#so i just assumed i'd lost it forever for years

[macronectes]

kandalaksha gulf, the white sea, 2015

[renova-writes]

lost in the pages. part 1

bucky barnes x reader

word count: 1,350

warnings: none

a/n: I haven't written in forever so please forgive me. I'm trying to get back into it and I started this fit a while ago so I figured I'd finally post the first few chapters of it! I hope you like it!

masterlist

You had your nose fully engrossed in your book, ignoring the lunch you had set out to eat on the table next to you. You had been itching to read your latest story- a crime thriller- all morning, making the minutes agonizing, and once you finally took your lunch break the book was the first thing you thought about. 

Just as the story started to pick up, your coworker David ran into the break room. “Hey, sorry to interrupt, Betty needs you up at the front. Some guy showed up all serious and she had to take a meeting with him.” 

“What about you? I’m on lunch right now. Why can’t you get the front desk?”

“I got story time in five minutes. Unless you want to read ‘Cat In The Hat’?”

“No, thanks. I’ll take the front.” Children stressed you out, the way they could never sit still and pay attention. You were grateful for David and his endless patience.

The library you worked at in downtown Manhattan saw a fair amount of traffic. Unfortunately, everyone always seemed to come in right after you took your lunch break. There was a decent amount of books for one of New York’s oldest private libraries and only three full time employees. Betty, the head librarian, was about sixty years old and a kind old soul. She had been a librarian at this branch her entire life and defended her books with such ferocity that she had been given the nickname ‘the book witch’ by the snot-nosed little kids that mixed up the shelving in the children’s section and ‘old hag’ by the meaner ones . You swore that you saw her hit a teenager over the head with a book when he and his friends were eating in the library. David was an oddball. He was technically in charge of the technology, but the branch had only a handful of computers and, for the most part, relied on paper records to keep track of its books. In the two years you had been working with David, you never once saw him read a book unless he had to. He was a character, to say the least. 

You had been working at the library for the past two and a half years. Growing up you loved to read and went to college at NYU, studying Classic Literature before graduating a year early and deciding to get your degree in Master’s in Library and Information Science and become a librarian. You found your job to be incredibly rewarding but also very stressful. You liked helping people find new books and seeing them get excited about books. However, you were constantly hounded by mounds of paperwork and phone calls and constant organization. During your first week, you had made the mistake of re-organizing the disheveled back room and had apparently done such a good job that Betty decided to put you in charge of all things ‘organized’ and gave you control of the library’s extensive records. You assumed that you had managed it fairly well. Housing thousands of books and newspaper records whilst still using the Dewey Decimal system, it had been a nightmare to digitize everything. The project had occupied a few months of your time but at the end of it, nobody complained and all files were straightforward and easy to find. It was all smooth sailing. 

While sitting at the front desk that afternoon you longed for the book that you were forced to abandon in the break room. Your felt stomach start to complain about the ignored lunch and you were about to go back to grab your sandwich during a rare dead-period when Betty walked over with someone.

 The man next to Betty had messy dark brown hair and a neatly shaped goatee. He wore an old Black Sabbath t-shirt and shaded sunglasses and walked with such confidence and swagger that he was easily recognizable. Tony freaking Stark. 

‘What the hell is he doing here?’ you wondered to yourself. 

“Ah, Mr. Stark, this is who I was talking about. She’s the best librarian and archivist I have ever worked with.” Betty smiled through her rectangle glasses. 

“Thank you,” you beamed, slightly flustered by the compliment, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Stark.”

“The pleasure’s all mine. All my prayers have been answered. You are really going to save my ass.” 

Though you had heard that Stark had a unique and slightly confusing way of talking, you were not expecting this. How could you help him? He was a genius. “How exactly am I going to do that, Mr. Stark.”

“Call me Tony. I have a slight problem that I could use your help with.” He began, “Back when we were just starting out a few years ago, after the New York alien invasion disaster, we were supposed to log everything and do debriefs and paperwork and all that stuff but we didn’t exactly know what to do with all of it so it kind of all just got piled up in filing cabinets and boxes. That wasn’t that big of a problem but now we’re supposed to share our records with the UN and they’re a disaster. None of us have any idea how to do it- not that we have time to- so that’s where you come in.” 

“So you want me to organize it all for you?” 

“All of it, by March 26th.” Your eyes widened. That was only three weeks away. Who knows how bad it was? Still, it was Tony Stark and he would probably be willing to pay pretty well. 

“Just as long as Betty and David will be able to manage without me-” you began, but Betty interrupted your only excuse. 

“We’ll be fine, dear.” She smiled, and you could tell that she was trying to encourage you to take the job. The library would survive despite the massive increase in work that she and David would have to endure. 

You looked from her to Stark, who was leaning against the desk and smiling also, then back to Betty. You felt bad about leaving Betty and the library but the opportunity to work with Stark was too alluring. “Okay, okay. I’m in.”

“Okay great! That was easier than I thought it would be.” Tony said, clapping his hands and standing up straight. “I’ll see you at 9 tomorrow, Happy will give you more info, here’s my card,” his mouth was moving faster than you expected and words were being thrown out that you didn’t understand. Who was Happy? Did he want to meet you at the Avenger’s Tower? Before you had even realized what you just got yourself into, Tony Stark was out the door.

You breathed out, muttering a curse word that you hoped Betty didn’t hear. You stood up from the desk and she walked over to you. Clasping her hands around yours she smiled again, “Congratulations, I am so proud of you, dear.” 

“No fucking way, Tony Stark wants you to come organize the Avenger’s records!?” David asked for the millionth time while the two of you were sorting the book returns. 

“I swear to god, David, it was him.” You were starting to get annoyed. David seemed more excited about your job than you were. “I have no idea how bad it is. I only have three weeks to get everything in order.”

“Oh, shit, you might be screwed then. How long did it take for you to get this branch in order?”

“Two, three months. But I also had other stuff to do, it wasn’t like my main job.” 

“You’re gonna be fine. You’re smart and capable and it can’t be that bad. Plus just remember how much he’s probably gonna pay you.” 

“Yeah,” you began but a buzz in your pocket distracted you. You pulled it out to find a text from an unknown number “Hey, I bet this is him with the info, I’ll be right back.” 

This is Happy. 

Avengers tower, 9 o’clock, front entrance. 

Don’t be late. I will meet you in the lobby. 

[threepandas]

Bad End: Screen Demons

Giggles echoed through the empty halls. Unhinged and static-y. Everything smelled of copper and viscera. Stale air and fear. The final moments of these poor souls, had not been kind ones. Somewhere, not far from where I was trapped, I could hear dripping. Unsteady. I hoped... I prayed... it was water.

I had already smashed every screen in this room. Ripped out every reflective surface. Security cameras, shards of glass, bottles. Every single thing the average person forgets, when warned against "reflection" based threats. There were more then you'd think.

Even your own eyes could be a problem, depend on how powerful they were. You may have to fight blind. There were specialists. I, however, was no such individual. I was a CONSULTANT. Company wanted to both keep compliance and cut costs. I'd been requesting a team for over a year. Getting denied. "We'll look into it." And "gotta check the budget".

All while they go on another yacht vacation.

Well, now? NOW the inevitable happened. I had been stretched too thin. Couldn't check all the sites in a timely enough manner. Someone, somewhere, got DISGRUNTLED. Started listening to a little voice they shouldn't have. One that PROMISED them things. Love, power, revenge. Just do this oooone little thing.

THEY'RE not like those OTHER Demons! Promise!

Ha!

I got here too late. Far, far too late. Everyone was already dead. Whole satellite facility overrun. Didn't even REALIZE until I found the first body. And by then? I was too far from the door.

They sealed me in.

The only, ONLY, reason I survived those first few hours? Was because of my safety suit. It got SHREDDED. But? They have my patronage for LIFE. I counted no less then fifteen blows that SHOULD have killed me. Claws, fangs, curses, the WORKS. I used every single off hand trick my professors ever mentioned. Plan to buy them all flowers... assuming I live.

Fell back to a defensible position. Like you're supposed too. Set up a camp. Armed myself. Took stock of supplies. Risked my life, nearly lost a LIMB, to get to the emergency communications system. The warded one.

Fucking IDIOTS had kept it in a SAFE. Yeah, it's expensive. Really expensive. But that wasn't were it goes! For a REASON. This! SPECIFICALLY! Is the reason! This happening RIGHT HERE! But did I get it? Fuck YEAH I got it. Will have the scars to PROVE that for the rest of my life.

And? It worked like a CHAMP. I could kiss it. Make sweet, sweet, sloppy love to it. Inanimate object be damned. We would have a spring wedding, honeymoon in the fall, go fuckin apple picking. It would be BEAUTIFUL. Is that the blood loss talking? MAYBE! There are A LOT of wards to set up! I'm fucking terrified!

But Cental Supernatural Suppression is ON THE FUCKING LINE. And the C.S.S. does NOT fuck around. I've never called their emergency line before. Never wanted to be in a situation where I HAD too. But the calming voice on the other end? Helps. Walks me through ward set up I NEVER would have been able to do on my own.

There is a rescue team being sourced to get me out and back up to put this thing back where it belongs.

And... and if I cry? When they tell me I'm going to be okay? That's between me and the blood stained walls.

All the while, that THING laughs and coos. It can feel my fear. My desperation. And? The most fucked up thing? Is that it looks like a fucking "waifu". Some vampire e-girl I think, from a show. Whoever had unleashed this thing had... they had been lonely. Wanted connection. And I want to say ugly, UGLY things because I am scared.

But that is how THEY fucking win.

So I won't. I will not judge. I will not sneer. Won't let my fear turn to anger. Lash out at the dead. Someone who was hurting. Who made a terrible, fatal, mistake. They just... just wanted CONNECTION. Someone to listen. And this THING preyed on that. Fed on it.

"Muuu~, don't be like thaaat~! I was just giving them what they WANTED! They SAID they wanted to be Together Forever~! Now~. We~. Are~!" Coos a cutesy voice from speakers throughout the building. My room is the only room without them. "You're being so MEAN. I just want to LOVE yooou~! Don't you want to LOVE me? You've lasted so LONG! So COOL~☆ I should give you a biiiiig kiss! He he~"

Kiss. Right. Says the Demon pretending to be a vampire girl.

