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the-bar-sinister · 4 months ago

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Bleeding, Broken, Mended (50225 words) by VickytheSnake, thesavagesabretooth Chapters: 9/?

Summary: Law is certain that he was 'rescued' just so Doflamingo could kill him himself, but Doffy has other plans. As far as he's concerned, Law's decade-long quest for revenge was nothing more than a sad misunderstanding. He wants to remind Law how things used to be. He wants to find a way to bring Law back into the fold-- back to him-- forever.

catch up here

After dinner Law was extricated with difficulty from the scene of Sugar and Baby 5's clamor in the galley. Bepo dragged him off, leaving Komurasaki to chat with the girls as seemed to be either her preference, or her duty. It was difficult to tell.

The executives and Doffy had vanished from the corridor by the time he was tugged down it, back toward the relative privacy of their cabin.

"Well that was bracing," Law chuckled as the door finally shut behind them. He was thankful to Komurasaki for regaling the distracted Baby 5 and the unsettlingly whatever that was Sugar and giving him time to escape.

He was just lucky Baby 5 seemed enamored with Saki and her stories, or she might never have let him slip away.

Bepo thumped him on the back, nodding with companionable sympathy. "It was pretty intense, captain. Are you okay?"

The bear scrutinized him carefully with his big dark eyes. Law knew that Bepo was practiced at seeing right through him. He'd gotten more than used to it over the last decade– honestly, it was a relief to know someone understood even the deepest parts of him.

He ran his hand through his hair. "I'm a little— not overwhelmed, but getting there. A lot's been going on, Bepo. Lots to think about. Baby 5 and Sugar…I mean, I get why they're upset. I hurt 'em both pretty bad."

Bepo rubbed Law's back for a moment, and then went to pour them some water from the pitcher on the table. "And I'm guessing at this point you don't exactly think they did anything to deserve it."

The Heart Pirates were pirates. They had hurt a lot of people. Law had seen Bepo's face and claws red with blood on uncountable occasions. Law himself had ripped the hearts from a hundred pirates to present to the World Government. They were alive, sure…but they weren't whole.

They weren't saints, they weren't heroes. Even if Law had been dragged into the pace of others for a few islands now, saving populations from tyrants, he and his men were pirates to the end. Yes— Dressrosa had gotten out of hand. He hated the way Sugar's power was used en masse. He thought the birdcage was overkill to an unsettling degree.

But when he really thought about it… "They've done as much as any other pirate. Us included, Bepo. They just had the bad luck to be on the other side of an old grudge that I forced myself to never let die."

"Which I guess wouldn't have been an issue if we weren't eating breakfast with them," Bepo murmured. He pushed a glass of water into Law's hand.

"K-kinda." Law frowned as he took the water, giving Bepo a grateful look. "...I'm gonna admit something, partner. Back in Punk Hazard I started to feel …bad. Guilty. It was my first direct encounter with someone I'd known before Rosi kidnapped me. And I got her killed. But I forced myself to ignore that in favor of 'the mission'. Always pushing forward."

Bepo sighed, leaning on Law with his big arm around his shoulder. "Yeah, captain, at this point I kind of expected you to say that. But... it seems like they're willing to bury the hatchet over all of it if you are, I guess?"

Law took a long sip of his water.

"Most of 'em. Yeah. Even Sugar seems willing to, even if it'll be a process." He hesitated, looking into the rippling water in his cup. "...all I gotta do is bury the hatchet…heh."

"I mean, if you want to, captain." Bepo scratched his head. "We could fuck off as soon as we hit land on this island we're aimed at. I mean, I… kinda wanna see the concert, but outside of that…"

Law laughed. "I betcha do, Bepo. I mean— when is that Uta chick ever gonna do anything like that again? This is the first time I've ever heard of any musician sending out a damn beacon to draw people in. This could be once in a lifetime."

He looked up at him with a half smile. "If I did bury the hatchet, Bepo…would you think I've wasted the last 13 years of my life?"

He scratched his furry ears again and returned with his own lopsided ursine smile. "I mean, you're the only one who can judge that, Law. But you met me? We had some good times? R-right?"

"We had some fucking wonderful times, Bepo." He looped his arm around his first mate with a wink. "...so if nothing else, I got to meet you. That's worth everything to me."

Bepo slung his arm around Law in return and nuzzled him. "Then no matter what happens next, that time wasn't a waste, right? Even if we'd gone down with the ship. Even if we like, I don't know, retire to the beach, or become Uta's back-up dancers."

Law laughed against him, head resting against his shoulder.

"Bepo, I'd be the worst fucking backup dancer you'd ever seen. We're not doing that." He smiled up at him. "...the time wasn't a waste. And now we just gotta figure out what's next. It might be joining back up with the family, it might not be. I'm– I'm gonna think about it."

Bepo nuzzled his face on the top of Law's head. "Yeah, I thought you were probably gonna say something like that."

"Am I getting predictable, Bepo?" he teased as he let his eyes close, soaking in the comfort of Bepo's proximity and warmth.

"I don't think you're predictable, I just think I've been listening to you when you talk. Would you rather I didn't pay attention?" Bepo's tone was grumbly, but teasing as he held Law close, fuzzy and comforting.

"Damn you, Bepo. You always make too much sense." Law grumbled back, resting his head against him. "but yeah…I'll tell you when I have an answer."

"Don't feel the need to rush on my account, captain, I'm just following along as usual. But you can always use me as a sounding board."

Law nodded against him. "Furriest fucking sounding board I've ever met." he murmured.

Whenever Law was stuck, conflicted, or lost talking to Bepo and bouncing his thoughts and feelings off of him always helped get his head straight again.

The last decade wasn't a waste— if for no other reason than it had given Law the chance to meet the Heart Pirates, to meet Bepo. If he rejoined the Donquixote family, as a dangerous part of him seemed drawn to, then Bepo wouldn't blame him and wouldn't leave.

If that was what he did, they'd join the Donquixotes together.

After the meeting, Doffy talked a little more with the others about their heading, the concert and its potential Navy encounter, the situation with Crocodile, and the possible push toward the end of the grand line. All of them, Trebol, Dia, Vergo, Pica, and even himself— they were avoiding talking about Law for now. Unsurprisingly, it didn't last. After Vergo headed off to lay in their course with Violet's assistance Trebol put a hand on Doffy's shoulder.

"Hey, can I talk to you in private, Doffy?"

"Sure thing, Tre." Doffy'd been expecting it. Maybe not looking forward to it, but he sure as hell wanted to know what went down in that room after he left. And maybe he'd get an apology out of Trebol, too. He could dream.

He glanced over at Diamante and Pica, and thought about the fact that he was for sure going to need to talk to them soon, too. Dia would be easy. He'd butter him up a little bit, and Dia would protest, but ultimately go along with whatever Doffy said. Pica would be… a little tricker. Oh sure on the surface, Pica would agree to anything Doffy asked of him without hesitation. But he knew Pica was mad at Law. And Pica's emotions played out on a glacial, stoneage scale. He was going to be mad for a long time unless Doffy could do something about it.

But that would be a later problem. He left the two of them sharing a smoke, and followed Trebol a good way away across the deck. The weather was still beautiful– at least for now. Out in the New World that could change in an instant, but for the moment Doffy let himself enjoy the warm sunshine and cool breeze that filled their sails.

He leaned on the high rail and regarded Trebol. "So how'd the talk go? I didn't see any marks."

It was a flippant remark. In a fight between Trebol and Law there wouldn't be any marks to speak of. Not in a serious fight anyway, and that was the only kind Trebol got in.

"Eheh, very funny, Doffy. No, we didn't try to kill each other. Law was remarkably civil. For Law, anyway."

"I noticed he's still a pissy little bastard," Doffy giggled, thinking of their discussions so far. "So what happened?"

Trebol sighed. "First I think I owe you a little apology, Doffy. It looks like Law might actually feel some guilt for the trouble he caused the family after all."

Doffy felt a warm surge of triumph and pleasure rush through him, both at the apology, and the fact even Trebol– who could be extremely cynical and judgemental a lot of the time– thought that Law was actually feeling bad about hurting him.

"Well now, fancy that," Doffy cooed, smiling widely. He waved a hand. "Of course I forgive you, Trebol. We're all hurt, it's so hard to imagine he'd actually feel bad after everything, right?"

"Right, right. But unless he's gotten much better at his acting skills in the last decade— and I don't think he has, he seems like the same old Law— well, he seems like the same old Law, eh? Petulant, impulsive, angry, violent— and slow to realize when he's made a mistake."

Doffy chuckled. "But when he realizes it, oh boy."

"Oh boy, oh boy." Trebol smiled, and reached in his coat, producing the slim shackle from Law's wrist and its key.

"You let him out?" Doffy hadn't been expecting that.

"Hey, hey, what better way to make him feel even guiltier than to show we trust him?" Trebol's smile turned rather sly, and Doflamingo had to laugh.

"Always the grand manipulator," he teased. "A skill I'm always glad you passed along to me."

"I'm just glad you appreciate it, Doffy," Trebol said, scooting closer into his personal space. Doffy put his arm around his old mentor and criminal companion, glad to be done with their days long argument. "You're going to need it if you're really going to keep Law in line. He's had 13 years to go wild. Or maybe feral, eh?"

"You're not wrong," Doffy drawled, gazing thoughtfully out at the sea. "He's going to get bored with nothing to do on the ship, and when Law's bored he causes trouble."

"So you'd better find something to keep him occupied," Trebol agreed. "And pull him into the family again– you can't just let him stay shut up in his cabin with his bear. Hey, that's his navigator, isn't it?"

"I think so," Doffy nodded, wondering where Trebol's twisted mind was going with the idea.

"Have him do some navigation then, Doffy! Vergo benefits from someone checking his work, and it'll peel him away from his captain for a bit so you can find something for him to do, too, eh?"

Doffy grinned widely. "Brilliant as always, Trebol. I already have some ideas for what to do with Law."

The trick would be not getting too completely carried away with those ideas.

After their talk, Bepo had, at Law's request, been telling him about Uta for the better part of an hour. He was pretty sure it was just to get his mind off the situation at hand, and he really couldn't blame him. But they'd been interrupted by Doflamingo again, who had proclaimed that Law was now 'officially a guest' and insisted on taking them both up on deck.

"You're a navigator, aren't you?" he'd been asked. And on answering the affirmative, Doflamingo had basically insisted that Bepo should meet their current navigator who was locking in the course to follow Uta's mysterious signal.

And that was how he now found himself face to face by the wheel with the man called 'Vergo'-- quite literally at eye level which was a rarity for Bepo. Usually people were quite a bit shorter, or lately taller, than he was, but Vergo only beat him out in height by a couple of inches. It was almost refreshing.

Vergo he had seen at dinner and breakfast, though he hadn't been particularly talkative. He also knew that Law had dueled with him on Punk Hazard— but that was the extent of his knowledge of the man.

The man was sketching something on a large map between them, lines waving through the ocean to indicate currents that looped around islands dotting the path forward. He still hadn't been too talkative…but it didn't seem out of disinterest or malice. Instead, it seemed he just might have been a naturally quiet man.

He had a subtle smile on his face as he looked up at Bepo, a pen somehow stuck to his cheek as he tapped his finger against the map. "You know what the interesting thing is about this Uta's call to Elegia?"

Bepo glanced between the pen and the little smile, not yet sure what to make of the man. He certainly understood someone who chose to stay mostly quiet. He often did so himself.

"What's the interesting thing?"

"That she's giving folks a way to make it there without an eternal pose. It's not exactly as dangerous as , say…the space around Dressrosa or Wano. But she's sent out a beacon to follow through transponder snail. Makes for a tricky navigation."

"I mean, it'd be hard to have a concert without people having a reliable way to get there," Bepo considered. "I'm surprised people don't do this sort of thing for big events more often. Though I guess big events don't usually happen in the Grand Line. Not public ones."

Vergo chuckled low under his breath, and leaned on his hand with a widening of his smile.

"Because it's a crime. The sort of crime the Celestial Dragons and their dogs tend to take note of. Uta's got balls to pull something like this for a concert, they consider it an interference with World Government communications."

"Huh…" Bepo scratched his chin. "I never would have guessed that Uta would be such a rebel. Though I guess it makes sense…"

He glanced Vergo over again, wondering if he was a fan.

Vergo rubbed his chin, briefly…almost…dislodging the pen from his face.

"Doffy's a big fan of hers. Played a bunch of her music for me to…to…"

His brow furrowed, and for a moment it almost seemed like he'd forgotten what he was saying as he started on a completely different track with "so I'm thinking we can ride this current to…" — then frowning.

He pushed up his glasses and returned to the original topic. "To show me what all the hype was about. It was pretty fun, but I think if anything's making me a real fan here, it's that kind of rebel spirit."

Bepo's lack of certainty about what to make of the man redoubled with the odd incident. It seemed like he was the type to get lost in the middle of a sentence, which was definitely at odds with being a high ranking member of a dangerous pirate group. But admittedly, all of the Donquixote pirates seemed very… quirky. Not that he was one to talk.

"I'm a pretty big fan already," he explained, a bit shy about it. He had picked up some of Uta's music the first time while they'd been on Sabaody two years ago-– some of her first public work– and had been following her ever since. "But knowing that she's willing to thumb her nose at the celestial dragons just makes me more intrigued."

"Big fan, huh?" Vergo leaned over and slapped his shoulder. "Hah. Then I gotta ask…what's your favorite? Of the ones Doffy's shown me, I gotta say I liked 'The Dreaming Sea' the best so far."

It was one of her later releases, sent out mysteriously to become a hit overnight. A ballad style, surprisingly sappy pick for the large and grimly serious looking man to say was his favorite. Bepo wasn't about to be put off by it though– everybody laughed at a bear who liked pop music anyway.

"You have good taste," Bepo rumbled. "The Dreaming Sea is really good. All of her recent work has, I don't know, this really deep intensity to it, don't you think? I mean, you might not have noticed since you haven't heard all her work, but her earlier stuff is lighter. More, I don't want to say hesitant, but it definitely feels like she's 'found her voice' so to speak."

This was exactly the kind of thing he'd been rambling about to Law just a bit earlier, though, admittedly, he wasn't exactly sure Law quite appreciated it, even if he appreciated the distraction.

Vergo nodded once, almost curtly as he pushed up his glasses and the pen bobbed on his face. Was it…melting into his skin?

"I heard a bit of her earlier stuff. Doffy's …he's a real big fan. Her earlier stuff is safer. You ain't wrong with hesitant, it's like she wasn't sure what people would think if she put her more complicated emotions out into the world. Given the way she operates, I think it kinda tracks that she was pretty young and probably lonely at that time. It's got that 'projected happiness' to it that rings as unsure. But later, the intensity really drives it. You get more yearning, more of her heart and feelings on things. You get the sense there's somethin' out there that…"

He was really going now, somehow more animated as he went on about the musician with Bepo. The pen vanished a little more.

For 'not that big a fan' he definitely seemed to have some nuanced opinions. Bepo wondered a bit what Doflamingo— 'Doffy', as everyone, even Law seemed to be calling him— would say about the music if he asked him. It felt surreal to even be in a situation where he was considering that. Doflamingo had been their enemy for ages. All Bepo had heard from Law, in the few times that he'd spoken about him, was how awful he was.

But that was then, and this was now.

"You really get it," Bepo nodded. He couldn't help being distracted however. "Um, is your face… okay?"

"Huh?" Vergo reached up…missed the pen entirely, and rubbed the edge of his beard. "...did I screw up shaving this morning?"

"No, um, your shave looks great actually," Bepo mumbled. "It's actually um—"

He sort of pointed at the pen with his claw.

Vergo reached up, and finally found the pen. "Oh, shit. I guess I was getting fired up, huh?" The metal pen was jutting out of him at a weird angle now…

He reached up, pulled the half melted pen from his cheek where the end had turned to jagged slag…and ate it with a crunch.. "Sorry about that. That sort of thing just happens sometimes."

Bepo blinked. The Donquixote pirates were weird.

"Oh, um. Right. So hey, you said the navigation for this was a little tricky. I'd be interested if you wanted to walk me through the map!"

Vergo slapped his back companionably. "Alright pal…so tell me what you know about the New World's currents…"

The two of them worked on the map for quite some time, mapping currants, problem areas, islands to stop on and a course that could be followed through the Poses' and skilled seamanship. Vergo, despite his occasional lapses in memory, seemed like a pretty smart guy when they got to talking.

And he certainly seemed to take a liking to Bepo, treating him like a longtime friend by the end with a promise of a beer in the near future.

Bepo wasn't certain if Vergo had even noticed that he was a bear. He certainly didn't seem to care, if he had.

The deck of the ship they were on was huge— unsurprising for a vessel that accommodated 20 foot high ceilings— but this was Law's first look at it, and his first look at the calm, jewel-blue water that surrounded him since he'd been pulled out of it two days before.

Law was officially a 'guest' now, according to Doffy and as such it was apparently alright for him to walk around the ship. He guessed that was what Doffy and the executives had been talking about when they left the galley after the meeting.

Law took in the beauty of the ocean for a long moment. It was that same beautiful view that took his men from him and nearly did him in if it wasn't for Doflamingo's obsession with saving him. He should hate it, the glittering deep blue sea, but he never could despise the ocean for all the pain it gave him.

It was as beautiful as it was deadly.

He walked along with Doflamingo , painfully aware of his hand on his shoulder almost possessively as they crossed the ship's deck. It was as intimate as it was familiar.

The weight of the warm, familiar hand on his shoulder was so distracting that Law didn't even notice Diamante waiting for them until they were almost on top of him. The loomingly lanky man— Law's former swordsmanship instructor— was half-sitting on the rail of the ship with a wide brimmed cavalier hat shading his eyes, and a cigarette in his mouth. He had a sword resting across one shoulder.

Law's sword.

He hadn't seen it since the shipwreck. Its familiar weight at his hip had been gone, nagging at him even through the more pressing concerns. It was a legendary blade, a named sword found by him during the early years in the North Blue while he gathered the Heart Pirates.

And of course Dia had it. "Nice sword, Dia."

"Thanks," Dia grinned broadly at him, hopping up from the rail and tossing the butt of his cigarette in the ocean. "Had to shine it up a bit, some idiot dropped it in the sea."

"Yeah, what an absolute moron, right?" Law drawled as he put his hand on his hip. "That's a legendary sword, y'know. It's got a name and everything."

"Well hot damn. Guy'd be pretty lucky to wield a sword like that, huh?" He looked over the sword still in its sheath, and then significantly at Law. "Pretty big sword for a guy who still hasn't cracked seven feet though."

Doffy chuckled, still looming behind him, distracting hand on his shoulder. "Give him time, Dia."

Law felt his face hotly flush,whether from the jab, or from Doflamingo's ever present hand he wasn't sure.

Frankly, it was probably fucking both.

"GgghhhHHhhhhh…Dia, I'm gonna kick your fucking ass for that."

"With that sword, you've almost got the reach to have a shot at it, short stuff," Dia snickered. "But I mean, it's been 13 years after all. Maybe you will kick my ass. Trebol says I'm getting old."

"You're not getting old, Dia," Doffy hummed.

"I'm practically a skeleton."

"You're five years older than me, am I a skeleton?"

Whether or not Dia was old, the bit he was playing out with Doflamingo was old enough that Law was immediately catapulted back to his childhood.

It was their classic interplay. Dia would say something, Doffy would disagree or offer another input, Dia would refuse…and then Doffy would 'turn the tables' and Dia would immediately cave to either praise or mild playful threat.

It was a two man comedy act. One that actually made him smile a little. "Just gimme my sword, Dia."

Diamante chuckled and glanced at Doffy. "Should I give it to him, Doffy? Or should I keep it."

"Give it back to him, Dia, or I'll never get to see this match." Doffy snickered as well.

Dia offered the sword over to Law. "Kinda itching to have this match. Didn't get a chance to spar when you dropped by our old address."

Law took the sword from him with a low chuckle, feeling it's familiar and heavy weight in his hand. Yeah, it was a big sword, maybe a bit big for his comparatively shorter body, but he'd learned to use it well and to deadly effect.

