud), but she navigates that anyway.

At the risk of running off even further into unpopular opinion territory, I think Tangent and Instance's dynamic is actually the better depiction of abuse in Exocolonist (which is surprising, because it's not mentioned in the game's content warnings at all). Anemone and Vace's relationship is a power fantasy of being a bystander to an abusive relationship; you catch Anemone when her heavily-armed, hyper-possessive boyfriend with anger issues is giving her the silent treatment once, tell her she deserves better than that, and she's like "you know what, you're right, I do!" and leaves him and everything is good. Tangent's is more realistic. You might not even see it unless you really focus and look. Sol doesn't see it, across multiple timelines, even if they're dating Tangent in some of them. There's nothing you can do about it; intervening even to echo thoughts she's brought to you just pushes her away. Tangent is getting an emotional need met there that she doesn't think she could get anywhere else. That's more often what it's like.

[arcamemoryberlin]

The mysterious world of indigenous Hutsuls. How romanticising can become a dangerous tool of imperialism.

The world of indigenous Ukrainians have always been covered with mystery. Even more so for the external observers - people who perceive this land as the most authentic place in Ukraine, where the local traditions and rites have been preserved and cultivated. Nevertheless, some aspects of the Hutsul culture and history have changed over time under the pressure of various forces, both political and technological, and for the full picture those forces should be closely examined. Today I talked to a young woman from Hutsul region, S. (name changed), who shared her story of superstitions, magic and paganism that exist in the Carpathians until this day.

I was curious about whether there exist any myths and mystical narratives that are being told by the elderly to the young generations. S. shared a story that was narrated in her family, where a woman was called a witch mostly die to her unethical behaviour. That woman was engaged with herbal medicine, so the superstitions worked well with the image of a powerful indigenous Hutsul dealing with the natural forces. S. also shared that witchcraft has always been stigmatised, where a woman would be called a “witch” if she did not fully comply with normativity. S. added: “The topic of witchcraft has always been of interest to me.” The Western European medieval witch hunt with which most of people associate the story of women’s magic was not the only existing framework. In Hutsul region, due to the late imposition of Catholic religion, and its close interaction with paganism, there was no violent witch hunt, but rather social and moral condemnation of non-normative women. Simultaneously, S. shared a story of pagan culture that has been very strong despite the hegemony of the Christian Catholic Church. For example, it was documented in 80-90s that there were still people praying to the sun and not to the God. “This also exists until today,” S. shared, “but back then [paganism] was still sincerely living.”

The history of the region is exciting. People who did not want to be subjected to oppression of any of the empires that ruled on the Ukrainian territory (there were plenty of them), were fleeing to the Carpathian Mountains. There, far from the state rules and structures, they managed to preserve and develop rites and traditions, which would not withstand the imperial forces of unification and subjugation. However, the depiction of indigenous Hutsul people has turned into the post-colonial narrative the people from the capital tell each other. “These are the people who were not influenced by civilisation,” S. shared. She thinks that this image is way too romanticised. She also drew a parallel between the narrative about Hutsul people by Ukrainians from Kyiv and elsewhere, and the way Americans talk about native Americans - the superficial depiction of the richness of culture and labelling of the indigenous communities as “noble savages”. However, there are a plenty of other region in Ukraine where the culture is rich and exciting, like Polissya and Poltavschyna, yet they are not as “appealing” and “mysterious” as the people who live high in the mountains, far from the rest of the population, isolated and authentic. The desire to explore the indigenousness is understandable, however, the outsider would almost inevitably come with their stereotypes and lenses that would impact the objectivity of research.

I have never had sincere conversations with Hutsul people on the topic of their cultural framing. This time, however, the discussion with S. revealed something special. She helped me understand that the interest in the topic does not necessarily justify research, especially if no cultural sensitivity is present.

The immediate temptation to apply my personal understanding of “witchcraft” and “mysticism” onto the Hutsul people shows that the story can be narrated by the agent themselves much better than external people who have pre-existing knowledge, although superficial, about the regional culture.

Sometimes the best question that can be asked is “What do YOU think is important and would be nice to share?” rather than “Tell me about the mythology of your people.” The curious mind coming into the culture should not necessarily impose their superstitions or hypotheses, but would rather observe and note the reality without any theoretical framework. Only afterwards, when the ethnographic work is done, they could draw conclusions and construct the theory to explain what they have seen, and not the other way around. Such approach helps discover some hidden gems, non-conventional knowledge of the indigenous peoples, but also the frames that are so quick to limit the vast wisdom of the nation for the purpose of reinforcing post-colonial narratives in culture, society and politics.

[transportationunknown]

on Looking for blackness: Considerations of a researcher's paradox

Bressey melds narratives, historical geographies, and photography to foster an understanding of Black Briton women during the Victorian ages. Revealed in this article are her own feelings about the construction of racial categorization, both contemporary and during the Victorian era, and whether her quest of Black identity (“looking for blackness”) is unintentionally reinforcing the same late 1800s racial framing she intended to deconstruct. The questions that arise from her research ultimately become central to the article, as they overtake the study. 