She never STOPS. It's been hours. And still she's trying to convince me to leave my bunker of wards. Compliments. Threats. Mimicry. For the last six? She pretended there was another survivor. You know... one she was torturing. Classic "I'll STOP if you come get them. Don't you want to STOP me? Save them?" Shtick.

Ha! As though life sign detectors aren't the FIRST thing we're told to make, once a safe zone is established. There's no one in this building but me. I have a week's work of rations from smashing vending machines in the break room. Would have had more, but my flare died faster then anticipated thanks to her constant direct attacks.

"Aaaaw, are you ignoring me? You're making Kimi-tan SAD~! You big MEANIE! Why you got to be like that? Some~Thing~ I~ diiiiiiid~?" She continues, before breaking off into cackles. The sound discordant and rapidly changing pitch. Distant speakers whining and crackling with the strain of it. "It's not like they didn't deserve it. They ALWAYS deserve it~! They summoned ME!!"

Yeah. After you fed off them. Called to them. Built up their loneliness and pain, until it actually seemed reasonable. Try your lies on someone who didn't SPECIFICALLY go to school for this, you hellfire shit.

"Well, that's not nice."

I choke on the scream I know won't save me. Scramble back. Away, away, AWAY! There, in the doorway. Stands a glitching manifest of the Demon herself. Pale, wrong, and impossible. She's-! She was-! IS a reflection demon! The sort of power MANIFESTATION costs?? Oh god. What have I walked INTO?!

"I wonder, Dar~ling~," she muses, eyes unblinking as she stares me down. "How long you can survive me? I bet it's REAL long. Bet you'd be FUN to break. You know~? If you're cute enough? I might just KEEP you! Like a little pet. Bet I could make you a demon, easy!"

A hand comes up, single finger out, to lazily trace the air between us. Holy light violently rejecting her. BURNING her. Yet it clearly doesn't bother her, even as the tip of her finger sizzles and cooks. Instead, she lazily traces shapes in the light. Watching me. Contemplating. Deciding if it's worth it.

"Thoooough? I DO like you like this. You're like a little mouse in a cage. All terrified and alone. It's cute. I never did get why the others got so obsessed over hunting you guys." Pulling back her finger, she smiles.

It splits her face farther then it should.

"I think I get it now."

[beevean]

I don't think I've ever seen anyone trying to analyze Lilly's route, in particular the choices that lead to the Good Ending, despite her being by far the most popular girl. It took me years to understand the logic of the choices, but I think I got it.

As a recap: to get the Good Ending, you need to make three correct choices, making Lilly's route the most delicate of the five: it's possible to mess up in Act 2, and not see any repercussion until Act 4.

The repercussion is that Akira drops the bombshell that Lilly has been planning to rejoin their parents in Scotland, permanently, and hid this from Hisao. If you failed to get the Good Ending, the story simply... stops, and Lilly and Akira leave forever leaving Hisao and Hanako behind. If you do get the Good Ending, the story continues and Hisao gains the inspiration to chase Lilly down to apologize for not being there for her during such a difficult time.

The difference between the Neutral Ending and the Good Ending is that Hisao in the former never realizes that he took Lilly for granted, and he only saw her as the perfect girlfriend and person, so when she goes away, he simply lets her, powerless; while in the Good Ending he recognizes that she too is human and she too needs help, and he gains the courage to do so. But how did he come to this conclusion?

The three choices are, apparently inconsequential and fairly obvious. In those three circumstances, Hisao has the choice to be honest or keep things to himself: as the player has learned in the Mind Your Step scene, in Act 1, being secretive leads to your death lol. Lilly values honesty, that's something that she insists on frequently; but the logic can't be so simple. Why would Hisao completely give up on Lilly if one day months before he didn't feel like sharing his thoughts?

Let's go through a rundown:

A Brief History of Thyme, choice 1:

LILLY: "Are you all right, Hisao?" HISAO: "Sorry?" LILLY: "You just seemed to go very quiet, that's all." HISAO: "Ah, sorry. I was just thinking." LILLY: "Oh?" NARRATOR: "Ah, now I've piqued her curiosity. It feels kind of overly personal to talk about though..."

Hisao is caught being lost in his thoughts, and Lilly innocently asks what they're about. He feels self-conscious as he was thinking of her, her life, and her relationships, so he's hesitant to answer.

If you "Tell the truth":

HISAO: "It was just kind of... I was thinking about how you seem to have everything so sorted out, even with Hanako relying on you. I can admit that even I kind of relied on you when I first transferred in. I think it's a good quality to have." NARRATOR: "I turn to Lilly, surveying her reaction. She's forcing herself to look forward and furrowing her brow quite a bit. Her face looks a bit awkward, as if she was trying to find just the right words." HISAO: "...Lilly?" LILLY: "I would thank you, but... assuming that I don't rely on the presence of others is too much. You'd be wrong to think that Hanako simply depends on me with nothing in return." NARRATOR: "She seems to have a bit of trouble saying it, even though it's largely what I'd thought already. If she's tried so hard to maintain her independence, as anyone would have had to in her position, sighted or not, maybe she finds it hard to talk about her own needs. It's only now that I realize an omission in what she says, though. I decide to follow it up, largely in jest, to avoid things getting too personal." HISAO: "Oh? And what about me?" NARRATOR: "She suddenly runs ahead of me and turns, blocking me off. With a smile, she holds her hands behind her as she leans forwards." LILLY: "You're different."

So, not only Hisao and Lilly gets a cute bonding moment, but Lilly already reveals the core message of her route.

Hisao believes Lilly "seems to have her life set up and going just as she wants," and has everything sorted out. Lilly, however, admits that it's not true and she too relies on the presence of others. Both her words and her reluctance to say them are key to what follows in her route. "Maybe she finds it hard to talk about her own needs," oh my sweet summer child.

Contrast with "Just what is she thinking now? I look up to the dark sky as I slump my shoulders. I think this is something I have to sort out for myself, rather than relying on her for everything," which is what Hisao thinks if you "Avoid the subject". If he's honest, Lilly passes the message that everyone relies on someone; if he's not, Hisao thinks he'd better only rely on himself... leaving Lilly in the same position.

Prelude, choice, 2:

LILLY: "If you want to sleep more, you should really go to bed earlier. I heard the television going long into the night." HISAO: "Sorry about that. My medications have been interfering with my sleep for a while now. Even if I'm tired I have trouble actually sleeping." LILLY: "I'm... sorry for bringing it up, Hisao." NARRATOR: "I sigh. This is exactly the kind of thing I wish others wouldn't do."

Hisao is still self-conscious about his condition, and doesn't want to be pitied, even more so by the naturally caring and motherly Lilly.

But we must "Address it":

HISAO: "Come on, you worry about me more than I do at times. It just means I have to sleep a bit longer, that's all." LILLY: "But still..." HISAO: "I'd say that I look absolutely fine, but I guess that wouldn't have a lot of meaning for you." NARRATOR: "She gives a sigh of consternation before trailing off with an amused chuckle, giving up the point." LILLY: "If you say so. Please do take care of yourself, Hisao."

Not doing so has Hisao awkwardly telling Lilly to help Hanako, which she doesn't appreciate.

This choice is mostly about Hisao, and it picks back one of the most important lessons of the game. The story is very, very clear that he must not wallow in self-pity and denial: he has a medical condition, and that condition comes with challenges, but that doesn't make him any lesser. If his shame makes him push people away, he won't get far.

Hisao's conception of Lilly is of a loving, but fretting figure that at worst pities him from her position of superiority. If he waves her off, too ashamed and prideful to open up, he doesn't fully challenge his misconception, and doesn't fully realize that she's more vulnerable that she lets on.

Out and About, choice 3:

LILLY: "But on that note, what of your confessions, Hisao? I'm sure someone like you must have had at least one admirer." NARRATOR: "As I open my mouth to speak, I can feel my face turn slightly dour. At times like this, I secretly appreciate the fact that she can't see my expressions." HISAO: "Just... one. Her name was Iwanako. It was when she confessed to me that I had my heart attack. There in the woods, during winter." NARRATOR: "Lilly finds herself speechless, not expecting for the topic to move into such an area. My condition has always been something of a concern for her, something that I strive to minimize despite my body's best efforts to the contrary." HISAO: "Afterwards, she visited me for a while when I was in the hospital. For weeks she came in and talked. It was usually just smalltalk or classroom gossip, but that was enough. But eventually... she just stopped coming. She was there every day. Then every other day. Then once a week. Then finally, one day, she just stopped visiting entirely." LILLY: "Did you ever... see her again?"

Lilly has inadvertedly hit a sore spot for Hisao. The two are together and having a sweet romantic date, but he understandably wouldn't like to talk about what was effectively the lowest point of his life.

It would be understandable if he "Dropped the subject", because as he points out, their date is about them, not a girl that broke up with him months before. But it's best if we "Mention the letter", because the following piece is crucial:

NARRATOR: "The memory of that single letter Iwanako sent me comes back to my mind." HISAO: "I never saw her again, but after I was sent to Yamaku... she wrote me one letter." NARRATOR: "Lilly's face shows an expression I know well. I've piqued her interest. I'd be slightly offended that it's simply a matter of curiosity for her, but she's never been very good at masking her reactions." HISAO: "In hindsight, it really didn't say much. What was going on in my old class, how she was faring, and, almost as an afterthought, that it was probably best for the both of us that we don't see each other again. After reading it, I ended up reassessing a lot of things I thought I'd managed to work out. For the most part, that letter reminded me that the world around me was still moving, and just how much I'd become isolated from it. And... I guess it also reminded me of what I'd lost." NARRATOR: "She gives the information some thought before her face lights up in realization. No doubt she's worked out that it was this letter which had contributed to my angst during that lunch on the rooftop. It's a rare sight to see Lilly quite so lost for words, her entire persona is a little deflated from her earlier rapt interest. As charismatic as she is, in the end that isn't any replacement for life nor relationship experience." LILLY: "Perhaps... it is better she sent it than not." HISAO: "How's that?" LILLY: "It can be difficult to work out how best to communicate with those you haven't met in a long time. All the more so, considering your separate situations. Instead of doing what was easiest, she built up the courage to talk to you one last time; not only for her sake but, from how it sounds, for yours as well." HISAO: "Maybe. I don't hate her for it, not that I really ever did, but... I don't know." NARRATOR: "Probably a more noncomittal answer than I should give, but it isn't without cause. I've never looked at the situation from Iwanako's perspective like that before."