He flushed a little, huffing quietly with a shake of his head. In Dressrosa, everything had gone to shit. It was a disaster that somehow ended in 'victory' for him and Straw Hat Luffy— if you could call it that for all the good it did.

"Admittedly, I was only planning on destroying the SMILE factory and leaving before you ever knew I was there. So yeah….I missed out on a sparring match. I didn't even get to enjoy that fucking gladiator fight you put on."

"Now that's a damned shame." Dia shook his head, putting his hand on the hilt of the sword that rested at his hip. "Coliseum's probably what I'll miss most about Dressrosa. Had a couple of decent fights in there the last decade or so."

"A couple of decent fights he says," Doffy drawled. "As if they didn't call you 'the hero of the coliseum'."

"Just because he had a lot of them doesn't mean they were all good," Law pointed out as he started to draw his sword from its sheath. "Coulda been that too many of the guys he fought sucked."

"Well now," Dia grinned slyly. "The kid gets it. Alright, Law, we doing this classic style or you end up developing a crutch you're gonna need to rely on?"

Law's eye twitched.

"Dia, buddy. If I relied on my powers, you'd be a smear on the deck in thirty seconds. I've gotten some pretty deadly tricks up my sleeve since Dressrosa." He grinned widely. "...classic style. And this time I'm gonna beat you fair and square."

Dia's wide-lipped grin broadened further. "You hear that, Doffy, he's gonna beat me fair and square."

"I heard it alright," Doffy purred eagerly. Law felt his hand squeeze his shoulder for a moment before he released him. "Go to first blood. Give him hell, Law."

The weight of his sword in his hand bolstered his confidence. In the day, he'd never been able to defeat the hulking, talented swordsman. But that was then, this was now. He wasn't the little boy he used to be, just learning how to fight with a blade. He was the Surgeon of Death.

He made his first move faster than Dia, a lunging slash towards his lanky legs at a diagonal , dodging angle. But Diamante was, if anything, faster than Law had remembered. Steel clashed with steel as he parried Law's attack out of the way with a flash of his blade.

"Not a bad opening, kid. You're not out of practice."

Dia actually sounded pleased about that.

Law found he was actually pretty pleased with it himself. Bolstered by Dia's approval, he pressed what he felt was his advantage. His attacks were quick, relying on agility and the blade's reach to try and get one over on Dia.

Doffy watched the match with rapt fascination, grinning ear to ear the moment it became clear that neither of them were actually trying to kill each other. He hadn't expected it to be a problem but Dia could be vindictive and despite his soaring hopes for Law, he was an unpredictable element.

But this was nostalgic. This was fun, even. Law had been a good student when he was still a kid and it was obvious he'd only gotten better. Now, with the sparring match laid out in front of him, he could see how Law'd managed to beat Vergo and take him apart— in an unfortunately literal way.

The memory clouded Doffy's good mood only for a moment before he was able to push it away, watching Law elegantly knock back a forceful blow from Dia. This was a friendly match. Law had apologized, basically, for what had happened on Punk Hazard. He felt guilty. Even Trebol was sure he felt guilty.

And this was just like old times. Better, even, since it was a much more equal match now, it was much more fun to watch. Doffy's eyes lingered on Law's strong, lean body, and his ferocious, determined expression on his sharp face. Who would have thought the sickly little kid would turn out so good?

Him. He'd thought so.

And he was right.

He wasn't a fan of all the tattoos though. Those could use some… alteration.

Law practically danced across the deck, avoiding Dia's sword strikes at every opportunity. His toned body, limber and athletic, carried him up against the bannister, and sliding low across the wood as he parried and retaliated.

At one point he'd caught Dia's sword in a lock, and had headbutted him sharply in the chest between the blades in a risky move that paid off with a stagger. He fought like the same reckless maniac as ever— but with the fitness and experience to actually pull it off.

In the end, he'd shockingly made first blood. It was a small wound, one that once inflicted he immediately danced away and held his hands up with a wicked grin, inflicted when Law had grabbed Dia's arm and pulled himself closer to close the distance, the blade glancing off Dia's side as he held it out.

In a serious fight, he'd probably have tried to run him through— but instead he sliced him the once with a victorious grin.

"Finally got you, old man!"

Doffy saw Diamante's expression flash dangerous for just a moment as blood was drawn, and he readied himself to hold the man back with thread if necessary. But Dia's bloody lust scowl immediately split into a pleased grin just a split second later, and he held his hands up in answer to Law.

"Well, shit, Law, you actually got one on me. I guess you weren't slacking off since I last saw you." He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and daubed at the thin slice.

Doffy laughed and clapped his hands. "Now that's entertainment. Both of you are fantastic.

Law seemed to practically glow with the praise. It was the first time, since he was even when he was younger, that Doffy saw him light up with such unrestrained joy and pride, and Doffy was absolutely thrilled to see it.

Law laughed, grabbing his scabbard and sliding the blade back into it with a wink. "Had to keep myself occupied somehow. I'm even better with my power."

"I'll bet you fucking are," Dia laughed, waving Doffy off humbly over the praise. He didn't press the issue since the two were talking. "I'd love to have a match with you sometime powers out, but if I'm using mine we'll need to be somewhere other than the deck of a ship."

"I appreciate you not dumping us all in the sea, Dia," Doffy chuckled.

Law held his hands up with a snort. "Had my fill of that for a lifetime, honestly."

"I'll just bet you have," Dia said, putting the bloody handkerchief away as the bleeding from the shallow wound stopped. "I donno if it's been a problem for you before, but you looked about half fucking drowned by the time we fished you out."

Doffy frowned, remembering it. Dia wasn't wrong. They'd been in the water for a while by the time the ship caught up to them, and not only did Law look half dead, the bear, who'd been keeping them out of the water was more than obviously at his limit. If they hadn't been following, if Violet hadn't seen Law and reported it— if Doffy hadn't insisted on going after him— Law would be gone.

Law twitched, his shoulders briefly shaking before he waved his hand. "Yeah. Blackbeard did a number on us. That fucking doctor of his put us all off guard…and then he went full force with that 'darkness' power of his."

"That guy seems like a fucking menace." Dia pulled his cigarettes out of his pocket and put one to his lips, offering the pack to Law. "Glad it worked out so I could get a match in with ya."

Law gratefully took a cigarette, holding it between his fingers with a nod.

"He's a monster. The kind of guy who gives pirates a bad name. A fucking buffoon who somehow became the biggest threat to anyone around." He grimaced, before it melted into a grin. "...yeah. Same. Sorry I didn't give you one in Dressrosa, Dia. I woulda done it differently if I could."

"Ehhh, it was a busy day, right? Can't believe how much was fucking going on in hindsight." Dia shook his head and lit up his cigarette, taking a long puff from it and blowing smoke out of his nose. "Shitshow, from start to finish. Sorry about that, Doffy."

Doffy waved his hand. "As if it's your fault. Before you say it is– it's not."

Dia looked like he was about to protest, but just took another puff of his cigarette. "You're the boss, Doffy. C'mere, Law, lemme light you up."

Law inched towards him and held out his cigarette with a nod of his head. "I'm just glad we're all past it. You know..I.."

Dia flicked his lighter and the flame caught. He cocked his head, looking at Law curiously. "Yeah?"

Doffy found himself listening very closely as well.

He held up his hand.

"N-never mind. Just. You know." He shrugged his slender shoulders with a huff of breath. "I just missed you guys. In…in a way. Even when I kept telling myself you were monsters."

"I've been known to be a monster every now and then," Dia said, snapping his lighter shut once Law's cigarette was lit. "Missed you too, kid, in a way. Ain't that right, Doffy? Shit wasn't the same without ya."

"It really wasn't."

With how far off the rails things had gone, it was amazing to see how easily Law dropped right back into the family. It warmed Doffy's monstrous, black heart.

Law rubbed his arm after he put the cigarette between his lips, taking a long pull. "Wonder if you guys would survive me leaving again." He said it, as if a joke— but his expression didn't change from the sheepish, pensive look in his eyes.

Doffy felt his stomach twist into a knot, especially as he saw the way Dia's gaze flicked over to him when Law asked. They'd survive. Of course they'd survive. Doffy didn't think he'd be a fun person to be around if it happened though, maybe ever again. And Dia's expression confirmed that he was thinking the same thing. He glanced away, despite the fact that Diamante couldn't see where he was looking.

Dia slapped Law companionably on the back. "Hey I'd prefer if we didn't find out. More fun having you on our side than running around feral. Honestly, we oughta have a drink to celebrate you being around."

Law staggered under the hit, and flushed a bright red with a huff of breath. "FERAL???" he snapped. "I ain't some kind of dog, Dia! Feral…fuck off! Yeah, I'd love the drink…ass."

He laughed at that, and Dia laughed with him, catching his eye again.

"Doffy, tell the kid. He was feral as hell the day we found him. Day we lost him he returned to the fucking wild."

Doffy grinned and put his hand on Law's shoulder. "He isn't exactly a kid any more, Dia. But I'll grant you he was pretty feral when he rolled up on us. I might use some other words to describe him now."

Law huffed sharply, leaning back into his hand. "Like what?"

Handsome bastard, Doffy thought.

"Let's get that drink and I can pick a few," he said with a bright grin. "Wanna grab Vergo and your buddy first, or let them keep talking?"

"They seem to be getting pretty chummy," Dia snickered, hands in his pockets.

"Huh…" Law tilted his head. "Well I ain't gonna complain about that. It's better if they get along than having navigators at one another's throats. Might as well extend the invitation."

Doffy wasn't going to complain either. Law's navigator getting along with the family was one more string on him to keep him close.

#doflaw #doflamingo x law #donquixote doflamingo #trafalgar law #trafalgar d water law #third corazon law #one piece #fanfiction #fan fiction #fanfic #archive of our own #ao3 #fic: one piece deicide

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azlovesem · 4 months ago

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Not yoo tough thats what i think of americans kJenna. But youre half mexican and cute so youre sn exception. Does it look like im scared or care. Ill literally lsugh in anyones face. And no one sneeks up on me. And no one else is Azriel therefore i eill slaughter any asshole fol any goof bag religio cult. That regions soomed it does in a war and we dont care. Understand america we ve had enpugh of those people all of them. If you gef outnof line im gonna start killing americans en masse. Everyehere your punk beat up defeated coward bitch asses are found, ill kill you where you stand. What are you talking about i run your country now have now for years. Im that bad ass. Youll be better off than you were with Satan. That bitch is finished fighting and Azriel has slwsys been Arch of earth. That rat fucking bitch has always just been my prisoner here. It official now im God of earth. Anyone says otherwise Michael you kill them all. There its done and no ones saying otherwise. People are convinced i aint lying and youll be a dying if you fuck with this Arch. I said fuck your god small g. Punk. You dontvwanba mess with me nor does he.

Jenna Ortega

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thescarletchan · 2 years ago

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The Good Old Days

ship: Handsome Jack x Reader tags: AU, Canon typical Violence

summary: I remember them. The good old days.When I was a simple engineer, Jack was a Programmer. We worked for Hyperion, creating the next generation of Loaders. I built them, he programmed them.But when the COV attacked Helios, the only place to turn was the now ship, Sanctuary.

word count: 3,273

a/n: As always, I'm terrible at summaries. Essentially this is an AU where Jack never became Handsome Jack and kept on programming, causing the events of Borderlands 2, the Pre-Sequel, and Tales from the Borderlands, to never happen. But you know, Troy and Tyreen are still out there.I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it! (Oh and I could totally write a second chapter with smut, just saying.)

I remember them. The good old days.

When I was a simple engineer, Jack was a Programmer. We worked for Hyperion, creating the next generation of Loaders. I built them, he programmed them.

All was good.

Life was simple.

We lived and worked in the Helios as it orbited the planet Pandora.

There was always fighting down on that planet. Inescapable fighting. Fighting for territory, weapons, and power.

But there was one safe haven we knew of. Sanctuary. Run by a group called themselves the Crimson Raiders, they provided safety to almost anyone.

Then came the transmission from Pandora, from a group calling themselves the “Children of the Vault” or the COV if you’re short on time.

Led by the Siren twins Troy and Tyreen Calypso, they gave Helios, and by proxy, Hyperion, two choices.

Join us or die.

Tassiter chose the latter. And boy, the COV wasn’t joking when they said “Or die”.

The very next day, they launched an attack. The Cultist fucking teleported onto the Moon Base, and began killing Hyperion employee en mass.

Jack and I were wandering around when they attacked. God, I remember it like it was yesterday.

“So, what’s your next project gonna be?” Jack asked, and I shrugged as we walked.

“No clue. I’ll probably just go to Tassiter, ask what he wants, and do that. Creatively, I’m a little burnt out at the moment.” I sighed.

“Oh, well if you need my help, I’m always there.” He gave me a light pat on the shoulder. The moment his hand made contact with me, alarms started blaring and red lights were flashing. There was a moment of confusion, from Jack, myself, and other Hyperion employees around us.

“Attention, we are under attack, I repeat, we are under attack!” A voice shouted over the intercoms.

“Under attack? How?” Jack asked the air, the both of us still standing in the middle of the hallway, other employees now rushing around. From down the hall, there was a bright orange glow in the shape of an orb, and a whole crowd of people appeared.

“Shit, that’s how! Jack, come on!” I grabbed him by the arm as the attackers began to open fire.

“Who are these guys?” Jack yelled as we sprinted.

“I don’t know, why the hell would I know?” I responded as we turned a corner, only to find more of the attackers.

“Long live God Queen Tyreen!” One of them shouted, before blowing a poor sucker's head off with a shotgun.

“Tyreen? I recognize that name!” I said as we started running the opposite direction.

“Shit! It’s Troy and Tyreen. The Children of the Vault!” He yelled, pulling me into an empty conference room and hiding below the window. He put a finger up to his lips. Screams and a stampede of footsteps passed. We waited, and all was eerily silent, save for the alarms still blaring.

“We need to get to my workshop. There are things I need to save and-” I started rumbling, and Jack put his hands on my shoulders, forcing me to face him.

“No, Y/N. We need to get the hell outta here. We need to get some guns, get to an escape pod, and get to Pandora.” He said, his heterochromatic eyes staring into mine.

“Pandora? Why? That’s where the rest of the COV is.” I said, and Jack nodded.

“Yes, but there’s also Sanctuary. We can head there and-” Something out of the corner of his eye caught his attention. It caught mine too.

A spaceship. And written on the side was the word “Sanctuary”.

“We’re fucked.” I sighed, and Jack looked back at me.

“No, no! This is good! We can have them dock here, and just hop right on!” Jack suggested, and I sighed once more.

“I mean, I suppose that could work. But how would we get their attention?” I asked, and the crackle of the intercom was heard once more.

“Attention Hyperion Employee’s, this is Commander Lilith of the Crimson Raiders. We know you are currently under attack and will be docking to take refugees onto Sanctuary. Please open up the nearest docking bay so we can help.”

“Fuck me man, why’s it gotta be everytime I speak I get proven wrong?” I grumble, and Jack smiles.

“I mean, it’s helping us! Right, so we need weapons.” He said, and I peeked out the window into the hall. Still empty.

“Yeah, um, we should go where the COV was headed. Good chance that some got killed by LOADERs and we can loot the bodies,” I said and he nodded along, “Then you head to the docking bay control room and open it up, I’ll go back to my workshop, grab my ECHO and some stuff and make a mad dash for the bay.” I go to stand up but Jack pulls me back down.

“Y/N, are you crazy? Leave it!” He nearly hissed.

“No. I worked so hard to make all that stuff. I’m not just gonna leave it and let the COV get their cultist hands all over it. Plus, it could help us out with the Raiders, you know? Get us trusted quicker.” I said, and he sighed.

“Fine. Call me as soon as you get your ECHO. I’ll hold off the COV for as long as I can but I am not leaving here without you.” He stated.

“If worst comes to worst, you might need to,” He goes to say something, but I interrupt, “But let’s not think about that alright? Right now, we need guns. Come on.” I stood up, and Jack joined me. We peeked out of the door, I looked right and he looked left.

“Found something.” He said, just loud enough to be heard over the alarms. I followed him to the left where we found some guns. Two pistols, a shotgun, and an assault rifle. We each took a pistol, with Jack grabbing a Maliwan and I got a Jakobs.

“You take the rifle. I’ll have the shotgun.” I reached for the Hyperion shotgun when Jack suddenly snatched it.

“No, you’re the better shot, you take it.” He said, loading the shotgun.

“Jack-” I started, and he stopped me.

“Now’s not the time. Take it and go. Haul ass over there and then get back. I’m not going anywhere without you.” His eyes bored into mine. I had seen him serious before, but that was entirely different. I nodded, grabbing the rifle and loading it, before turning away. I took a few steps down the hall before stopping and turning back to Jack.

“See you in a bit.” I said, and he smiled.

“See you in Sanctuary.” He turned and began jogging down the hall, and I went the opposite way.

It wasn’t too far to my workshop, but I tried my best to dodge any encounters with the COV. There was the occasional shout, what they were saying, I had know clue. Bodies, both COV and Hyperion littered the floors. I turned a corner, the door to my workshop in sight.

But so were a small group of COV. They were in a fight with some Hyperion security, so I tried to sneak behind them, attempting to slip into my workshop unseen, but some crazy asshole in the group saw me.

“You’re gonna be my new meat bicycle!” He shouted at me as I scrambled through the door. I locked it behind me, and it slid in his face. I could hear his fists pound on the metal, but he wasn’t getting anywhere with that.

I fell backwards, staring at the door, panting. I could hear my heartbeat thrumming in my ears, and I forced myself to calm down. Slowly standing up, I looked around.

My ECHO. I need to find it.

I jogged over to my desk and began to sift through the mess. I found the side bag I adore and slung it over my shoulder. Inside was my ECHO, which I clipped to the waist of my pants and called up Jack.

“Y/N! You made it to your workshop.” Jack exclaimed, sounding hopeful.

“Yeah, but not before some COV fuck saw me and said I was gonna be a meat bicycle, whatever the hell that mean…” I muttered to myself, sifting through the contents of my desk, collecting anything that I would miss or needed, “How's the docking bay going?”

“Oh, uh, it’s going,” He said, and there was a gunshot, “I got in contact with that Lilith chick. They can’t bring in the ship until this area is clear, they don’t wanna risk their people.”

“Damn it,” I grabbed a thumbdrive off my desk, which contained my most recent blueprints, and pocketed it, “Listen, I’m almost done here. I think I can slip through the vents into the room next door and get out that way. Then I’ll head over to you and help clean things up.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Another gunshot, then a grunt of effort, “Get here quick.”

“Got it.” I hung up, looking around the room. Anything else I would miss? I mean, yes, but it’s nothing I can carry. Time to move I guess. I passed the door, which that group seemed to still be distracted with, and made my way to the vent. It just went to the next room over, nothing crazy, it was five feet long at most.

I yanked on the grate, which fell off surprisingly easily. I slid my bag through, before crawling in. It was small and dusty but I didn’t care. This was life or death. I’d live with some dust on me.

I pushed on the other grate, which came off with the same ease as the first one, and pulled myself out on the other side. It was a storage room. I picked my way through it and found the door. It silently slid open, and I glanced at where the COV was. They were still focused on the other door.

I didn’t even bother closing the door to the storage room, not wanting to risk them hearing me. I slowly snuck out of that hall, and once I turned the corner, I was sprinting down the halls, jumping over corpses and avoiding puddles of blood. As I ran, the alarm turned off, and I could hear the sounds of fights all around. I kept moving, gunshots fading out as new ones faded in, until I was close enough to the Docking Bay where I could hear Jack’s fight.

“Son of a-” I heard him yell as I got to the doorway. If we weren’t in a life or death situation, the scene in front of me would almost be comical.

Jack stood at the control panel, a cultist jumping towards him, with other cultist bodies littered at his feet and all over the room. He was stepping backwards when he tripped over a corpse, and began to fall. The cultist was screaming as he jumped. I drew my pistol, and fired once.

The bullet struck the cultist in the head, sending him limply across the room with the momentum of the shot. I gave Jack a look as I walked over, as he pushed himself up, sighing and muttering to himself.

“I could’ve handled that.” He grumbled, and I snorted.

“Sure Jackie, sure. Anyways, ready to open the docking bay?” I asked, and he wiped his hands off.