As noted within previous summaries of texts from the Black geographies, race is often a missing, and missed, element within geographic study. Bressey chooses to focus on this “missing” element through exploring the thread of Black Briton identity. The Black geographies is overwhelmingly North American-centric, as most, if not all, of its seminal authors are African American whose research involves not only the imaginaries of a displaced African diaspora in North and South America, but also the creation of indigenous Black cultures in the New World. England, as a site, is an outlier in this discipline for despite its role in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, they exported more slaves than they imported. The dominant Black ethnicities that live in England are from their present and former colonies: West Indian (noticeably Jamaican) and West African (Nigerian). 

Bressey focuses on the formation, and reinforcement, of cultural identity through the manufacturing of shared memories. Photography is her central unit of analysis, both as a material and as a document. She focuses on photographs of Black British women in Victorian London and narrows this focus to Black Briton women living in prisons, asylums, and children’s homes. The Black Briton underclass. Through this research method, she asks the following questions:

How would the biographies of prisoners and the ‘socially excluded’ help an examination of the place of black people in London’s history, and how would they be received today?

How helpful would the (re)discovery of a black underclass be to the black community living in London now?

How could the detailing of an underclass become an extra tool for those challenging racism, rather than providing examples that could reinforce prejudice?

Through these questions is an interest in exploring “counter-memories”. Counter-memories are described by bell hooks as, “A way to understand and change the present by placing it in a new relation to the past” following Foucault’s argument of memories being “a site of resistance.” The reason behind exploring counter-memories is due to Victorian-era archives that, despite being known for its thorough documentation of people’s lives, specifically did not record skin color or ethnicity. Without these markers of identity, as socially constructed as they are, how does Black Briton identity and British cultural identity atone for these losses? 

Photographs and the re-treading of historical archives have become a tool of resistance as a process of reclamation. Because Victorian archives did not record skin color or ethnicity, Bressey and other historical geographers can only rely on birth (and death) certificates, but as she notes being from the Caribbean and Africa does not necessarily mean that someone identifies as Black. Still, combing through archives of photos, particularly photos of working class peoples, helps to define who was truly present during Victorian London, even if attributes of their race weren’t recorded. Photographs allow a closer look into these gaps. 

However, during her research, Bressey encounters complicating factors:

Photography as a medium 

Racial identity as subversion or… reinforcement?

What defines Blackness?

Arguably, the three factors above are the most intriguing aspects of the article, for I originally went into this with an interest in how she uses visual methods in qualitative research. My previous interactions in the Black Geographies so far have largely either established theory or provide exhaustive literature reviews. 

Photography as a medium - Photography, in general, produces a host of feelings within someone, depending on their culture and the images within them tell just a fraction of a story. Additionally, as technology has progressed, photography has become a part of the surveillance state. Photographs also allow for stories to be superimposed onto them, eventually becoming fact because images cannot dispute the viewer’s fictive imagination. Levine (1989) suggests that photographs should be read as “provocative and suggestive rather than definitive.” As Bressey progresses in her usage of photographs, she notes that even after encountering photographs of Black women in the historical archives, she still did not manage to learn anything more about them other than what was presented (in the photo) and what was written down.

Racial identity as subversion or… reinforcement? - Bressey notes early on that a researcher’s own involvement in life stories and archives is a personal one, and that what is uncovered will affect them (p. 217). In the “Presenting Blackness” section of the article, Bressey introduces a second method of data collection: focus groups. The focus groups consisted of undergraduate students tasked with interacting with her research. The students were almost all Black women. She tasked the students with racially categorizing the women in the photos, and the students shared they thought the women were Black. Bressey notes that their categorization of the women was based upon physical features. However, the students believed the women led very different lives than they did, at the time of the article. So, shared features, different histories. The students’ manner of categorization forced Bressey to think, “I wondered how far we could really say we have come in the process of dismantling the boundaries of race and the racism that derives power from them.” (p. 220)

What defines Blackness? - Bressey is left with an existential conundrum. Through her quest to find Blackness in Victorian era Britain, she is caught in the loop of categorizing Blackness through physical features assigned to Black people. In her usage of photographs, where she assigns Blackness to through physical features, she’s forced to confront her hidden danger within method of choice. Stating, “The use of photographs in this project means that a research project with anti-racist ideals at its heart is bolstered by evidence that would not seem entirely out of place in the ‘racist’ world of Victorian phrenology and physiognomy.” Furthermore, she shares that her use of photography, “In this methodology reinforce the artificially fixed attributes of race, it also reinforces colonial and imperial discourse in what is supposed to be a body of research attempting directly to contradict these claims.” 

Right now, I feel an element of distress both from this conclusion and my own concept of race. On one hand, yes, I do use physical features to assess if someone else is Black, but I also know features only go so far. There are cultural nuances that help to form Black identity but they’re also constrained by political borders (though possibly less so due to the pace of technology). And what I may see in someone may not be the same for another Black person due diversity of a place. Slash and Cardi B come to mind. Slash having an African American mother is usually a surprise to the unknown because, in my experience, folks don’t “see” it. I saw it; didn’t understand why others couldn’t. Whereas Cardi B’s Blackness is debated because is an Afro-Latina (exhausting)  Anyway. 

