#some sequences in the middle were just great

[you-should-care-about-animation]

Chicken for Linda! - Chiara Malta & Sébastien Laudenbach (2023)

[littledollll]

Ok but manipulative obsessive ballet teacher larissa keeping her star student after hours so they can focus on her technique in more ways than one

AND YOU JUST KNOW SHE’LL HAVE HER HANDS ON HER STUDENT AT ALL TIMES

It’s to help your form she says, definitely not just to see how flustered you can get

Private lessons

Ballet teacher!Larissa x ballerina!reader

A/n: is this becoming a thing? I think it’s becoming a thing. I’m kinda obsessed, could be a little AU for us?👀 also I’d like to note that while I’m not gonna specify age in hopes of inclusivity, reader is around their mid 20’s.

HAH I wrote that back when I thought I was gonna have the ideas and motivation keep writing. Anyways, this is my last draft. Hope you enjoy!!

Warning: unhealthy teacher/student relationship, touching, sexual undertones, little bit of mean Larissa

_______________________________

“I will say this once and only once. At this level none of you should not need me walking you through every little step like the girls from baby ballet!” Larissa spoke loud enough to fill the room, before signaling the pianist to begin playing.

Everyone ran to form a line across the back of the room, you ending up fifth in line for the exercise. Perfect spot. Only four in front to watch, and be done quickly.

“However you’d like to start, give me four pique turns to the center, four changing fouettés, pas de bourree and close with a triple.”

One by one each student went. Some being sent back to start from the beginning if they messed up, some going without comment, very rarely did she praise anyone.

Your turn came, you started in a simple fifth position, spotting towards the diagonal which just so happened to be exactly where Larissa was standing. You had no trouble keeping your eyes on her.

“Thank you!” She said in a very clearly annoyed tone. “Finally someone who knows how to spot correctly. The rest of you should learn a little from this starting position. Go on, my dear. I apologize for interrupting your start.” You gave a short nod and began your sequence. Everything was going perfectly until the final part, where you failed to complete the third turn, but saved it by landing on fifth.

You quickly got up and were about to scurry back to the beginning but Larissa spoke up. “No need. You were perfect till the very end and at least saved it. Back of the line.”

You smiled, Larissa smiled back, giving you- a wink? Oh you must have been seeing things. She wouldn’t. What an odd thing it would be for her to do. Regardless, you nodded, looking down as you walked past her only for her to stop you in your tracks and tilt your chin up with her pointer finger. “A ballerina walks proudly. She floats with a straight back and gentle steps. Chin up, my dear.”

Surely she could see the dark red blush covering your cheeks, she nodded you off to continue walking, a smile still on her lips.

When she turned to continue the class, her smile fell, and the strict teacher was back.

When everyone was done with diagonal, she called back to center. “That will be all for today. Applaud yourself for the effort and I will see you all tomorrow.” She locked eyes with you as she spoke, before turning to talk to the pianist while everyone packed up and left.

“You. Stay back, my dear.” A few girls looked back, but she was very clearly talking to you. Her direct tone made it seem like you were in trouble, making your heart race.

“O-okay. Should I keep my pointes on?” You spoke as you stopped in the middle of untying the ribbon. “Yes, please do.”

“Is something wrong, ma’am?” You asked softly as you noticed her staring, watching you. She shook her head with a smile. “Nothing at all, darling. You’re a great student, I’d just like to give you a few pointers.”

By the time you finished tying your ribbons back on securely, and stood, walking over to her, everyone else was already gone, even the pianist. And Larissa had closed the door with the last one out.

“I’ll start with how you failed that triple turn. It shouldn’t be much of a difficult thing for someone of your level…” she mutters.

“Yes, I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened.” You said, lowering your head.

Larissa stepped in front of you, so close you could practically feel her breathing as she once again tilted your chin up. “What did I say about ballerinas, sweetheart.”

You blushed at the closeness, this woman was beyond beautiful, and talented. Having her this up close felt like an honor. You felt so small next to her. “They walk proudly.” You answered.

“Good girl. So you do listen.” She stepped back and you immediately missed her presence so close to yours. “Fortunately for you, I do know what happened.”

She rounded you. “Get into fourth, give me a clean double.” You did as told, a clean double pirouette, finishing back in fourth position.

“Good. Now give me a triple, this time focus on what you’re feeling.” Again, you did as told and just like last time fell on the last turn.

“Do you see the problem?” “Yes- I think so.” She nods. “Tell me.”

“My heel is on the floor by the time I’m in the third turn.” She looked at you proudly for a moment. “Very good. You’re dropping your heel. When you do a double it’s no issue because you’re still high on pointe. But you’re turning in demi at the third. No dancer of mine turns in demi at this level. That’s for the little girls. Tell me miss, are you a little girl?”

“I- well- no of course not.” She hummed, bringing a chair in front of the mirror, centered in the room. She pointed at you to move to the center as well as she sat down, crossing her gorgeously long legs.

Any dancer would die for those. You’re sure she was the envy of the whole school back when she was just a student. “You’re acting like it. You turn like it.” Her voice brought you back in the moment.

“Anyone can do a simple turn. I’m sure the damn pianist could come do one for us. Anyone can do a double too. Any one of the juniors at this establishment could. You’re failing, at this age and this level. I mean you can do it, but you don’t do it well.”

“I can. I promise you I can. I’ve done it before!” You rushed to prove yourself to her. She was the last person on earth you wanted to disappoint.

“Well of course you have. You wouldn’t be in this level if you couldn’t pull off a simple triple turn. So what is it? Are you finding the easy way? Is this you being lazy, in my class, miss?”

You wanted to cry at just the idea of disappointing her.. and this was how she saw you? Some lazy brat in an advanced class while she was God herself to you? That wouldn’t do.

“I’ll help you, my girl. You dance beautifully, you move and project emotions the way no other can. But you’re falling at the basics. All the talent and emotion in the world won’t save you if you can’t pull off a good turn. Try to think of any important role to dance which doesn’t turn.”

“There’s not many..” you said quietly. You wanted to bring your head down again, truly, you felt shameful. You could do it, both of you knew that. But you weren’t, why is that? Larissa wondered.

“Not any, my dear.” She sighed, walking behind you. “I want you to try for four turns with me here. I will spin and support you. Just keep that heel up.” You nodded, getting into fourth, and doing a plié before starting your turns.

Larissa’s hands moved quickly around your waist, guiding you through every turn and stopping at the four count. “You’re very capable. You can spot well, you could turn ten times with me here, I bet. But I trust you know that there won’t always be a pas de deux in every show or every dance. There won’t always be somebody to help you turn.”

“Yes I know, ma’am.” She smiled. “Of course you do. You’re a smart girl, my dear.”

“You trust that I won’t let you fall, yet you’re not trusting yourself.” She said, squeezing your hips lightly as she kept her hands in place. “You have the strength to stay up, no doubt. Trusting yourself is just as important.”

“Let’s try to balance on pasé for a few, hm? Get your body comfortable with staying up for a longer time.” She stepped back.

Her eyes were racking over your body. You could feel it, it only made your blush grow deeper. “Slowly. Take your foot from the ground up to your ankle first.” You moved as she spoke, she seemed to approve of that.

“Up your calf… and above your knee. Do not rest it, now hold.” You were perfectly still once she told you to hold position, settling all the shaking in an instant.

“Your breathing cannot interrupt you. I want it to look like you’re not even breathing. Keep that rib cage closed tightly and focus. Imagine there is a string going straight through the center of your body, pulling you up toward the ceiling.”

You breathed slowly, barely. Not even thinking about uttering a word at this moment. “Turning is much easier than balancing. You have more momentum to stay up, and as long as you don’t move and exaggerated amount you can get away with not being perfectly in center with your body. Though you should be.”

You felt the warmth of her hands again. You could see her blurry in the mirror, trying to keep your face straight. You stared right into your own eyes.

Her hands were under your breasts for a moment, pressing down on your rib cage gently. “Tightly closed. Very good, my darling.. very good.” She whispered.

Larissa’s hands caressed your thighs before reaching your knee, spreading your leg a little more open. “I should be able to see you in one line if I were to look at you from the side. Keep your knee aligned with your shoulder.” She spoke softly, having no need for loud words as she was practically pressed up against you.

Your balance shook as she adjusted you, but she didn’t let you fall. Instead helping you find your balance once more before moving on. “You’re focusing too much on me. I’m not even here. Now rest.”

You sighed in relief as she gave that command, letting your pointe trail down your leg the same way it trailed up, until you reached fifth position and got off pointe, allowing yourself to rest.

“That was very good.. I would’ve been a little disappointed had you not done that. Half the girls would rush, out of sheer desperation but you.. you did that stunningly. A very good girl, you are.”