We have a lot packed here. Hisao admits and puts into words how much Iwanako's letter shook him and forced him to reconsider that he hadn't moved on as easily as he had thought. He realizes that Lilly may be charismatic, which I suppose is a way to say that she looks mature and reliable, but she still lacks life and relationship experience. Lilly commends Iwanako for having the courage to speak to Hisao one last time to have a proper closure. Hisao is seeing the situation for the first time from the girl's perspective.

With all of this in mind, it makes perfect sense that only by being honest with Lilly three times, he can reach this conclusion in False Cadence:

"I had thought her sense of independence to be a good and admirable trait. It was in stark difference to my reliance on my parents before my heart attack, as reluctant as I may have been to admit it. However, it also meant that she never let people get too close to her. She lost her family likely due to her blindness, went to a different school from anybody she knew because of it, and worked all the harder to make sure she didn't end up a burden on her sister and those around her. And now, Akira's going to Inverness, just like the family she thought she'd lost. She never told me of her plans, as conflicted as she was about them. Lilly didn't want to be a burden on anyone, including me. ...I'm an idiot." "I never questioned it. I never tried to be there or asked when she needed me to. I just set my life up and expected it to stay that way forever, with the two of us having a nice long relationship where we pushed forwards towards our future together. A small pit of frustration and anger at myself wells up in my chest. I just let everything happen, never even trying to help Lilly. Just her being there was enough. I thought I could keep going on if that were true. But that could never have been enough. It was a childlike dependence on somebody, without any attempt to understand or help their situation. Thanks to that, I lost Lilly. I lost the one person I loved most because I wasn't there for her when she needed me."

And why he would even have the idea of chasing her down before it's too late, much like Iwanako chose to be brave enough to send him one last letter.

While I still think these three choices are very obvious to pick, which takes away the fun of guessing what would be the right thing to do, I really like how everything ties together and subtly conveys the message of Lilly's route: no one is perfect, there is no shame is needing help, and two lovers have to be there for each other and allow the other to be there for them. Poor Lilly lived for years with the convinction that if she just was perfect and went beyond the limits of her pesky blindness, her parents would love her again. Hisao has the chance to teach her that she doesn't need to pretend to be flawless, as long as he too challenges himself and his own shame.

[darkstarofchaos]

In the wake of TF One, I have finally figured out why I have less interest in MegOp with every new piece of media I consume, and it turns out not to be because of the way Megatron is written like I'd assumed (there are no TF One spoilers here, the movie just triggered the epiphany).

MegOp for a lot of early series (G1, Unicron Trilogy, TFA) was Enemies To Lovers, aka, one of my favorite relationship dynamics. They only knew each other as enemies, but something happened, they had to work together or get Married For Peace, homoerotic undercurrents of being rivals, whatever. Point is, they eventually had to interact for an extended period as not-enemies. And then they fell for each other and boom, relationship. Messy and complicated and very, "I used to hate you, but now that I've gotten to know you, I don't want to hate you anymore."

Modern MegOp is either set before the war, or it's Lovers To Enemies (and sometimes Back To Lovers). One of my least favorite dynamics, because it feels like a romantic dead end. "I have seen the darkness in you and I reject it". "I have seen you at your worst and your best isn't worth it". "I will set myself against you forever because I am opposed to your desires on a fundamental level". It's a good tragedy, but if you've seen both their good and their bad and rejected them, that's... That's it. There's no path forward without a redemption arc (which is a dynamic I have a love-hate relationship with, but we'll get to that).

If you've read much of my work, you probably know I'm a big SkyStar shipper and are very confused by the above. The thing about SkyStar, though, is that I didn't ship it. It was a bit different from the usual Lovers To Enemies dynamic in that Starscream was functionally a stranger to Skyfire after millions of years, but it still had that vibe of "I knew you and reject who you've become". All love lost, no path forward.

I didn't start shipping SkyStar until reading @grayseeker's Under His Wing, which starts off establishing them as... enemies. Because even though Skyfire still misses the Starscream he knew, he doesn't know this Starscream, and he rejected this Starscream (this is in stark contrast to other SkyStar fics I was seeing at the time, where Skyfire pined for Starscream like he was the one who'd been rejected, and would take him back at the drop of a hat. Also, a lot of those fics just kinda gave him "his" Starscream back, instead of asking either of them to figure out how to make things work if they still want to be together. But I digress).

Point is, Skyfire and Starscream became enemies under unusual circumstances, which leaves them a path forward if Skyfire is willing to get to know the new Starscream, and meet him where he is now instead of where he used to be. You can hit some Enemies To Lovers beats with this pairing if you try.

MegOp doesn't have that weird breakup situation. When one of them rejects the other, it's not after an extended separation during which one of them changed dramatically. It's more "I never knew you at all". It's, "I've known you for so long, and as recently as five minutes ago, I never would have thought you'd be capable of this". They hit the wall together, in real time, and have to confront the fact that they know this person who hurt them so deeply. Which, again, it's a great tragedy and a great breakup story, but it ends the romance. There's only one way they can possibly move forward from this, but in the case of MegOp, I do not think it works.

Let's talk about romantic redemption arcs, I guess.

So here's the thing about redemption arcs: I don't like them. Mostly because redemption is always treated as a good vs evil thing, where a reformed villain makes up their bad deeds to the people who used to be their enemies, but they never have to face the things they did to their allies (yes, I am talking about canon Megatron redemptions). The only upside to Defection = Redemption is that it sets the scene for an Enemies To Lovers story, but honestly, it doesn't feel the same. I want "drawn to each other despite their fundamental differences", not a relationship that doesn't even start until one character changes on a fundamental level.

In general, the only time I enjoy romantic redemptions is when it's not about what faction you're a part of, and more about whether you can accept the other person for who they are. SkyStar is one example, but a better one would be MegaStar. MegaStar as I prefer to write it is a relationship where both parties have seen the other's worst traits and did not reject each other - but their worst traits also feed on each other, so they're stuck in a sort of relationship purgatory until one of them either lets go or changes. And if Megatron decides to change (they both have issues to work on, but Megatron has to change, it can't just be Starscream), and he succeeds, that is a redemption arc. And it's a redemption arc I would enjoy, because I'm not asking one character to change their entire personality and moral standing; I'm just asking they choose kindness, not cruelty (yes, there is an entire conversation to be had about morality and abuse, but that's a whole post all on its own, so I'm not going to get into that right now).

Anyway, that's why a MegOp redemption arc wouldn't work for me. They have seen traits they didn't like - maybe not even the worst the other person had to offer - and one rejected the other. Reconciliation requires one or the other to change on a deep, worldview-altering level. And I'm not into that.

Enemies To Lovers says, "I have seen your darkness and will brave it for a chance to bask in your light". Lovers To Enemies says, "I have seen your darkness and am compelled to snuff it out".

Granted, my preferred take on MegOp is "I have seen your darkness and am compelled to snuff it out". But like, less "I will stand against you forever" and more "I will shape you to my liking". But whatever.

I should probably throw an unpopular opinions tag on this thing.

[marzipanandminutiae]

You posted about getting married young, and I just wanna say thank you? I got really lucky and met THE woman when we were 17, and engagement is in the horizon for us at 22, 23. Sometimes it gets to me when people say we're wasting our youth, it's nice having someone batting for us

Also love the pfp, carmilla fans are still alive and well and if you've got any fanfic recs lmk

Congrats! I hope it works out for you. (I would say "girl" at 17, not "woman," but I assume it's just a random word choice since it sounds like you're the same age, so not a big deal.)

While I of course don't advocate for child marriage- ie marriage below age 18, and really I think 20+ is wiser -the whole "date around or you're Wasting Your Youth!!!" narrative pisses me off, like I said. I grew up with that shoved down my throat to the point where I believed my own desires to just meet the right girl and stay with her forever were just youthful romanticism; that I'd "mature" and want to date more people instead of wanting to settle down. (And for some people that is the trajectory! And that's fine! Just...not everyone.)

When your mother got so lost in the Swinging Sixties sauce during her own teen years that she goes too far the opposite way of most parents, I guess?

Yeah, someone might regret a young marriage. But they might regret ANY marriage- that's just a risk you take when you get married. Trusting people to know their own minds in relationships that present no actual red flags is important, even for teenagers. Teaching young people not to trust their own (harmless) emotions and desires for their lives because it doesn't match what you'd have them do seems horribly backwards to me. It's a dangerous precedent to set for them.

When I was 16, I thought I'd be perfectly happy if I married a girl I met at that age- when we were older, of course. Now I'm 30, and guess what? I still think that. I would have been satisfied. Hell, I wish that had happened. It's not right for everybody, but it would have been right for me.

I hope things work out for you two!

[whumpshaped]

Im pretty sure you're in a different part of the world then me. And you like vampires, too! So what's your local vampires lore like, assuming there is any. I'm white American, so I don't really... Have that. Native Americans didn't really have a vampire-equivalent, and even if they did, not my place to speak on it. I don't know my family heritage either, so I can't speak of any vampires from whatever culture my bloodline comes from.

bro u hit some sort of jackpot for sure. im from hungary. its in eastern europe and for a long long time transylvania belonged to hungary too. dracula, the real, historical dracula, was literally held captive here for a while. i just went to see his manor's cellar this summer w my brother. its awesome. so uh. ok. lets see what i can give u-

so hungary and hungarians used to be veeeery pagan and we did not leave that behind after converting. lots of our folklore has been lost but lots of it has remained! a significant part of it, of course, is vampires.

vampires were super popular in the medieval era, when people believed the standard stuff: vampires leave their graves at night and suck the blood of the living. they tried to avoid being preyed on by putting garlic in their windows and wearing amulets.

one of our most famous hungarian vampire figure is báthory erzsébet whom u might know as elizabeth báthory :) she was the wife (and later widow) of a hungarian nobleman, and she was rumoured to have killed hundreds of young women to then bathe in their blood and stay forever young! she became a very prominent figure in the hungarian vampire lore. of course her only sin was likely the fact that she was a girlboss ruling over the enormous land of her late husband alone, which people didnt like, so they started the rumours to be able to get that land from her. she was eventually arrested and died in her cell 4 years later without a trial.

then of course theres the dracula stuff and the fact that hungary is located in eastern europe. its honestly mostly the same as u would hear from slavic vampire myths. heavily intertwined and overlapping. hungary isnt technically slavic but its like...... u know how it is. if i go outside rn i will see a man in a wifebeater and another in an adidas tracksuit. we have pretty good vampire tourism i'd say. and obviously a shit ton of hungarians live in transylvania to this day sooo. basically we're at the heart of the vampire conspiracy.

speaking of dracula, lugosi béla was literally the most iconic dracula according to a bunch of ppl. hes hungarian!

basically.. listen im not saying i know a couple vampires and meet w them frequently to ask questions to better my story.. im just saying the likelihood of that isnt zero

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

Sorry to give more attention to something that sucks, but I figure I'm not the only one who'd rather know than not know about a comedian I like in a case like this - remember last year, when Richard Ayoade gave that supportive quote on the cover of Graham Linehan's book? And it was disappointing, I figured that even if it's what I assume happens regularly with books like this, where they'll just get whatever famous friends they have to give some positive quote for the cover, even if those friends haven't read the book - even if it was that, that still sucks on Richard Ayoade's part, if he signed off on that for a book like this. But hey, maybe he just doesn't follow the news of which old colleagues of his have lost their minds on social media, maybe he didn't think that much about it, maybe he didn't even know what the book was about, maybe he didn't even write that quote himself. Still sucks, but doesn't necessarily mean all that much.