Assigning Blackness through physical features is/can be (?) racist/a form of cultural solidarity/complicated.

In conclusion: This journey meant to “illustrate the importance of photographs for the study of black historical geography in Britain in two main ways” (p. 224):

“It emphasises that such photographs provide access to archives, and reveal pathways to the stories of black people that it would otherwise be very difficult, if not impossible, to trace.”

“Secondly, it argues that the images that are collected are an immediate and dramatic way of subverting the traditional narratives of British history.”

While Bressey’s research questions and methods conjured up more questions than answers, where she lands in her usage of photographs as a method for uncovering Black Briton history is stating, “…While their lives outside the institutions in which I found them remain unknown, they will perhaps be awarded little dignity, and a limited sense of place.” (p. 225). A sense of place that is missing in the geographies. 

[star-anise]

Ok, I'll bite. What *is* the difference between Bridgerton and Jane Austen in relationship to their skirts?

Oh! Not in their costuming, just in their general *waves hands* everything. It's a comment I see a lot about Bridgerton: "Well, it's not much like Austen, is it?"

That's because there are 200 years of literary history between the two, and they have not been empty!

This ended up being 1.5k words, but when I put stuff under a readmore, people don't actually read it and then just yell at me because of a misread of the 1/10th of the post they did read. Press j to skip or get ready to do a lot of scrolling (It takes four generous flicks to get past on my iPhone).

First I'll say my perspective on this is hugely shaped by Sherwood Smith, who has done a lot of research on silver fork novels and the way the Regency has been remembered in the romance genre.

The Regency and Napoleonic eras stretch from basically the 1790s to 1820, and after that, it was hard to ignore the amount of social change happening in Britain and Europe. The real watershed moment is the 1819 Peterloo Massacre, where 60,000 working-class people protesting for political change were attacked by a militia. The issues of poverty, class, industrialization, and social change are inescapable, and we end up with things like the 1832 Reform Act and 1834 Poor Law.

This is why later novelists, like Charles Dickens and Elizabeth Gaskell, are so concerned with the experiences of the urban poor. Gaskell's North and South has been accurately described as "Pride and Prejudice for socialists."

So almost as soon as it ended, people started to look back and mythologize the Regency as a halcyon era, back when rich people could just live their rich lives and fret about "only" having three hundred pounds a year to live on. Back when London society was the domain of hereditary landowners, when you weren't constantly meeting with jumped-up industrialists and colonials.

Jane Austen is kind of perfect for this because she comes at the very end of the long eighteenth century, and her novels show hints of the tremors that are about to completely reshape England, but still comfortably sit in the old world. ("The Musgroves, like their houses, were in a state of alteration, perhaps of improvement. The father and mother were in the old English style, and the young people in the new. Mr and Mrs Musgrove were a very good sort of people; friendly and hospitable, not much educated, and not at all elegant. Their children had more modern minds and manners.")

Sherwood Smith covers the writers who birthed the Silver Fork genre in detail, but there's one name that stands out in its history more than any other: Georgette Heyer.

Georgette Heyer basically single-handedly established the Regency Romance as we know it today. Between 1935 and 1972, she published 26 novels set in a meticulously researched version of London of the late 18th and early 19th century. She took Silver Fork settings and characters and turned them into a highly recognizable set of tropes, conventions, and types. (As Sherwood points out, her fictional Regency England isn't actually very similar to the period as it really happened; it's like Arthurian Camelot, a mythical confection with a dash of truth for zest.)

Regency Romance is an escapist genre in which a happy, prosperous married life is an attainable prize that will solve everything for you. Georgette Heyer's novels are bright, sparkling, delightful romps through a beautiful and exotic world. Her female characters have spirit and vivacity, and are allowed to have flaws and make mistakes without being puritanically punished for them. Her romances have real unique sparks to them. She's able to write a formula over and over without it becoming dull.

And.... well. The essay that introduced me to Heyer still, in my opinion, says it best:

Here's the thing about Georgette Heyer: she hates you. Or, okay, she doesn't hate you, exactly. It's just that unless you are white, English, and upper class (and hale, and hearty, and straight, and and and), she thinks you are a lesser being. [...W]ith Heyer, I knew where I stood: somewhere way below the bottom rung of humanity. Along with everyone else in the world except Prince William and four of his friends from Eton, which really took away the sting. But my point is: if you are not that white British upper-class person of good stock and hearty bluffness and a large country estate, the only question for you is which book will contain a grimly bigoted caricature of you featuring every single stereotyped trait ever associated with your particular group. (You have to decide for yourself if really wonderful female characters and great writing are worth the rest of it.)

So Heyer created the genre, but she exacerbated the flaw that was always at the heart of fiction about the Regency, was that its appeal was not having to deal with the inherent rot of the British aristocracy. I think part of why it's such a popular genre in North America specifically is that we often don't know much British history, so we can focus more on the perfume and less on the dank odor it's hiding.