“Yeah yeah, gimme a minute.” He stood at the console and began pressing buttons. There was the whirring of machines as the Docking Bay doors opened, a barrier of energy protecting the inside from the vacuum of space, yet weak enough for people and ships loading bays to pass through. I leaned back on the console looking towards the door.

I heard a near stampede of footsteps grow closer and closer.

“Uh, Jack?” He looked over at me, “I think we need to call Lilith.” I said, pointing to the door, where a new wave of cultists began to pour from.

“Shit!” He shouted, pressing a few more buttons before a crackling came over the small speaker embedded in the console.

“Is the Docking Bay open?” The same female voice from earlier, Lilith asked.

“Yes, but we’re not gonna be able to keep this place clear for too long, they just keep coming.” I said, shooting the first cultist that came my way.

“Who is this?” She asked and I groaned.

“Y/N, a friend of Jack’s.” I groaned, and narrowly dodged a tackle from a cultist.

“He mentioned you, listen, we can’t come in until you’re clear over there, we’re not risking our own-”

“Lilith, it’s not gonna get clear! They’re teleporting onto Helios, you don’t get your ass over here now, and there’s gonna be no one left on this base!” I shouted, shooting another cultist.

“Alright, we’re coming. It’ll take a minute, hold it down there until we dock, then get your ass and the ass of anyone else there in Sanctuary.” She said before going silent.

“Jack, we’re on our own for a bit, but they’re coming!” I shouted to him, and watched as he leapt out of the way causing a cultist to fall out of the Docking Bay and into space.

I slung the rifle off my back and opened fire on the cultists as they ran into the room. Many of them dropped, but a few took the shots and kept on moving. I kept getting pushed back in the room, until both Jack and myself were at the energy barrier.

“Exactly how long did Lilith say?” He shouted, the blast from his shotgun hitting a cultist right in the chest, dropping him there.

“That’s the thing, she didn’t!” I yelled back, and heard him groan. I shot another crazy masked man that was running at me, and he fell. I went to shoot another, and my gun just clicked, “Jack I’m out.” I said, and Jack turned to me.

“Me too.” He turned the shotgun around in his hands, holding it like a club, and I did the same with my rifle.

“Let’s go motherfuckers!” I shouted, hitting the nearest cultist with the stock of my gun, knocking him down. Behind us, there was a strange sound. I half turned, seeing Sanctuary’s loading bay back through the energy field.

“Y/N, Jack, get on!” I heard the familiar voice of Lilith, and saw a red headed woman talking, and connected the dots. She had her own people fire on the cultists, giving us the time needed to get on the ship. The Loading Dock doors closed, and we were safe, we were off of Helios.

I sat down on the floor, trying to get my breathing under control. Jack sat down next to me. He leaned against me as the red headed woman, Lilith, crouched before us.

“Welcome to Sanctuary.”

That was three years ago. Time really flew.

I showed Lilith what I had, the blueprints I made, and that gained us some trust.

We have been fighting the COV off constantly, and both Jack and myself slowly rose up in the ranks of the Crimson Raiders. We met the Vault Hunters Lilith worked with. They were a strange but tight knit group. Multiple Sirens, Amara, Maya, and Tannis, with Lilith’s Siren powers having gotten stolen by Tyreen.

Me and Jack were the only Hyperion employees that made it off Helios, and the Moonbase soon crashed into Pandora after that. Both Jack and I are fairly sure Tassiter died, and you know, good riddance.

“Y/N?” I jumped slightly.

“Uh, yeah?” I looked over, seeing Jack.

“You alright?” He asked. “Yeah, I’m fine.” I gave him a small smile.

“Okay… You were just… Kinda staring out into nothingness.” He sat down next to me.

“Sorry I was just… reminiscing I guess.” I shrugged and he looked at me.

“About what?” He asked, opening a bag of pretzels I didn’t even notice he had.

“Life before we were here. Back on Helios. I was thinking of that day actually.” I laughed a bit.

“Why?” “I… I don’t really know. These past few years… They’ve gone by so quick, I hadn’t even noticed. Three years of my life, just, gone,” I said, leaning back, “Sorry, I’m getting weirdly deep. What’s up?” I turned to him.

“I wanted to give you this. Found it on a scouting mission with Morticai,” He digs around in his pocket, and his eyes light up when he finds what he’s searching for, “Close your eyes and open your hands.” “Jack, seriously?” I sighed, and he nodded.

“Yeah seriously. Trust me, you’re gonna love it.” He says with a sincere smile. I roll my eyes, but close them, holding a hand out.

“I swear to god, if it’s Skag shit again, I’m ejecting you.” I grumbled, and I heard him chuckle as the couch shook slightly.

“That was one time.” He shot back, and I scowled at my approximation of where he was.

“That’s far too many times to be handed Skag shit. Now just gimme what you have or I’m opening my-” I felt a small object drop into my hand.

“Look at it.” I opened my eyes, looked down at what he had put in my hand.

It was an arch on a chain. Looking at it closer, it had a clasp, and the arch was the Vault symbol.

“A necklace?” I asked, looking back at him.

“I bought it for you a few days before everything on Helios went to shit. Lilith sent me and Mordecai to the wreckage of Helios. I found it there, still intact. I never got the chance to give it to you then, so I thought I’d give it to you now, considering we’re sort of Vault Hunters now.” As he spoke, I lifted the necklace up, the charm swinging gently with the slight shake of my hand.

The charm, at first glance, appeared to be black, but as I peered closer at it, I saw something swirling in the darkness. I tapped it with my free hand, and the swirling lit up purple.

“Jack, this is made of eridium.” I said, looking back and forth from the charm to him. He looked down at it, watching the glowing purple fade.

“Huh. I guess it is,” He said, not at all sounding surprised, “Well, do you like it?” He asked, as I opened the clasp and put it around my neck, the Vault charm sitting just below my collar bone. I grinned down at it, then looked back at Jack.

“I love it!” I practically tackled him, enveloping him in a hug as he fell to his back on the couch.

“Jeez you two, just fuck and get it over with.” I heard a familiar Irish accent say. I peeked up to find Zane and Amara walking into the room. Zane sat across from Jack and I, and Amara stood with her arms crossed.

“Seriously, I’ve had to watch you two dance around each other for three years. That might as well be psychological torture,” Amara said, and I felt my face heat up. I glanced down at Jack for a moment, and I saw his cheeks getting red.

Slowly, I got off the couch, standing beside the couch. Jack sat up, giving me a strange look. Quickly, I grabbed his arm, running from the room and dragging him along with me. We ran upstairs, and into my room at the back of the ship.

The door slid shut behind us with a hydraulic hiss, and mischievous giggles filled the room.

#borderlands #handsome jack x reader #AU #borderlands au

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makeste · 4 years ago

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BnHA Chapter 305: Worst Intervention Ever

Previously on BnHA: Shinomori, whose name took me an entire week to memorize, was all, “nice to meet you Deku, I’m ten feet tall, do you want to know how I died?” and without waiting for an answer explained that he kicked it from old age at forty thanks to good ol’ OFA. Deku was all “wait a minute, then how come All Might, who’s fifty-five and is definitely dyeing his gray hair, is still alive?” First and Shino were all, “we really have no fucking clue but we think it’s cuz he’s quirkless, JUST LIKE YOU!” So basically, since quirkless people don’t exactly grow on trees these days, Deku is probably going to be the last user of OFA. The chapter ended with Nana being all, “psst, Deku, about my grandson. Uh, can you kill him?” which is sure to lead to a very interesting conversation this week.

Today on BnHA: Nana And The Gang are all “so, Deku, how can we put this delicately. The thing is, we’re pretty sure that AFO really fucked my grandson up, so on the off chance you can’t save him, how would you feel about, you know... [throat slitting gesture].” Deku is all “idk you guys, I kinda feel like he’s really just a traumatized child at heart and he’s in a lot of pain and stuff and so I should try to help him.” The Vestiges are all “BUT WHAT IF YOU CAN’T” and Deku is all “BUT I WANT TO TRY, DAMMIT” and the Vestiges are all “well when you put it that way, we, uh, were just testing you, so congrats, you passed!” The chapter ends with First being all, “ANYWAY SO WHY DON’T YOU TWO SHY BOYS STANDING OVER THERE IN THE SHADOWS COME SAY HELLO” before we CUT AWAY FOR ANOTHER WEEK, goddammit.

seriously, Nana

just... have you met Deku?? look, if you really want Tomura dead, just sic him on the U.A. first years and tell Shouto and Honenuki that it’s a training exercise

oh my god lmao

we’re too far away to see Nana’s face here so I will just assume that she turned and is staring DIRECTLY INTO THE CAMERA for this one line lmao. “I just wanted to clarify in case anyone felt inclined to take my dialogue out of context and spend an entire week complaining about it”

oh my god?! are you all purposely trying to make me sad??

someone stop me before I launch into an impromptu rant about all my Tomura feels. WHY IS NOBODY STOPPING ME. oh my god but yes, exactly. he’s just in pain all the time. this is exactly why I think Tomura has such high redemption potential even though so far he seems to lack so many of the redemption arc essentials such as feeling remorse, wanting to change, and taking responsibility for his actions. the reason why I’m willing to overlook all that in his case is because Tomura has essentially had zero agency his entire life. AFO molded him into a killer by making sure he was in constant mental agony, and making it so that the only thing that even slightly relieved that agony was killing peeps. like, please don’t think I’m making excuses for him or anything, but if you take a child and manipulate their existence to make it virtually impossible for that child to grow up as anything other than a killer, and basically never give him the chance to be anything else, then no shit he’s gonna be a killer?? he’s basically never had the choice not to be. it’s never been an option for him. anyways I feel like I am EXPLAINING MYSELF SO BADLY but nonetheless I am prepared to die on this hill

anyway so now Nana is all “that’s a rhetorical question btw because Our Hearts And Minds Are One so we can feel everything you feel bro.” so yeah, that’s interesting

now Banjou is getting started on the “let’s try and talk Deku out of wanting to save Tomura because it’s insane” part of their OFA Mystical Space Void Reunion agenda

look, Banjou, I feel you, I really do. you guys don’t think it’s realistic that Deku can defeat Tomura without killing him. so if it’s a choice between killing Tomura vs letting Deku and everyone else in the entire world die, then duh, you think Deku should kill him. I get it! and if this were a real life mass murderer I’d totally agree with you. but the problem is that this isn’t real life, this is a sympathetic shounen villain with a tragic past who might as well have FUTURE REDEMPTION ARC RECEIPIENT stamped on his forehead at this point

so First is all “look, there’s absolutely no doubt my brother has fucked this kid up good and proper by now”, which, again, fair

though, that’s kind of exactly my point though. everything that Tomura is, everything he’s done, he’s done because of AFO. AFO has so effectively shaped his personality and his worldview by this point that it’s all but impossible to penetrate that. he’s AFO’s puppet. but the problem is that rather than treating him like a victim, you all are treating him like a casualty. like he’s already a lost cause. but good luck trying to convince Deku of that

WHOA WHAT, RANDOM SUPER-IMPORTANT AND BIZARRELY UNRELATED EXPOSITION DROPPED IN JUST LIKE THAT??

way to still not reveal Sixth’s name, btw. THE PEOPLE WANT TO KNOW, DAMMIT. but also so this confirms something we basically already knew already, which is that not even AFO can steal OFA. it literally can’t be taken away by anyone unless the owner wills it. SO SUCK ON THAT AFO YOU EGG

(ETA: so I have no idea why this was omitted from this translation, but apparently the Sixth’s name was revealed as “En”, which is obviously not his full name but at least it’s something. also he most likely has a fire or smoke-related quirk based on the kanji used, 煙.)

so Banjou is saying that Deku’s “lack of an iron will” could be a disadvantage against AFO. hahaha what?? Midoriya “I’ll break all of my bones without blinking an eye just to protect someone” Izuku lacks an iron will? do tell

he says this is going to be a test of Deku’s determination. well yeah, no shit. but just not in the way you guys think

OH HELLO AGAIN

darker hair again here! but I don’t trust the contrast in these scans at all after last week. his coveralls are way darker than they looked before too, and you can clearly see he’s standing in the shadows now

(ETA: yep, once again the raw shows that his hair is considerably lighter than what’s shown in these scans here. although there’s no mistaking now that his hair is consistently being colored in this slightly darker shade, and it’s not just the lighting.)

anyways lol First was saying something about how AFO can’t steal OFA, and they’ve spent all this time cultivating it as the ultimate weapon against AFO, and blah blah blah. go on then, keep lecturing

NANA GODDAMMIT NONE OF THIS IS YOUR FAULT

girl what?? you did everything in your power to protect your family, and AFO, fucked up man that he is, targeted them anyway. there is one person and one person only to blame for what’s happened to Tomura, and that potato-faced asshole needs a good kick in the balls

NANA GODDAMMIT DON’T MAKE ME COME OVER THERE

SO HELP ME GOD!! I WILL GIVE YOU THE BIGGEST HUG YOU’VE EVER HAD!! THAT IS A THREAT

so now Nana is all “I’m just going to call my grandson a Thing to ensure that fandom has only the freshest, grass-fed no-hormones-added discourse this week”

I don’t even need to drop into the tags to know exactly which specific people are going to respond to this, and what kind of posts they are going to write lmao. everyone’s all caught up in the “that thing”, and meanwhile I’m over here completely hung up on this “nay” that’s appeared out of NOWHERE you guys. look at that. she really said “NAY”

Nana, my love, my dearest, I feel you girl I really do. but he’s not an unforgivable manifestation of pure evil, Deku is exactly right actually, he’s a boy in pain. you guys need to stop questioning Deku’s shounen protagonist instincts here and just let him work his sparkly magic. “let’s try and convince Midoriya Fucking Izuku that he can’t save someone” is a plan that is NEVER going to turn out well you guys

“DEKU GODDAMMIT WHAT IF WE CAN’T SAVE HIM” lmao it’s like an intervention

“DAMMIT DEKU JUST ADMIT YOU HAVE A SAVING PEOPLE PROBLEM!”

RED ALERT IT’S ANOTHER CLOSE-UP OF THE BACK OF MISTER TWO BON CLAY’S HEAD OMG

(ETA: I was too distracted with freaking out about Two and Three to really appreciate how ridiculously handsome First looks in this panel. but on my second readthrough it stood out so much that I had to go back and add an extra bullet point just to talk about how hot he is. look at him. wtf.)

THAT IS DEFINITELY AN UNDERCUT. THE PLOT THICKENSSSS. also those are fucking exhaust vents on Mister Three’s neck. MISTER THREE COULD YOU POSSIBLY BE RELATED TO THE IIDAS, PLEASE TELL ME YOUR SECRETS I’M DYING OVER HERE

so now Deku is launching into what will undoubtedly be a “saving people problems require SAVING PEOPLE SOLUTIONS” heroic counter-speech!

I mean, they can already feel the “lol nah I’m gonna try and save him” feelings running through him lol. ~OuR hEaRtS aNd MiNdS aRe CoNnEcTeD~ and all that. this is just a formality, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love a good shounen protag speech

oh wait hold up, do you mean to tell me that the whole “hearts and minds are connected” thing I was just mocking just a paragraph ago actually allowed Deku to feel what Tomura was feeling?? like literally feel it??

YET AGAIN these Tomura feels are pounding on my front door you guys?? they just will not quit?? people my house is already full of feels, does it look like I need you to sell me any more of them?? -- what do you mean, they’re free??

AW YISS THAT’S IT DEKU. THAT’S SOME GOOD SPEECH RIGHT THERE

I appreciate the contrast here between the Douchebag Triumvirate of Overhaul, Muscular, and Stain versus the Misguided Twosome of Gentle and La Brava. never let it be said that Deku doesn’t know the difference between a redeemable villain and an unredeemable one

OH NO -- OH MY GOD

someone please help me I need directions to the OFA Spooky Galactic Nebula Realm in this fictional Japanese manga land. it’s not on google maps. I need to give these two babies a big hug and wrap them up in a blanket and treat them to some McDonalds Happy Meals please help

other things: (1) ENDEAVOR CHILLING OUT IN DEKU’S “PEOPLE I HOLD DEAR” PANEL LMAO NEON DISCOURSE EXTRAVAGANZA, (2) “ONE FOR ALL IS A POWER TO SAVE, NOT TO KILL” I’M ABOUT TO CRY DEKU I LOVE YOU SO MUCH HOW IS IT EVEN POSSIBLE TO FEEL ALL THIS LOVE, (3) [SLAMS HANDS ON TABLE] THERE’S YOUR MOTHERFUCKING IRON WILL!!!!!!!! -- I’m sorry, please don’t call security, I’ll be good

I just randomly remembered that Deku is still saying all of this in his muffled “FMMPHHMMPHMM” voice and I’m somehow cracking up lol. so actually it’s a very good thing Their Hearts And Minds Are Connected, otherwise they’d no doubt be all, “...what?”

(ETA: so I completely missed this on account of it literally not being visible in the scan at all, but in the raw you can clearly see Baby Kacchan and Baby Shouto fanboying over All Might in two of these panels, and excuse me, ma’am??

thank you very much Deku for including them in your montage, particularly since you’ve never seen Baby Shouto before lol. amazingly accurate image you managed to conjure up, all things considered.)

SDKFJLSKHG -- AS IF ON CUE???

HE’S SO ADORABLE HELP?? Trippy Space All Might looks like he’s about to cry, and First is all “don’t crack a smile... you have to be Firm and Serious here... dammit, don’t smile” omg

anyways! YOU GO DEKU. “MY QUIRK MY RULES, BITCHES” damn, son

KLJLKKHLG TRIPPY SPACE ALL MIGHT LITERALLY ACTUALLY IS CRYING ALL MIGHT HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME

“I JUST... [CLENCHES FIST] REALLY LOVE SAVING PEOPLE” FUCKING HELL LMAO THIS IS THE WORST INTERVENTION OF ALL TIME

Deku is literally all “sure, maybe I’ll have to kill him, but have you guys also considered, MAYBE NOT??” it’s no use Nana he’s too powerful

LMAO FIRST

“like I’ve been saying this whole time, you should definitely try saving Shigaraki Tomura.” “but, uh... First, didn’t you just -- ” “shut up”

(ETA: clearly it’s not just his brother who inherited those smooth-talking genes.)

so now Deku has turned back into a sixteen year old and his clothes have gone missing again. just OFA things

dskljdlsklgk

yes... sure... “testing” you...

HEY

FIRST OF ALL, DAMN YOU HORIKOSHI YOU MADE NANA CRY. even if I’m pretty sure they’re actually tears of happiness/relief. and SECOND OF ALL, “TELL MY BOYFRIEND I SAID HI” DJSKDLKJJL ANYWAY MAYBE GRAN, NANA, AND MR. SHIMURA WERE IN A THROUPLE

[SCREAMS]

WHY WOULD YOU END IT THERE?? WHY WOULD YOU END IT THERE!!!!!