“Thank you, ma’am.. I’ll be honest, I do my best to impress you…” Larissa quirked her brow. “Is that right.. Well, lovely girl, you do a good job at it. Let’s get those turns right and I’ll be even more impressed, proud, even.” Larissa hummed as she traced down your spine with her long fingers, and then reached your skirt.

Shamelessly, she began untying it, removing the garment from your body and throwing it next to her chair. “That thing only makes seeing the things I need to see harder.” You nodded in agreement, feeling your skin heat up as she held your hips for a few moments much longer than necessary.

“We will work on your left side another time. For now I want to focus on getting that left heel to stay up.” She stepped back, moving around you to be in front now. “Give me a triple pirouette.”

You took a deep breath in, breathing out slowly. You moved into fourth position, doing a deep plié before you started.

This time, you stayed up longer, but let your heel fall by the end. Larissa sighed. “Again.”

It went on for some time. Each time you would get closer to doing it right, finally. “Again.”

“Let’s try something. Think about doing four. Set your mind, we’re doing four turns, but remember you’re closing, cleanly, on the third.” You nodded, feeling anxious about how many tries this has already taken. No doubt you felt Larissa was tired of this.

With the thought cemented on your mind, you went for four. Just keep the heel up for four.

“One.”

“Two.”

“Three, close it!” You landed it right as she finished speaking, closing on a tight fifth position, your arms rounded and lowered around your bellybutton.

“Absolutely perfect. You did perfect, my dear. That was the cleanest I’ve ever seen you turn.”

“Why’d you count?” You said in a whiny tone and Larissa couldn’t help but chuckle. “You all hate it when I count. But it helped you, didn’t it? I’m just guiding you, my beautiful girl.”

You smiled, “yeah it did help..”

“Come, sweet girl.” With hurting legs you walked to her, standing in front of her with little idea of what exactly to do. But she grabbed your hand and pulled you towards herself, wrapping you in a soft hug.

It was certainly an odd thing to do, but her warmth was something you seeked.. and God, was being in her arms delightful.

She rubbed your sides gently, caressing over your soft leotard. “You did very well, my star. I want to see this progress shown in the next class, yes?” You nodded, nuzzling yourself against her neck without even thinking about it. And breathing in.. she smelled expensive, a little woody but also floral. You wanted to bathe in whatever perfume it was she wore.

“Very good, my girl. It’s time for you to get home.” You almost whined as you pulled away from her, and Larissa hushed you. “Change out of your pointes, and don’t forget your skirt. I have to close up here soon.”

You nodded, going over to your bag and quickly changing into your street shoes and some shorts. “Um, thank you, ma’am. For helping me and everything.”

“It’s a pleasure to help such a delightful student like you, always.” You blushed, waving a quick goodbye before practically skipping out of the room.

Larissa smiled as she saw it written clear across your face, she had you wrapped around her little finger. What a good girl you truly were.

[crownedwithstars]

Hot Takes and Conspiracy Theories About the Silm by Fourth Age Gondorians

(this post stemmed from the idea of the Silm as a part of some very ancient manuscripts Tolkien was just translating, and how it may compare to real world epics like Edda - stories that may have started as poems and songs written down centuries after the fact in a completely different mode and by someone with very different cultural background than the original context of the poems and possibly with motives about promoting himself or his ancestors. so what if this was how Fourth Age Gondorians regarded the Silm as well and had schools of thought and self-taught enthusiasts debating what the stories actually mean? what kind of takes would they come up with?)

The Two Trees

Valinor did not have some special light-emanating trees and they did not actually die, it's just a nature myth that metaphorically talks about a period when the sky literally darkened; this was caused by some unknown natural disaster (like the explosion of a supervolcano).

references to Tree-light and Elves being enhanced by it is just Noldorin propaganda. 

The Silmarils were not real. At least not as they are portrayed in the Silm. 

there are various theories as to what they really were (religious artifacts? some mandate of rulership? just really pretty jewels and everybody exaggerated how special they were? some kind of a super weapon?), but also more philosophical suggestions that the Silmarils are the elements of air, water and earth itself (hint hint that's why they eventually become part of these), and the struggle over them represents the struggle over rulership of Beleriand/Middle-earth. that in the end the Silmarils aren't really possessed by anyone reflects how all kingdoms eventually fall and nobody under Eru can be a master of the world. 

Fëanor was not a real guy and the sons of Fëanor were not actually related to one another.

like who even is that great and perfect?

he's probably just some kind of a bogeyman made up by the Sindar

did anyone in Beleriand ever even see him? CONVENIENT that he spontaneously combusted almost immediately after he came to Beleriand

also who names their kid "the spirit of fire"??? what if it's not a personal name of any elf but more like a title? or a name associated with some entity that had religious following in Valinor?

there's a clue to this in how Fëanor's supposed sons are mostly referred to as "the sons of Fëanor" or "Fëanorians": it bears thinking that they were not actually related to one another, but "Fëanorian" was a title in a same way that "Fëanor" was a title. It doesn't mean an ACTUAL son to a guy named Fëanor but a devotee to whatever the entity or title named Fëanor represented. 

(they couldn't be real brothers because there just can't be that many hair colours in one family.)

MAYBE FËANORIANS WERE SOME KIND OF A CULT

it was probably some kind of a death cult obsessed with blood and murder, considering their body count 

also because of this they were kicked out of Valinor and all stories about how they WANTED to leave are propaganda. 

Celeborn was at least three or four different guys.

How else do you explain the different versions about who he was?

the one who fathered Celebrían was Galadriel's real true love, but he died in obscure circumstances

this theory you don't really want to talk about much, because you don't want to insult Queen Arwen. Also the current Celeborn may come after you. 

Beren did not actually die and come back

his first death is a symbolic one: he had been estranged from his relatives and people, but by marrying Lúthien he completely leaves behind that life and "dies" as a member of the House of Bëor to become a part of the House of Elwe

he did not come again among Men after marrying Lúthien, in other words he was dead to his original society

the sequence in Mandos where Lúthien pleads for pity was originally a description of a courting scene that got bastardised along the way; she had to go to the remaining members of the House of Bëor and ask for Beren's hand in marriage. They would not agree unless Beren gave up his claim to the title of chieftain, i. e. he has symbolically died. 

Melian was actually Ungoliant

that's why Doriath lasted so long, Morgoth was still scared shitless of her and didn't dare go anywhere near her

Nan Dunghortheb was literally her backyard!!!

why else Lúthien would be able to weave weird dream cloaks???

Húan wasn't a dog, he was an Elf

the idea that he was a dog came from: 

he was the best tracker in Aman, so in Beleriand he was called "The Hound of Valinor". Later generations thought this literally meant he was a dog.  

whoever wrote down the legends about him was a wishful idiot who loved dogs and wanted them to be able to talk (understandable)

Something Weird Was Going On With Maeglin

aside from the obvious, of course

were Aredhel and Eöl really his parents though? was Aredhel even married to Eöl? 

maybe Maeglin was a thrall of Morgoth, or was born in captivity and brainwashed to be loyal, and his task from the beginning was to bring Gondolin down

Aredhel did leave Gondolin like the Silm says, but stuff did not go down like the story tells. 

-during her wanderings, Aredhel somehow found Maeglin and saw him as her shot to stage a coup in Gondolin by claiming he was her son (and male heir for the kingdom). Eöl never existed. Or if he did, he was a random guy Aredhel met and used to her own ends. 

Turgon found out about Aredhel's plans (but not about Maeglin) and he was the one who actually killed her.

maybe she was a Fëanorian cult member in secret and was trying to take over Gondolin for them

Túrin son of Húrin, Mormegil, Turambar and the other aliases associated with The Children of Húrin were actually all different guys

nobody can get up to that much weird shit

the real Túrin probably died in Doriath and Melian covered it up

Elured and Elurin survived. They changed their names and became Elrond and Elros. 

Maglor is the Bigfoot of Middle-earth. There is a dedicated fanclub that keeps track of sightings (which are as obscure and bonkers as you could imagine). 

if you subscribe to "Fëanorians were a death cult" theory, then Maglor is actually an ominous cryptid that foretells misfortunes. 

Thingol is alive and lives as a hermit somewhere in Mirkwood.

Thranduil is aware of it and in fact he has helped to keep it secret all this time.

There are also hot takes about Eärendil and Elwing and whether they were real people. 

Eärendil is a half-elf, actual Star and God's favourite little guy. He has a flying ship and travels in space. He keeps an eye on Satan himself. His birth was foretold, he fought and killed the biggest dragon in history in a massive air battle that caused an entire mountain to collapse, and he may have killed Ungoliant. No real person is that special. 