And like, escapism is not a bad thing. Romance writers as a community have sat down and said: We are an escapist genre. The Romance Writers of America, one of the biggest author associations out there, back when they were good, have foundationally said: "Two basic elements comprise every romance novel: a central love story and an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." A strong part of the community argue that publishing in the genre is a "contract" between author and reader: If it's marketed as a romance book, there's a Happily Ever After. If there's no Happily Ever After, it's not romance.

It's important for people to be able to take a break from the stresses of their lives and do things that are enjoyable. But the big question the romance genre in particular has to deal with is, who should be allowed to escape? Is it really "escapist" if only white, straight, upper class, able-bodied thin cis people get to escape into it? In historical romance, this is especially an issue for POC and LGBTQ+ people. It's taken a lot of work, in a genre dominated by the Georgette Heyers of the world, to try to hew out the space for optimistic romances for people of colour or LGBTQ+ people. These are minority groups that deal with a literally damaging amount of stress in real lives; they are in especial need of sources of comfort, refuge, community, and encouragement. For brief introductions to the issue, I can give you Talia Hibbert on race, and KJ Charles on LGBTQ+ issues.

Up until the 1990s, the romance genre evolved slowly. It did evolve; Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan's Beyond Heaving Bosoms charts the demise of the "bodice-ripper" genre as it became more acceptable for women to have and enjoy sex. The historical romance genre became more accommodating to non-aristocratic heroines, or ones that weren't thin or conventionally pretty. The first Bridgerton book, The Duke and I, was published in 2000, and has that kind of vibe: Its characters are all white but not all of them are aristocrats, its heroines are frequently not conventionally beautiful and occasionally plump, and its cultivation to modern sensibility is reflected in its titles, which reference popular media of today.

This is just my impression, but I think that while traditional mainstream publishing was beginning to diversify in the 1990s, the Internet was what really made diverse romance take off. Readers, reviewers, and authors could talk more freely on the internet, which allowed books to become unlikely successes even if their publishers didn't promote them very much. Then e-publishing meant that authors could market directly to their readers without the filter of a publishing house, and things exploded. Indie ebooks proved that there was a huge untapped market.

One of my favourite books, Zen Cho's Sorcerer to the Crown, is an example of what historical romance is like today; it's a direct callback and reclamation of Georgette Heyer, with a dash of "Fuck you and all your prejudices" on top of it. It fearlessly weaves magic into a classic Heyer plot, maintaining the essential structure while putting power into the hands of people of colour and non-Western cultures, enjoying the delights of London society while pointing out and dodging around the rot. It doesn't erase the ugliness, but imagines a Britain that is made better because its poor, its immigrants, its people of colour, and the foreign countries it interacts with have more power to make their voices heard and to enforce their wills. Another book I've loved that does the same thing is Courtney Milan's The Duke Who Didn't.

So then... Bridgerton the TV show is trying to take a book series with a very middle-of-the-road approach to diversity, differing from Heyer but not really critiquing her, and giving it a facelift to bring it up to date.

So to be honest, although it's set in the same time period as Austen, it's not in the least her literary successor. It's infinitely more "about" the past 30 years of conversation and art in the romance genre than it is about books written 200 years ago.

[an-aspiring-jester]

Hi I have a question and want to hear your thoughts! A lot of anti-Maiko arguments claim that Mai was completely unaware/does not align with Zuko’s moral codes and mission, for example in stopping the fire nations imperialism. This therefore means that they don’t work in a relationship. I want to hear your thoughts, specifically if you choose to debunk this claim! Thank you!

Hi! Thanks for the ask! I don't know if you're the same anon as before but I love seeing (and talking to!) other maiko fans on this site! <3

To start off, I don't think the show gives us any concrete evidence of Mai's political views, so my response consists mostly of canon-compliant headcanons that I think make sense for her character.

Mai's main problem is her passivity. So frankly, I think she never questioned Fire Nation's imperialism because she had no reason to! (Or even the opportunity - remember that everyone in the Fire Nation is spoon-fed the propaganda since early childhood, and the only time she went out she was traveling with Azula) But, judging from her apathy in Omashu, her view can be summed up as something like "why bother conquering other nations, we already have everything we need in the capital, it's more trouble than it's worth/it's boring." What she does have strong opinions about (I think) is the absolute power of the Firelord - the guy branded and banished his own son for speaking out of turn - what can a regular citizen do? I talked about it before - she views maintaining the status quo and playing by the Firelord's rules as a way to keep Zuko (and herself) safe. Add her own stifling upbringing where she was forbidden to express her opinions, and you see why she never speaks against the regime. Even talking about it with Zuko can be potentially dangerous - the walls have ears, after all.

(Purely headcanon territory: I think one of the reasons she fell for Zuko in the first place was his earnestness in speaking up against mistreatment of others - be it the fountain incident, or opposing the slaughtering of young Fire Nation soldiers. And she saw how that turned out for him. I believe the Agni Kai trauma made her even more reluctant to stand up for anything.)