I fortunately wasn't a sufficiently invested fan of Richard Ayoade to be hugely upset about it. I mean, I wasn't happy. I find him very funny on panel shows and I think Garth Marenghi's Darkplace was a masterpiece. I am, however, sort of pleased that the fact that Richard Ayoade sucks now makes it more acceptable for me to say I've always found The IT Crowd overrated. Also, while he can be very very funny when he's good, his persona does get grating after a while (especially given that... look, if he's going to express support for a man who's so against people changing their outer markers to affect how they're perceived, it's worth noting that it's not his real voice). It annoys me that the running joke on Catsdown is how he's so good at it because he's such a nerd, and they keep doing that joke even though he does badly in all the games. He's not really that smart, he just puts on glasses and a nasal voice and identifies as a nerd. He often doesn't even seem like his heart is really in the persona, I think he just played one nerd in 2006 and then got typecast and stuck doing it forever. Garth Marenghi was still a masterpiece though.

Anyway, I've just been pointed to an episode of Gyles Brandreth's podcast from a few weeks ago, where Richard Ayoade featured as a guest and discussed Linehan. I listened to the relevant passage and can confirm that he did know what he was talking about when he gave that quote for the book, he talks about how Graham Linehan has been doing good work and treated unfairly, and has been accused of transphobia but really it's about women's rights. Thought I'd share that for the information of anyone who likes Richard Ayoade and, like me, would rather know that not know if a comedian we like is saying stuff like that. Sorry again for giving it more attention. I briefly considered posting the clip, but I don't think I need to spread the actual audio around - if you, like me, like to hear things from the actual source rather than relying on out-of-context secondhand accounts, you can hear it yourself on the Ayoade episode of the Rosebud podcast. But I don't really recommend doing that.

I'd love to say I'm not too upset by the Ayoade news because I don't do that kind of parasocial putting celebrities on pedestals, to the point where I'd be upset about them turning out to be bad. But that's not true, there are plenty of comedians to whom I have some scraps of faith in humanity tied, and those rare scraps would disappear if my favourite comedians came out in support of Graham Linehan. Richard Ayoade's just not one of them. It was Matthew Holness who made Garth Marenghi so great anyway. And he did a far better job in one scene than Richard Ayoade did in four seasons, of playing a nerd in an 00s sitcom that was created by a guy who's now an awful transphobe. Even in a niche as small as that, Richard Ayoade doesn't win.

In order to make this post not 100% about terrible people being terrible, I'm going to take this somewhat tenuous excuse to talk about Richard Ayoade's best friend from Cambridge, who is far better than Richard. A couple of years ago, I went to make one of my little Bugle compilations, it got out of hand as I kept adding stuff to it, and I accidentally made a feature film. I entitled it A Groundhog Day of Hatred, as it chronicled the saga of John Oliver vs. Sarah Palin, every time their careers regrettably crossed paths. In September 2023, I updated that film with a few further bits, and released a second edition, which runs at 78 minutes. It's too many minutes.

To accompany the second edition, I thought it would be funny to create a movie poster. I got one quote from the excellent @lastweeksshirttonight, but thought it needed another quote, as all good promotional images are accompanied by quotes of famous people talking up the work. I realized that actually, John Oliver's old friend/Footlights teammate had recently given one of those promotional quotes that, by coincidence, would work just as well to describe my movie as it did to describe the work that that quote was originally used to promote. In fact, it would work even better. Because the story of John Oliver trying to cover Sarah Palin's political career really is the tale of a hero's harrowing journey, unlike Linehan's shit book.

So basically, if you find Richard Ayoade's political views disappointing, you can just look at that quote he gave Graham Linehan's book, and imagine he was instead describing this:

[dogtoling]

what would inklings think of humans? would it kinda be like the same way we think of dinosaurs, or something...?

also since people in the real world have dinosaur ocs, would inklings would have humanoid ocs.......

(i have no idea how to word this question right srry)

I assume Inklings think of humans much like dinosaurs, but what I feel largely fits the "dinosaur" role in the Splatoon world would be extinct animals and especially mammals because of how bizarre they are. Marine mammals are probably the most known, seeing how we see whale imagery and mentions a lot, and very likely Inklings would find familiarity and insane cool factor in stuff like whales, dolphins, sea lions and the like given that they used to share a habitat directly and in many cases, those animals were top predators. But that's besides the point.

I'd like to think humans are relatively well-studied in the Splatoon world, I mean, there were A LOT of humans. And while a lot of human remains were probably washed away and lost forever into the depths of the ocean, we know from the game that a lot of it remains to this day, to the point where human bones can just kinda be found if you go digging pretty much anywhere. Aside from just human bones, human items and especially ruins of buildings remain, and I believe a lot of Inkling architecture and technology was studied and replicated out of a lot of the things that the humans left behind.

For example, if you take the human fossil and the Wii U in that one sunken scroll at face value and say "yeah that's real", that's the scope of niche stuff that would've survived. And obviously the comment of that scroll implies that Inklings dont actually understand shit about humans or anything at all, considering playing the Wii U is described as "some kind of ritual" and they're theorizing that humans must've had very low intellect due to the small size of the head. Come on now, we KNOW they have nearly IDENTICAL gaming consoles in the Mollusc Era..... but then again if the scrolls have the potential for some of them to be really old, then if someone like a hundred years ago were to examine that fossil, they wouldn't have had any idea what the hell is going on because they wouldn't have had gaming consoles lol.

Either way I feel that generally Inklings have a pretty good BASIC picture of what humans were like. With extremely vague details, but I think they'd at least know what humans look like and how they dressed, based on a lot of global evidence - and well, the NILS statue being a pretty recent development in case you still DIDN'T know what a human looks like. There's definitely attempts to decode human scripts and languages, which further sheds insight on how human societies functioned and what kind of lives they led. Obviously there is a really big difference in what the average Inkling knows about humans (probably just what they looked like and some really basic stuff and not much else), while researchers, historians and human scientists might know all kinds of niche things, like basic knowledge of some languages, deep dives into local cultures, what kind of candy humans enjoyed, time stamping when smartphones were invented (which is so recent that Inklings might think technology wasn't as important as it is, given it's REALLY not been around that long if you consider like, 100 years back from now), maybe even human-made fiction in some cases. (No, we're not getting into the topic of Splatoon the game existing in Splatoon the universe, because it would)

Basically inklings definitely know a lot about humans, the scope of what they know just really varies. And yes people probably have human OCs. The human fanatics are out there. I mean, if I was an Inkling, i'd find it really wild that just 12,000 years ago or so there was a completely different sapient species ruling the planet that just DISAPPEARED and inklings as a species are SO very different (a MOLLUSC), but still eerily similar in so many ways, down to appearance, cultures, clothing, even having like identical technology in many ways. Like is that not cool as hell.

[battleangelaelita]

Yet another post-canon Azula plot bunny

This time, with 100% more trans fem energy.

I've actually had this one for a while, and discussed it at length with @jusendork on discord. But due to an unfortunate run-in with malware, and discord support being useless as ever, my account and all the dm convos are lost forever now, so I figured I'd put it up on here so the idea itself does not fall down the memory hole.

So this came as a result of my unfortunate tendency to write right up to the line about trans adjacent characters, but never really go all the way despite being trans fem myself (see every Ranma 1/2 fanfic I have ever written). So this ones for all my sisters out there.

We begin the fic ten years after the ending of ATLA, and we're just going to sidestep the comics. The inciting incident is an attempt on the life of Fire Lord Zuko; the plot fails, but with as of yet no heir, the Fire Lord is in a politically difficult situation.

Wanting to settle this matter discretely, Zuko turns to his old friends to find the whereabouts of his sister, to determine whether she had any part in the plot, and if not, to return her safely to the capital so that there will be a line of succession. Unfortunately for him, he's a bit hard up for people able and willing to help. Ultimately, only Katara, ambassador from the Southern Water Tribe, and Mai are able and willing, no matter how reluctantly.

I've decided to borrow one note from the comics and have Zuko have split with Mai. Whether he is married to someone else for political reasons, I have not decided. The first leg will be told primarily from Katara's point of view as the outsider to the family dynamics. In the search, she's trying to peel back the layers of resentment and secrets. Mai knows more than she let's on.

Azula herself has been living under an assumed name in Ba Sing Se, disappearing into the anonymous mass with the help of a few of the former Dai Li who remained loyal. I've mulled various different trades she may have plied to survive, from organized crime to more reputable trades, but ultimately they are not important. The key is that she's basically been disassociating the past ten years, and the sudden arrival of people from her past dredges up everything she's been trying to forget.

The keystone of all this is that Azula is a trans girl, and it always was a sordid little secret of the royal family. Her father's (selective) affirmation of this was just another part of controlling her. From the moment his 'son' made 'his' first flames when 'his' mother humored 'his' protestations, Ozai saw an opportunity. 'Azulon' the Younger can play at being a girl, but only if she's the best. And she certainly can't go back on filial piety.

The main theme of it will be transmisogyny in all its forms. And I'd hope to do it in such a way that conserves the scenes in the original; events occur as they did in the show proper, but flashbacks are of course in full unreliable narrator. So the changes would be things that recontextualize events, not change them.