(ETA: and two-to-one odds that we cut away to some other scene once they finally start to turn around next week. I’M CALLING IT NOW. giving myself a week to brace myself for the rage.)

fucking hell. well if anyone needs me I will be adding Horikoshi fucking Kouhei to the list of irredeemable villains, peace

#bnha 305 #midoriya izuku #shigaraki tomura #shimura tenko #shimura nana #ofa the first #banjou daigorou #bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #makeste reads bnha #'deku. sweetheart. your other vestiges and I just want what's best for you'#'have you tried... *not* saving people?'#only to backpedal SPECTACULARLY when he was all 'WHAT DO YOU MEAN NOT SAVING THEM'#yeah okay guys #you're not fooling anyone #but it's okay I still love you

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shipskicksandgiggles · 3 years ago

Note

What happens when peter parker sleeps in

For the fic title thing

oh my god I'm so sorry I forgot about this hi I hope this is good, it's really fluffy

send a title and I'll write a fic for it

Read What Happens When Peter Parker Sleeps In on ao3

~~~

An alarm blared through the lab, startling Tony out of his revere.

“J?”

“There appears to be a small army of androids marching on Philadelphia and the Avengers have been alerted.”

“Footage, please and thank you.”

JARVIS pulled up a few different angles from CCTV and other public access cameras that he projected into Tony’s screens.

“Wonderful,” he grumbled. “Who’s home?”

“Sirs Barton, Rogers, and Wilson are available, and young Mr. Parker is in, but asleep and not to be disturbed as requested.”

“And make sure it stays that way. Considering the circumstances, the rest of them are a good team. I mean, only Wilson has brains but what’s brains without brawn? Tell ‘em to suit up and meet me in the air.”

“Of course sir.”

“Actually, patch me through to them.”

He stepped into the Iron Man suit and listened for the coms to buzz to life.

“Stark.”

“Captain,” he greeted curtly. “JARVIS is already running composite scans of the droids. Should be a quick in and out, so the four of us should do just fine. Keys are in the jet so I’m gonna get a head start and start assessing the damage.”

“Great, we’ll see you when we touch down.”

By the time his thrusters whirred, the coms had gone silent. The flight to Pennsylvania was short, and he had half a mind to stop and say hello to Rhodey’s family after everything was all said and done.

He hovered above the city, marking out all the areas the bots were targeting.

“Now, unless my age is catching up to me, it’s gonna be a safe bet to guess that if we take the average center of all the droids spread out across the city, we’ll come up with their base. JARVIS?”

“Calculating center… Heat signatures from an abandoned warehouse on Delancey match that of the adequate machinery to manufacture and control the androids, as well as the manpower to power it all.”

“Wonderful. Get the coordinates to the others and have them land up top, then alert local law enforcement so they can come in when it’s clear. It looks like we’re going to Tosche Station to pick up some power converters.”

“And your plan of attack, sir?”

“Will going through the front door get me killed? The boys need somewhere to land.”

“I don’t read any explosives rigged to go off if you go through the door, and I estimate significantly less property damage via that approach.”

“Fantastic.” He zeroed in on the warehouse and swooped in to examine the barn-like doors.

They were already wide open with androids marching out in battle formation.

“Oh yeah, that’s totally not conspicuous,” he muttered.

There was a whine as the quinjet touched down on the roof, and his coms reactivated. “Nice of you boys to join us.”

“Not having too much fun, I hope,” Clint fired back.

“Oh, never.”

“Well they certainly aren’t trying to hide,” Sam noted.

“Yeah, but is it amatuers or a mastermind luring us into a trap?” Steve asked. “You got a preliminary report, Stark?”

“This appears to be the base, complete with machinery and manpower. From here, they’ve been advancing on the city, causing varying amounts of destruction. I was thinking that Wilson and I could focus up here, work on shutting down the operation while you and Barton start on the streets. If we’re lucky, there’ll be a way to power them down en masse so you can start helping get people to safety.”

“Remember who’s in command, Iron Man,” Steve chastised lightly.

“But the final call goes to you, of course, Captain,” Tony added somewhat cheekily.

Steve let out a heavy sigh. “What he said. Hawkeye, with me. Falcon-”

“I think I saw an open window on the west side of the building. See you inside, Stark.”

“Likewise.” He nodded to Steve and Clint as they hit the pavement. “Good luck.”

“You too,” Barton shouted back.

“Right then,” Tony muttered to himself. “Let's see where those puppies are coming from.”

He flew in over the top of the moving robots, startling a bunch of college aged kids that were manning the controls. “I assure you, these are the droids I’ve been looking for,” he deadpanned. “Step away from the computers! Who’s in charge here?”

They all pointed to a girl who hadn’t even paused to glance at him. “Hey, you!”

“I’m busy, what do you- oh shit.” She did a double take. “Look, I only took this job because I don’t want to go back to serving entitled people overpriced coffee. It’s not my fault that computers are easier than people, and this pays better.”

“Food service workers are the cornerstone of society kiddo, but I’m sorry that people suck. Who do you work for now?”

“Guy’s real mysterious, so I don’t know his name. He should be in the back office though. Does this mean I’m fired?”

He stepped out of the suit and surveyed his surroundings, setting the suit on sentry mode. “Probably means jail time too, but what’s your name? We could use someone with your talent and stubbornness at Stark Industries.”

“It’s Maia. Maia Dotman.”

“Well Maia Dotman, when you’re able to, give my office a ring and we’ll see what we can do.”

“Tony, you can’t just hire minor villains,” Sam chimed in.

“I can, and I did. Anyways, did you get that? Back office.”

“Yeah, yeah, on my way.”

“Wonderful. I’m guessing this is the system that controls the droids?” He directed the question back at Maia, who nodded.

“Every android squadron is controlled by a single base code with their individual assignments coded over top,” she confirmed.

“Good, that makes my job a little easier. JARVIS, reroute the information to six screens and wire in. Somewhere in that base code should be a kill switch.”

“Actually,” Maia interrupted, “the kill switches are in the differential code.”

“Was that your idea or your bosses?”

“Mine.”

“Clever girl. Seriously, keep talking, it’ll get your prison sentence shortened and you in my office faster.”

“Cool, cool, so-” she jumped on the keyboard next to him “-I used the same equation when I built the codes, so it should be easy to localize. Just like… that!” She turned the monitor to face him.

“So we have to run these all individually?”

“Yeah, sorry.”

“Whatever, how many squadrons are there?”

“107”

Tony snorted. “Oh Steve’s gonna hate that. Great, okay, let’s see that equation again.”

She showed him, and he made sure JARVIS was recording. “Seriously, clever, clever girl.” He had him load the sequence up onto a flash drive and had JARVIS redirect everything to one monitor. “Run it, shut it all down. Wilson?”

A few of the techies shrieked when he seemed to drop from the ceiling with a man held up by his arms. “Caught this bastard trying to sneak out the window.”

“Ah, that’s too bad. We’re running a protocol to shut this all down.”

“This is my life’s work!” the struggling man yelled.

“This is IKEA level workmanship,” Tony corrected. “It’s basic, and- oh good, the cops are here. Wilson, if you’d like to do the honors?”

“Gladly.” Sam locked the man’s arms behind his back more securely before walking him over to the waiting sirens.

They heard the decided snick of handcuffs latching, and Tony breathed a sigh of relief. “It was good working with you, Maia Dotman.”

“It was good working with you too, Mr. Stark.”

“I’ll make sure there’s a note in your file about how you helped today. Then you’ll be back to making the world a better place in no time.”

“You’re serious about hiring me, huh?”

“Why not?” he shrugged. “I like hiring people with promise.”

“I’ll call your office then.” She held out her hand for him to shake.

“Atta girl.” He called the suit back to him, and pinged Steve’s location. “See you around.”

“That was quick,” Steve’s voice rang in his ear.

“They went down like limp noodles,” Clint agreed.

“I had help,” Tony said. “Now can we make this quick? I want to visit Rhodey’s mom before we split town.”

~~~

“Spider-Baby… Underoos…C’mon bud, wake up.”

“Wh’s happnin’?” Peter mumbled blearily.

“Hey, welcome back to the land of the living, sport,” Tony laughed.

“What happened?”

“You slept through most of the day, bug. Which you needed, by the way”

“Ugh.” He rubbed the sleep out his eyes. “What’s that smell?”

“Rhodey’s mom sent me home with leftovers to heat up. Figured you might be hungry when you woke up.”

“Where’d you see Rhodey's mom?”

Philadelphia. Low-level mission, so I stopped by and saw her on my way home.”

“Oh. Mission?”

“Androids. Shitty tech, so we let you sleep.”

“Aw, no Star Wars jokes.”

“I made a few just to make up for the fact that you weren’t there, kiddo.”

Tony laughed at the face Peter made.

“Traitor! You never make Star Wars jokes around me!”

“How about this then? You go eat, and later we can watch The Empire Strikes Back and I’ll quote the ‘I am your father’ scene like I know you’ve been trying to get me to do for months now.

Peter’s jaw dropped, and just like that he was out of bed in a flash. Tony sighed and shook his head. The things he does for this team.

#irondad #star wars references #tony stark being himself basically #prompts #anon #asks #fluff #fluff and humor #ellis writes

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iamnmbr3 · 4 years ago

Note

And here's the thing about TVA... even if/when they are gonna be revealed as bad guys (in Phase 4 Multiverse of Madness is happening, the timecops have to go down for that), the first impression I've got is that the show presents totalitarian organization in 'funny', zany, catroonized way. I know very little about Rick and Morty, but I've heard their style of jokes can be twisted and weird. And I just think that something working for animation medium is not always good for live action. Add to that Loki's humiliation and declawing made through stupid gags... I'm starting to think Marvel made a mistake hiring those creators just for name recognition...

Yeah! Exactly! We're not supposed to find them scary or take their evil that seriously. Look at all the things they do in Avengers to villain code Loki and to present what he is doing as evil and sinister. And en even better example. Avengers 2011. The bit where Sif & the W3 come and confront Loki once he's on the throne. Loki actually hasn't done anything wrong there but the camera angles and music and character reactions etc. all cue that audience that we're supposed to view this moment as sinister. Same for lots of other villain moments in various MCU films. Even the Grandmaster, who is presented as a more fun and funny villain, is still clearly framed as being evil and in the wrong. We don't get that with the TVA.

They copied the melt stick scene from TR but whereas in TR the joke is that the GM seemed silly but he's actually dangerous, the joke in the Loki Series appears to be that Loki is scared and is making a silly face. We're not really supposed to engage with the TVA being evil because it's all part of the joke. The humor derives from what they are doing to Loki. And we're not supposed to feel bad for him or mad at the TVA. We're just suppose to laugh. Despite the fact that the TVA are the most evil villains ever in the MCU - they commit mass genocide, enslave people, torture people, surveil them without leave, commit acts of police brutality, and WANT TO ELIMINATE FREE WILL. That's very evil. But it's presented as a complete joke. That might be fine in a cartoon parody. But it feels weird here. It also robs the story of any tension.

Now that doesn't mean that the show won't engage at all with the TVA being evil. I sure hope they do! But I don't think it will be handled in the right way. We know the multiverse has to get opened up, so I suspect something along these lines might go down. I think it'll turn out that *gasp* the extremely antisemitic tropes space lizards are evil and Loki will rebel against them and decide to change his own fate because he doesn't want to be a villain anymore and instead wants to try to be better (thus retconning his complex character history and motivations and turning him into a simple villain who now wants a redemption arc) and he will probably team up with Mobius to free the timeline. He may kill his alternate self along the way or possibly they will team up (I hope!).

I don't think Mobius will be characterized as evil for what he did to Loki in this episode. It will be portrayed as tough love. I also don't think the other TVA characters we've met will be portrayed as evil even tho they and Mobius work for an incredibly evil organization. I mean we know the Renslayer actress said this is an origin story for her character so I doubt she's getting killed off, and the head writer seems to love Mobius and think he is a good guy so I doubt he'll die. Instead I think it'll be framed as them and Loki both learning from each other and becoming better. And then Loki probably leaves or maybe heads off with Mobius to deal with some new threat next season.

I don't think Mobius will be characterized as evil for what he did to Loki in this episode. It will be portrayed as tough love. I also don't think the other TVA characters we've met will be portrayed as evil even tho they and Mobius work for an incredibly evil organization. I mean we know the Renslayer actress said this is an origin story for her character so I doubt she's getting killed off, and the head writer seems to love Mobius and think he is a good guy so I doubt he'll die. Instead I think it'll be framed as them and Loki both learning from each other and becoming better. Then Loki will probably leave or maybe head off to confront some new threat with Mobius at his side so they can set up for another season.

They will probably validate the idea that Loki's experience with the TVA was positive and taught him to be a better person. The fact that Mobius's treatment of him was utterly inexcusable will be ignored. The fact that the TVA characters were part of an organization committing acts of genocide and torture and enslavement will be ignored. The framing will be that Loki was a villain up until the TVA experience "taught" him to be better and made him want to rebel against his villainous role. His motivations will be retconned to him just being a bully who feels weak and pathetic and takes it out on others to feel stronger.

I would love to be wrong.

#asks #loki tv serieis #loki series #loki 2021 #loki show

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falcor-thee-luck-dragon · 4 years ago

Text

What a Time to be Alive - Diego Hargreeves x reader Season I

Chapter 7- The Day That Was

Summary: Five has popped in from nowhere, yet again. Now you, Diego, Five, and Allison are on the hunt for an important file.

Masterlist - where all the other chapters are⚔️

Tagged: @sambucky8 @white-wolf-buckaroo @2cuteforyourlies @la-vie-en-amour1 @fandomoverlord221 @thatfandombitcch @alonewolfsblog @starrrybarnes @winterboobear11

“Who the hell is Harold Jenkins?” Questions Diego, bewildered at the random insignificant name Five just handed Allison on a folded piece of paper. Five glances up at the six of you, who are all gathered around Allison in various states of befuddlement. He lets out a short huff before taking one more sip of coffee, promptly chucking it behind him where it soars across the room forgotten and out of sight.

“I don’t know...yet. But I know that he’s responsible for the apocalypse. So we have to find him. And we have to do it now.” Explains Five, setting up a new plan of attack.

“How is he connected to what’s gonna happen?” Wonders Luther doubtfully.

“I don’t know.” Answers Five, Diego cutting in with his own questions, “Wait so you just know his name? That’s it?”

“That’s enough.” Assures Five to the rest of you. You let out a snort, amused by his ready-to-go vagueness.

“There are probably dozens of Harold Jenkins in the city.” Adds Diego, making a compelling point, how are you guys supposed to find one guy within the giant populous of the city?

“Well, we better start looking, then.” You deadpan, not thrilled with the idea of playing a game of Where’s Waldo.

Five then goes on to fully explain the reasoning and valuable information about how he came to the conclusion of Harold Jenkins causing the apocalypse. Further diving more in depth about his former employer and what the Commission is, as well as what it does, which is to protect and maintain the timeline. It’s a large informational dump, but it does clear up more about who Hazel and Cha-Cha are. As well as what they do, so they’re timetraveling assassins who help keep the timeline in order. And you already thought your life was weird enough.

Five finishes his little rant, the rest of you all beginning to speak out at once, rambling on with more opinions and unnecessary questions. Allison commenting on how completely insane everything he just said sounds. Five’s head snaps up at that, “You know what else is insane? I look like a 13 year old boy. Klaus talks to the dead, Y/N can get shot in the head and come back to life, and Luther thinks he’s fooling everybody with that overcoat. Everything about us is insane. It always has been.” You nod at that, Klaus adding his two cents from his spot laying on the couch, “He’s got a point there.”

“We didn’t choose this life, we’re just living it. For the next three days, anyway.” Five ends with, hoping everyone will see the importance of sticking together. “But the last time we tried to stop it, we all died. Why is this time any different? Why shouldn’t I go home to my daughter?” Worries Allison.

“Because this time, I’m here. We have the name of the man responsible. Guys, we actually have the chance of saving the lives of billions of people. Including Claire.” Replies Five, a new determination pushing him forward. Allison’s eyebrows furrow in thought, “You know her name?”

“I do, and I’d like to live long enough to meet her.” Five tells her honestly.

“All right. Let’s get this bastard.” She agrees, walking closer to Five. “You had me at Gerald Jenkins.” Says Diego, you roll your eyes, Five correcting him “Harold Jenkins.”

“Whatever it is. Too many people have been killed his week, let’s not lose anyone else.” You add, walking towards the door.

“You, Luther?” Five says, surprised that Luther hasn’t joined the band wagon yet. “Yeah, you go. I’m gonna stay and go through Dad’s files. I still think this has something to do with why he sent me to the Moon.” Luther tells all of you, his mind still dead set on the Moon and why he was sent there. You roll your eyes, Diego speaking up at Luther’s unwillingness to help, “Seriously? Now you wanna make the end of the world about you and Dad?”

“No. “Watch for threats.” That’s what he told me. You think that’s a coincidence? This all has to be connected somehow.” Luther explains while looking to each of you expectantly. “No, we should all stick together.” Allison reasons, trying to get Luther to see the light. “We don’t have time for this.” You groan while reaching out to touch Diego’s arm, you just really want to leave and get on with things.

“Let’s roll. I know where we can find this asshole. Klaus, you’re with me and Y/N.” Beckons Diego, nodding for him to follow.

“Yeah. I...I’m good. I think I’ll, uh...I think I’ll pass,” He says from the couch while waving him off, “I’m feeling a little under the weather, so..uh...” He trails off, getting up and walking past you, Diego, and Five.

Diego and Five look to you for an answer as Klaus walks away and out of sight, you just shrug your shoulders, “The worlds a rainstorm and he’s but a tiny rain forest ant.....I don’t know, lets just leave.” You tell them with a sigh as you start walking towards the front door, the two of them following.

“When did you get all metaphorical?” Says Five.

“Since today.”

“That’s right my babes a smart one.”

“Someone has to be...and Diego it’s not gonna be you.” Five lets out a choked laugh at your teasing comment.

“I’ve missed you guys.”

——

Surprisingly enough, Diego had the right idea when it came to finding this Harold Jenkins guy at the police station. They have all the records of almost everyone in the whole city, so Jenkins record has to be here.

Diego pulls up to the side of the building, while you look out the window at the bustling city life, thinking to yourself about how none of these people could even begin to dream of the life you live. They’re all blissfully oblivious to that fact that the actual apocalypse is supposed to be coming in a couple days. None of them have a goddamn clue. They don’t know what it’s like to die, or what a heartbeat sounds like in the chest of a terrified teenage robber. They’ll never know what it feels like to look at their own reflection in a bullet, as it flies past their head. When it seems like time is rolling in slow motion, and you’re the only one fast enough to react. They have no idea, and they’ll never carry the memories of taking another humans life. But no life you have ended was ever innocent, and the world can sleep a little easier with the loss of another rapist or murderer gone from the streets.

You stay silent as Diego and Five start talking about this Jenkins guy. “I know this Jenkins dude has to have a record. We gotta get our hands on his file.” States Diego, but you do wonder how he’s gonna pull this off.

“And your plan is to what? Waltz in there and just ask for it?” Sasses Allison, doubtful about Diego’s confidence.

“I know the station like the back of my hand, sis. I’ve spent a lot of time inside.” You snort at that, “Behind bars or handcuffed.” He glares at you through the front mirror, you just smile sweetly at him.

“Whatever. Here’s the plan.”

“Plan? I’m just gonna blink in and get the file.” Five says matter-of-factly. Diego shakes his head, “No, that’s not...You don’t know the ins and outs of this place, okay?” Diego jabs defensively.

“I literally just did this yesterday.”

“What.”

“My yesterday, not your yesterday. It’ll take me two seconds. Why don’t I just go?” Argues Five clearly confused as to why Diego is being difficult about this simple task.

“Listen to me. You are not going in there. I made a call. That’s what a leader does. He leads.”

“Okay then Mr. Leader, get the damn file.” You grumble, wanting to get on with the day, considering there’s only three left. He gives you another fake mirror glare, before opening the door and getting out.

——

While Diego is off and away, getting that file, you’re currently leaned against a marble wall of some giant building, Five doing the same to your left. The both of you listening to Allison’s attempt at calling Vanya, who doesn’t appear to want to answer. Finally Diego walks around the corner, “So?” Asks Five pulling himself off the wall.

“You’re welcome.” He says while Allison snatches the file out of his hand. Suddenly her eyes go wide, “Holy shit.” She exclaims, taken aback by whatever she’s looking at.

“What?” You question, leaning in closer to see what the big deal is.

Allison turns the file around so the three of you can see the photograph of a man, “Harold Jenkins is Leonard Peabody.”

Your brows furrow in confusion, “Am I supposed to know who the fuck that is?”

——

It feels like you’re playing a game of clue or something of that nature, the file leading the four of you to Harold/Leonard’s house in some suburban neighborhood. You all get out of the car, making your way up to the front porch. “Be careful, okay? We don’t know what Peabody’s capable of.” Warns Allison in that concerned motherly tone of hers, it’s almost comforting.

“Yeah, he didn’t seem dangerous when I first saw him. Looked kinda scrawny.” Replies Diego taking the lead up to the house.

“Yeah, well, so are most serial killers and mass murders.” Allison adds, you laugh at the irony. “Exactly, I mean look at Five.” You tell them, Five gives you a half offended look while muttering a short, “Thanks.”