Elwing wouldn't do what bunch of men (who were maybe in a death cult) told her, she's obviously a villain if she existed. She can't die (was directly prevented by divine powers when she tried to) and chose to be immortal. Also being God's favourite little gal and having the ability to turn into a bird? Very suspicious. 

Silmarien and her descendants were the true heirs of Númenor and if they had ruled, Númenor would still exist

the ruling line had many problematic characters that were not well suited to the role

it also culminated in Ar-Pharazon and all the tragedy that his actions brought

Silmarien inherited some of the most important heirlooms from the First Age, which proves that even her father thought she was the true heir

also Silmarien's descendants survived to maintain was what left of the culture and wisdom of Númenor; further proof of Silmarien's right.

[ikkyfics]

Our Home

James Potter x fem!reader

Summary: "Look, you’ll be able to have your favorite chair there," he said, pointing to a corner of the room next to the fireplace. "And I’ll flop down on the couch after a long day and..." He paused dramatically, spinning on his heels to look at you with a dreamy expression. "We’ll have the most comfortable couch in the world, of course. One that suits us."

Warnings: none

Part 4 of Marry Me

Masterlist

Since you decided to get married, your life had become a sequence of choices and preparations. It was an important step — maybe the most important — and although you weren’t exactly the type of person who planned a fairytale wedding, James made every moment light and unforgettable. After long weeks of searching for the perfect place for your future home, you both finally made a decision: a cozy house in Godric's Hollow. James had fallen in love with the village the moment he stepped foot there — "It’s historic, it’s charming, and there’s a bakery that smells like heaven right around the corner!" — but it was the small white house with wooden windows and the garden in front that won both of your hearts.

It was modest compared to other places he insisted on visiting — some so big you could get lost in a hallway — but there was something about this house. Something cozy, like it had been waiting for you both.

"I still can't believe we found it," you murmured, your eyes fixed on the house as you stood in the garden, hands intertwined, the late afternoon sun painting everything in golden hues.

"I knew it the moment you flashed that smile and started talking about décor." James looked at you with that sparkle in his eyes, the one he only had — intense and sweet, as if the world spun around him. "I would’ve bought any house where you could see the future."

You smiled, feeling your heart warm. "So it’s my fault we stopped here?"

"Totally," he teased, tilting his head and giving you that playful look as if he had already prepared a clever response. "But to be fair, I can kind of picture kids running through the living room. And you yelling at me for leaving toys scattered around."

"You? Leaving toys around? Never."

"I’ll be a great role model for our future heirs. I’ll teach them the art of the perfect organized mess."

You laughed, squeezing his hand before pulling him toward the house’s entrance. The old wooden floor creaked under your feet as you entered, but that only added to the charm of the place. James was clearly excited — he walked around the room with his hair even messier than usual, his glasses slipping down his nose as he pointed to every corner of the house as if showing you something you’d never seen before.

"Look, you’ll be able to have your favorite chair there," he said, pointing to a corner of the room next to the fireplace. "And I’ll flop down on the couch after a long day and..." He paused dramatically, spinning on his heels to look at you with a dreamy expression. "We’ll have the most comfortable couch in the world, of course. One that suits us."

"Do you only think about where you’ll flop, Potter?" you teased, crossing your arms and trying to hold back your laughter.

"Not just that," he said, stepping closer with a mischievous smile. He took your hands and placed them on his chest, leaning in just a little so your faces were close. "I also think about where you’ll pull me to kiss me in the middle of some silly argument about the color of the curtains."

You rolled your eyes but couldn’t resist the smile. "That’s very specific."

"It’s my vision of the future," he retorted, as if it were obvious, before closing the gap with a quick, sweet kiss.

You laughed against his lips, and when you pulled away, you couldn’t help but look around the house again. In your mind, every room was already coming to life. You could picture plants scattered around the room, pictures of you and James on the walls, the kitchen smelling like coffee on Sunday mornings. It was simple, but it was perfect.

"I think I already know what we’ll do first," you murmured, looking at him.

James raised an eyebrow, curious. "Oh yeah? Paint the walls? Change the bathroom floor?"

"No. We’re picking the couch."

The smile that spread across his face was so wide that it made you laugh once more. He spun you in the middle of the room, his arms firm around your waist as your laughter echoed through the empty house.

"You just earned a million points, future Mrs. Potter," he said when he finally stopped, looking at you with those bright blue eyes behind his glasses. "And speaking of which... have you noticed how 'Mrs. Potter' sounds so good? I mean, it sounds perfect."

"You really never get tired of being a goofy, lovesick fool, do you?"

"Not when the reason is you."

He pulled you closer, his nose brushing yours before kissing you again. Unlike the previous one, this kiss was slower, more tender, as if he wanted to convey everything he felt in silence. His hands moved to your face, his thumb caressing your cheek so gently that you felt your knees go a little weak.

When you finally pulled apart, he smiled contentedly, watching the way you looked at him — half lost, half too in love to speak.

"This house will never be the same after we set foot here," he murmured, his eyes locked on yours.

"I hope not," you answered softly. "Because now it’s going to be our home."

James pulled you close to his chest, his chin resting on top of your head for a few seconds, as if he wanted to memorize the moment. He pulled away just enough to look at you, a small but absolutely charming smile on his lips.

"Our home." He repeated the words, as if savoring them. "Do you have any idea how many plans I've already made for us here? And we just picked it."

"Oh, really? What are you planning, Mr. Potter?" you asked, raising an eyebrow, clearly teasing.

He took your hand and began walking through the room, gesturing excitedly. "See that corner over there? Perfect for a bookshelf. A big one, full of books, so when you're reading and ignoring me. And over there, in front of the window, will be the softest sofa in the universe, because I know we'll spend hours tangled up on it. And the kitchen?" He turned, already pointing to the other side. "I can't cook, but I'm absolutely committed to making at least one decent dinner for you."

"A decent dinner? Sounds ambitious."

"Ambitious, but necessary," he shot back, pretending to be offended. "And if dinner's a disaster, you can always comfort me. Or laugh at me. I accept both options."

You couldn't hold back your laugh, shaking your head. "And where are you going to put the broom, huh, visionary? Thought about that?"

He stopped for a moment, pretending to ponder. "Hmm, good question. I think the broom will go in the bedroom. Or even better, on the balcony. We'll have a balcony, right? Because I kinda want to fly at night with you when the sky is full of stars."

"You really can't stop dreaming, can you?"

"Not when it’s about you," he replied without hesitation, his tone sincere enough to make your cheeks warm. "By the way, have you noticed this house has the perfect spot for a garden? I can picture you out there, messing with the plants, while I do absolutely nothing but admire you."

"You are completely impossible, James Potter."

"I know. And you love me for it," he said, with a mischievous grin that made your heart race.

Before you could respond, he pulled you back into the center of the room, his bright blue eyes fixed on yours. "Seriously, what do you think? How do you imagine all this? Tell me. I want to know exactly what will make you feel at home."

You hesitated for a moment, looking around. It wasn’t the house itself that made you dream; it was the idea of a future with James here. Still, you tried to imagine, and the words started flowing.

"I think I want a room with lots of light. Light curtains, you know? And a chair just for me, where I can read and maybe nap while you try not to wake me up."

"I'll fail miserably at that, but keep going," he said, smiling.

"In the kitchen... something simple. A place to have coffee together in the mornings, no rush. Maybe a little spot for plants, because you know I love that. And the bedroom…"

James tilted his head, pretending to be curious. "Ah, yes, the bedroom. Keep going, please. I'm very interested in this part."

"A comfortable bed, of course," you said, rolling your eyes. "And maybe a big window, so we can wake up to the sunlight. We don't need much, you know? Just enough for the two of us."

"You forgot the most important detail," he pointed out, his smile widening.

"Oh, really? And what would that be?"

"You," he said, stepping closer and holding your face with both hands. "You in every corner of this house. Your smile, your laugh, the way you look at me when you think I'm being silly. That’s the only detail that matters."

The comment was so unexpected and so full of sincerity that your eyes welled up. James noticed immediately, his smile softening as he leaned his forehead against yours.

"Hey," he whispered, his voice full of affection. "Why the tears, love?"

"It's just..." you took a deep breath, trying to find the words. "I never thought I’d have something like this. A house, you, a future. It feels too good to be true."

James pulled away just enough to look at you, his bright blue eyes shining with what looked like pure love. "Too good? There’s no such thing as ‘too good’ when it comes to you. You deserve all of this and so much more. I promise this house will be full of happiness. Every corner will tell our story."

You smiled, your eyes still a little watery, and James took the opportunity to steal a soft kiss, his lips conveying all the comfort and security you needed.

"Now," he said, a little more excited, "let's talk about that garden. Because I’m going to plant flowers for you. Lots of flowers. And I’ll let you choose the color."