This is of course one of those ideas I may not actually get around to, so please don't stop if you're thinking along similar lines or if you got inspiration from this. But I really just had a good hard think about how Azula in fanon gets this sort of degendering; a character commonly perceived as a cis lesbian, and the commonalities lesbians have with trans women in how they're treated for existing outside the bounds of patriarchal norms, treated as violent, predatory, emotionally unstable, and masculinized. So i thought I'd just steer into this skid, and write her as a trans lesbian, because I can. There's few things as subversive as treating a character as having been trans and passing the entire time.

[jayarrarr]

Radical Authenticity

Yesterday, I reconnected with one of my favorite people. I'd honestly assumed that I'd lost him forever, no differently than if he'd died. The fact that we reconnected now, I feel, is no coincidence. When we first met, on Tumblr, I was very active within the "Tumblr Writing Community" (TWC), as was he. What I wouldn't know at the time was that I would develop some of the strongest and most long-lasting relationships of my life through the TWC. It took an extended period away from Tumblr to realize what Tumblr had given to me, and what I needed, now, to create for myself in my life. During a transitional period of my life, as I was looking back, turning things inside out, trying to figure out where I went wrong because I just didn't believe that existence was meant to be such a existential struggle, I realized that over the 17 years I'd lived in Nashville, Tennessee, the closest relationships I'd had were with people I'd met on Tumblr. Many of them became friends (or even lovers) of mine IRL, but most of them remained virtual—although their virtuality makes them no less real. What Tumblr gave me was a safe space where I could be not just my authentic self, but my ideal authentic self—the person I really wanted to be. It gave me space to experiment and play around in the margins of that self, keeping the things that I loved and tossing what didn't work for me. I made such powerful connections on Tumblr because I was committed to a sort of radical authenticity that I did not yet have the courage to embody in real life. The difference, I realized looking back, was a matter of tense. I didn't have the courage then—but maybe I do now. Courage is a funny thing because you never think about it beforehand. You're not, like, faced with a decision and go "I'm gonna do the courageous thing!" No, you do what you think is right, you do what you feel you need to do. Courage isn't something you have—it's a judgement placed on your actions by other people. Why did I say judgement? Because people only talk about courage when they talk about somebody doing something that they either know they wouldn't do or doubt very seriously they would do if they were in the same situation. So they assign the mythical to give themselves an out. Such courage, they'll say. I'm afraid I'm not nearly as brave as that. So humble. Saying something requires courage, or bravery, means that you don't have to dig into your core values to figure out why you wouldn't have the same instincts, why you wouldn't follow the same path, why you wouldn't put your ass on the line for something you believe in. Like I said, they give themselves an out. The thing is, when you recognize that, something happens that stops holding you back from doing the thing you needed to be doing all along. And what I needed to be doing was being radically authentic, to myself and others, and let all of me shine out into the world instead of holding myself back and making myself small so other people would feel more comfortable. Do what you love and the rest will follow. And if someone's meant to be in your life, they're never truly gone. ©2024 by Jennifer R.R. Mueller

[at-secret-gardens-in-my-mind]

i didn't know who i was supposed to be at fifteen -> well i was sixteen when suddenly, i wasn't that little girl you used to see -> don't you think i was too young to be messed with/don't you think nineteen's too young to be played by your dark twisted games when i loved you so? -> and i damn sure never would've danced with the devil at nineteen -> we embroidered the memories of the time i was away, stitching "we were just kids, babe" -> oh, i don't wanna grow up, wish i'd never grown up-> and you throw your head back laughing like a little kid/i watched it begin again -> you said if we had been closer in age maybe it would've been fine/i'd like to be my old self again but i'm still trying to find it/and i was never good at telling jokes but the punchline goes "i'll get older but your lovers stay my age" -> what will become of me once i've lost my novelty/how can a person know everything at eighteen but nothing at twenty two -> ten months older i won't give in, now that i'm clean i'm never gonna risk it -> and why i've spent my whole life trying to put it into words -> hold on to the memories, they will hold onto you -> i never grew up, it's getting so old -> i've been sleeping so long in a twenty year dark night, but now i see daylight -> and if you never bleed, you're never gonna grow -> when you are young, they assume you know nothing/cause i knew everything when i was young -> i know they said the end is near/shining just for you/cause i'm a mirrorball -> i hit my peak at seven/i used to scream ferociously anytime i wanted/though i can't recall your face, i still got love for you -> back when i was living for the hope of it all -> i've been having a hard time adjusting, i had the shiniest wheels, now they're rusting -> time, curious time, cutting me open, then healing me fine -> i'm only seventeen, i don't know anything -> our coming of age has come and gone -> i never was ready so i watch you go -> what must it be like to grow up that beautiful -> time flies, messy as the mud on your truck tire -> you're so much older and wiser and i wait by the door like i'm just a kid -> dear reader, burn all the files, desert all your past lives, and if you don't recognize yourself, that means you did it right -> i haven't met the new me yet -> do you ever stop and think about me when we were younger, down in the park, honey, making a lark of the misery -> will you forgive my soul when you're too wise to trust me and too old to care -> forever is the sweetest con -> nothing lasts forever -> it was real enough to get me through the violence of the dog days -> she's still twenty three inside her fantasy -> i have this thing where i get older but just never wiser -> you're on your own kid, you always have been -> no one wanted to play with me as a little kid, so i've been scheming like a criminal ever since -> and if i was a child did it matter if you got to wash your hands/i miss who i used to be, the tomb won't close/give me back my girlhood, it was mine first -> i'm pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free -> you wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me -> only when your girlish glow flickers just so do they let you know: it's hell on earth to be heavenly/the future's bright, dazzling -> too impaired by my youth to know what to do -> i feel so high school every time i look at you -> i read about it in a book when i was a precocious child -> growing up precocious sometimes means not growing up at all -> and i sound like an infant, feeling like the very last drops of an ink pen -> you said you were gonna grow up, then you were gonna come find me/you said you'd come get me but you were twenty five/lost to the lost boys chapter of your life -> oh, twenty five years old, oh, how was i to know? -> in the age of him she wished she was thirty/he said since she was so wise beyond her years, everything had been above board, she wasn't sure/and the years passed like scenes of a show/looking backwards might be the only way to move forward -> long story short, it was a bad time, long story short, i survived

taylor swift and the passing of time/getting older in her discography

[mhaynoot]

[ch 2]

just finished ch2 and got sick so excuse the ramblings of an only partly functioning brain HAHAHA but anyways some thoughts so far:

i think while he was dead, wei wuxian was semi-conscious or at least aware of time passing? he has a few direct thoughts like "I've actually been dead for many years" (p.14) and indirect "Wei Wuxian had already lost count of the number of years it'd been since he last heard a live person speak ..." (p.13). It can help explain his rather vaguely cavalier attitude towards his traumatic death and his, well, peculiar attitude towards his reverse non-con body possession which is honestly a sentence I really never thought I'd write. I also believe wwx was active in choosing not to "haunt the living, for one, and he'd never saught vengence, for two" (p.17) which makes me think about where he was? I guess he could be in the underworld or something, waiting for his soup of oblivion and reincarnation cycle but there's really no mention of the afterlife and I assume there won't be either but I'm really really curious and could be fun to explore. Also this whole chapter has such a flippant tone and a very easygoing, almost jokey manner. Like calling wwx the most "decent and honest" (p.17) ghost there could ever be -- there's really lots of exaggeration and hyperbole and it's just so very wwx.

but also it's not completely lighthearted of course, you can tell when the narration becomes serious like when wei wuxian becomes incensed about mo xuanyu's life. he insults mo xuanyu at first, lots of "madman" and "lunatic" (p.20), but he continues reading mo xuanyu's horrible eye-straining letters, listens to this poor dead boy's words, and eventually his rhetorical questions become mocking towards the mo family, his narration becomes gentle towards mo xuanyu, ultimately questioning "what kind of hellish life was he fucking living" (p.21). it is forgiveness despite the reverse non-con body possession, and it starts the novels characterisation of wwx really well, a subtle moral declaration of standing with the weak and the helpless, of revealing his great and deep empathy. like i believe wwx genuinely felt bad this tortured boy destroyed his soul to fulfil his last wish only to get an evil ghost that wasn't even evil. like it just made me so sad reading this part, you can feel the tragedy of a life cut short because of cruelty. really, wwx so called trecherous, wwx the mad. wwx, forever righteous and just.

i adore foreshadowing and comparisons that can be made between mo xuanyu and wei wuxian, and especially how mo xuanyu's backstory sets up like a miniature version of wwx backstory vs the cultivation gentry, already establishing an anti-classism/aristocracy theme. "It appeared that, despite how the cultivation world had demanded Wei Wuxian's demise, they nevercheless had no qualms about making use use of of his his inventions." (p.33) truly what righteousness, what orthodoxy and what single broad path? only hyprocrisy and the insular gentry, a world soaked in the blood of the weak, gorged on by the powerful.

also wwx is so smart? i love how he questions and deduces his way into knowing how to fulfil mo xuanyu's unknown wishes. like him publically putting out a spectacle and humiliating the mo family was very funny but it makes it rewarding when it's also revealed as an information gathering situation of the mo family, the village, the servants, as well as finding out who the cultivators invited are, AND if this level of revenge was enough to fulfil the contract was just ingeniusly written into a very fun interaction. this plus the flag "stealing" scene really shows how wwx can really think on the spot to achieve his covert goals while masking it as fun mischief and like his understanding of social dynamics and utilisisation of prejudice/preconceptions is extremely proficient.

and he canonically meditates a lot even within the first few pages so I don't really understand where the fanon "he can't meditate" thing comes from alskkfl

also i like how wwx really didnt want to kill the mo family even if it meant like not dying but even worse dying this time cause his soul would be destroyed which allskdd huh maybe the traumatic death was an indication of smth but also wwx really isn't into killing or escalating situations at all. and then he's all like 'not like it'll be all that hard' about the killing too but still refuses to do so and compared to the whole massacre, blood, supreme evil lord stuff, it really reveals to not trust what the ears hear and only half what the eyes see (butchered edgar allen poe quote btw). and i really like how explaining the summoning also set up the spell backlash concept for later. and wwx really risking it all for the lan disciples because it was the good thing to do.

also i never really thought about it but mdzs is a really cool contrast to most transmigration/time stories I've read? mdzs is a really great reversal of the transmig/time-reversal genre tbh which should be expected of mxtx considering svsss i suppose! but like setting it 13 years into the future instead of the past, having the body snatching be intentional from the original owner, explaining the rules and that there had been previous and recorded historical accounts of this type of body trading, making the protagonist accidentally fulfilling the contract instead of actively, and many other things! it's great, it really is!

okay!! my brain is melting right now and i still have so much more to say like the lan disciples!!! and lan sizhui!! omhygod my boy!! but yeah! brain melt! so see you next time!!!