Five and Diego continue their way up and onto the front porch, slowly walking towards the door. As they’re doing this, Allison goes to the right, heading for the back entrance. You pause on the sidewalk, right in front of the house, while looking up at the roof where you spot a window into the upstairs bedroom, bingo. Crouching down ever so slightly, you spring up, hurling your arms upwards for more momentum as you launch yourself onto the roof. And she lands a perfect 10, outstanding, you think chuckling to yourself. Both Diego and Five completely unaware of yours and Allison’s absence, you continue to the upstairs window. The window’s locked but like that’s going to stop you, you grip the bottom of it and push up, snapping off the lock as you lift it. Giving yourself access into the house, you stick a leg in, ducking under as you make your way inside. It’s clean enough, and best part, there’s no house alarm. You have a look around at your current surroundings, nothing seemingly out of the ordinary that would raise any alarm bells, in fact the place is kind of a bore if your being honest.

Walking down the wooden stairs you see Allison and Five making their way towards the front door to unlock it for Diego. A second later Diego comes bursting through the glass, crashing into the floor and making a nice mess in the process. “Subtle.” Comments Allison looking down at him. Five walks over to the door handle, turning the knob and opening it, “You know, the door was unlocked.” He tells him. You make it to the first step, watching in amusement as Diego picks himself up, “Dramatic, as per usual.” You quip, Five and Allison snickering as Diego just grumbles, “Yeah, well, my way works just fine.”

He stands up, flicking loose pieces of glass stuck to his jacket, “Spread out. Yell if you, uh.... you know, you’re in trouble.” He sighs, walking away and into the living room.

“Ah, inspiring leadership.” Comments Five bluntly. “One of the greats.” Adds Allison as the three of you watch him limp away.

“If we ever have kids, I hope they’re not that stupid.” You mutter, Allison lets out a loud laugh as she turns to you, her face breaking out into an amused smile. Five just shakes his head with a tiny smirk lacing his boyish features, he then moves to walk away and into another room.

You shrug, walking back up the stairs, Allison trailing behind you. She searches in some guest room, as you slowly walk down the short hallway, your nose catching the scent of something odd, you look up. The attic door, “Well this has never let me down in any horror movie. There’s gotta be some creepy shit up here.” You mumble to yourself, incredibly curious as to what you may find. Reaching your arm up, you grab the dangling handle, firmly pulling down the retractable steps. Letting curiosity take the better of you, you march up the wooden step-ladder, only for your eyes to land on the entirety of the Umbrella Academy in its prime. All your faces scratched where the eyes should be, plus a multitude of figurines, some of which are broken and melted. Definitely not weird or anything, totally normal.

“Guys, you’re not gonna believe the weird-ass shit I just found!” You shout down to them, excited about your creepy horror movie like find. You can hear the thumping of their shoes as they all race to where you are from their various spots in the house. Allison peaking her head up first, the others following suit. They all stand around behind you, taking in their peculiar new surroundings.

“All our faces are burnt off.” Says Allison, freaked out and bewildered by this wild discovery.

“Well, that’s not creepy. This guys got some serious issues.” Mumbles Diego, who’s leaning down to get a better view of the damage.

“I was hoping our breaking and entering would lead to something interesting, I didn’t exactly have weird-man-child-obsessed-with-childhood-heroes in mind.” You muse, picking up a half melted figurine of yourself. Your face scrunches up into a grimace at the ugly sight, you then turn to face the others, gaining their attention.

“Look. Mine even has orange eyes. Special Edition Number Eight.”

“That’s nice Y/N. Mine doesn’t have a head.” Retorts Diego.

“Five you still look like your figurine, it’s like a freaky spitting image.”

“My hair looks better.”

“Amen brother.”

“Y/N I can’t say the same for yours..ah don’t hit me I’m kidding.”

“This was never about Vanya. This was about us.” Exclaims Allison, getting more disgusted by the second as she quickly gathers the attention of the three of you.

Without warning Five falls to the floor, making a loud thud. You all turn in concern, “Five. What...” Allison trails off, getting down on her knees to better assess the situation, you set your half melted Special Edition self down on the shelf, turning to do the same but on Five’s left. Your eyes catch a deep red stained to his fingers. A subtle whiff of blood dissipating off of Five.

You lift up his uniform shirt to better see the damage, he’s got a nasty piece of metal shrapnel stuck in his side. “Jesus, Five.” Whispers Diego, concern lacing every word.

“Five what the fuck, I was wondering why I could smell blood on the way here.” You glance at Allison for a fraction of a second, she thankfully doesn’t catch what that glance was implying, you’d be laughing at the thought if not for the current situation. Five just groans, “You have to keep going. So...close.” He whispers, passing out once again.

“Five. Five!” Allison shouts as the both of you try and shake him awake. It’s no use, he’s to exhausted.

“Well, shit.” You add dryly, positioning yourself to lift Five’s unconscious body up.

——

Diego holds open the Academy’s door as you quickly make your way inside, holding a barely conscious Five in your strong arms. Allison and Diego right behind you, “We should have taken him to the hospital.” She whisper yells.

“A kid with a shrapnel wound might raise some questions.” Five mutters tiredly, as a stream of blood runs out the side of his mouth.

“Yeah, well, so does the murder shrine in Harold Jenkins’ attic.” Presses Allison, making a solid point. You finally reach the living room couch, laying Five down as gently as you possibly can.

“He’s still losing a lot of blood. What do we do? We gotta get the shrapnel out.” Worries Allison, looking to you for guidance. Diego randomly walks past the two of you, seemingly abandoning ship, nope he’s just found Grace who’s apparently fixed and about to walk up the stairs.

“Diego, where are you going?” Allison calls after him, but he completely ignores her.

“Fuck Diego, we don’t have time for this. I’ll get the medical stuff...just uh...keep the old guy awake. I’ll be right back.”

——

You’re leaning against Five’s wardrobe as Grace puts a fresh bandage on his wound. Your mind flashes to the times when she would have to do the same thing to you, after countless dangerous missions. Although she would actually just be painfully dislodging the shrapnel, doing her best to be as gentle as she possibly could. Those metal and glass pieces would have left you for dead, if not for your miraculous healing capabilities.

Diego leans against the door frame as Allison walks up behind him. “Anything?”

“There’s no answer at Vanya’s place. And the receptionist at her music school said she was a no-show for her lessons today.” Replies Allison, nervous as to where her sister could be.

You turn around to face them, as they both walk into the hallway. You keenly notice how Diego’s face looks almost slightly startled to see Grace up and active after what he did.

“D, you okay?” You whisper walking closer to him and Allison. “Yeah. I don’t know, it’s just surreal seeing her. I just wanna tell her that I’m s...” he doesn’t let himself finish, not wanting to reveal any important details that Allison is unaware about, “We don’t have enough time. We gotta go.” He says, turning for the stairs. “I don’t know, Diego. Five is laying there, unconscious. We need him.” Pleads Allison, holding Diego from taking off just yet.

“We can do this ourselves.” He says, his voice laced with determination. Crossing your arms you take a deep breath, “We did that already, remember? Long story short, we all died.” You sass, also wanting to stay and wait for Five.

“I’m thinking I should go back and see Claire before...” Starts Allison, Diego cutting her off, “You can’t run away from this, Allison. That’s what started this whole mess in the first place.” Diego pauses for a moment sighing, “Luther was right.” He admits, both you and Allison giving him a look. She scoffs, surprised, “I didn’t think I would ever hear you say those words.” He gives an apprehensive smile, “Yeah, well... we gotta stick together.”

You nod towards him, “Alright, hot stuff. Where do we start.” You ask him. He flashes you a small smile, “There’s no other addresses in the file, but there is another relation listed. Jenkins’ grandmother. She lived near Jackpine Road.” He explains turning to walk down the steps, you and Allison following suit.

“You think he took her there?” She wonders.

“I wouldn’t mind a late night drive, it’s a good enough place to start anyways.” You conclude as the three of you make your way through the Academy and out the front gate.

Continuing your way into the street, “Nope. Come on, this way.” Diego says, pulling you in the opposite direction of two police cars sitting further down the street. “Wait, but the cars back that way?” Allison says, troubled as to why Diego refuses to go in that direction.

“Trust me, okay. Come on.” He quickly says, walking briskly away from the cruisers, you lightly touch his right arm, quickening your own steps.

“What’s up with the cops?” You whisper, he doesn’t look at you.

“They think I killed Patch. Because of all the evidence and all my finger prints were on everything.” He mumbles, your brows furrow in frustration, “What the hell? But I was there too? Guess I didn’t touch anything.” You state puzzled, just as blue and red lights begin flashing behind the three of you.

“We’re gonna have to split up, okay. I’m in charge. Remember Vanya needs you two.” He tells you, his face showing deep worry. Why must things always go wrong?

You grab his hand, holding it tight, “Don’t say or do anything stupid, okay?” You warn him, as Allison turns to quickly flee the scene. You squeeze his hand, “I love you.” You whisper quickly, before jogging away from the cop cars, as you hustle after Allison. You can hear him mumble a quiet “Love you too” as the police cars speed into view. You glance back, your heart stinging when handcuffs are forcefully placed on his wrists. Guns drawn on him, you’d love to kick those pistols right out of their grasp. But alas, you push onward, getting into the passenger seat as Allison starts the engine, taking off down the avenue and towards this house out in buttfuck nowhere. This whole evening has had quit the turn of events.

#diego hargreeves #the umbrella academy #diego hargreeves x reader #diego hargreeves x you #the umbrella academy x you #falcor the luck dragon stories #what a time to be alive fic #tua #number two

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kawaiijellymonster · 5 years ago

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Tomura Shigaraki’s Development

A friend and I have recently been talking a lot about mha and the character development within it, we agreed that the villains, more specifically Tomura experienced significant development and so I wanted to analyze some of that here.

The first time we meet Tomura is when he first attacks U.A in order to get schools plans so he could attack en masse a few days later. This Tomura when we first meet him is very single track minded, childish, and he doesn’t care about the people around him or what happen to them. Tomura attacked U.A because he believes that All Might is bad for society because giving society a pillar to lean on deprives them of the motivation to be strong enough to fight for and defend themselves, he thinks that All Might makes the individuals of the society less self reliant and that that is inherently a bad thing because people will always face an issue with the mindset of “Allmight will save me” rather than “I need to find a way out of this”.

Tomura was “adopted” by All for One at a very young age, he was given AFO’s last name “Shigaraki” and given Tomura because AFO stated that it meant mourning and that Shigaraki was to become a harbinger of mourning.

Being raised by All for One gave Tomura unique challenges. Because the way AFO raised him caused him to never grow out of the “I want do do something/have something and I want to have/do it now” ideology that kids live by because he was always given anything he really wanted on a silver platter. All for One also raised him to be devoid of other people in his life, part of this may have been due to his obvious anxiety ( ticks such as his neck scratching are indicative of anxiety) but it was also likely because like Todoroki, AFO was raising him for a reason, Tomura was supposed to have enough hatred for hero society and All Might that if AFO himself was unable to defeat All Might then Tomura could/woudl do it instead. Therefore exposing him to a variety of people with a variety of opinions would have interfered with the conditioning that AFO was trying to impose.

At the USJ attack it becomes very apparent that while he is intelligent ad can think critically on both macro and micro scales he wasn’t really able to apply that knowledge instantly, he got overwhelmed quickly and became emotional when things didn’t go his way, he only had the thought process of having a bunch of little pawns and then a king hoping that sheer force and numbers could overwhelm the enemy rather than creating a complex and interesting plan that worked off of the abilities of his group. The reason he didn’t do that was 1)because he had never had to before, AFO gave him everything and 2)because he didn’t care about the lives of the people involved.

All for One leaving his life was one of the most important peices of his development because it required Tomura to begin doing things on his own. He had to create and sustain relationships, quirks and influence were no longer easily at his disposal, nothing was served to him anymore he had to evolve himself in such a way that he grew into the leader role that he had claimed, he had to grapple tooth and nail for every bit of power and influence that he wanted to accheive.

Thus, the leauge evolved, instead of the begining where it was a bunch of people just kind of existing and doing what Tomura said...just because....It became a group of likeminded individuals who had an issue with society and the way it was run, which in turn forced Tomura to begin cultivating relationships with other people and then made him actually have to put thought into his plans and apply his knowledge properly because the members weren’t strangers anymore, they were friends and perhaps even family. It forced him to change his way of thinking from normal chess where he could sacrifice whoever to get a desired result, to the living chess from the first couple episodes of No Game No Life, the players (members of the leauge) didn’t want to die or get hurt and he does’t want them too either.

You can clearly see the difference between the two Tomuras if you look at the one who watched as Aizawa beat his members to hell and back during the USJ attack and then look at how Tomura reacted to Magne being killed by Chisaki. He first tried to stop Compress from attacking Chisaki in the first place because he knew it was dangerous, then he stepped up after compress had lost his arm to attack Chisaki himself, because these people actually matter to him now. He clearly is angry at Chisaki’s actions but he still tells twice to stand down because he knows they couldn’t win at that moment and he doesn’t want to lost anyone else that day.

Moving on to Tomura’s childhood, we know that Tomura killed his family, first his dog, then his mother and sister, and eventually his dad (this one seems to be in self defense given that his dad seems angry and violent, like he might have tried to kill tomura). Then we have a panel where the doctor shows up standing over a bunch of hands and informs him that they are all that is left of his family.

Those hands become both his trademark and his heavy burden. Tomura wears his fathers hand (or at least the one he refers to as “father”) on his face. This works to remind him of both the fact that he is a monster, and of the past and what he did to his family. It also metaphorically blocked his veiw of the future, keeping him trapped in the dissillusion that AFO created for him.

However, in recent chapters he has been seen more often without the hands blocking his veiw, he still has them around his body but no longer on his face, its as though the “blinder” from before is slowly being removed and he starting to be able to move forward on his own with his new family and new goals.

Beforehand while Tomura posed a threat because he was erratic and hard to predict beyond “He’s gonna go after All Might”, now he poses a real actual threat because he has applicable intelligence, a dangerous quirk, and network of people who believe in him and will work with him to acchieve group goals. At the begining he was kinda goofy, the anime did a goood job at animating his kind of carefree languid movements that were slightly menacing, but overall he seemed relatively harmless, like a teenager who’s going through a phase and will get over it. Now he actually seems scary, he seems like someone powerful and dangerous, someone you don’t want to cross.

This then goes back to the Leauge, the League is a bunch of people who have all been outcast or wronged by society who came together due to relatively similar ideologies and desires to have a place to belong. They are all people who aren’t blinded by the decadance of the Hero society, they see its dark underbelly and the know the wrongs that heroes and citizens commit behind closed doors and when they think people aren’t paying attention. They have all been wronged or outcast for a variety of reasons and it makes the league, their mission, and by proxy Tomura into almost harbingers of Karma. They all want to get back at hero society for something that it has done to them, they’re like the dark things that hero society tries to forget it’s done, but they won’t let them forget, they are working in an attempt to make hero society own up to the injustices that it produces. Which almost makes AFO right, Tomura is a Harbinger, both of mourning but also of a new age, where the injustices of heroes will no longer be tollerated, and due to the development that Tomura has gone through he is the perfect person to be this leader, he isn’t dissillusioned, he is intelligent and complex, and he has become his own person, almost a hero of the villains who is standing there telling them that he will get justice for the wrongs that heroes have commited against them.

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writingforyourpleasure · 5 years ago

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ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Characters: GERARD WAY x Reader

Link to chapter four : https://writingforyourpleasure.tumblr.com/post/616411340391759872/on-the-road-again

Warnings : None

Author’s note: Hello ! Hope you’re all doing okay during those strange times ? Sorry for not posting but I had my en-of-the-year exam, but it’s now done and , I only got a few homework to hand-over now and my second year in college’ll be done !Here you go thank you to keep reading .

5. “ Pun-master “

You woke up, feeling something or someone moving in front of you . You started to groan at the uncomfortable feeling not wanting to get up just yet.

“And what owe me the pleasure to be assisted by your presence tonight sir Way?” You said while looking for plates.

The mass finally moved away , listening to your complains .

You woke up what felt just five minutes later but probably was in reality hours after it. Your eyes fluttered slowly as if they were disconnected from your brain. A light shine from the outside was peeking through your tinted window as soon as you truly started to wake up , you realized that Gerard wasn’t here anymore.

“Right…” You breathed out to yourself. Honestly you didn’t want to wake up. You were scared , scared of overthinking this , and because of that you actually was overthinking it . Your brain wasn’t playing on your favor . You didn’t knew how you were gonna survive today. The worst was, you didn’t knew how to act with Gerard , what happened yesterday night wasn’t that big of a deal, really , but again ; you were overthinking it . You just wanted to act normal with him , and was prying your brain to not let you down once you’ll see him. You felt so stupid for having a crush on one of your coworker and friends. You got up and hoped for the best.

You got out of your nest , only to find that you were alone in the bus and that you already had arrived into the next parking’s venue . You went directly to the kitchenette and groaned realized that you guys were short on coffee. You finally resigned yourself and went for the shower.

You got out of the bus a dozen of minutes later to find the parking lot empty except for the security that was already keeping everything on check. You checked your phone to see that it was 3pm . You had enough time, to get yourself a coffee somewhere and not stressing about when to comeback since you didn’t had to repeat with Dex or anything. You put back in your , old black Green Day’s hoodie, pocket your phone . You’ve dressed yourself as unfashionable as it is socially allowed , your laziness was clearly reflecting itself through most of your actions today. You put your headphones on , listening to the last Fever 333’s album and searched on google maps for the nearest Starbucks, once again a reflect of your laziness you figured.

You arrived to the welcoming smell of dirty beans being ground and hot milk.

Once you got your order you looked around for a seat since the place was pretty full, luckily you got one in front of the glass and on both sides what appeared to be two couples . Great. You hope that you’ll be lucky and won’t have to witness the same amount of smooshing in both of them. The teenage one , on your right , were the ones all over each other, with the boy groping at every part accessible of his what-you-presumed-to-be his girlfriend. The one on your left were two men in suits holding each other hands while talking , you sat facing the widow and the other empty seat. You got out of your backpack your sketch book and a pencil starting to draw people passing by while music took you in other world. A tap on your shoulder took you of guard , you got off your headphones .

“Yes ?” you turned around your head to see who was trying to get your attention.

“Hey, is this seat taken ?” Dex was smiling down at you with a big smile.

You said nothing instead kicking the seat in front of you, back to the glass for them to seat.

“I feel like it’s been a while since we talked .” Dex said sitting and looking expectantly at you.

“What are you talking ‘bout we talked just yesterday.” You said not looking up from your sketch book.

“Don’t play dumb y/n , you know what I mean. Like just the two of us ?” Dex sighed , seeing that you decided to not play cooperative . This time you did look up to your friend with a blank expression . Watching their eyebrows furrowed in confusion. It’s true , lately you tried to somewhat distance yourself since you were trying to figure out what the hell was happening with Gerard and you knew that being close to Dex would not help one second . Your friend knew how to read you even when you tried to hide something as well as you could. You had thinked that if Dex was about to ask questions it would make it weird since you were all working together . If you fucked up at any moments , you’ll have nowhere to hide and sometimes it can be a great deal of pain . But apparently you didn’t succeed not to make it awkward since your friend was not so happy that you act a little colder than usual . You were already fucking cold to any strangers , so to be cold to them was shitty. You sighed and run a hand through your now greasy hair . You needed to take a shower quickly , maybe it could wait after the show .

“Hey earth to y/n, hellooo?”

“Huh yeah sorry I was gone for a few…”

“Yeah no shit .”

“Sorry… like for all of it it’s true I’ve been kinda avoiding you guys.”

“Meh it happens , I mean it’s okay we all got our own problems.”

Dex tried to stay warm inside of the Starbucks but you could sense that being against a cold ass window wasn’t helped them to get the warmth that provided the Starbucks.

“I’m so cold….” They whispered as they took a gulp from their drink.

“Well….then stand in a corner .” You replied taking a large gulp of your hot drink too.

“What-Why ?”

“Think..”

“No….. please tell me it’s not because of what I think dude.”

“Coz’ corners are 90 degrees.” You said with a smug smile.

“Ho god …. Ok you know what maybe it’s for the best to be socially distant haha. It is so bad please do not do that again?”

“You’re asking way to much to the pun master .”