"Oh, really?"

"Of course. Because I’m a perfect fiancé."

You laughed, shaking your head, while the house around you already started to feel like home.

[enchanting-chit-chat]

Beetlejuice's Backstory and the Black Plague 💚🕷️🥀💀 PART 2

Hello, hellooo! I’m thrilled that so many of you enjoyed my previous post! 🎊 This is the second part of a series dedicated to the Black Plague era, BJ’s past life, and other movieverse theories.

If you missed it, here is PART 1.

Warning: This post contains SPOILERS for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024) and many, MANY speculations.

In the previous segment, I analyzed various pieces of evidence and concluded that Beetlejuice was:

definitely a plague survivor.

possibly a monatto by profession (though this is still debatable).

most likely Italian, living in Italy during one of the historically significant outbreaks in European history.

However, we still haven’t addressed the million-euro question: Which plague outbreak did he live through when he was alive? And the reason I avoided this question until now is that it’s basically impossible to tell for now. Here’s why:

Reason number 1. The two most notable outbreaks in Italian history occurred in 1350 and 1630. However, after the first incident, the disease reappeared in smaller epidemics every few years across Europe. Additionally, upon rechecking my sources, I discovered three more significant outbreaks:

in 1658, mainly affecting Naples.

in 1749, confined to Sicily and Calabria.

the very last one, in 1815, affecting the Bari area (Noicattaro)

After these outbreaks, the disease seemingly disappeared from Italy for good, which is great news but leaves us with many possibilities.

Reason number 2. In both movies, Beetlejuice has repeatedly proven to be an unreliable narrator. This means we can’t take his origin story at face value.

For instance, his claim of being over 600 years old completely contrasts with the clothes he and Delores are wearing in the backstory sequence. That style of fashion is typical of the Baroque period, which flourished from the early 17th century until the 1750s.

To keep it brief: Beetlejuice’s neckband, his three-piece suit, and Delores’ outfit visually suggest that the backstory is likely set in the 17th century and definitely did not occur before the 16th century.

On top of that, consider that Tim Burton navigated various historical periods throughout his filmography: think about Sleepy Hollow, Sweeney Todd, Alice in Wonderland, Big Eyes, and Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. I believe that it’s unlikely that historical inaccuracies were unintentional.

For context, here is what Beetlejuice and Delores would wear if their story was actually set in the Middle Ages, around the 1300s-1400s:

…not quite the same impression they give during the backstory, is it? And lace cravats were invented in the 1660s. This fact alone is significant because:

It would suggest that Beetlejuice is actually 'younger' that what he stated: Personally, I believe he might be around 300-400 years old. However, this is just an approximation, and I might be wrong.

It would imply that the backstory he narrated and showed us might be a lie (partially or entirely).

Or… perhaps he lied earlier about being 600 years old, but the backstory is the actual truth? Maybe he never learned to count properly… who knows?

My point is that there’s no way to discern what is true and what isn’t. All I can do is analyze what I see with my own eyes, hoping to find some answers. And yes, this means that, in PART 3, I’m going to delve into historical fashion, in unnecessary detail.

But that’s fine, I enjoy making sacrifices for this team. 😀

Until then, have a fantastic week! ✨

[murderouswidowsmatter]

Just saw Wicked for the second time, and I for once feel very happy to be in this timeline. It’s so good and shows such clear love for the source material. It really shows that making a Wicked adaptation was Jon Chu’a dream project for years before landing the role as director. Even the title card is a clear love letter to tradition of movies he is stepping into. The casting is great, next to zero complaints, and Cynthia and Ariana are incredible. While I don’t necessarily prefer a closeted lesbian read of Glinda (I don’t think the closet exists in Oz and I think her relationship with Fiyero is genuine), Ariana nailed the gay longing and heart eyes that I like to see in a Glinda. I’ve been strapped to the Gelphie train for over a decade, and I don’t plan to get off anytime soon.

The movie’s not perfect, though, and I do have some complaints. They strip back the instrumentation in a lot of the songs, relying very heavily on percussion (seriously, there is a lot of snare). For a score as iconically epic as Wicked’s, the choice is a bit baffling. It exacerbates the jerkiness of the choreography, which is not my favorite. The dancing has a lot of sharp, jarring movements where people are stomping and lunging. Maybe if the music was more orchestral or if the choreography were different or even if they had just chilled it with the stomping folio, it would be fine. But in combination it’s not my favorite.

The bit the add in the middle of One Short Day with the Wizomania performance is pretty musically weak for me. It loses the melody and the momentum of what should be a very high energy number. I get the exposition was important, but the only good part of the scene was the cameos (which I wouldn’t trade for the world).

In general there are a lot of brakes in the middle of songs for added bits, and while some work for me, others really don’t. The repeated interruptions to Defying Gravity devalue the impact a bit. I mean the leads are so talented that they can carry it, but I think the sequence could do with less cutaways to guards running down halls or breaking down doors. I like the idea of slowing several parts of the song, but the cutaways slow down the pacing enough that you kind of start to feel it when they cut the tempo.

The whole span Sentimental Man and the ending of Defying Gravity could be tightened up a bit. I’m happy that they are doing it in two parts, but I think it could have been a 2 hr movie rather than a 2 1/2 hr movie if they stopped trying to make it an action movie.

[theamityelf]

Makoto enters the Neo World Program to help with the shutdown sequence, but to his surprise, he doesn't find himself in the trial room.

He finds himself on the beach, in the simulation's normal map. The original map, before Junko's twisted Funhouse and her Titty Typhoon and all her other contributions. He was even dressed for the beach, in a tank top and swim trunks.

(Back in the trial room, Junko stops in the middle of some great exposition and exclaims, "OMG, finally! Later, chumps! Sit and spin, or whatever," and she disappears, leaving them confused.)

Makoto feels that she's there. He doesn't have to turn around, but he does, only to get glomped in an unnecessarily tight hug.

"You made it," Junko('s AI) coos. "It felt like I was waiting forever. Did you let me play with those chumps because you were scared to see me?"

He sighs. He kind of knew that he wouldn't have much control over what happened once he was in the simulation, but the fact that he hasn't joined the surviving Remnants as intended is a bad sign. "Get off."

"Oooh, so forward!"

"Get off me, Junko."

She takes a few steps back, eyeing him up like she's taking inventory of his limbs.

"What happened to the trial? What's happening to them, while I'm here?"

"Who knows? Who cares? You didn't actually think this was about them, did you?"

"It is for me."

"Not even that. Come on, those nutty senpais of ours were always just dolls. They're proxies. How about you put on your big boy pants, instead of wetting them, and talk to me directly."

"They're not dolls, and you're not her. She's dead."

"But I'm like her. Aren't I?" She traipses up to him again, trailing her nails lightly over his skin. "Aren't I enough like her?"

She looks completely real. The details of her skin, her eyes, are exactly the same. Her hair is frizzing from the spray of the sea. She's wearing a bathing suit, too. The top piece laces at the shoulders; it's tied into a bow on one side, but on the other it's just a knot. Imperfection. Realism. The placement of the sun directs his gaze to her, and her shadow snakes across the sand.

The sand feels real.

"This is cheating. You didn't win the trial. You haven't earned this. If you don't play fairly, you're admitting that they can beat you if you give-"

"Yawn! You're taking a leaf out of Kyoko's book. We already did this 'I owe you a trial' thing. Take a load off. We're one-one right now. You beat me once, I beat you once. Let's take a walk."

Makoto almost argues, but then he remembers the ancient ruins on the second island and considers that he might be able to get out through there. "Fine. Let's take a walk."

"Yay!" Junko bounces up and down, and he quickly looks away. "I just love this map. As soon as Kamukura plugged me in, I could just smell your nasty little hope-hands all over this thing. Did you notice, I kept all of your ideas in my version of the map, in some form or another."

Makoto starts walking toward the bridge. He did notice that the places that were removed or walled off wholesale were ones that were thought up by other people. He assumed it was a coincidence. After all, how would Junko know which ideas were his? "I'm glad they got to ride the rollercoaster. It looked like they had fun."

"Like we did."

He remembers that class trip. "Yeah. We did."

"Tampering with your map was more fun than this whole killing game. It was like we were making a baby together."

"N-No it wasn't."

"You planted the seed, and I-"

"Nope. I'm walking faster now." He power walks across the bridge.

"Oh no," Junko deadpans, remaining a step behind him. "Your legs. So long."

[hauntingsunshine14]

SPOILERS FOR ALIEN ROMULUS

no seriously like spoilers for the ending not just a bit in the middle

It's just a funny (hilarious) bit of foreshadowing but still spoilers

I'm driving home from watching this movie with my mother, and we're both just yapping about how we liked it, and I was suddenly reminded of what I noticed about Isabela Merced's character Kay!