[magical-girl-coral]

Wyll quest rewrite attempt number 39, take one, featuring a blank tav for self insert reasons.

(spoilers for act 3)

As the party crossed Wyrm's rock, a hellish figure waited for them near the entrance to the lower city. The smell of sulfur was familiar, and yet that was where the familiarity ended. [Tav] prepared their weapon in case it's a new enemy they have to put down. The rest of them followed suite.

Karlach's eyes widen in shock when the figure finally came in full view. A yellow cambion with blue eyes. She signaled her friends to lower their weapons.

"Flo!" She yelled out. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"What? Is it that odd to visit an old friend after they've been away for so long?" Flo asked back, as if this greeting was the epitome of normalcy. "Honestly, you'd think the living world would have better manners than this."

Karlach's expression didn't move an inch. "Cut the crap, Flo. Just tell us what you're here for or fuck off."

Flo huffed in mock annoyance. "And here I thought we could at least have lunch first. Very well." She turned to face the rest of the party. "Mizora is going to kill Ulder Ravengard within the next three days. Whatever he is taken to has him sealed shut enough to keep even the hells at bay, so I'd say you better hurry up."

Wyll eyes widen in terror. "What?" He readied his rapier. "Explain yourself, devil, now!"

Flo grinned. This was obviously the reaction she was hoping for. "You heard me, loves. Mizora is going to kill the grand duke of Baldur's Gate right under everyone's noses. Quite the spectacle if you ask me. Here I thought she knew better than that."

[Tav] couldn't wrap their head around the logic of this decision. It feels so... chaotic, rather the usual lawfulness that devils exude. "But why? What does she get out of this? Wouldn't it be more useful for him to live?"

Flo threw her head back and laughed like a mad hyena. "That's the best part! She fucked up so badly that Zariel has begun to lose interest in her, so now she has to get her hands dirty for the first time in forever."

When she faced the party again, her teeth pierced her smile. "You see, Mizora was originally supposed to just destroy the cult of the dragon seven years ago under boss' orders, but after meeting little baby Wyll Ravengard, she had the brilliant idea of going against Zariel's orders and trick the poor lad into selling his soul to her to "Save" his precious home." She turned to acknowledge Wyll. "The sending stone for an eye was a nice touch though. I'll give her that much."

Wyll just stood there, completely lost to the world, his rapier slowly slipping from his hand. "You... You mean...I.. I never... I never had to..." His breathing was getting worst with every word he choked out. Lae'zel stood closer to him in case he collapsed.

Flo grinned like a shark. "Nope! Fucking none of that was needed! Mizora had just assumed that if she had the son of the duke under her claw, she could slowly influence Baldur's Gate into selling more souls for herself in Zariel's name. Unfortunately, daddy dearest didn't approve of son's new friend, and banished both of them from his beloved home. And now Mizora is trying to fix that mistake by killing Ulder to pressure little Wyll into a new contract. Would have been brilliant if she wasn't so stupid to begin with.

[Tav] was somehow even more confused then they were before. "Why didn't Mizora allow Wyll to tell Ulder how he sold his soul to save Baldur's Gate? Wouldn't have that helped them both stay?"

Crackling like a rabid dog, Flo continued. "Because Mizora herself couldn't say a word about the event. The cult came into power thanks to Zariel not noticing who was selling their soul to her, and wanted to clean up this mess she made without anyone ever knowing she had a hand in it through fucking up her paperwork. Thanks to that, Mizora couldn't speak a word of the cult to anyone, and since Wyll was her little pet, she decided he should share her suffering to avoid a little tongue slip and igniting Zariel's wrath. We were only allowed to speak of this incident a year after it was done, but of course Mizzie just had to leash her favorite a little harder than she needed to. What a beautiful wreck of a conclusion."

Wyll was fully leaning on Lae'zel by the time the story was done, too numb to the world to feel his limps around him with erratic breathing making it all worse. Karlach shielded him from her 'friend'. "That's enough, Flo. You've had your fun, now beat it before I beat you."

Flo hummed. "So be it. This will keep me entertained for days anyway. Tata for now!"

With a mocking wave of a hand, Flo returned to the hells, living only ashes and the stench of Avernus behind her.

Wyll had collapsed on the ground, Lae'zel catching him just in time. [Tav] turned their head in worry. "Shit, Wyll!"

They knelt by his side, bringing cold water to his lips. "Stay with me, alright? We have three days to find your father. We got time."

"That's not it," Wyll wheezed out, "That's not it at all. My home. I've been away for seven years. For nothing. It was going to be saved. She was going to save it. I didn't have to lose my eye. I didn't have to be alone. She took it all from me. Everything. That..That..."

"That cunt," Astarion finished for him. It was hard to tell if he did it out of sympathy, or just as a good excuse to curse someone out to the wind.

Wyll chugged the clown water and gingerly rose to his feet. "I think I need to get back to camp. Or an inn. Just, somewhere to be alone. Get my thoughts in order. Maybe throw up. I don't feel like I know anything anymore."

Shadowheart slung Wyll's arm around her shoulder. "I heard there's a tavern close by called the Elfsong. We can camp there for the evening."

The party had continued forward, with Wyll walking right in the middle of it, being protected from all sides in case another unwanted surprise pops up. [Tav] was in the front with Karlach, a few more questions on the tip of their tongue.

"Why would Flo spill all of Mizora's plans to us? Do you think they have another motivation?"

"Don't worry your little head about," Karlach answered. "Flo is only here for a good time. It's just that her good time usually involves someone else having a shit day from hell. I can see why she did it; if we fail, Wyll will be miserable from not being to save his dad. If we succeed, Mizora will be seen as a fool at best and a useless vessel at worst. Either way, Flo will have her fun."

[Tav] grimaced. "If this was the best company you could find in Avernus, I don't even want to think about the rest of it."

Karlach snorted. "Trust me, you really don't"

_____________________________________________________________

A few notes:

1). Flo's color choices was to balance out the cambion color pallets. Raphael has red skin and yellow eyes, Mizora has blue skin and red eyes, so Flo has yellow skin and blue eyes.

2). If the party find the iron throne before the the day limit is up, Mizora appears just as they enter it, finding it thanks to Wyll's stone eye. If the party misses the three day mark, Ulder is dead with his soul taken to the hells, so the usual resurrection scroll or revival wouldn't work.

3). The new contract goes like this: Ulder's soul has been claimed by the hells after he was trapped in Avernus along with the city of Elturel. Wyll's new choice is between sending his soul or his father's into enteral damnation.

4). I mostly wrote this out of annoyance when I found out Ulder dies if we go to the iron throne before meeting Mizora at act 3. It's so fucking dumb. Just kill the man before you do your dramatic entrance, you dumb bitch. You'd think her horns pierced her brains with how she thinks.

[amplifyme]

In celebration of the 25th anniversary of Fight the Future. A little post-movie feel-good fic. Thanks again to @lilydalexf for scouring her personal fanfic vault and presenting me with a copy of something I'd written 25 years ago that I'd thought was forever lost. You are a treasure, m'dear! 😘

Shift (aka The Lost Fanfic). Read on AO3. PG-13. UST. Slow burn.

"Let me see if I'm understanding you, Mulder." Scully silently offered to swap her container of shrimp fried rice for his Mongolian beef. "You're saying that our work on the X-Files should be considered the norm, as opposed to the typical white-collar worker with the house in the suburbs and the two point five kids?'

"And the Range Rover," Mulder added as they traded off. He took a bite of the rice and talked around it, his typical enthusiasm overriding any need for manners. "What I'm saying is that we're hardwired to seek out new experiences, blaze new trails. The human intellect demands new and different challenges, and if we ignore that basic need we run the risk of becoming complacent; the perfect target for any organization with enough power to literally take over our lives."

He set the container on the coffee table and tore open a packet of hot mustard with his teeth, liberally dousing an egg roll with the runny yellow substance before inhaling half of it in one bite. Scully watched with bemusement. A grazing Mulder was a sight to behold.

"So, if everyone was hunting down fat sucking vampires instead of sitting behind a desk or flipping burgers, the world would be a better place?" She waited as he furiously waved a hand in front of his open mouth and grabbed his beer, draining the last couple inches from the bottle. Pushing forty and he still hadn't figured out how much hot mustard was enough.

"That's kind of simplistic," he declared when he could talk again, "but yeah. Just think about it, Scully. What if the majority of the population could see just a fraction of the things we have? Think of how much more open-minded people would be to extreme possibilities. The idea of a race of aliens bent on colonizing the planet with not so benign intentions would be much more easily accepted."

Mulder held his hand out for the beef, giving her some time to consider what he'd said. Night had fallen and his living room was bathed in shadows. Light spilled from the kitchen doorway. Aside from the cool blue cast by the muted and ignored TV and the soft glow from the newly stocked fish tank, it was the only illumination in the apartment.

"But, Mulder, you're assuming that the majority of the world's population would even want to know the things we know. Contrary to what you might think, most people are perfectly happy living a life of order and routine. I dare say most of them would go out of their way to avoid the changes that kind of knowledge would inevitably bring."

"Ignorance is bliss?"

"That's kind of simplistic," she remarked, catching his faint smile as she echoed his earlier jab, "but yes. Most people just want to be left alone to live their lives as they see fit. Change isn't always a good thing, Mulder."

"But it's inevitable," he argued. "Chaos is the norm. I can't believe I'm the only one who realizes that." He chewed and swallowed another bite, staring off into space. And then he looked in her direction, aiming the full force of his gaze squarely at her. His eyes were suddenly darker and more soulful. More aware. In a split second his entire focus had changed, and now everything in him was intent on nothing but her. It was a look she'd seen in his hallway just a few weeks ago, and one not easily forgotten.

"What about you, Scully? Is ignorance bliss?"