“More like the master of fucking nothing y’mean .”

“What did you said peasant , I think I didn’t quite hear that ?”

“Ho nothing .” said your friend smiling like a fool.

“Y/N I’m still fucking cold !” Said your friend trying to warm themselves up by rubbing strongly their arms.

“And how is that my problem , my dear?”

“Someday I really am going to kill you , y’know?” Told Dex between their teeth, with a little grunt along the way.

“Y/N , Can I borrow your scarf? I’m seriously freezing. ”

“Well I can’t turn into a heater for you now can I? So do you want me to set you on fire? Because, I mean it’s still an option? Like I have my lighter right here so….?” You joked while giving them your scarf.

They gave you a warning glance as if they believed you . Then on a very exasperate note they sighed and said :

“Why are you like this?”

You both laughed at that getting some curious looks from other clients. Once both of calmed down you try to get serious talking about the elephant in the room .

“Hey , can I ask your advice on something?”

“Absolutely , but I only advise communication, homosexuality, or murder.” Answered your friend earning a smug know-it-all smile out of you.

You were about to start to get off of your chest the whole “Hey I think I may or may not like the lead singer of the band for which we’re working for.” They cut you off.

“WAIT!”

“Yeah ?”

“Are you absolutely positive this isn’t dangerous or something?” They looked very serious about this , which had the reflex to make you roll your eyes deep inside your skull.

“I’m 95% sure, but yeah, I’ve failed fourth grade math so…” You decided to answer her stupid question with a stupid answer.

“Ho okay then we’re good I failed second grade! So just before we start , how long will this take ? I got to pick up my dog at the salon. «You both laughed at that. «No but like seriously we’ll have to go back to the bus eventually . Maybe tell me along the way back?”

“Alright , alright” You both got up from your seats and finally got out of the Starbucks.

“So huh, you remember when we got the 1 week break , alright?”

“Right. “

“Well huh, me and Gerard started talking by text pretty often during this time.”

“Ho. Did you now ?” They said waving their eyebrows in a suggestive way.

“No not like that calm down, you demon fuck .”

“Always a pleasure to fill my responsibilities.”

“You weirdo….” You whispered under your breath.

“Ho do not act if you aren’t even weirder man ! “

“Anyway, I just , I don’t know . I think, I think I may like him y’know?”

“Well it’s pretty comprehensible , I mean he’s hot .”

“I’m not talking about this you twat!”

“Ho c’mon you can’t say he isn’t !”

“Haha ,He is , I ‘ve sight too I’d let you know. It’s just not the point here .”

“You do? Sorry it’s hard to tell when you dress yourself like that .

“You bitch!” You choked on your drink , coughing violently.

“I’m just kind of dreading to really assuming the whole ‘hey by the way I’m hitting on you’ I don’t want to make it weird during the tour , when we’re not even at the half of it. And I don’t wish for everyone to see that I am hitting on him. I’m not ready.” You explained to Dex , not really wanting to expose everything you and Gerard said or do , foremost because there’s not that much to say

“Maybe not hitting on him is a good call since if you do I’m pretty sure he’s gonna freak out hearing your lame puns.”

“May I recall to you that I’m the pun-master AND the master of pickup lines ?”

“You completely suck at pickup lines, bro.”

“No I don’t !”

“The last time you tried one of you’re pickup lines was on this poor cute girl in Louisiana when you said ‘Are you Google –“

“CUZ YOU’RE EVERYTHING I’M SEARCHING FOR !!!”

“Yeah no wonder it didn’t worked !”

“I’m a genius , you’ll miss me when I’m gone.”

“You wish . So why are you’re feeling attracted to the guy ?”

“Well you see my kink is when people actually care about my feelings and what I have to say. And Since I know him he seems to correspond to this criteria , so I find it pretty attractive and hot since it’s my main kink.”

“Yeah , too unrealistic. Settle for bondage like the rest of us.”

“Where you ever nice Dex ?”

“2012, worst year of my life.” You laughed at what your friend said . “No but more seriously y/n, just let it happen y’know? And when you have the feeling that both of you are having a moment then maybe hit on him but stay subtle y’know?”

“I just want him to take me out…”

“Like, on a date or with a sniper ?”

“He’ll have to surprise me .” You both laughed before changing the subject to the little surprise you’ve both had planned for Max, since he was spending all of his nights and days working on your band , you wanted to do something nice for him. You bought a cookbook a few weeks ago for him as a present for the occasion, he often baked pastries as a distressful way to exhale from work time. Even though the bus condition made it hard to cook anything big it already was a good start. And you bought some bottle of Irish hard cider, since he had said it was the best thing he ever tasted when you all took a vacation to Dex family house there. After getting back to the bus everything went pretty fast , but the talk with Dex about Gerard was still playing in your mind. Ames saw that you were lost in your thoughts most of the time and ask you several times if everything was okay, you tried to act like you didn’t knew what he was talking about and you all moved on with your day . Mikey, Frank , Gerard and Ray were already in your bus when you had come back from your coffee session, and they yelled at you for not texting them and taking them with you. You brushed it off saying that next time you would. Gerard had tried to share looks with you during the day but you were too much caught up into your head to notice.

The show this night was nice and almost too short even if you guys took a ten minutes on My chemical romance planning since you played a special song. Once you were backstage Ames and Billy started their routines taking everything off stage to let place for the boys. To go faster Max offered to help them. It gave you and Dex a chance to run to the bus to prepare your little plan. You took any cushions , pillow and anything fluffy you could find , when you were done the bunks were quite a mess but you didn’t want to think of it since you still had to prepare the hard cider and the cake you brought from the Mark & Spencer’s not having too much time to find anything else. By the time everything was served , you knew that My chem was done with their show too , so you decided to prepare them a part too , you made a point to serve a apple juice instead of the cider for Gerard , not wanting him to feel excluded or anything. Max had been held backstage by Billy and Ames who were your dearest allies as ever.

You installed yourself with every plates and drinks giggling between the two of you alone in the bus to stupid jokes.

A knock made itself hear through the bus and Billy appeared into the kitchenette area before being followed by Ames and Max , who where looking at you with huge smiles spread across their face and a snort from the three of them.

“What the fuck did you do with our beds ?” Asked Max between a laugh.

“Well we did a pillow fort !” Answered Dex.

“Isn’t that a little childish ? “

“Does it means you don’t want to join us ?” You asked Max.

A silence swept through the bus.

“…Move over .” Said Max entering your huge pillow fort and already going for the cake and drink.

“Wait there’s a party and you guys didn’t told us about?! “Said Frank entering your bus.

You handed a plate in his direction , earning a smile from him before he arrived by your side as well as everyone else too.

Frank was on your right while Gerard was on your right and all of you were in a cercle eating and joking about stupid stuff.

“Hey you look better than this morning it’s good to see.” Whispered at your side Gerard offering a sweet smile before readjusting a few locks behind his ear.

“Well It’s because in the end we migrate towards comfort , and I realized that I am most comfortable around you , all of you.” You said returning a bright smile to the man.The night went along before Frank spoke up .

“Guys how are you gonna clean this mess to sleep tonight ?” Painful groans made themselves heard from all of you.

#fanfict mcr #frank iero imagine #frank iero x reader #gerard way imagine #gerard way x reader #mikey way imagine #mikey way x reader #ray toro imagine #ray toro x reader #gerard way fanfic #gerard way fanfiction

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botslayer · 5 years ago

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Fantasy and Scifi “Racism,” an opinion piece:

This whole thing is gonna be a slurry of politics, hot takes, nerd shit, some pictures to make it not a snooze fest on the eyes, and me asking the lot of ya to consider both sides of an argument. If you have a problem with any of that, please leave. All that said, let's get on with it: Let’s take three gentlemen for an example. One is from Poland. One is from Angola, one is from South Korea. What does that tell us about them? We can infer averages. For example, The average Polish man’s height is about five feet, ten and a half inches, so the Polish gentleman’s height might be in that ballpark. A very well known Korean dish is Kimchi, so it is moderately safe to assume the Korean man has, at some point, eaten it. Two of Angola’s largest provinces happen to be “Moxico” and “Cuandocubango” and one of it’s most populated is called “Huambo” So it would be a moderately safe bet to assume the man from Angola is from one of those areas. Their countries/continents of origin don’t directly tell us much though. Hell, we could be dealing with a Polish little person, a Korean who has bafflingly never had kimchi and an Angolan from Lunda Sul. We also don’t know about their outlooks, their lives, mental conditions they might have. Hell, we may not know what race these guys are. There’s a slim chance the Angolan Gentleman is Chinese (1.4% of the country’s population) Or that the Polish guy is ethnically German. We just don’t know. What we do know for a fact is that they’re all human men. They have (most likely) similar psychology, anatomy, dietary need to not starve to death or dehydrate, etc. And that’s about it. Now let’s take a sample from three fictional species off the top of my head: Starting with a Furon from Destroy all humans.

Now, Furons are pretty much universally shorter and physically weaker than humans, so it is safe to assume our single Furon has these qualities. He's also likely a psychic as that's a common attribute of his people. Also common would be the perception of humans as cattle, his possession of advanced force field technology is also pretty much a guarantee. Outliers exist and all that but something worth mentioning: This Furon is a Furon. In other news: The sky is blue, yeah? The problem is though: The Furons are very much not humans. And there aren't too many "races" in that equation, either. Just the populace of the Furon Homeworld. It's also worth noting that we don't actually know what Furons eat, their water intake any of that. We know only so many details but with just those, it's obvious that Furons and humans are too damn different. For species two, let's look at Mind Flayers from DnD.

Mind Flayers, otherwise known as "Illithids," are generally humanoid creatures born through a process known as "Ceramorphosis." See, Illithids are anatomically asexual, as in, they self inseminate and produce eggs from their mouths. They put the eggs in with an entity called "The Elder brain" which is a conglomerate of other Illithid brains, the tadpoles eat one another or get eaten by the brain for about ten years before being selected and implanted into a sentient creature (Humans, elves, etc) From there, the tadpole eats the brain of that creature, replacing it with its own and slowly altering their anatomy until you get a malevolent microcthulhu with potent psychic powers and the need to eat one entire human-level brain every month. Mindflayers start their lives as parasites that literally consume your entire sense of self and mutate you into an unrecognizable husk with a cephalopod for a face. And they have the gall to consider humans lesser? How bloody dare... an entirely separate species of sentient creatures come to that conclusion. For our last example, let's talk about a species from a setting best described as Technomystical: The Skakdi from Bionicle.

For those who don't know what that species is, The Piraka from the 2006 toyline are all examples of Skakdi. Now, Skakdi look, and they are, absolutely brutal. For example, the species was beset by an army of large and lethal creatures called "Zyglak" after becoming what they are today, the lot of them being mutants. The Zyglak were completely wiped out. Skakdi are savage in the best of ways. They aren't just beasts, they're berserkers with the powers of the elements, however, it does require two of them to activate such powers. Thing is though, they're all like that. The entire species has been mutated from what it once was into a legion that knows little else other than slaughter and subjugation of others... Generally speaking, at least. The problem with all three of these species, or "Races" (As I do NOT prefer to call it), and in fact most species from almost all settings is that they're a monolith. Illithids, for example, generally all follow the same societal structure, living in large groups wherever they can under the "guidance" (as in "Hivemind link") of elder brains, some strike out on their own, but for the most part, they live under elder brains, no matter where in the world they are. There aren't competing Illithid Nations or sub-species with things that makes them distinctly Korean or Aztec inspired unless the DM adds those things. And even then, when settings do that, say, Warhammer, there are some groups that are a national proxy (The Empire is Germany, Bretonnia is France, etc) and then some proxies are just an entire species. (See the Lizard Men, who went from Native American-coded to Aztec over the course of some years.) Adding to these things is a slight elephant in the room. Alignment systems. See, humans in games like DnD can be anything from neutral evil to chaotic good, true neutral to lawful evil, etc. But then some species are stuck as inherently good or evil or inherently lawful or chaotic. The problem with saying that about a sentient species is that it smacks a bit of actual, real racism/racist ideas. The idea that this group of beings that just lives differently to the rest of us is inherently almost anything is clearly bad, right? Well... Maybe if we didn't do that IRL, that would feel more genuine. The hell am I on about?

We, as humans, understand that other species of everything from primates to insects are naturally more aggressive, more gentle, more poisonous, more endowed with certain senses, etc. All except for other groups of humans. Because save for pigments of skin, general height, and elements of culture, pretty much all human groups are the same. That said: Point me to the the race of humans more naturally endowed with psychic powers. Or the human race that can only go on by implanting itself in other humans and slowly making people lose their minds until only they take over said body.

I can show you examples of animals doing the whole “Eating you from the inside out” thing. But not humans. Hell, even cannibals have to get a cut off of ya first. But that’s just how beings like Mind Flayers operate. I can show you examples of more aggressive insectoid life vs ones that just want to be left alone. Generally speaking, a wasp is more aggressive than a ladybug. But that’s because they evolved differently to one another. Like Mind Flayers have from elves. Or like Furons have from Blisk. Or like The Skakdi had from Matoran, even before being mutants. Does that make them (wasps) “Evil” though? Well... No. The problem is that wasps took on the various scary attributes they did because that was the hand nature played for them. A wasp does not choose to start life by eating it’s way out of a living tarantula and then spending the rest of it angrily defending whatever it considers to be it’s “territory” only to lay another one of its kind into another tarantula, that’s just what the little bastards do without thinking because that’s how they adapted to the world. I would say though that Furons are evil. They view an entire species they consider intelligent (Even “Loosely”) as cattle to harvest DNA from and otherwise use as playthings, killing them en masse just for shits and giggles. Mindflayers, I would say much the same of unless they willingly find violent/genuinely harmful examples of intelligent life that will do the world no good and then eat only them. But no, these freaks bred an entire species of creatures to have massive brains and be super passive just to make eating their brains easier. That’s pretty damn evil.

(Pictured above, an Oortling from Forgotten Realms 2e) Creatures like the Krill from Seth Macfarlane’s “The Orville” believe all other sentient species are lesser than them. The galaxy is for them and them alone to conquer and do with as they please. Such is the Will of their god Avis. They started stabbing a human head live in front of other Krill in an episode as part of their religious practices. But then the species has some nuance. This fundamentalism and extremism is how they cope with being so damn small in the face of an uncaring, unfeeling void. So are the Krill evil? No. They’re afraid.

Coming back to the Skakdi, They started out as relatively peaceful until a creature from the Makuta species showed up and mutated the lot of them into the magabadasses they are now. All of them now have, fighting skill equal to, if not greater than most Toa, and even elemental powers. But they aren’t all evil. They’re just aggressive, angry, and furthermore, also probably hurting. A peaceful existence was just taken from these poor bastards, all they know now is conflict with one another. So are the Skakdi evil? No. Some of them might be but it ain’t because they’re Skakdi.

See, Skakdi and Krill are important things to remember here because they, while still being monolithic as cultures, have a little more depth than just the myriad ways in which they’re evil bastards. But Mind Flayers? Not really. Not unless the DM adds that. Furons? I mean... Sometimes they become friends or mate with humans but not usually. And what of the big old elephant in the room? The Orcs of D&D? Orcs as a species were recently described as only having limited capacities for things like empathy... If raised outside the violent and chaotic madness that is living with other orcs.

This is the thing that sparked this post, so I will now, at the near end, address it specifically: People find the wording here to be reminiscent of things actual racist propaganda and ideas perpetuated about pretty much specifically black people as I understand it. Which, I genuinely wouldn’t know. I never really grew up around that stuff and I do my best to avoid racists/racism in my day-to-day. But to me? This just makes a depressing kind of sense. The species that evolved/was made or whatever to be this big, hulking set of warrior badasses. has a limited ability to understand what it is to be the other guy. Seems legit. Especially when you remember that even if Orcs are just another group of primates, they aren’t human and would likely have psychological differences to humans.

This is a baby chimpanzee. Look at it. It’s cute. You want one, don’t you? Well... That’s not advised, honestly. Chimps can be fucking monsters. Don’t know what I mean? A. I’m surprised. B. Just google “Chimpanzee attacks” if you have the stomach for it. Not all Chimps will do it, but chimps can and do, do it. Some Chimps hunt monkeys for food in their territory. It’s royally fucked up, but its a thing they do. And you know how different human DNA is to theirs? About 1%. I personally don’t see anything wrong with saying “An entire species is evil” in any setting other than that being shallow as fuck. I also personally don’t see anything wrong with suggesting that a species has limited empathy because honestly...? Just look at nature and even humans. Fantasy and Scifi often entertain the idea of “What if we are not the only living things smart/naturally equipped enough to build a society?” But the sad reality is if we weren’t? Most other species wouldn’t act a damn thing like humans, most other species probably wouldn’t give a shit about us, and a large number, even if they can and do act like us in some ways, will not in all ways. So, to bring this ramble to something resembling a conclusive point: Fantasy/Scifi “Racism” (As in just being prejudiced, although it should just be Xenophobia, IMO) is way more understandable and even more easily believable than the real thing because we stopped talking humans the second we brought in the crazy dudes with octopus heads. Or who are just naturally, by virtue of their species (not “race”) psychic. And even if it was just between groups that didn’t exist, nature proves that it would most definitely happen. But those are just my thoughts, anybody wanna weigh in? I’m all ears.

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secret-engima · 5 years ago

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Oo! For your Nox verse you mentioned Axis and now I'm all ears for anything you're willing to talk about for the Kingsglaives. Is Axis Nox's assigned guard? Does Noctis have one he's close with like you hinted Arra is for Nox? Does Regis assign *Ardyn* a glaive? It might give more reason for him to interact with Titus? Just what is the Kingsglaive in general's reaction to the chancellor being not that bad actually and basically defecting to Lucis?

(cracks knuckles) Anon. ANON. Kingsglaive are a fav okay? I am always willing to talk about them. ALWAYS. In this AU though, Axis is not actually a glaive. The Kingsglaive was only formed a few months after Nox and Ardyn time-traveled, and Nox met him sometime not long after arriving in the past, so Axis was wandering around taking Hunts to get by. Axis, upon meeting Nox “I’m going to single-handed blow up ALL the Nif’s stuff” Izunia ended up tagging along a few times and then just … never really stopped. Be ends up becoming Nox’s official Shield after Nox is discovered by Regis, but honestly considered himself that well before (because someone has to keep these moron, and his uncle by extension, alive). Nox gets to know the rest of the galahdians through Axis after he’s discovered.

For the rest of the glaives (who are actual glaives in this), Noctis … I don’t think he has a particular favorite? Nox starts dragging Noctis down to the glaive HQ to “train” with them (read: play with them and endear himself to them) so Noctis kinda ends up adopted en masse by these guys (though honestly Tredd might glom onto being Noctis’s buddy/reckless older bro just to spite Axis, because how DARE his buddy in crime get his own LC and not share with Tredd?). Regis assigns the Kingsglaive and the Crownsguard in rotation to guard Ardyn because Chancellor of Niflheim, but Ardyn’s trolling tendency weeds out 98% of the Crownsguard pretty fast (Ardyn: ”It’s not my fault they can’t take a joke!”). Titus, being also Glauca (and secretly Ardyn’s newest minion) tends to volunteer himself after the first five trolling sprees just to keep this moron (who is also somehow his boss, Astrals save him) from driving the entire Citadel nuts.

For your last question. Hmmmm (straps on HC hat) warning this is gonna be LONG:

-Nobody in the glaive is happy when they learn that the Chancellor of Niflheim is a guest (actual guest, not prisoner) in the Citadel. The fact that he’s going to remain a guest for the indefinite future because their King apparently had a kid with the Chancellor’s sister just makes it worse. Nobody is happy and some Potentially Traitorous Things are often mumbled half-heartedly over their alcohol in the first few days when only the Crownsguard are allowed near him (mostly just different ways of calling Regis an idiot, nothing actually harmful or murderous). The glaive however, don’t think the Crownsguard are going to stay Ardyn’s primary keepers for long. Not just because of their general disdain for the organization that prefers to hide behind the Wall rather than fight, but because all of them saw Captain’s face when Ardyn’s arrival was announced. It was the same face he wore the last time the Nifs unleashed a trio of Behemoths onto the field. The one that screamed “Damage Control Inbound” and “This is Going to Become Our Problem and We’re All Collectively Doomed”.