Early on in the movie, we get a shot of her in bed after she tells Rain that she's pregnant, with a flat oval necklace clearly displayed.

This isn't the exact scene, but example:

you can kinda see the necklace once you zoom in

This medal is easily identifiable even from the distance/lack of detail thanks to Catholic guilt! yay! This is a Miraculous Medal (pictured below)

This is a necklace that centers Mary with a whole bunch of lore attached that details how St. Catherine Labouré saw Mary in a vision (twice technically) and the second time was instructed to

 “Have a medal struck upon this model. Those who wear it will receive great graces, especially if they wear it around the neck. Those who repeat this prayer with devotion will be, in a special manner, under the protection of the Mother of God. Graces will be abundantly bestowed upon those who have confidence.”

tldr: it's a very common and recognizable representation of Mary, they often have these medals at catholic churches as back when I worked at mine they were literally just sitting in the lobby.

What made me laugh so profusely in my car ride home is that Mary is considered literally THE mother in Christan lore and Kay does in fact give birth at the end of the movie... to what is essentially Weyland-Yutani Jesus.

Technically she took David's goo injection and produced the 'Offspring' (apparently what the horrifying human/xenomorph is called) (I prefer W-Y Jesus)

This is a wonderful bit of foreshadowing for the ending sequence, coupled with the engraving of Romulus and Remus and the Capitoline wolf, as well as the painting that was zoomed in on right before of a mother and child. And kinda as well to the whole thing about Weyland-Yutani trying to 'play God' with humanity's evolution.

But, on a larger more franchise-wide scale, this foreshadowing continues on with some of the themes from the previous two movies concerning origins and beginnings, as the whole Mary/Jesus thing is technically speaking, the 'origin/beginning' part of the New Testament. This is shown very plainly in the titles (Prometheus, Covenant, Romulus) which are all pulled from various origin stories - Greek, Abrahamic, and Roman. Prometheus stole fire, the covenants in the Torah/Pentateuch, and the founding of Rome. All different stories about the growth of humanity, ranging from how to live all the way up to founding empires. These ideas somewhat parallel the actual events of the movies.

B/c we watch David - and therefore Weyland-Yutani - discover the goo, experiment on it, learn how to interact with it, and then attempt to build a new empire with it.

It's a very messy analogy and kinda? does not fit with the Mary thing in Romulus, but in very broad strokes it ties in well enough, which for the whole confusing Prometheus/Covenant situation is par for the course.

Overall, Alien: Romulus is an amazing addition to the franchise and at the risk of sounding cheesy is literally a breath of fresh air. Right down to the pacing of the movie, it's classic Alien. I loved it, and even if you haven't seen any of the alien movies or even if you've only seen the first, and even if you have these spoilers, it's a fantastic experience!

(and for all the alien: isolation lovers there's such a cute nod to the game in the movie)

[vinelark]

ALL timkon recs I BEG

hello hi! here are some of my favs! it got long so putting some under the cut

💄 Lipstick on the glass by @cairoscene read for timkon being soft and goofy and disgustingly in love, set in vague future college-y years with amazing core four dynamics too. cair is one of the funniest people to ever exist and we are so blessed that they decided to write some timkon. (also read for my own greatest contribution to literature, the fictional “jerry the void nexus” meme)

🎢 been a number and a name by @wynterstars i had SO MUCH FUN reading this one, a 90s comics-divergent AU where robin and superboy become friends—and crushes—when superboy is pretty new on the scene. feat. lex luthor being terrible, tim staging a rescue operation that at one point involves platform shoes and a blonde wig, spice girls references, and fantastic action sequences. it’s also a series, with an installment focusing on kon & clark, and a currently updating longfic sequel with SO MANY timkon identity shenanigans (my beloved) and kon feelings (also my beloved).

📸 the surveillance series by @smilebackwards i feel like i rec this all the time but it’s because it’s THAT GOOD. a tim-centric AU where tim joins the family late, but is still involved in bat business without the bats realizing. there’s some fun timkon identity shenanigans at the top, and some of my all-time favorite tim characterization (ruthless! lonely! brilliant!) plus a great tim & bruce arc, too.

🦉 Detours by miyaji_08 this is part 2 of a series and i def recommend reading the whole thing! a reverse robins + joker jr au that has lots of trauma and lots of healing, and in part 2 there’s timkon identity shenanigans that’s simultaneously enemies to lovers + And They Were Roommates. tim sure does run a gauntlet of horrors in this series, but it has so much healing and also one of my fav reverse robins concepts i’ve read so far.

📱 unfurl by @burins tim and kon might be dating, and there’s no kryptonian sex ed handy. bruce, being bruce, makes it his business, which means talking to clark and Realizing some things about his own feelings. superbat are billed first here, but i think timkon steal the show—i laughed out loud like five different times reading this. hilarious and sweet on all sides. (and if you like this, check out their timkon road trip fic!)

🌾 A Saturday Evening by malcyon in which tim visits the kent farm for family dinner with kon, feat. very sweet established relationship timkon and fun superfamily dynamics, and it touches on tim’s past grief over kon’s death (and complicated feelings post-undeath).

🤼‍♂️ Sore Loser by @hearteyeshayley kon learns that tim always let him win while sparring, and has to process that. this was such a fun exploration of tim’s prowess as a fighter—one who regularly has to go up against superpowered friends and foes alike—and also tim as a person who is always doing mental calculations about the people around him (in an endearing way). kon, too, got his time to shine and grow, and the ending was so smart and sweet.

🔮 Ascension by Violet_Witch an AU longfic where tim is a witchling and kon is a fallen angel who has (oops) just lost his wings. tim sets out to help get kon’s wings back, and there’s a ticking clock because angel wings are dangerous in the wrong hands—and tim has a big, horrible secret that’s about to come due. the plot/worldbuilding of this was WILDLY cool, and there was a big ol misunderstanding in the middle that had me clawing my face off (in a good way).

🌌 straight on ’til morning by merils kon vs. the terrifying ordeal of growing up, feat. sweet friends-to-lovers timkon and really thoughtful exploration of some of kon’s canon past relationships and their abusive dynamics. i haven’t finished this one yet but it’s been rec’d multiple times and i’m excited to dive back in (and it's recently complete!)—and what i have read so far gave me an amazing sequence of kon and dick interacting and dick’s big brother mode activating in an instant, which is something i now desperately need more of.

📧 aaaand would it even be a reclist by me if i didn’t include send to all by @cairoscene the absolute moment i find myself feeling down i go reread this and boom. i am instantly laughing again. timkon are just one part of a bat grab-bag here but they are so so funny and cute and in-character. maybe one day i’ll compile the timkon-centric sequel that exists in my head but for now i’ll just go reread this for the zillionth time.

okay yeah!! i’m probably missing so many good fics here because i constantly have like a zillion tabs open that i plan to read someday. also i reserve the right to reblog later like OH I FORGOT— but in the meanwhile, happy timkon reading!

[blueberry-lemon]

An introductory guide to getting into Sonic the Hedgehog...

…if you're a grown-ass adult who is busy and doesn't want to play a bunch of video games but thinks the characters look sorta cool.

If you've ever been curious about Sonic as a series but haven't known where to start, I have some recommendations! I think Sonic is a cool and still somewhat unique thing because it takes cartoony characters (like a Mickey Mouse or Felix the Cat) and lets them jump around in cool action sequences through the lens of a shonen anime. It's colorful and usually pretty light-hearted, and I think the character designs are pretty iconic.

There's two handy places you can start without prior context, to see if it's something you'd be into...

Getting Started: If You Wanna Read Something

The IDW Sonic Comics

There were years of different Sonic comics back in the '90s and early 2000's, but the franchise got a complete reboot and fresh start with IDW Publishing in 2018. If you're looking for the most straight-forward way to get into this world of characters, I think this is a great start. You don't need any prior knowledge whatsoever to crack open issue 1 and get started. All you need to know is "Sonic and his friends protect the world by fighting against an evil scientist named Dr. Eggman, who they just recently defeated after he briefly took over the world."

I love these comics and I feel that the writers and artists who work on it have a really good sense for this series. Reading issues 1 through 12 will get you the first major story arc. If you like it so far, I highly suggest reading up through issue 32, when another major story arc concludes. After that, the world's your oyster! Unlike the tangled web of Marvel or DC comics, IDW Sonic has a very simple and linear reading order. You pretty much just read the issues in order, and occasionally there are spinoff stories that are optional to read.

Getting Started: If You Wanna Watch Something

Sonic Mania Adventures

Maybe comics aren't your thing and you want something even quicker. These are a series of animated shorts that are lovely. Conveniently, they've been compiled together by Sega into one little video right here.