It was a question fraught with many different meanings - and they both knew it. That he felt comfortable enough to ask anyway was a sign of how much things had changed. It wasn't just one event out of all the events of the last month: it was the sum total of them that had led to this new and still tentative honesty; the constant awareness that they were standing on the brink of something brand new and yet older than time.

It was an electrifying feeling that had her thoughts careening wildly. She was smart enough to realize that what was blossoming between them was a strange and beautiful thing, but it was also a double-edged sword, and she wasn't entirely certain she was emotionally prepared to deal with the risks it entailed.

She held his eye, determined not to flinch, and chose to answer the easier version of his question. "No, of course not. It would be foolish of me to try to pretend that none of these things have happened." She glanced away and then back at him. The fact that his attention had shifted to the food and off of her allowed her to elaborate more than she might've otherwise.

"I guess I'm uneasy with the inherent changes that certain kinds of knowledge bring. I've always been a creature of habit, Mulder. I like routine. I like knowing what to expect. And despite the rather bizarre lifestyle I seem to have established, I've been able to adapt fairly well. It's just that sometimes it gets a little overwhelming."

"There's nothing wrong with routine, Scully. You're taking me too literally." Apparently, her deflection had worked. At least for the time being. He went on in his slightly professorial monotone. "The daily grind is a natural outgrowth of living in a civilized society. All I'm saying is that it tends to make us lazy and stupid. And that leaves us vulnerable to anyone or anything who cares to take advantage of the situation."

Mulder scrubbed his newly cropped hair and slouched back against the couch, one hand unconsciously and contentedly rubbing his stomach. "I probably don't have to tell you this," he continued, "but I thrive on change. I like chaos. It keeps me sharp. The best thing about not knowing what might happen next is that you're prepared for anything."

She pushed away from the food and settled back next to him, their shoulders barely brushing. "But, Mulder, we all need some kind of stability, a constant we can depend on. Otherwise, we'd spend our lives wandering aimlessly from one experience to another, without any kind of cohesiveness. I hear what you're saying, but there's nothing that prevents us from living an ordered life except our own inability to make sense of the very chaos you seem to cherish."

He rewarded her with a low chuckle. "Is this a kinder, gentler way of telling me I'm crazy?"

She shot him a dismissive look. "No. I'm just baffled by your attitude. Don't you ever find yourself wishing for a simpler life; one where you knew what to expect from day to day?"

"You make it sound like I don't have that already."

She gaped at him and then recovered. "Okay, now you've completely lost me. You wanna explain to me how you can possibly describe your life as simple?"

"Well, using the criteria you've established, it is simple. I have the stability you spoke of. I have that constant."

She snorted softly. "And that would be… what? That your stability is the fact that you have none? That your only constant is change?"

He turned his head and pinned her with a look, his words echoing the gentle rebuke she saw in the mossy green of his eyes. "You haven't been paying attention, Scully."

Still sprawled on the couch, his face bland, the only clue to Mulder's anxiety was the almost imperceptible bouncing of one leg. "I realize that the aftermath might be a little foggy to you, but I find it hard to believe you don't remember what was said just outside that door." He tilted his head toward the front of his apartment. He made no attempt to elaborate. His words lay solid and heavy between them, offered up like a gift she couldn't refuse, even if she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to accept it just then.

She'd been anticipating this. She'd thought about it enough that she'd even come to think of it as The Moment of Truth because of its potential to shift a large portion of her life in an unknown direction. Formulating possible responses to Mulder's probable remarks about what had happened and what'd been said had been uppermost in her mind lately. When he’d jokingly accused her of daydreaming just the day before, she hadn't been able to argue the point. He'd been right: she'd been far too distracted the last few weeks. Maybe it was best just to get things out in the open - for her continued sanity, if nothing else.

But before she could say anything he beat her to it, apparently misconstruing her long silence as refusal to take his bait. "Well," he rasped, sitting up and pulling a hand down his face, "this is an awkward moment. Look, Scully, forget I said anything."

"No," she quickly assured him, laying her hand on his back. "No, it's okay. I was just… I'm just not sure what to say, Mulder."   

He glanced back over his shoulder at her. "Well, I think I made my feelings pretty clear."

She certainly wouldn't argue with that. While she couldn't claim to remember much after she'd been stung in the hallway outside his apartment, the memory of Mulder's strangled words and the thrill of realization as he'd moved in to kiss her were etched into her brain. And now it was obvious that he was expecting her to come clean about her feelings. Yet another version of their well-established “I showed you mine, now you show me yours” game. Only this time it wasn't theories they were trading.

If Scully'd had a list, she could've checked off the symptoms of reticence she was experiencing, one by one. First came the dry mouth, followed closely by the leaden feeling in her stomach. Then the reeling in her head as she began to contemplate all she could say wrong despite her best efforts to put the correct spin on things. If discussing emotions were as simple as analyzing facts and figures, debating hypothetical situations, she'd be in the clear. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case.

She'd never been very big on flowery declarations; the words had always stuck in her throat every time she'd attempted it. She was a woman of action, and if forced to 'fess up, would much rather show than tell. And so that's what she did: sitting up and perching on the edge of the couch next to him, she gently turned his face toward hers and leaned in to kiss him. She was aware as her lips brushed his that he had gone completely still. She didn't linger, choosing instead to make it a chaste but tender kiss, pulling away after just a few seconds. Her hand stayed at his jaw a little longer though, as her fingers memorized the slight abrasiveness of his evening stubble. His eyes, when she raised hers to meet them, were both amused and a little shocked.

"There," she whispered. "I hate leaving things unfinished."

Mulder's eyebrows crept up and he gave an infinitesimal shake of his head. "That's it?" he asked. "You mean we're done?"

Now it was her turn to be taken aback. "What were you expecting?"

As his hands lifted to cup her cheeks he murmured, "C'mere and I'll show you."

Chaste was clearly not what Mulder had in mind. Not that she was complaining. She was too busy admiring the way his bottom lip was expertly nudging hers apart, opening her mouth to admit just the tip of his tongue. He briefly touched it to hers before sweeping it across her upper lip and withdrawing, pulling back just enough to be able to look her in the eye. Permission was asked and granted in the few moments it took her to curl a hand around the nape of his neck and bring his mouth back to hers.

Scully decided that his idea of what constituted finishing business was much more comprehensive than hers. She also decided that kissing him was something she really enjoyed doing and vaguely wondered what had taken them so long.

Good little investigator that he was, Mulder was busy making a thorough exploration of her mouth. It occurred to her, in some distant, foggy place in the back of her mind, that the shift she'd predicted was indeed inevitable. Funny thing was that the reality of it didn't scare her nearly as much as she'd thought it would. She allowed herself to completely relax into their kiss, with Mulder sensing her acquiescence and slowly easing her down onto the couch, his arms cradling her. They ended up with Scully lying against one of the throw pillows, his upper body draped across hers, their legs tangled.

It took her a few seconds to force her eyes open after Mulder finally broke for air. She found him looking down at her, his expression a wickedly potent mixture of affection and good old-fashioned lust. One corner of his mouth drew up just the tiniest bit.

"That was more what I had in mind," he informed her. And then he dipped his head and began to plant small, wet kisses down the line of her jaw. His hand slid up her back and gathered a fistful of hair, gently but determinedly drawing her head back and exposing the tender skin of her neck to his mouth. The soft cotton of his dress shirt rubbed against her stiffening nipples through the silk of her blouse and bra, setting off sparks of heat traveling swiftly through her body.

Hoo-boy.

It'd been a very long time since she'd felt the weight of a man's body on hers, the delicious friction it created. Forever since her hands had roamed over corded muscle and curve of spine. Too long since she'd felt the heat pooling deep within her and someone there to share it, add to it, eventually douse it. What made the cottony thickness of her arousal even more enjoyable was that it was the real thing this time - not some fantasy Mulder who came to her only in the relative safety of her dreams. And there was only a little part of her that wondered if perhaps they should slow down and think about this some more.

She didn't know whether to laugh or cry when Mulder muttered against her neck, "You're gonna have to tell me when to stop, Scully, 'cause if you leave it up to me, I won't."

God bless his considerate, gentlemanly little heart.

Damn it.

"Then maybe," she managed to utter even while threading her fingers through his hair and urging his mouth to points south, "we should stop and think about this."

Deft fingers began working the buttons on her blouse. "Okay. Just say the word and I'll stop."

Oh, she didn't want to do this. She didn't want to stop him. She had a sudden urge to strangle the life out of the sensible little voice in her head. If such a thing were possible, that is.

"Mulder."

"Hmm?"

"Stop."

He groaned in noisy protest but did as she asked. Resting his chin between her breasts, he peered up at her. Hair askew, eyes warm but a little wary, he was the most gorgeous man she'd ever had the pleasure of lying beneath. He was content to wait quietly while she pronounced sentence on him, trusting her to do what was best for both of them. That particular trust was a heavy burden he'd placed on her long ago, and one she'd struggled to throw off more than once. But here and now, she was beginning to realize that it was also a precious gift. And it gave her far more power over him than she even dared contemplate. 

"Is this what you had in mind in the hallway?" Her voice was intentionally rich with humor. It was important that he know she wasn't upset by his attempted seduction. Getting their wires crossed about this was the last thing they needed.

She watched as his eyes lost their wariness. The hint of a boyish grin crossed his face before disappearing behind his trademark deadpan expression. "Actually," he quipped, "I was kind of hoping to make it to second base." And with that, he deliberately began to refasten the buttons he'd managed to undo. His knuckles unintentionally brushed fire along her breasts.

"Don't give up, Slugger," she told him as he finished, her voice gone slow and husky. "You haven't struck out yet."

The look on his face was priceless. She couldn't help but grin at him. His answering smile was enough to light up the room. He sat up and pulled her along with him, waiting until she was settled before he twisted around and sat down on the coffee table across from her, his long legs caging hers. Mulder reached out and caught one of her hands in his. He took in a breath and let it out slowly. "The truth is, Scully, I accomplished everything I set out to do that night. The rest of it… just icing on the cake." There was a beat of silence. "Well, except for the bee sting. That kind of put a damper on things."

"Mulder…"

"No, let me finish. I'm sorry it took me so long, but I want you to know I meant every word I said."

"I know." She squeezed his hand and ducked her head, not wanting him to see the sudden tears that threatened to spill over.

"Do you? Because that's all that really matters to me. I don't ever want you to think that I don't value you, or that you're not the most important thing in my -"

She cut him off with her fingers pressed against his mouth. If he kept it up, she'd lose her struggle to hold off her tears. She didn't want to turn into a blubbering idiot, not now. Not when smiling had felt so good.