And now the turning point - the Boiling Rock. Mai's whole arc is about overcoming her apathy and passivity and finally finding the courage and the drive to stand up and FIGHT for what's important to her. And let's not kid ourselves, she didn't do it for any political agenda, but for ZUKO. But it doesn't make it any less impactful. It's just the first step for her! I see no reason why she wouldn't become a supporting and politically-aware queen by Zuko's side? It's not like she threw a fit over keeping Fire Nations colonies or insisted on staying spoiled and unbothered in Caldera - we see her in Earth Kingdom clothes, peacefully interacting with Zuko's friends!!! She has time to learn about the world and different cultures now that the danger is over, and there's no Azula's shadow looming over her, ready to report any perceived treachery if her opinions stray from the universally accepted.

I'll give antis that - maiko probably WOULDN'T work out long-term if Mai stayed her uninterested, apathetic self. This (among other things) is why they had communication problems during the show. But the whole POINT is that she grows as a person and will CONTINUE to do so after the show! It's never too late to change! Mai didn't have to actively help Zuko stop the war (though saving his life was a pretty important step for that!), it's enough that she'll help him shape a better future for the Fire Nation and the world!

There's a long way still ahead of them but what we are shown in the finale makes me very optimistic about these two. :)

I don't know if you're satisfied with my answer but that's basically my opinion on the matter. I'm really glad you reached out! (And kinda flattered you wanted to hear MY thoughts XD I'm just a nobody chilling in my corner XD)

[starsscribble]

Stick Shift

Summary: Rick thinks he freeing Y/n. Y/n thinks she's the problem.

Tags: Angst, No comfort, Age Difference, Reader is 25 Rick is in in 40.

A/n: This was when I was on my Walking Dead kick. Finally got it edited.

But today I drove through the suburbs

Crying 'cause you weren't around

  You pulled into the post-apocalyptic suburbs; in a separate car than what Glenn and you left in. Your earlier pride of find and driving said care was gone. Now in it place was a numb type of sadness. It was stupid. You know that. Getting worked up over the fact you were driving a stick shift. All on your own. But Rick. Your boyfriend; ex-boyfriend now. He had been the one to teach you how to drive a stick shift. Before Virginia. When the group was still in the prison. When you were both still happy.

  “Come on,” his southern drawl was clear as day. You let out a puff of air. Head pushing against the headrest. “This was your idea. You gotta confess something.” You started to hate that you suggested this game, but the drive was so damn long. You didn’t have the radio to help distract you. No, it was just you, Rick, and a long stretch of Georgia backroad. The former sheriff’s right hand shifted off the steering wheel. Moving carefully as not to catch your attention. You were still racking your brain for a secret to tell. Then a yelp left your mouth. You jumped in your seat making the older man laugh. Hand retreated to the wheel.

“That’s what you get for taking so long pumpkin.” He grinned; eyes shifted from the road onto you. A hint of playfulness in those ocean blue eyes. 

“I was thinking of something!” You shot back making him chuckle before looking back to the road. 

“There’s gotta be something you have never told anyone.”

“Well,” you hummed. Readjusting in your seat. “I don’t know if this would count because I’ve never told this to anyone in the group.”

“I’ll count it.” He glances at you quickly, still smiling. Which makes you smile.

“Alright. I don’t know how to drive a stick shift.” You feel the jerk was the car spot. Rick looked at you as if you just told him the undead are all gone. Eye full of disbelief. 

“You’re joking.” He speaks after a beat and you shake your head. Nope, you couldn’t drive a stick to save your life. And with how the world was it just might. Rick took off his seatbelt as you questioned just what he was doing. “I’m gonna teach you how to drive stick. You might need it.”

“We are on a run.”

“Yep and this is the perfect time. Now get into the driver’s seat.”

  Slowly you parked next to Glenn. Killing the engine you got out as Glenn moved over to your vehicle. He smiled at you. Today was a good day. Got more food, medicine, and another car. The possibilities for cars were endless. Used for parts. Set up at protection. Used as traps. Daryl Dixon the town resident mechanic would have a field day with this car.

“I’m gonna check in with Rick,” Glenn says. You see him playing with his wedding band. Maggie’s baby bump had started to show and Glenn didn’t like being away for too long. Patting his shoulder you speak.

“Go see Maggie and your baby.” You slammed the driver’s side door shut. The dark-haired man stares at you. Willing to argue with you on this.

“Really it’s-” You raised your hand stopping him.

“If you don’t go check up on Maggie. I will and I’ll tell her how you screamed like a girl.” His eyes widen at the threat. 

“I didn’t know a group of bats would be in there!” He defended himself only making you grin at him. You both head away from the parking area. Back towards the stretch of cookie-cutter homes. You nudge his shoulder with yours.

“First it’s a colony of bats. Second, not only was the scream funny, so was your face.” You teased him. Glenn shoved your shoulder playfully. Before mumbling that he was going to check in with his wife. Leaving you with the task of checking in with the community’s newly appointed leader Rick. 