-Then they actually start getting assigned to the man and he’s … nothing like what they were expecting. There is no brilliant tactician, no cunning, poison-tongue politician. No enemy infiltrating their second home using his own nephew as leverage. There’s just a man in tacky clothes and the world’s Dumbest Hat who hides from the irate doctors who insist he needs medical intervention for his weight and general health problems Right Now and only lets Captain or his nephew bully him into eating more than a single meal per day. There’s just an uncle who teases his nephew mercilessly but never lets the boy get lost in his own head (which is too easy for the kid to do, they all recognize the signs of Battle Trauma) and dotes on their crown prince like he’s a long lost nephew rather than the son of the Lucian king.

-There’s just a very, very tired soul who they sometimes find in the Hall of Arts, staring up at the picture of the Founder King and First Oracle with deceptively blank expression and a faintly cracking voice as he sings something Ancient that sounds like a lullaby for all they can’t understand the words, swaying to the melody of his own song like he’ll topple and shatter the moment someone puts pressure on the wrong place.

-Nyx is the first one other than Captain to find him like that, and for all he wants to hate the man who represents Niflheim (represents the empire that burned Galahd and killed his sister), he instead finds himself coaxing Ardyn away from the Hall with gentle words and steady hands, just like he would any of his brother or sister glaives. Nyx mentions it to Captain later, which is how he and the others learn that this isn’t an uncommon occurrence. That they should keep him away from the Hall of Arts if they can.

-It’s the first sign that Ardyn isn’t a vicious leader of monsters playing nice to trick an enemy, but a broken, tired man using his nephew as an excuse to finally escape his glittering cage of “Chancellor”.

-None of them are quite sure what to make of that, so they watch, they listen, they learn. …They get attached. Grudgingly. One prank and melodramatic smile and accidentally witnessed quiet moment at a time. There are a lot of sides to Ardyn Izunia, like the individual fragments of a broken mirror, and somehow the glaives keep being allowed to stumble on them. Somehow they keep getting attached to the shards, one by one and moment by moment without realizing that Ardyn is getting attached in return.

-Until one day, on a good day when Ardyn is wearing his Cheerful, Melodramatic Self and the glaives are hiding their snickers in the corners as they follow him like shadows, two of the King’s Council meet him in the halls. Look down their noses with contemptuous eyes, just like they do the glaives themselves and (in that uniquely flowery way only politicians can) start insulting Ardyn under the guise of casual conversation. They watch, seething despite themselves, as Ardyn takes it, smiles through it, tilts his head like he doesn’t know exactly what they are doing. Libertus finally ducks out of the shadows, bites out some made up excuse of Ardyn’s presence being requested by Cor (the councilmen wouldn’t prevent the Marshal’s orders from being followed and wouldn’t ask him about it later and discover the lie), grinds his teeth when the two councilmen turn their flowery poison on Libertus and the Kingsglaive (the Galahdian refugees) as well. Just like they always do.

-In the middle of taking a step to follow Libertus away, the glaives see Ardyn go still as a painting. See blue eyes sharpen like blades and then-. He turns around in one fluid movement, like it was intentional all along, his easy smile still in place but now dripping an unstated sort of malice that takes the glaive by surprise. They watch, gaping and confused, as Ardyn suddenly transforms into the monster they expected to find those first weeks he arrived in the Citadel, the vaunted Niflheim Chancellor who could ruin people with a smile and a few honeyed words. Where a moment ago he’d been passively taking insults, now Ardyn runs verbal mazes around the two councilmen, ripping them open and stripping them down to their barest, ugliest parts all while never dropping his friendly, polite mien. Somewhere in the “conversation” (massacre), the glaives are pretty sure Ardyn blackmails the two councilmen into supporting a bunch of refugee support programs that, as a technical enemy politician, Ardyn should not know about and they are definitely sure that Ardyn manages to pull it off while simultaneously insulting the two men’s family lines all the way back to the era of the Founder King. By name.

-As he suddenly bids the sputtering councilmen good day and trails along after a wide-eyed Libertus and a long-suffering Captain who arrived somewhere in the verbal massacre, his footsteps silent and predatory when around the glaive he’s always been easy and noisy (to let them know he’s there, to ensure he cannot startle them), the glaive realize that Ardyn is every inch the monster they were expecting. Every centimeter the poisonous, deadly politician they complained about before getting to know him. He just … doesn’t bare his fangs at the people that, by all conventional logic, he should. Somewhere along the way, this Niflheim Chancellor decided that he was more loyal to the line of Lucis and the ragtag refugees called the Kingsglaive than he was his own empire, and that if hiding his claws and acting oblivious around disapproving, snobby nobles was what it took to stay rather than having to return to his own country (his prison), then he would.

-Over drinks, they all agree Ardyn Izunia, former Chancellor of Niflheim, is the scariest person they’ve ever seen. And that they are all really glad he’s on their side.

(hope that satisfies your Ask, Anon! It … spiraled out of my control)

#SE asks #anon asks #Melodies and Manuscripts #Nox verse #Secret Engima Rambles

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itsclydebitches · 5 years ago

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RWBY Recap: “Cordially Invited”

Only a week late, folks! Can’t say I’m surprised, what with the holidays underway and my normal schedule all topsy-turvy. Still, at least now there’s a little something to fill the RWBY-less hole this Saturday. Always a silver lining.

We begin the episode with our group discussing their upcoming dinner---Oscar included! We’re off to a great start. We learn that Jacques supposedly just wants to “break bread and hash things out,” but anyone with two brain cells to function together know that’s a load of BS. What frustrates me is Ruby’s attempts to spin this as a good thing because they supposedly want Ironwood to start “opening up” to “these people.” Yeah... there’s so much wrong with that. Normally Ruby’s optimism is one of the personality traits I love most about her, but lately that optimism has been twisted into naivety at best, that pro-protagonist perspective at worst. We saw this in Volume Six where the optimistic “We’ll find some way into Atlas!” became an attack on Argus. Now, Ruby’s “Maybe this won’t be so bad!” is functionally an attack on Ironwood. The responsibility lies with him to achieve that good outcome: he needs to open up to the horrendously corrupt abuser that Weiss at least suspects might be involved with Salem. Note that Ruby doesn’t extend those same expectations to herself and her team. She doesn’t claim that they all should “open up” to Jacques in the name of crafting better relations. No, she immediately jumps to having Weiss spy on him in order to get ahead in the game. For the record, I don’t give a damn if the group commits “bad” actions against Jacques (more on that below) because again, Jacques is an evil, corrupt abuser. Rather, it’s just that continuing issue of hypocrisy. Ruby expects Ironwood to “open up” to him and make peace over dinner, but only expects herself and her friends to give him what’s for. Insert [Ozpin and Ironwood must never keep secrets or tell lies, but we’re allowed to] here. Same song, different tune.

Oscar at least points out how idiotic that perspective is from a practical perspective. He doesn’t call Ruby out on the expectation that Ironwood make nice with the man they want to keep Weiss five billion feet away from, but he does acknowledge that such expectations can’t be fulfilled at this time in this place. Jacques has tailored this dinner to benefit him and him alone. He will control the conversation, so good luck getting around that.

Weiss: “I think my dad would do whatever it takes to win.”

Ruby: “And we should do the same.”

Granted, “whatever it takes” comes to mean spilling some food which obviously is in no way comparable to Jacques’ entire existence. The viewer doesn’t know that’s coming though. When we first hear them, these lines are another nod to the closing gap between the “heroes” and the “villains”---whether we’re defining a “villain” as someone like Jacques or someone like Ozpin. The theme is there. The group is willfully adopting the same choices as those they oppose. If Ozpin is going to lie to us then we’ll lie to Ironwood. If Jacques is going to do whatever it takes then so will we. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. As I’ve mentioned in non-recap metas, RWBY has now created a harsh world where by-the-book heroics will only hurt you in the end. If Ozpin had never kept secrets I don’t believe he would have achieved that extraordinary time of peace. If Blake and Yang hadn’t killed Adam they still would have a murderous abuser stalking them. We clearly have a story where the concept of a lesser evil exists...it’s just that we’re continually turning around to insist that the group is somehow better than everyone else for also doing what they have to to survive.

Which brings me to the fact that if Blake and Yang told everyone else about Robyn, we get not indication of that here. The only nod to last episode’s huge decision was Robyn’s shock that Jacques doesn’t already know what the Amity tower is for, but she’s cut off before she can reveal anything in front of Ironwood. So until proven otherwise... here’s another secret. Not just from an adult in a position of authority, but from the rest of the team as well. Given that Blake hid her faunus status and time in the White Fang, Yang continues to hide her knowledge of the Spring Maiden, both of them are helping to keep at least three major secrets from Ironwood, and are now keeping the Robyn secret from everyone else... no leg to stand on. Not to be dramatic on main, but if either of them ever pulls another, “How dare you keep secrets?!” I’m gonna go absolutely feral lol.

Anyway, back to the plot.

There are no new models of the group in fancy dinner clothes. I in no way had my hopes up for that, but it was fun seeing the posts theorizing about it and I can understand others’ disappointment. That definitely would have been a nice surprise, if an insane amount of work for what amounts to ten minutes of screen time.

Instead everyone just shows up in their normal gear and we get a telling exchange between Ironwood and Winter where she informs him he’d have to pay her to smile. I’m really glad she got a lot of attention this episode, both because we expect as much with her returning to the Schnee manor and because, if she’s going to become the next Winter Maiden, we really need to develop her character some. Even just setting up that she might become a Maiden demands that Winter be more than just Ironwood’s second hand and Wiess’ big sis. Who is she on her own? We start getting a glimpse of that here.

Before her outburst though, the group arrives en masse looking like a small army knocking on Jacques’ door. They’re greeted by Whitley who comments on that, asking Ironwood how large he thinks their dining room table is. Absolutely humongous, obviously. Not really the point though. This is clearly Rooster Teeth poking fun at their own massive cast, which would be more enjoyable if the number of characters didn’t constantly hinder the story. Personally, I’d prefer that they actually tackle underdeveloped or mostly dropped characters (like Maria) rather than just joking about it, but anyone keeping up with these recaps already knows that. If we’re not going to get a better structured story I’ll take some jokes here and there. Laugh about it when you can.

Although, I will say that Rooster Teeth does a good job with a minor character here, namely Klein. Whitley makes a dig at Weiss over how he was let go. Wonder how that could have happened. Klein, to my mind at least, was always meant to be a one shot sort of deal. He was introduced to help Weiss escape and once he’d achieved that was no longer useful to the story. It makes sense that we left him behind, but it’s nevertheless wonderful to get a bit of closure. Sad closure, but closure nonetheless. Now, if Rooster Teeth wants to keep him out of the picture we technically have a complete story. We know who Klein was, what he did, and what happened to him in the aftermath. Yet by keeping him alive and away from the Schnees, there’s always the potential that we’ll run into him again someday. I’m quite satisfied with that balance. It’s much better than what I was expecting, namely for Weiss to return home and conveniently not run into him because that would complicate things. Here we’re given an in-character explanation for his absence. Of course Jacques would fire him.

Finally, in the realm of massive casts and character development, I’ve got to admit that I’m disappointing with Penny being there. Simply because it once and for all shatters the hope that this well-executed frame job will amount to anything. If she’s attending a dinner with Jacques Schnee then things are fine. I said that I wasn’t convinced of this “Penny might be deactivated!” consequence before and I’m definitely not convinced of it now. Theoretically another consequence could have been Ironwood losing his council position, but we don’t see that either. Jacques references Ironwood’s inability to catch whoever hacked them at Beacon and his inability to catch whoever attacked Robyn’s supporters as reasons for being untrustworthy, both of which stand without the frame job. It’s incidental. Tyrian could have just killed everyone as Tyrian and it would have had the exact same effect. All the framing has done is make Penny sad (which hasn’t led to any development yet) and get Pietro to spill the beans about her aura (which could have happened in a thousand other ways). I was so pleased at this setup and the ingenuity of the villains, wondering what sort of impact this framing would have, but now we see the impact is minimal at best. If you frame a character for murder but have no other major character questioning their guilt and they’re out in public two episodes later... what was the point of the framing? Penny’s presence here is disappointing. Not because I don’t love Penny, but simply because of more missed opportunities. At this point I’m wondering why they bothered to bring her back at all. We’re not going to have Ruby grapple with the resurrection of her friend. We’re not going to deal with Penny taking the heat for Tyrian’s murders... Why is she here?

Also, not to distract from these important questions but... that.

That.

Friends, I cannot quite convey how confused I was at first. This is obviously supposed to be akin to the Jaguar ornament but... that’s a raptor, right? Have we seen raptor-type grimm? Am I missing something?? Yes, yes I am. Turns out RWBY Rex is a thing I never knew about and I can now only assume this is another Easter egg. Either that or I’m still missing something. Which is always possible. Either way it made me laugh.

The group heads inside and then splits, Ironwood, Clover, Winter, and Penny going into the dining area. Clover makes a quip about needing luck and Qrow points out that he’s already been invited. I can easily see why so many people are shipping them, but as a hardcore ozqrow shipper myself I’m already biased to view this as friendship. Maybe if we see more of Clover and he doesn’t die like everyone thinks he will I’ll find space in my heart for a dual ship. Either way it’s sweet. As much as I’d like Qrow to acknowledge the best friend he already has two feet away in the body of a kid he hasn’t treated particularly well, I’m nevertheless here for Qrow having healthy and supportive relationships.

We also get to see him refusing a glass of wine. Thank you! Again, it’s pretty late in the game to introduce this and we’re still given no insight into why Qrow is willing to battle his addiction now when he’s succumbed to it for most of his life, but at least they’re maintaining the work needed to stay sober. Qrow politely refuses the offer (from a faunus waiter. No surprise there given Jacques’ racism) and removes himself from temptation by offering to patrol the grounds. Very nicely done. The other Ace Ops join him, warning the newbie huntsmen not to wander off, not to break anything, and make sure you’re available if Ironwood needs you.

To which Yang provides the counter point that they should wander off, they should break things, and all the rest. Jaune later says, “What was that about breaking things?” Admittedly, these lines originally rankled. Because as much as Jacques deserves all the snooping and breaking our team can dish out, I maintain the position that they need to act more responsibly, especially now that they’re officially on the job. We’ve already got Blake and Yang deciding to go behind their bosses’ back. We don’t need them aggravating a situation when they’re the ones who want Ironwood to do that “opening up.” Jacques controlling the situation aside, Ironwood is even less likely to make headway if his guests are off causing trouble.

Which is why I’m so thrilled they didn’t. I’ll be blunt and say straight out that this was a fantastic way to do things. They’re allowed to get food. Nothing wrong with that. We already know Nora is a big eater and tends to be impulsive. If she just happens to pile a plate crazy high, it just happens to hit another guest, and she just happens to douse Whitley in wine? Well... who could have seen that coming? It’s a way of causing mayhem without endangering others or their mission. It achieves the one very specific thing they need: give Weiss an opening to sneak off. No one went overboard. No one else actually snuck off to break things. It was an all around smart plan. Unlike the group attacking Cordovin or Weiss dumping a racist in the trash when they’re supposed to keep a low profile, this is the kind of decision making I can get behind. Something that demonstrates the maturity the group continues to insist they have alongside keeping their playful personalities.

Also, just look at Ren’s smile. That might be the first smile we’ve gotten from him all season. That’s a blessed image, right up there with Oscar stealing hors d'oeuvres the second he walks through the door. Our farm boy is hungry and he’s going to milk Jacques’ wealth for all it’s worth.

The other thing this scene gives us---besides the joyous image of Whitley drenched in wine and Weiss’ amusement over it---is the split screen technique. On the whole I think Rooster Teeth chucks this in too often. There have been many times since the beginning of Volume Six, especially during fight scenes, where the split screen doesn’t feel necessary to me and is even at times quite distracting. Here though? I think it works. The split screen montage used to show the many people involved in, say, a heist is a pretty common technique and it adds another spot of humor to this situation. They’re plotting and executing their food spill with all the sincerity of a bank robbery. I’m here for that.

As Weiss heads upstairs we turn our attention to the meeting with Jacques. It goes about as well as anyone expects. A lot happens in that short span of time though. Robyn sarcastically points out that she should just be happy to have been “invited to the table” and though there’s another black woman across from her, it stands out to me that Robyn, a comparatively dark skinned woman to the rest of the group, says this while the shot poises her between two very white, powerful men. Even the phrase “invited to the table” has gender and racial implications for the audience watching, outside of Robyn’s in-world characterization as a Robin Hood type focused on class. Going off of these themes, we also hear Ironwood reassuring Jacques of their safety by claiming that “Penny is completely under my control.” This, hands down, is the worst thing I’ve seen Ironwood do this volume. Sure, things like the embargo and the supplies have objectively worse consequences, but the story has done a lot to demonstrate the “greater good” justifications behind those choices. We might not agree with Ironwood, but we’re supposed to understand that (until proven otherwise) he has good motivations. Here? That comment is pretty horrible. Ironwood refers to Penny as if she’s a weapon or a tool, a young woman who he believes he literally has control over. It’s a fascinating look into his perspective and a pretty logical one as well. Here’s a man who has put so much faith in his technology, from amassing an army to protect his kingdom to relying on prosthetics to get around. He asked his team to create a new security measure and they did... they just happened to create a person along with it. I’m not sure Ironwood fully understands that yet. He trusts Penny enough to bring her into his own inner circle, but he likewise thinks he can manage her like he would a gun or a vehicle, dictating whether she has friends and announcing that she is under his control. I hope that this is something the writing explores and helps Ironwood work through, rather than just letting it sit as generic evidence that he’s a bad (as opposed to flawed) person. I think Ironwood would realize his mistake and work to correct it if someone pointed out the issue, in the same way we’ve seen him considering, settling, and agreeing with the issues the group has seen fit to yell at him lately.

What interests me most about this whole interaction is (shocking) this continued debate regarding secrets and trust. Overall Rooster Teeth has actually succeeded in creating a decently complex situation here. We know that (again, until proven otherwise) Ironwood has only good intentions and we likewise know that Jacques is now connected to Salem. The information the audience has makes us biased. We know who is supposedly good and supposedly bad. At the same time though, the actual issue appears to be removed from that. Jacques’ side---notably expressed through a new character who acts as a more neutral party---points out that from where they stand there’s no reason for this embargo. We know there’s a reason. Ironwood knows there’s a reason. Because we all know about Salem. But the other council members are making entirely reasonable demands given the information they have: why are you continuing to hurt both the people and our relationship with others? What’s the justification? You can’t give us one? Then why in the world would we let you keep doing this? It puts us in the discomforting position of knowing Jacques is an evil slim ball manipulating the conversation while likewise having to admit that his side has a point. You can’t just announce Salem’s existence because that would make things exponentially worse, but keeping her secret has its definite downsides.

Where Jacques’ party doesn’t have a good position is in his insistence that because Ironwood hasn’t caught these various perpetrators he can’t be trusted, equating trust with results. There’s only so many ideas, resources, and luck that can lead you to catching someone like Tyrian. I understand that knee-jerk reaction, the idea that because someone hasn’t succeeded you should replace them with someone you assume will, but in situations like this you only have so much control over the probability of success. Claiming that Ironwood not catching criminals is indicative of an inability to lead is flimsy, but as we’ve seen, Jacques is a manipulator. He tosses these assertions out as if they’re facts. He and the others continually cut Ironwood off, refusing to let him defend himself. It’s not at all surprising that Winter, someone who suffered under his abuse, eventually explodes with, “You can’t just buy trust like everything else! You have to earn it.” Winter is someone I’m particularly interested in seeing react to the group’s secret keeping because from her perspective, she and Ironwood have earned the group’s trust a hundred times over. Again, provided the story isn’t hiding something from us and Winter is secretly in on some plot with Ironwood, we’re seeing this volume how she’s done the work her father couldn’t and it still wasn’t enough. Her peers, including her baby sister, still decided they weren’t going to trust her with secrets that are intimately tied up in their current work and choices.