It's a great intro to some of the main characters, and combines cartoon slapstick with some amazing action sequences.

There's also a nice little epilogue short.

Sonic CD's intro cutscene

If I had to pick a single 1-and-a-half minute clip to embody what I like about this series, it would be this very simple intro movie that plays before Sonic CD. Check it out!

Sonic Origins/Sonic Origins Plus Cutscenes

In 2022, Sega released a compilation of the classic Genesis games on modern consoles. In it, they added a few animated cutscenes. You can watch those cutscenes, plus the Sonic CD intro and the Sonic Mania Adventures episodes, all compiled into one handy Youtube video.

Taking The Next Step: If You Wanna Read Something

The Archie Sonic Comics

You might have heard that Sonic had a comic series published by Archie Comics from 1992 to 2016. This was a vast, overarching series that wrote an original story by weaving together ideas from the different Sonic cartoons and games. It went through several different writers, many different artists, and obviously spanned over multiple eras of pop culture.

It's pretty cool! The fact that it was so long-running, and the fact that Sega wasn't very strict with what the writers could do, led to a lot of buckwild lore, new characters, and plot developments. That said, it's also pretty bizarre, complicated, corny, and cringey at times. There is a stretch in the middle that is pretty infamous among fans.

You have a few options for jumping in.

Option A: You can start at the very beginning and read all of it. If you do this, it is going to be like a One Piece / Homestuck / etc. kind of undertaking, and you're going to be pushing through the good and the bad of huge genre and tone shifts. That's your call!

Option B: You can brush up on the main characters on a wiki and then start at Issue 160, when Ian Flynn (who now does a lot of work on IDW Sonic) became the lead writer. More specifically, you can jump in at the start of a new story arc by starting at Issue 175.

Option C: You can start at Issue 252, when there is a universe-altering event that essentially retcons all of the characters and plot threads from the previous writers and starts completely fresh. Easier to keep track of and you won't have to worry about all the previous plot and lore.

If you want something you can read in a single sitting, you should instead read Sonic: Mega Drive, a short-lived miniseries published by Archie that follows "Classic Sonic" characters (aka, the same vibe and art style of Sonic Origins, Sonic Mania Adventures, etc.) It's really great!

Taking The Next Step: If You Wanna Watch Something

Sonic the Hedgehog (OVA) aka "Sonic the Hedgehog: The Movie" (1996)

This is, essentially, a 1-hour Sonic anime movie. You can watch it in Japanese or in English. I adore it. It makes up its own lore and continuity so you don't need to know anything before going in, besides generally knowing a one-sentence synopsis of who Sonic, Tails, and Dr. Robotnik are. It's action-packed, well-animated, and has great music. Enjoy! Sonic X If you're enjoying what you've seen so far, and you want something much, much longer...there's an official 78-episode anime adaptation of Sonic called Sonic X. It's an original story that loosely pulls together some ideas from a few of the games. It's mostly intended for a younger audience, but I hear if you watch it in the original uncut Japanese, it feels a little less "for kids."

Other Ways To Get Into Sonic

There's some great video essays on Youtube about the series!

Professional animator Dan Floyd did an in-depth video looking at the highs and lows of Sonic character animation in the games starting from Sonic 1 up through Sonic Forces.

Super Bunnyhop plays through the first level of a bunch of Sonic games to compare how the mechanics, physics, and level design feel throughout the games' history.

Liam Triforce has a great deep dive on the franchise's music.

You can play The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog, a murder-mystery-party themed visual novel put out by Sega. It's nice and short, so you can finish it in an afternoon.

If you haven't seen them already, you can check out the live-action/animated hybrid films Sonic 1 and Sonic 2 featuring Ben Schwartz and Jim Carrey, they're pretty good. That Sonic Prime cartoon that's currently on Netflix is pretty good too.

This may sound strange, but honestly you might enjoy poring over the sprite sheets from the old games. In particular, I really like the sprite animations from the GBA games, like Sonic Advance and Sonic Battle.

Sega is pretty lax about allowing noncommercial fan games, so there's at least a hundred different Sonic fan games out there by hobbyist developers. Check out the Sonic Amateur Games Expo and the Sonic Fan Games HQ.

You can watch LPs or cutscene compilations of the games on Youtube! If you watch Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, and Sonic Heroes, you'll get a crash course on most of the characters.

And finally, of course...you can play the games if you want to! There's a number of them that are available on Steam, Switch, Xbox, and Playstation if you don't have access to older consoles.

There's a lot of different angles to come at Sonic as a franchise, and lots of different entry points. Have fun!

[maverick-werewolf]

Daily Werewolf Thoughts - Days 10-16

More not super prettily formatting werewolf thought posts that I've been doing daily!

Day 10- You don't really love werewolves if you don't enjoy terrible werewolf movies. Which the vast and overwhelming majority of them are terrible, at least if you ask me. But I just love werewolves so much I am driven to watch them (I also love movies with all my heart and soul), and even if the film is beyond terrible - again, as most of them are, even the ones people say are good - there's going to be a few moments that make it worth it, because werewolves are so badass, and I absolutely love studying how they created the werewolf for any film. Here's a bit of a rant for today...

One such film and series is Underworld. I hate the Underworld movies. Yes, stone me. They're terrible. The only one I enjoyed in its own right at all was Rise of the Lycans, since it had a far more compelling story than Selene's tight black leather (I understand why men enjoy this, in their defense) and absurd motivations that only extend as far as what the director wants for the next action sequence - and it was set in the Middle Ages, which is way better as a werewolf story, imo. Anyway, regardless of how I feel about the movies, I LOVE how they handled the practical effects on the werewolves.

The Underworld werewolves are unmatched. I'm not crazy about the design of the main "lie-kans" - I will never forgive the movie for the "lycans" thing btw - because they were specifically designed to be more "cat-like" or even more like a pitbull. For some reason people like to use things like cats, bears, etc to design something called a "werewolf." So I think those initial ones, like in the first film, frankly look pretty stupid. But the "feral" lycan "breed" or whatever they're called that have the more wolfish heads are a very cool design, and ultimately what I'm talking about here is how they were created and put to film. Sidebar: I'm not one of those people who thinks that the instant a movie uses any CGI, it should be condemned; CGI is a tool like any other filmmaking tool, and it can be used to achieve things we otherwise could never film and that are artistically beautiful and creative; but yes, I do prefer practical effects where they can be used.

The werewolves in Underworld were created using bodysuits, animatronics, and creature actors. They wore leg extensions, got big guys in the first place, and had extensive work for muscle, hair, and especially the faces and facial animations. The entire face is created using servos that respond to controllers held by workers off-camera to animate the werewolf costume in real time, while it's being worn by a person. The entire face, eyes, mouth, lips, etc were fully animated using a complex system of animatronics, and a comm system so the actor can be given instructions from the lead puppeteer so everyone can properly sync their work - and the final effect is such a step beyond anything we've seen from werewolf designs of this size in film before - or since.

There are better videos of the later films that had more advanced technology, like Underworld: Evolution (terrible movie but great werewolf effects), but here's one on youtube that has a lot of what was involved: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jWIF8lSlxg&ab_channel=IsaacKoo

*: "feral" by definition most often specifically refers to domesticated animals that have gone wild again and sounds very odd when used to refer to something like a wolf (but it always happens anyway because people don't care about the English language; ask any video game about their "feral wolves")

**: "breed" specifically refers to controlling the birthing of animals to produce a desired outcome, as in domesticated animals, such as dogs, cats, sheep, etc., and it makes me want to become a hermit living alone atop the Himalayas when I see people use it for werewolves

Day 11- I've often wondered what exactly set me down this path of being completely and hopelessly obsessed with werewolves. I've never really had an answer. I've speculated it was just Halloween itself, seeing the very rare and occasional werewolf around, since that's always been my favorite "kind" of werewolf. I have distinct memories of a little werewolf statue in a Hallmark; I really loved looking at that thing (never got it, though, sadly). I've occasionally wondered if it was watching Scooby Doo at my grandma's house - but in retrospect, the werewolves in Scooby Doo of that era weren't much to write home about, so that probably wasn't it. I do know for a fact I've been obsessed with them for as long as I can remember, certainly by age 6, so whatever it was, it started early. I was reading Sabine Baring-Gould's The Book of Werewolves when I was 8, searching for werewolves in video games forever, and I'll never forget the first werewolf figure I got to decorate my desk.