  Jogging onto his porch you knocked on the door. Eyes looking everywhere but the door until it opened. Sadly it wasn’t the male you were looking for. Carl greeted you with a soft smile. The bandages that once covered his right eye socket had been replaced with a custom-made eyepatch.

“Ahoy captain.” You tease the teenager who rolled his remaining eye. “Your dad here? Just checking in since Glenn and I got back.”

“Nope. Haven’t seen him since this morning.” Carl tells you, making you nodded. “When I see him…” He trails off because he knows you will just hunt his dad down. “I don’t know where he is.” He's lying. You know it. He knows that you know. But you just nod and quickly thank him. Tell him to kiss his sister for you before turning off the porch.

  And you're probably with that blonde girl

Who always made me doubt

She's so much older than me

She's everything I'm insecure about

  You know where Rick Grimes is. Feet carrying you down the still blood-stained street. Streets that just weeks ago were covered with the undead. You wave kindly to the people passing by. It is a mix of your group, older residents, and new people. You still feel out of place. Maybe you always will. Maybe you won't. You wonder quietly to yourself. A nice distraction. Because if you thought about where you were going. Where you had to go. You might just break. So you let your mind wander. Let your feet carry you to the destination. Everything seemed to be on autopilot. Until your using the knocker of the baby blue house. Her house.

“We should end this,” Rick says matter-of-factly. You stopped brushing your hair to look at him. He’s not facing you. Back facing you as he pulled his jeans on. 

“What?” Maybe you misheard him. Maybe it was your ear playing a trick on you. Because Rick couldn’t be breaking up with you right now.

“We should break up.” He rephrases. The words take the air from your lungs. Your mouth opened to say words that your mind can’t even come up with. The silence in the room grew by the seconds. It finally became too much for the man as he turned to face you. Jeans zipped up but not buttoned. Belt lay next to his shirt on the bed but his eyes fell on you instead. 

“Say something.” He requested of you softly. That same soft voice that he used when he said he loved you. Tears that formed in your eyes finally fell as you blinked. Once. Twice. Three times. Before you looked him in the eyes.

“Is it me? Did I do something wrong?” Getting shot was nothing compared to your question to him. Because he knew you honestly thought you did something wrong. You always doubted yourself. But you were perfect. So goddamn perfect. And amazing. And young. 

“No sweetheart. It’s just…” He stops himself from going over to embrace you. Tell you to forget about it. Because this has to happen. You're 24. His 39. Even if the group. His and your family were ok with it. He heard the whispers around town. The other weren’t as supportive. 

“I think we should end this. We had an amazing run. And you're young. You’re gonna find someone else that will love you more than I ever could.” He breaks his own heart with his words. Because he doesn’t want you to find someone else. He wants to be with you until the end. When and where ever the end was. But you deserve better. You deserve someone around your age. Not an old man with two children like him. 

“I…” you stare at him. Cheeks strained with tears he caused. “I don’t want someone else.” You grab the comforter. It gets balled up as you tighten your grip on the fabric. Your mind running over everything you had done in the last weeks to get to the point. You had snapped at him a few days back because of Jessie Anderson. The blonde woman in her thirties that lived up the street. You didn’t hear what they were talking but her body language told you everything. She was flirting with Rick. And either he didn’t notice or didn’t care. Doubt played in your mind the whole day after seeing the interaction. Because Jessie was around Rick’s age. And you weren’t. You didn’t really have any life experience before the world ended. So it made sense if Rick preferred a woman his own age. As opposed to you, a 24-year-old kid in his eyes.

“I can get you a brownstone to stay in.” He said. Brushing off your comment. Which broke your heart even more.

  The door opened showing the blonde that lived there. A smile and questioning look on her face. 

“Is Rick here?” You asked, watching as she turned her head and yelling the man’s name into the home. He comes out from the kitchen; questioning who it was. The question dying in his throat when he saw it was you. Jessie excused herself leaving you and Rick alone. The former sheriff stepped onto the porch, closing the door behind him.

“Hey,” he gives you a tight-lipped smile. Which you return.

“Just came to tell you Glenn and I are back.”

“Right,” he nods. “You guys went on a run. Get anything good?” You nodded before listing off some of the supplies you got. Including the stick shift car. You heard him chuckle. Looking into his eyes you saw that same playfulness as the day he first forced you to drive a stick. 

“You didn’t flood the engine this time right?” He teased and you scoffed, punching him in the shoulder. 

“I was amazing.” You boasted. The older man stared at you and you swear you heard a quiet. ‘Ya, you are.’ 

“You don’t mind if I asked Glenn?” You roll your eyes but smile.

“Go ahead. He's gonna tell you the same thing.” He nodded. Hand going on his hips. You watch as he licks his lips. Your breath hitching as you feel your stomach twisting in knots. “I should go. Need a shower desperately.” You don’t wait for him to say goodbye or stop you. You're off the porch and down the road heading home in a few steps. 