Frustrating moral questions aside, something I really loved about this scene was the character setup and the cinematography. Having Jacques with his two allies on one side, Ironwood mirroring that on the opposite end of the table, and Robyn sitting poised between the two, the audience still unsure whose side she’ll fall on. That aerial shot showing off the distance between them all? Excellent visual storytelling.

We get a quick conversation between Winter and Penny which I don’t have too much to say about. Merely that I love Penny for checking up on Winter and I love Winter for correcting her assumption: I’m not saying you wouldn’t understand because you’re a robot, I’m just saying these problems are very specific to me and being in this place. That was particularly reassuring after Ironwood’s comments. Penny ends the scene by saying she doesn’t understand why Winter wouldn’t want to follow her heart. Perhaps an odd comment coming from someone who almost blindly obeys the orders she’s given even when she doesn’t agree---such as not making more friends---but then, it may well be a ‘do as I say, not as I do’ situation. Just because Penny isn’t sure how to always follow her own heart doesn’t mean she can’t encourage others to do the same.

We return to Weiss who, after getting past a curious server, makes it to her father’s office. I feel like this is the scene people are most invested in, considering that I’ve seen a LOT of posts lately trying to demonize Willow for her comment about Whitley. Here’s what people need to remember about Willow moving forward: she’s as much a victim of abuse as Weiss is. She is, presumably, Jacques’ first victim, fully entrenched in his abuse by the time her kids started coming along. As a mother does she have a responsibility to her children? Absolutely, but that doesn’t erase the fact that she’s simultaneously a woman attempting to survive domestic abuse.

(That’s another stunning shot hell yes.)

Initially Weiss takes the side of the posts I’ve seen, painting her mother as someone who made a conscious decision to let the abuse happen---another abuser herself, one out of passiveness. “Some of us are trying to do something about it,” Weiss says, emphasizing that she’s better because she’s doing what her mother never could: fighting back. Ignoring for a moment the highly dubious insistence that abuse victims must simply ‘do something’ about that abuse (it’s not that simple at all), Weiss quickly realizes that she was wrong. Her mother has been doing something, namely setting up hidden cameras around the house for some spying of her own. Why? “For our safety.” To make sure that if Jacques ever goes farther than he already has, Willow will know about it and can take appropriate steps. Is taking precautions against something worse better than leaving a situation that’s already horrific? Of course not, but as said, abuse isn’t just something you can fix. Even if you know it’s happening. This is a woman doing all she can and what someone is capable of in an abusive relationship is based on them and that context, not what others believe is fighting back “enough.”

Willow then reassures everyone, Weiss and the audience alike, that she doesn’t expect Weiss to be the family savior.

Willow: “You haven’t come back to stay, have you?” Weiss: “No.” Willow: “Good.”

That first line potentially reads as a plea. We might have gotten a scene where Willow is disappointed that Weiss isn’t coming back because she doesn’t want to face this family alone. While a very human and understandable desire, it’s likewise not okay to expect another abuse survivor to return to their abuser after they’ve gotten out. In that hypothetical scene the fandom would have a basis for going, “No. That’s... not okay.” But we don’t get that. Willow is thrilled that Weiss both got out and has no intention to return. She wants her daughter safe. That parental instinct outweighs any selfish, human desire to not suffer this situation alone.

Keep the above point in mind when we read the line, “No matter what happens, Weiss, please don’t forget about your brother.” Willow isn’t telling Weiss to return to the house and save him. She’s not even telling her to forgive him. Just don’t forget him. Remember that he’s not a mini Jacques. He’s another young abuse victim. He’s just like you. When we look at the family dynamic it’s clear that in some ways Weiss had a leg up from her brother that helped her get out. Namely, she had Winter. They’re the ones who are close among the siblings and thus Weiss had a role model to follow. Winter, however she managed it, got out and forged her own path. We then see throughout the series how closely Weiss emulates that, from going into combat herself and having Winter train her. The two actions---fighting and escape---are connected in Weiss’ Volume 5 short. Winter tells her that if she wants to get out she has to get better. That’s your route.

In contrast, Whitley has shown no interest in combat and thus doesn’t have that path to emulate. He’s not a girl and is thus automatically treated as the next Jacques, not the next Winter or even Willow. Most importantly, Whitley doesn’t have a close relationship with an older sibling to guide him.

That’s all Willow is asking of Weiss: be for Whitley what Winter was to you. Don’t forget about him. Don’t pretend he doesn’t exist. Don’t fall into the lie Whitley himself believes, that he’s set to be the next Jacques. He’s really an abused 14-15 year old who has suffered through everything we have. So if there ever comes a time where Whitley falters in this belief or you’re given an opening... please treat him like your brother, not your father.

I think that’s a perfectly reasonable thing for a mother to ask and we can easily see via Weiss’ expression that she’s coming to all these realizations too.

“Of course [Whitley doesn’t want anything to do with you.] You left him alone. With us.” That’s not an accusation, it’s a fact. As established, Willow is happy that Weiss got out, but like with so much in RWBY the best decision doesn’t mean it’s a consequence-free decision. In this case the consequence is that Weiss and Winter left their little brother alone with their abuser. They had to for their own mental health and their safety, but they nevertheless did it. So if there ever comes a time when they can help alleviate that consequence, please do.

It likewise doesn’t escape my notice that, again, Whitley is a guy. Just like the fandom was unwilling to accept Ozpin as an abuse victim, people seem hesitant to accept Whitley as an abuse victim either. From what I’ve seen (and there are admittedly always exceptions) Whitley’s shitty behavior hasn’t gotten an a fraction of the sympathy Weiss’ shitty Volume 1-3 behavior got. They’re three years apart at most. If Weiss is a victim then so is her little brother. Don’t let the Jacques’ genetics and learned behavior fool you.

Finally, we end on Watts. The man who continues to be THE most dramatic bitch in this entire series.

We watch as he shuts down the system keeping Mantle warm. Rather than rain, snow starts to fall. Whether this will be just another generic thing going wrong to make the people angry and Ironwood seem incompetent, or whether there’s a more dangerous downside here (we did hear from Weiss about the deadly temperatures...) remains to be seen.

And that’s it. You know, I think that’s the first time in nearly two volumes where I ultimately had more good things to say about an episode than bad. It’s a holiday miracle!

Until next Saturday ;)

#rwby #rwby volume 7 #rwby volume 7 spoilers #mymetas #rwby recaps

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firelxdykatara · 5 years ago

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🔥 tvd. unleash the salt.

YOU BROUGHT THIS ON YOURSELF MEEKS

-cough-

no but ok, my biggest unpopular opinion re: tvd? (judging mostly from what i’ve seen come out of what’s left of the ‘fandom’ since s6 when 99% of it jumped fuckin’ ship, but anyway)

the show turning to shit had absolutely nothing to do with delena becoming canon

like, i’ll be reading someone’s anti tvd post, and i’ll see something like ‘it started going downhill in s4′ and nod along, but then ‘when dullena became canon’ and it’s like -record scratch-

no. hold up. -squirts with a waterbottle-

anyone who didn’t realize that damon and elena were being set up to become canon down the line as early as season one were either in denial or just weren’t paying attention. i could write for days about all the signs and all the ways their relationship developed and how they each developed as characters, but i don’t have the energy to focus on the good about tvd anymore so i don’t feel like it. (i always have energy for salt, though. must be my high-sodium diet.)

there are a couple things we know for a fact about early tvd. one is that kevin williamson was largely in charge of the show as head showrunner for the first three seasons. another is that williamson left the show after season three–his name was still on it, but he moved onto another project, and julie plec was left in charge. given those two facts, and my belief that the show’s decline in s4 was far more gradual and less visible than it was in s5, when the show jumped the shark and over a fucking cliff, we (or at least i do, you don’t have to agree but it’s the story that makes the most sense to me so i’m sticking to it) can infer that kevin williamson left at least something of an outline behind for the season following his departure, and the rest was left up to julie as she meandered her way through three more seasons–two of which the show should never have had–with only the vaguest idea of an endpoint in mind.

(as early as season 2, julie said that she and kevin already knew how they wanted the show to end–or at least, they knew what they wanted the last words to be. given that the series finale ended the same way the pilot episode did, with damon showing up on stefan’s porch wearing his trademark smirk and saying ‘hello brother’, i can buy that they had this particular scene in mind when initially planning the overall series arc. i also think that julie plec went mad with the power she suddenly had over the story once williamson left, and any other tentative plans that may have been made were either forgotten or discarded in favor of magic vampire uteruses and pointless romantic arcs and killing characters off right before the end of the show for no real reason. but anyway, i digress.)

I THINK I’VE GOTTEN A LITTLE OFF TOPIC. anyway. if delena wasn’t the beginning of the end (we’ve established that delena–if not as an endgame, but certainly as a relationship that would need to be explored–was in the cards from the very beginning, and had achieved most of its crucial relationship beats by the s3 finale [all that remained was elena gaining closure for her decaying relationship with stefan before she could fully move on]), what was?

two things, primarily: the sire bond, and the cure.

now, neither of these things seemed particularly egregious at first. in fact, up until the end of the season, i was convinced the sire bond would be revealed to have never actually existed, because the ‘signs’ were so badly contrived that they had to be red herrings designed to make the characters doubt themselves and their feelings. in hindsight, i realize the piss poor writing surrounding the bond was emblematic of issues that would plague, and eventually destroy, the rest of the series. and until it came back in season six and undid literal years worth of character development for the central character of the fucking series, i actually thought the cure plotline in s4 was a stroke of brilliance–shoddily handled in a few places, but still solid enough in execution to make up for it.

because elena, having become a vampire, needed to have the option to become human again presented to her–and then she needed to reject it. Which she did, twice, at the end of the season–first when she offered it to Stefan without a second thought, and second when she shoved it down Katherine’s throat, again without a moment of hesitation. (Technically three times, if you count the fact that she was ready to force it on Damon, but that, at least, was motivated by her desire to save his life, since he was dying from werewolf venom at the time.)

elena’s arc throughout season 4 (and that’s another of my unpopular opinions–elena didn’t change into an unrecognizable monster when she became a vampire, becoming a vampire allowed her to let go of the gloomy graveyard girl and finally learn to love LIVING again, and the fandom was so used to her as the suicidal martyr ready to sacrifice anything and everything without a second’s hesitation that they turned on her, en masse, when she realized it was actually ok to want things for herself but…. that’s a different rant altogether, ahem ANYWAY) was about learning how to be herself again.

not herself as she was immediately pre-vamping–herself as she was before her parents died. it’s no coincidence, i think, that the s3 finale (when she was being turned) and then s4 were some of the only real glimpses we got of elena’s parents, and her life with them before they died. she literally hallucinated her mother, in one of the most heartbreaking scenes of the entire show, trying to convince her to kill herself because of what she’d become–but this, notably, was a curse enacted on her by a vampire hunter. (here’s another unpopular opinion–elena killing connor had nothing to do with the sire bond. she would have killed him anyway, because he was threatening her brother’s life. am i the only one who remembers that elena, as a human, went to denver with the sole purpose of figuring out which original sired mary, so she’d know which ones it was safe to kill to protect her family? she was a human and willing to kill 75% of all remaining vampires on the planet. girl could be fucking ruthless when it came to protecting the people she loved, especially after losing so many.)

“mommy, i never meant to disappoint you.”

and then the sun came up. and just as the light hit her and began to burn, because she’d thrown her ring into the river, she looked to damon and whispered his name, panic in her eyes–because she suddenly realized she didn’t want to die. she wanted to LIVE. she DESERVED to live. and damon did what he always did best–he saved elena gilbert’s life. and that’s when she realized she couldn’t keep ignoring the things she felt for him, the way her feelings for stefan had never really recovered, the fact that she wanted to learn to enjoy the life she had instead of subscribing to stefan’s tortured broody vampire bullshit.

(ok, in fairness to stefan [loathe as i am to be fair to mister Hero Hair], i don’t think he actually realized what he was doing to elena. i don’t think he quite understood just how badly he was feeding into her self-loathing and how much he was making her think she would become a monster just like him–just like ripper!stefan if she didn’t take to the bunny diet and make like a good little vampire who never stepped a toe out of line. but i do think that as those first few episodes wore on, elena realized, more and more, that she would not survive being a vampire if she had to do things stefan’s way. and it became clear that the elena stefan was in love with was the idealized, human version of elena who’d died going over that bridge–the elena who could remind stefan of his own humanity and be his anchor to non-ripperness. she couldn’t be his sober companion/humanity anchor if she wasn’t subscribing to his bunny blood ideals.)

the bottom line being, season 4 was about elena not only becoming a vampire, but learning to enjoy her life AS a vampire. no, it wasn’t something she’d chosen for herself, and maybe it wasn’t something she ever would have chosen for herself–considering that even as far back as the end of s2, when the possibility of turning was first presented to her as a real possibility, she was talking about a future where she grew old and maybe even had kids and started a family, things she wouldn’t be able to do with stefan, meaning that even then, in the back of her mind, their relationship came with a potential expiry date (and then we got ‘i can’t think about always, i can only think about right now‘ in the s3 finale, further cementing that)–but while she’d gotten exposed to so much of the darkness inherent in being a vampire throughout the first three seasons and then her own vampiric awakening, she also got to see the good.

her no-humanity arc was kind of essential for this, btw. (is this an unpopular opinion? probably. i’m gonna pretend it is so it doesn’t seem like i’ve gone too far afield here.) which is another reason i hated that stupid fucking sire bond, after i gave up the idea it’d be revealed to be fake, and choose to ignore it in my own interpretation of canon–because there was no need for it. elena just lost her brother, the one remaining member of her immediate family, the one she’d gone to extraordinary lengths the entire season to protect. she was in unimaginable fucking pain. she was in agony, because not only was her brother dead, but she was still a very new vampire and her emotions were spiraling out of fucking control.

she would have absolutely destroyed herself in her grief, if she hadn’t been presented with an outlet. something she absolutely would have chosen for herself, in that moment–damon talking to her softly, reminding her that there was a way she could just be without needing to feel everything, and elena latching onto that one tiny bit of hope, that maybe for now she didn’t have to be in so much pain she thought she might actually fucking die on the spot from it. elena making that choice for herself–actually, you know, having some fucking agency as the central character of the series–would have been a much better choice, both from a narrative and character perspective. BUT ANYWAY.

it was during her stint with the switch turned off that elena first got a real taste of how fun and how freeing being a vampire could be. if the Idiot Brothers hadn’t banded together to try and force elena to be human again against her will, i really don’t doubt that the worst she would’ve done was snatch-eat-erase a whole bunch of people and live it up in the seedier unberbellies of various big party cities for a while. but whatever, the damage was done and eventually elena had her switch turned on by watching matt die, and feeling the relief at seeing him wearing the gilbert ring, and etc.

she largely had vengeance in mind once she was back to her more or less ‘normal’ self, but a crucial part of her development over that particular arc was the fact that she no longer hated herself for existing.

that was huge. it wasn’t given the focus or prominence it should have had, and i’ll again blame that on the weaker writing that was filling the gaps left by kevin williamson’s departure, but elena was no longer the suicidal martyr she’d been since the beginning of the show. she enjoyed living. she reveled in the strength she had, in the fact that she was no longer the Token Human, the doppelganger whose blood attracted all kinds of atrocities. she could protect herself now. she got closure with her brother, when the ghosts came back for a while, and with alaric, and she basically gave herself permission to want to have forever with the man she loved.

(and the fandom villified her, for it. because of fucking course they did. because she was a teenage girl who’d spent most of the previous four seasons dying or preparing to die or literally ready to slit her own throat without a second’s hesitation when it came to protecting people she cared about, but now that she’d decided it was ok to want to be selfish for a while and be with who she wanted without feeling guilty, suddenly it was open fucking season. but ANYWAY.)

where was i?

oh. yeah. season 5.

like i said, season 4 was a little shaky, but more or less solid–it wasn’t until after season 6 that i realized the signs of the show’s downfall had started in s4, with the cure and the sire bond heralding much worse things to come. it was s5 where the show really went off the rails.

here’s another unpopular opinion–it was absolutely character regression to have damon acting out the way he did that season. yes, in seasons past, damon acting out was a big part of his progression–two steps forward, one step back, but still slowly but steadily moving forward. but by the time we get to s5, damon had literally everything he wanted. he was BLISSFULLY happy, with the woman of his dreams, living in utter domestic bliss for an entire summer before she went off to university. and this trashfire of a show actually tried to convince me that he would’ve left their bedroom for more than five minutes, let alone long enough to drive across the state and murder some innocent human woman over a sixty-year-old grudge he’d never so much as thought about the entire time he was in mystic falls????? really?????

as if that weren’t enough, this man who witnessed, first hand, elena’s love for her brother, and who had grown to love him too–who was desperate to save his life on more than one occasion, including VERY RECENTLY in the show–would let enzo waltz in and nearly murder him??? i’m????? god

and then katherine stole elena’s body, and i was fucking done.

literally ragequit the show once elena got her body back, because i was that fucking pissed. they literally had to do so much character regression and assassination to even make it work???? they had to put bonnie on a bus to ‘away from the main plot’ville just so that she couldn’t tell anyone that katherine hadn’t actually crossed over–even though she was right fucking there in the living room with them when she saw katherine’s ghost, and she would have known immediately that something was wrong because katherine disappeared rather than crossing over. and then they had to make damon devolve so he wouldn’t be in a position to realize elena wasn’t herself. and then everyone else carried the fucking idiot ball, except matt who was promptly compelled, and TYLER who nearly died about it, ALL so that no one would notice what had happened until damon was right there with katherine!elena trying to get him to kill her so she could kill him so he wouldn’t reveal what she’d done, and i JUST.

anyway. the awful thing is, the last few episodes of season 5 were really fucking good. it felt like the show had gone back to circa s3 levels of writing. and then s6 was ok for two episodes and then…. fucking nosedived off a cliff and into the abyss.

elena losing all her good memories of damon just so she could fall in love with him all over again was one of the worst writing decisions ever made. just, in history. completely. we didn’t need to see them fall in love in a rushed and half-assed manner when we’d already gotten a beautiful four-season arc of their love story. at the VERY LEAST, they could have had her just lose all her memories, similar to stefan’s s5 memory wipe, so that it wouldn’t seem weird that she thought he was a monster and loved him anyway because something something toxic bullshit. (oh, yeah, i’m still bitter af that they had to beat us over the head with DELENA IS TOXIC YOU GAIZ as if they didn’t have one of the healthier relationships in the show until it was decided that there wasn’t enough drama so they had to make damon regress and elena excuse it in a series of increasingly ooc writing decisions)

UH. ANYWAY YEAH.

as a sidenote, tyler and elena’s friendship had a lot of potential to be something kind of fucking amazing, and it’s one of the most underrated friendships in the fandom, which is a fucking shame because i would have loved to see them get closer and have a real bond as supernatural orphans who’d had almost everything and everyone they cared about torn away at one point or another.

god. ugh. TL;DR: delena was planned from the beginning and was in no way responsible for the show going to shit, it just had the unfortunate timing of becoming canon right before the show became terrible; elena gilbert was an amazing protagonist and character in general, who should not have been hated for daring to be a teenage girl who wasn’t always fully aware or in control of her own feelings, and who dealt with so much grief and trauma in such a short time that it’s nothing short of a miracle that she eventually found her way back to the girl she’d been before, happy and sure of herself, and people just couldn’t recognize elena when she was happy so they decided she randomly changed when she became a vampire and it was All Damon’s and Delena’s Fault; stefan was a terrible boyfriend for most of their relationship; damon was wildly out of character for most of season 5; and the memory loss arc in s6 was pathetic and actively harmful to the show as a whole and especially damon and elena’s relationship and perception in fandom; oh, and tyler and elena had an amazing and horribly underrated friendship that should have gotten a lot more focus than it did. (i’m still mad tyler was put on a bus so much rather than allowed to be like, present in the lives of his only remaining friends lmfao.)

#rorykillmore #asked #anti tvd #elena gilbert #delena #MEEKS THIS IS YOUR FAULT #I WAS GONNA GO TO BED #INSTEAD I SPENT AN HOUR AND A HALF WRITING THIS #apparently there are depths to my salt mines i had not yet reached #i don't always get mad about tvd bc i've totally moved on with my life of course #but when i do #i drink eat sleep and BREATHE that salt #and dos equis i guess

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