If you ask one of my favorite professors, who sat on the committee that passed ultimate judgment upon what became my book The Werewolf: Past and Future, she would tell you I was led to love werewolves because of "dream visions" (she is a professor and lifelong student of Old Norse, Old English, and the cultures, many sagas, and histories thereof). I told her about how my earliest memories of werewolves and the start of my obsession with them were actually long series of dreams and nightmares I had - a white werewolf would always crop up in them, sooner or later. Sometimes he was on my side, sometimes not. My dreams and nightmares are... very detached from reality in the first place, but the white werewolf became consistent for a long time. What put the idea of a werewolf into my head in the first place? I'm really not sure.

Some of my favorite experiences with werewolves come from playing as them in classic RPGs, including ones where you aren't technically supposed to be one. I loved playing a werewolf in Neverwinter Nights using character editors, cheat codes, and scripts on the big roleplaying server I played on. Now THAT was fun, but that's a whole separate story.

Anyway, I really don't even know. All I know is, I've loved werewolves for as long as I can remember, and I always will, no matter how silly that might seem.

Day 12- Remember when video games called RPGs had actual roleplaying elements in them? Some of the only games that have ever let you play as a proper werewolf are the Elder Scrolls series, specifically Daggerfall and Morrowind: Bloodmoon, the latter being my absolute favorite werewolf game ever. Why? Because you actually played as a werewolf - and all that came with it - instead of lycanthropy being a cool thing and/or awesome button.

In Bloodmoon, if you are a werewolf (having either become one from surviving a werewolf attack - werewolves spawn with INSANE rarity, trust me I found one naturally and it took me weeks, in the wild of Solstheim or you can become one through the main Bloodmoon questline), you will transform each night. You must devour 1 humanoid (playable race) NPC or suffer from hunger and exhaustion the following day, lowering your stats. The transformation will break any armor you have equipped. If someone witnesses the transformation, word of your true nature will spread, and you will be hunted. You are also attacked on sight - but NPCs will often run away rather than dare attack you. Your stats are insanely boosted, you run like the wind and leap to the point of almost flying, and you can destroy nearly anything in your path. It is one of the single coolest things in all of gaming and nothing like it has ever been recreated (I have biases).

Being a werewolf became part of your character and changed your entire gameplay experience rather than just being an "ability" or "race."

Many of these systems were also in place in Daggerfall, Morrowind's predecessor. But Morrowind was the last game of the ES series to incorporate proper werewolf mechanics. In Oblivion, we got exactly nothing, which left me crushingly disappointed as a child. In Skyrim, you have an awesome button werewolf mode wherein you must continually devour enemies in order to maintain the werewolf form. It's cool and it's fun, and I'm very glad Skyrim had werewolves playable at launch, but it doesn't have anything approaching the same feel as "being" a werewolf in Bloodmoon, where it is a curse. It can be an inconvenience, it can be an advantage, and it's something you have to plan your gameplay around - and something you must hide from everyone around you. That is what playing as a werewolf should be. I'm likely to make another post soon talking about that some more, because it's a favorite subject.

Anyway, therefore, Morrowind's expansion pack Bloodmoon is easily one of my favorite games ever made. It is really the only game where you can really play as a werewolf instead of a reasonably cool and fun but ultimately far less interesting alternative.

I also recently wrote a big ol' article about the best video games that let you play as a werewolf: https://maverickwerewolf.com/werewolf-facts/werewolf-articles/werewolf-article-play-as-a-werewolf-video-games/

Day 13- A werewolf's transformation sequence is one of the single most important things in any werewolf story. It might even be -the- most important. After all, the crux of werewolves is that even a man who is pure at heart (etc) can become a monster - and back again - and the sequence undergoing such a traumatic change is quite a thing to tackle.

I've seen it approached many ways. Painfully (obviously), painlessly, slow, fast, as something undesirable and as something desirable, as something controllable and uncontrollable - I swear this isn't innuendo. Anyway, personally, my favorite will always very easily be the most classic concept of the werewolf transformation: painful, traumatic, and very, very bad. I am not here for cuddly or happy werewolves. I'm also a fan of the werewolf not remembering what happened, but I'll ramble about that one later.

This also actually has basis in legend, as well. Even in antiquity, witnessing a werewolf transformation would potentially bring one to madness. This is mentioned in several stories, including but not necessarily limited to Niceros's story, in which witnessing the werewolf transformation freaks him out beyond reason. When he realizes the soldier he'd traveled with was a werewolf, he swears never to go near him again: "I couldn’t have eaten a crumb of bread with him, no, not if you had killed me!"

In Ovid's Metamorphoses, oft hailed as one of the "first werewolf legends" (that we have recorded, anyway), we also get our first proper werewolf transformation ever in the form of the legend of Lycaon...

"[Lycaon] howled his heart out, trying in vain to speak.

With rabid mouth he turned his lust for slaughter

Against the flocks, delighting still in blood.

His clothes changed to coarse hair, his arms to legs—

He was a wolf, yet kept some human trace,

the same grey hair, the same fierce face, the same

Wild eyes, the same image of savagery."

I've always found it interesting to note that his clothes became coarse hair, rather than him tearing his clothes off. Just a little difference there between this and many other legends.

Lots more on the ancient Greek tale of King Lycaon here: https://maverickwerewolf.com/werewolf-fact-66-the-legend-of-king-lycaon-of-arcadia/

There are a few legends, of course, that don't make it quite this dramatic. But popular culture carried over the painful transformation sequence for those with the werewolf curse, by and large, and it's incredibly effective. Everyone remembers seeing the first transformation in An American Werewolf in London (as much as I think the movie itself frankly just sucks), and likewise no one was exactly taken by a guy jumping really high and painlessly CGI'ing into a wolf in like .3 seconds.

I obviously have a lot of opinions on werewolf transformations, just like every other werewolf thing. The best and most memorable werewolf transformations are painful, dramatic, and traumatizing - because, after all, being a werewolf is neither a fun thing nor a good time... not for anyone involved.

Day 14- There's something I deeply hate in media, and it's when someone says "a werewolf scratch can turn you!" What on earth?

I have a lot of thoughts about all of this, obviously, and I'll get more into the whole werewolf bite thing later, but let's entertain if you will this notion that becoming a werewolf is like rabies. This is an extremely Early Modern concept, following the rise of scientific thought and the dismissal of all things mystical, religious, magical, mysterious, and allegorical, but even then, a werewolf spreading lycanthropy (in itself an Early Modern concept, as it was viewed as a disease, not a curse) via bite has no basis in folklore already. Does that make it bad? Nonsense, a werewolf bite is a classic storytelling element - that, once again, almost certainly comes from The Wolf Man (1941). It's so classic that for some reason zombies later completely lifted it and now everyone acts like it's a zombie thing, which is completely unfair.

But a werewolf scratch? Really? Even if we're equating it with rabies, that still doesn't work. And how stupid is it for someone to be like "oh no! the werewolf SCRATCHED you!" When I hear "scratch," I think "my cat got a little too excited about the tummy button," not "I've been mauled by a giant twisted man-beast and now I will inherit its curse." How does a werewolf even "scratch" someone without taking an entire limb off or raking red rivers through your torso? Are we sure it was a werewolf, or is it a chihuahua*?

I really wish this "werewolf scratch" thing would stop. It's just bad all over. Bring back werewolf bites exclusively.

*: what pains me is that some people would find this hilarious and make this their exclusive takeaway, because werewolves have just become jokes

Day 15- I love a wide variety of werewolf designs. If the werewolf is presented well, the design doesn't always matter that massively, as long as it doesn't look incredibly dumb and/or doesn't even resemble a man or a wolf. Unfortunately, it's amazing how often this happens.

Many monster design classes do actually say, when designing a werewolf, absolutely don't use a wolf as a reference. Artists are told by everyone under the sun, including filmmakers: use dogs, cats, bears, mandrills, hyenas - I've even seen mules, foxes, bats, badgers... and above all, they are told explicitly: whatever you do, don't use a wolf as inspiration. That'd be like, expected or cliche or bad or corny or something, because it's a WOLF monster. And we can't do anything "expected."

Werewolves are two things: human and wolf. If you're drawing the majority of your inspiration from a bear or a cat or a fox or hyena or whatever else, why even call it a werewolf? Why not make a different creature entirely, like the Beast of Gevaudan?

(more on that remark here: https://maverickwerewolf.com/werewolf-facts/the-beast-of-gevaudan/ )

I can understand the desire of some to have some particularly "memorable" or "unique" design (although I have never been taken by any of these attempts, nor do I remember them fondly), but ultimately, it baffles me that someone would choose to draw more directly from animals that aren't wolves for a werewolf design. Then again, you can also go too far in the opposite direction and just end up with fluffy wolf-people, and those can look far too cuddly (at least to... modern audiences; no one thought the werewolves in Dog Soldiers were cute even just a few years ago).