  And all my friends are tired

Of hearing how much I miss you, but

I kinda feel sorry for them

'Cause they'll never know you the way that I do

  Maggie can’t drink. But that doesn’t mean you and Sasha can’t. Sasha, Abraham, and Rosita had come back later in the day from another run. They had been the unlucky ones not finding much of anything. But Sasha apparently found some top-tier booze in a rundown bar. The trio split it up between them. So here you were. Snacking on fresh strawberries drinking booze that would have been at least $100 for a bottle; straight out of the bottle. The three of you resting against the metal wall that protected the town from the nasty world outside.

“So,” Maggie started as she threw a strawberry stem into a bowl filled with them. “Heard someone talk with Rick.” Sasha and her eyes went to you as you grabbed the glass bottle of auburn liquid. Taking a healthy swig you felt the burn as it went down. You were far too sober to be talking about this. Talking about him. Because no one in the group knew why you guys ended it. Just one day you were a happy couple and the next you were packing up and moving into your own brownstone. Sasha took the bottle from you, making you whine. As you tried to reach for it but the former firefighter held it out of reach. Her hand on your chest also keeping you away from it.

“You can get some when you tell us what happened.” She landed down the rule and it makes you groan as you move to lay against the wall. You don't want to talk about it. You just want to wallow and let the scar form on your heart in peace.

A crack of thunder sends the trio onto the back porch of Maggie’s home. Lucky for you guys because moments after; the dark clouds opened up letting down heavy droplets that ping off the porch’s roof. Sasha is distracted by the rain. Asking Maggie if the crops will be ok. Allowing you to snatch the bottle from her hand and take another big glug. The bottle is half gone now. And honestly so are you. The alcohol works fast as your brain starts to go fuzzy. Sasha takes the bottle back slightly annoyed. But it clear the break-up has been hard. So she lets it go.

“You got your drink.” She says putting the cap back on and sitting it to the side out of your reach. “Now tell us what happened.”

“I don’t know.” You sob. You weren’t normally an emotional drunk. But with everything going on with Rick. Tonight you were. 

  And I know we weren't perfect

But I've never felt this way for no one, oh

And I just can't imagine how you could be so okay, now that I'm gone

  Maggie held you as you drunkenly cried. Sasha joined you on the other side, rubbing your back. You finally opened up about your breakup with Rick a month ago. You weren’t sure how much they understood because of the loud rain and your blubbering. But either way, they consoled you. Trying to help the only way they could. And the only way they knew how. Simply being there. Because for a month you kept this end. Kept this to yourself. So those outside of the group saw you were fine. The break-up didn’t seem to affect you. You carried on with work. Talked with Rick when it was needed. You acted fine. 

But the group knew it. Of course, they knew. It was an act. Because they saw how you were breaking. How you had a longing in your eyes when the cowboy boots-wearing man walked by. The smile that rarely reached your lips. You were faking so much of your joy because your heart was broken. 

“I just don’t get how he is so ok. Did I mean nothing?” The two women share a look at your question. Because they also know that Rick isn’t ok. Like you, he is acting. Because he is the leader and can’t break down. But the man isn’t ok. They don’t say that. Rick was the one that ended it. That was on him.

“I don’t know,” Maggie says softly as you rest your head onto her shoulder. “I wish I had the answer for you. But only Rick does.”

  Red lights, stop signs

I still see your face in the white cars, front yards

Can't drive past the places we used to go to

'Cause I still fuckin' love you, babe

  The street lights are now on. It’s still raining when you tell Maggie you were going home. Sasha and her try to get you to stay the night. Or at least until the rain lets up. But the rain isn't letting up. It was so heavy you could barely see a few steps in front of you. But you step off the back porch and disappear down the alleyway of the lined-up homes. You walk. Just walk because you don’t want to go home just yet. If you go home you’ll be lonely. And you don’t want that. Because for a month you have been lonely in that damn brownstone. Rick wasn’t lonely. He was with Jessie. His arms wrapped around her body. Damn your brain. Just because you didn’t want to be lonely didn’t mean you wanted to think about them together. 

  The rain started to ease up as you found yourself passing Rick’s house. The lights upstairs were on. As you quickly looked away from the cookie-cutter home. A shiver ran through you and shoved your hands into your soaked jean pockets. Maybe now was a good time to head home. You haven’t even turned when you heard your name being shouted over the rain. Looking back at Rick’s home you see him rushing off the porch and over to you. His dark brown jacket acting as an umbrella. He puts it mostly over you shielding you from the rain.

“What are you doing out here? You're going to get sick.” He frets because he knows how likely that is. Because after the rainstorm when the group was on the trek through Virginia you had gotten sick. “Come on.” He orders and you walk with him toward his house. 

  Sidewalks we crossed

I still hear your voice in the traffic, we're laughing

Over all the noise

  You smile at him lightly as he places a cup of peppermint tea in your hand; you're favorite. You're in one of his white t-shirt and pajama pants. Your hair, no longer wet from the rain but a hot shower. The alcohol is still in your system. How much you don’t know. 

“What were you doing walking in the rain?” He questioned taking the seat next to you. His own cup of tea in his hand.