"I know," she repeated.

His eyes flicked over her face, reading it like a map only he could decipher. Long seconds passed before he nodded slowly, satisfied by what he'd seen.

"Good," he said. "That's good."

She took a few moments to study his familiar features, softened by emotions he rarely let show. She took in the relaxed line of his jaw, the warmth of his eyes, the hair that stood up in tiny spikes on the top of his head. And the seductive fullness of his mouth, still moist from their kisses. She could drown there, she realized, and not give two hoots about anything else. It was a dangerous and compelling prospect.

She reached up and smoothed her hand over his unruly hair. "I guess this begs the question of what we do now."

He looked aside for a minute and then back at her, shrugging. "We keep on keepin' on. We see where this thing takes us. We fight the good fight. We start scheduling regular make-out sessions."

"Just thought you'd sneak that last one in there, huh?"

"Nothing gets past you, Scully."

She was trying to focus on the issue at hand. He wasn't going to make it easy. She knew this Mulder well. And she could tell he wanted to play, revert to his habit of joking about the most serious of subjects. All the nervous energy he'd suppressed just minutes ago had broken free. Both legs had taken up a gentle bouncing, his hands moving like moths around a flame: glancing off her knees, her hands, her arms, before flying away, only to return again.

Sometimes it was a pain in the ass always being the grown-up.

She grabbed one of his hands and held it tightly in both of hers. He went still almost at once, his keen sense of her innate composure helping to ground him. She vaguely wondered what would become of him if something happened to her. She could picture him floating off into space like an errant helium balloon, with no one to pull him back. She was his safety line; a fragile string that was nonetheless durable enough to keep them both anchored to the ground - even if Mulder was always looking up into the sky, wondering what he might be missing. 

"This is going to have an impact on everything," she told him as she caught his eye. "It's going to change everything."

He pursed his lips and jerked an eyebrow. "Maybe. But it's impossible that you'll ever be more important to me than you are right now, so that won't change."

"What if it does, Mulder?"

"That's not gonna happen." She opened her mouth to protest but he cut her off, grasping her shoulders and gazing at her with single-minded intensity. "I won't let it. I'm one relentless sonofabitch, Scully. It's gonna take a nuclear explosion to pry me away from you now. And I won't risk the only thing that matters to me unless I'm absolutely certain it's the right thing. How could it, how could we, be anything short of incredible?"

Five years with Mulder had programmed her to automatically begin formulating an argument to counteract his latest bizarre theory, and this time was no different. While her brain shifted into overdrive, spitting out a dozen reasons why they couldn't afford to be so blasé about the whole situation, her heart was busy tugging her in a different direction. One that whispered to her that he might have a point. Not every decision had to be based in logic - she'd slowly begun to realize that. Sometimes you just had to go with your gut.

"And besides," Mulder suddenly blurted into the silence, "who else would put up with my sorry ass?"

Strange how the simplest phrase could be the deciding factor in such a life-altering decision. He wasn't being facetious, despite the joking tone of his voice. He honestly believed that she was the only one who'd ever understand him, who'd willingly accept him for all that he was. Who'd see that what he did made a difference. And though there were times when she'd wondered if someone more open to extreme possibilities might be better for him, she knew in her heart that no one could ever feel about him the way she did. And no one could ever challenge, respect, trust, and complete her the way Mulder did.

“You made me a whole person.”

Isn't that what it came down to in the end? Wasn't that all that really mattered? Suddenly, nothing was more important to her than that he know what was in her heart.

"I want you to know something," she told him. "And I want you to listen to me very carefully." Mulder gazed at her with cautious chameleon eyes. "I want you to know that no matter what happens now, one thing will never change. What you do makes a difference. I know it doesn't seem like it most of the time, but it does. You have to believe that. And I want you to know how proud I am to be a part of that. You're an honorable man, Mulder, and you lead an honorable life. And I want you to know I'd be proud to be a part of that, too. In whatever form it takes."

She watched his face carefully as she spoke, cataloguing every emotion that passed over it. There were many things to see there, as he nervously chewed his lip and took in her words. But what she was left with was a mixture of tenderness and pride that nearly made her dizzy.

Mulder opened his mouth a few times before he finally got anything to come out. "Can I…" His brow furrowed and he cleared his throat and tried again. "Can I just hold you, Scully? For a minute?"

She reached for him, and they both stood, knowing that the limited contact they'd have otherwise wouldn't satisfy either of them. She went easily into his embrace, her head tucked under his chin, her arms wrapped around his waist. He held her loosely for a moment before tightening his arms and drawing her even closer. They stood toe to toe, touching everywhere it was possible to touch, the contact sweet and heavy with the promise of things to come.

Mulder dipped his head until it rested against hers. His chest expanded as he took in a deep breath and then released it with a ragged sigh. "God, you feel so good. So good."

She tightened her arms around him, wanting nothing more than to be enveloped by him, held in his warm and welcoming embrace for as long as he'd let her. Judging by his remark, that could end up being a good long while.

And that was okay. It was better than okay.

"You know what, Scully?" he murmured against her hair.

"What’s that, Mulder?"

"Someday soon we're gonna have really phenomenal sex."

Maybe even sooner than he thought.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

[alltimefail-sims]

LORE TIDBIT TIME WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Did you know Vlad was apart of the settler colony who mysterious disappeared? This is obviously a nod to the Roanoke colony which I think is sooo cool. What do you think happened to Vlad's colony? I like to think Vlad was turned or became a vampire and whipped them out.

HELL YEAH LORE TIDBIT ABOUT VLADDY DADDY!!! 😏

I'm going to treat this as a "deep dive" into Vlad and Forgotten Hollow, so I'll be adding it to my Deep Dive Series tag. Unsurprising to literally everyone, but this is gonna be a long one.

So… let’s get into it! ↓

Going into this I will admit that I actually did know this about Vlad!! I've been wanting to talk about it for forever but have never gotten around to it haha. 🤭 I'm a bit of a history nerd and I love a good spooky story/conspiracy, so naturally the Roanoke Colony was one of my obsessions when I was around 11 or 12 years old.

I think it's an interesting tie in from the sims team, I'd even say it's a bit meta because I feel like the game normally sticks to making references toward itself and its own canon characters/events while generally staying away from anything that would be too direct of a reference to "our world." Personally though I wish they broke the fourth wall more! I like easter eggs or hidden details that make it easier to imagine the characters existing not in their isolated, imaginary worlds, but in ours instead.

It's interesting to think about why the sims team might have made this connection - was it just a cheeky, unserious little wink to a well-known unsolved mystery, or was it done for the purposes of creating implications and expanded lore regarding Vlad and Forgotten Hollow (a case of them showing us instead of telling us). There are so many theories archaeologists and historians alike have had about the lost colony of Roanoke over the years: some believe the Roanoke colonists could have all died by disease or famine, some believe they could have been victims of a deadly storm, some believe they were attacked by neighboring tribes or by Spanish soldiers. Nowadays there are scholars who will argue that no tragedy befell the settlers at all and that they simply relocated (that would be why they left "Croatoan" behind - there was a nearby location referred to as Croatoan Island, now modern-day Hatters Island).

With that in mind, along with Vlad's own refusal to recall the details of this event, it's safe to assume that the sims team isn't referring to the happier Roanoke theories...the 25 colonists of Forgotten Hollow likely faced an unfortunate end.

Your theory of Vlad being turned and thus wiping out the colony (I'm guessing due to new-turn bloodlust) is sooooo compelling, the implications of that scenario are delicious and I personally never thought of it from that angle! My theory is only a little different: I agree that Vlad was turned on the day that the colonists "disappeared" (whatever that implies), but I have always played Vlad's story not as if he was turned and then killed everyone after, but rather that the thing that turned him successfully killed the other colonists but accidentally turned Vlad. It's a really long story that I play around with for fun in my brain but the short-ish version is: Vlad awoke outside - cold, alert, sweaty, dirty and covered in his own blood - but somehow alive, which he was thankful for. His new immortal condition is still unbeknownst to him at this point, but he felt an ache like never before, so deep in his bones it was excruciatingly painful, but his senses were heightened tenfold. He didn't remember much, just that the colony had been under attack the night before. His relief to be alive rapidly melted into abject horror as he found everyone else (friends, neighbors, family, children) dead. He realized soon enough what had happened to him and stayed in Forgotten Hollow where he would be memorialized as its "founder." He spent his days hellbent on retaliation and retribution, but was also steadfast in continuing the work that was began there before the attack. Eventually he does get to face off with the vampire who attacked him and his people, killing it and rising to power in the vampire world. He keeps the events close to his chest because they were traumatizing and cause him sadness, and he's worked diligently to remove himself from his humanity/human memories and from emotions in general (thus how he has become the person we see today). I always thought if he killed the colonists himself the other vampires in his circle - at least his closest confidantes - would know (as he's got quite the massive ego), but they don't seem to have knowledge of this event and they never mention it. I've thought that it could be possible that sharing the memories of this event would make Vlad feel weak, and he's not one to boast in his weakness. He'd much rather rewrite history in a way that is beneficial to his image; dragging up emotions about dead people would not bring them back to life, and by burying this history of a massacre in Forgotten Hollow he is also creating some mystery around himself and making it easier to play the role of a great-great-great-great grandson (or whatever he's pretending to be, relationship-wise) to the original founder.

But that's just how I play with Vlad! 🤷 I could be way off-base lmao!

Regardless of what happened, we know Vlad is the sole survivor of this event and he is scarred by it, impacted so deeply that he only ever vaguely alludes to it with no clear explanation. Whether he killed the colonists himself or just witnessed their death, the sims team will probably never give us concrete answers (and frankly, that's probably for the best considering their track record). But the clever connection of the LOST colony and FORGOTTEN Hollow are clear as day and I just think that is freaking cool! The occult lore in TS4, especially regarding Vlad and Forgotten Hollow, make interesting framework for storytellers and lore-lovers alike! Vlad is one of those characters who has sooooo many interpretations, and I eat up each and every one!

Okay, I think that's all I've got for now! Sorry about my word vomit! Somewhat related: here's an article I recently read on Roanoke that talks about the archaeological finds which have changed some of the discussions surrounding whether the colonists survived or not! I found it pretty interesting and you might as well!