“Was drinking with Sasha and Maggie.” You look towards him as his eyebrows knit together as the mention of Maggie and drinking. “Maggie was moderating us. She wasn’t drinking, come on. She knows better.” Rick nods bowing his head because he does know better to think that about Maggie. But his time as a cop taught him that some people just don’t care. Not about themselves. Not about others. And sure as hell not about kids. 

“Where did you get the booze from? Daryl?” You snort at him before blowing on your tea taking a careful sip. Sitting the cup down you look back towards him.

“I ain’t no rat officer.” He chuckles. You both do. A little inside joke between you both. And then the silence fell. The awkward uncertain silence of two people who didn’t know what to say next. You chew on the inside of your cheek as you stare into the tea. Rain still going strong outside, trapping on the roof of your former home.  Rick shifts beside you clearing his throat.

“Judy trying to walk.” It makes you smile a bit. 

“That’s good. Soon she’ll be running over you and Carl.” The older man chuckles nodding in agreement but you don’t see it. Head still bowed. Turning your mug as you watch the tea shift with each motion. 

“Seeing anyone?” He was trying to keep the conversation going. But there had to be another question to ask that wasn’t this. You still answer it by shaking your head.

“No. But you seemed to have moved on.” It has some bite to you. You're bitter. Of course, you are. The man you were in love with. Seemed to easily move on after he ended it. You lift the ceramic mug and take a huge glug of your tea. The warmth fills you but it’s not enough.

“Ya. Jessie, she’s…” He doesn’t know what to say. Jessie is ok. Good to have around. Doesn’t make him feel as empty. But she is just not you. All her touches. All her kisses. They feel off and he knows why. Because the hands touching him aren’t yours. Neither are the lips that kiss him. But Rick is stubborn. Even if it hurts you both, he knows you need better. You deserve the world and he just can’t give it to you.

“She’s perfect.” You looked at him. Sadness, rooted so deeply in your eyes. He wants to pull you into him. Tell you that he is sorry. That he will end it with Jessie. Come back to you. And try to make all of this right. But he already drew his line in the sand and he won’t cross it. Because the moment he touches you he knows it will be his undoing.

“She has her flaws. No one is perfect.” Except for you. He wants to add. He hears a quiet 'ya' then it silence once again.

  God, I'm so blue, know we're through

But I still fuckin' love you, babe

  You were gone when Rick woke up. His clothes lay on the guest bed since you were dried. He wondered just when you left. He wondered if you slept at all. Because he didn’t. Knowing you were in the house but not in his arms. He was restless the whole night. He sighs. Picking clothes up. It was sad that he hoped this wouldn’t be the last time. But it most likely was going to be the only time. Because how often are you going to walk in the rain drunk? He takes the clothes to the laundry room. Before he throws the shirt in the basket he lifts it to his nose. Inhaling the flowery body wash scent from when you shower last night. You must found where he hid the body wash you left behind. 

“Hey, dad!” Carl called out from the kitchen forcing Rick to dump the clothes in the basket. Entering the kitchen he smiled at his son. Judith was already in her high chair waiting for breakfast. Carl stood at the counter. The box of peppermint tea in his hands. Shit. He meant to put that up. Carl’s eye shifts from the box towards the sink. Where the mugs from last night sat unwashed. Then the young man turns to his father.

“Y/n was here wasn’t she?” He questioned but it was really a statement. It is the only reason for this tea to be out with two mugs in the sink.

“Ya,” He replied, moving towards his son and taking the box of tea from his hand. The young man sighed watching his father place the tea on a high shelf so only he could get to it.

“Why?” Carl asked.

“It was raining-”

“No,” he cut his father off. “Why did you break up with her?”

“Carl,” Rick sighed. As he pinched the bridge of his nose. If he didn’t want to have this conversation with Daryl or Michonne. He sure as hell didn’t want it with his son. But like Rick the young survivor was stubborn. He stepped into his father's past every time he tried to move around him.

“Carl,” Rick warns but the boy isn’t back down.

“No. You were happy with Y/n. Happier than I have ever seen you. Even with mom. Even before all of this.” The boy gestures at nothing but Rick knows what he means by that. Because he didn’t want to admit it. But his and Lori’s relationship was at rock bottom before the world ended. 

“So why? What happened?” Carl pressed, making Rick sigh. He wondered. Only for a second. If Michonne had put Carl up to his. But he shook that from his head. Michonne won’t do that. This is purely Carl. Because Carl loves you so much. The both of you had apparently clicked before Rick had gotten to the quarry. And that bond only grew over time. 

“It’s complicated, Carl. Now please,” Rick needed him to down the subject. And the young boy seemed to understand but is still pissed. He turns from his father. Feet carrying the young boy towards the door. “Where are you going?” He called out.

“Out!” And the slamming door let Rick know that Carl was gone. He sighed. 

  He knew everyone would move on. You would. Carl would. He would. In the far future, all of this will be just a bad memory. But right now. In the present, it hurt so fucking bad. Tears leaked from his eyes as he sucked in air. He did it to himself. He deserved this pain. And if he could he would take your pain. Allow you to be happy. To find love in someone else better than him. Because you're one of the good things in this ugly world. 

  I know we weren't perfect but I've never felt this way for no one