It's a careful balance to walk. When I was very young and innocent, I hated that many designs removed the tail from a werewolf (which they have in legend and I think it looks cooler), but I completely understand now. I also understand wanting to change the head shape, ear shape, etc, but all of this can be achieved without making the werewolf look like some other animal or like nothing in particular. There's a reason the Underworld werewolf design that became ubiquitous for so many werewolves afterward - Skyrim, for example, and World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, just to name two - was the one with the wolfish muzzle and head shape, not the "cat pitbull" design from the first film.

Call me old-fashioned (I am), but I want a werewolf to look like what it's called. Note: I'm also not knocking the quadrupedal but still part-man looking designs, although those are far from my favorite, but it should still have wolf features. At least a few.

Day 16- Another werewolf folklore lesson! How about "curing" lycanthropy? What was that like in folklore - lifting the werewolf curse?

As per usual for my discussions, I have to mention that being a werewolf was not considered a "disease" until relatively recently; it was a magical curse, not an illness that could be "contracted" or "cured," and individuals were not "infected." Likewise, there weren't exactly a lot of examples of a werewolf curse - as per traditional "transforming between man and beast on a regular basis" definition of "werewolf" - being lifted in folklore.

There are some examples of more unusual variations of the curse being lifted, however, namely with those who end up stuck in a more seemingly permanent wolf form. Removing a magic item that cursed you to become a werewolf is fairly common, such as the magic skins donned by Sigmund and Sinfjotli in the Volsunga Saga; when they wore them, they were wolves, and only returned to human form when they managed to get the skins back off again. Another example is Melion (titular character of a British lai), who was trapped in the form of a wolf when he put on a cursed ring.

And in at least one story, that of Guillame de Palerne, the werewolf returns to his human shape when the one who cursed him is killed. This is a special case in that the werewolf never actually returned to a human form and was in fact stuck as a wolf, so it's not quite your typical werewolf example, but it is still from a French story whose title was translated as William and the Werewolf - and it's a good story.

However, in the vast majority of cases, especially with the werewolves that are more in line with what we think of as proper werewolves (transforming back and forth, instead of stuck in a wolf form), either the werewolf stayed a werewolf and it wasn't really that big of a deal (such as in several ancient Greek tales and some medieval tales, for example)...

Or else the werewolf was killed. Popular culture sometimes insists the only cure for lycanthropy is death, and that also often held true in many legends. It's also quite fun and dramatic, of course, although I do get tired of the werewolf predictably getting wasted.

There is, of course, a Werewolf Fact for this: https://maverickwerewolf.com/werewolf-facts/how-to-cure-lycanthropy/

[alonelywaterbottle]

*EDGE OF SLEEP SPOILERS*

Still spoilers…

You can’t complain if you got spoiled now

Bullet points cause I think I had a point but I clearly lost the plot at some point

I’ve seen some people complain about the differences between the podcast and the show, and I just wanna say that I love it! I like the friends grandma better than the weird homeless guy cause she brought more world building for the implications of what that world would look like.

There was absolutely a bunch of people that were forgotten about. Teens pulling all nighters, babies who probably woke up in the middle of the night just in time for no one to be awake to care for them. All the dogs awake but confused as to why their owners doors never opened again. It’s sad, it’s horrible, I made myself sad thinking about it just now. There were people left behind that never knew what was happening

I was so incredibly happy that Mateo survived. He was my favorite and I was so sad watching the show knowing it was coming, but it pleasantly surprised me. And in the podcast when it was just Linda and Dave it made me go “ah… great. Ooo only a girl and a guy left, how shocking.”

I am sad that the funniness of the guy in Dave’s dream asking for cigarettes was cut. But I likes the more monster vibes rather than the ‘mysterious jungle tribe and spirits’

(I know that we will probably get some of that back if cleared for season 2 but still)

Ultimately, I’m glad it wasn’t a 1 for 1 remake with no changes. And it never was going to be. Television and podcasts are two very different mediums and it’s wrong to expect it to be.

I also wish we could have had some more horror elements but I know the budget was limited (Dave’s dream sequence in episode 8 would have been cool but so hard to do effects for) and hopefully we get a season 2 with a higher Amazon budget.

I also really hope that people know that it isn’t only popular cause hot YouTube man was in it. I personally would have watched it even if Mark wasn’t in it, I’ve been following its production as much as I could ever since the tv show was announced and Mark was flown out to Canada to film. It’s popular cause hot YouTube man is a good actor, it was made by very talented people, and it’s a great story.

I don’t know what I’m saying anymore, I really liked the show and I binged it while at work. If we don’t get a season two I will be sad and disappointed that The Plan™ didn’t work. (I think it will work but I’m afraid of big daddy Amazon nuking it like Netflix-does-actual-good-original-series just because the industry is scared of anything outside their status quo)

Edge real hard Sleep real good

Watch the edge of sleep all day and then also at night horray

[snapscube]

So you mentioned the Amazing Spider-man movies, what are your thoughts on them? For me; I was pleasantly surprised by 1 AND 2. Like 2 is bad, real bad, but the jokes were legit, Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone are just...an amazing on screen couple and until the transformation Harry is a really fun villain....just sucks that most of the movie is exposition about peoples relationships to one another or experiments done mostly off screen.

TASM1 is perfectly serviceable as a standalone project and was definitely not the worst jumping off point, but it struggles to really properly understand Spider-Man/Peter as a personality. Peter absolutely doesn't have to be a goody two-shoes loser, all of the best adaptations of Peter imo can have some serious attitude and grit to their persona, but TASM1 kinda over-corrects on the Tobey Maguire "shy nerd" angle by making Spidey a bit too much of a dick. I remember the movie getting a lot of praise for finally making Spider-Man funny and quippy, praise I similarly gave at the time, but it really... doesn't do that nearly as much as ppl gave it credit for??? There's like ONE scene where Spider-Man is kinda jokey with someone he suspects to be Ben's killer, but that scene kinda stinks because he's not quipping as much as he's like actively cruel lmao. Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone had great chemistry though and you can tell Marc Webb knew his stuff when it came to directing that kind of romantic tension, seeing as how his previous project was 500 Days of Summer. All-in-all, it's a Fine movie but it's not a fantastic adaptation of the things I personally like about Spider-Man.

TASM2 is so much more intriguing to me to watch and to talk about. It's genuinely baffling how that movie ended up like it did, but in a way that almost anyone could have predicted. That movie STINKS. It's really really bad. But it also has kind of the opposite problem to TASM1 in that... TASM1 is a good movie that doesn't properly showcase the character of Spider-Man, whereas TASM2 is a garbage movie that features some of the best live action Spider-Man scenes/setpieces we had seen and would ever see to this day. It's sincerely tragic how many great INDIVIDUAL MOMENTS are in that movie, and how loosely connected they are by some monumentally stupid studio meddling. That movie has everything going in its favor with Andrew Garfield in the lead, the best live action Spider-Man suit to this day, the most thrilling and well rendered swinging sequences put to film, and the occasional glimpse of a true Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man that is down on the ground connecting with and watching over not just the city itself but the people within it. There's a montage in the middle of the movie that features Spider-Man on his daily patrol and he comes across as just so PRESENT and on the same level as the people he protects, meanwhile in the audio track you hear newscasters and interviews fiercely debating whether or not what he does is actually worthwhile. And that shit HITS. But unfortunately that kind of stuff is still too rare and it far overshadowed by Sony desperately trying to make a Spidey Cinematic Universe without earning it. Ultimately they had all of the pieces to make a truly definitive adaptation of Spidey that I feel like almost anyone could get behind, but they just... couldn't. Even Spider-Man PS4, commonly lauded as one of the most definitive Spidey stories of all time, uses SO MUCH of the same DNA of the Amazing Spider-Man films, but the difference is that it had the space to be only exactly what it needed to be. Nothing more, nothing less. Anyway I could talk more about this for sure but I'm looking at the length of this write-up and wincing already LOL.

[txttletale]

(Other than the really weird bit about "Male presenting Doctor") what were your thoughts about the specials?

pretty mixed bag, pretty messy, but good overall. i think they were very obviously a nostalgia trip for people around my age lol and it worked! i loved seeing tennant and tate back onscreen together, their chemistry hasn't aged a bit, and honestly just watching doctor who that wasn't written by chris chibnall was a breath of fresh air. they weren't boring, like seasons 11 and 12 were, and they didn't go too far off the other end into nonsense like flux did. characters want things again! the show can let itself just be silly! i was literally cheering out loud when donna and the doctor were just saying random scifi gobbledegook at each other for like a solid several minutes during the star beast.

the structure of the specials kind of baffles me. i love wild blue yonder--i think it's definitively the best of the specials as a standalone, it's absolutely fantastic, creepy and atmospheric and bringing things around to RTD's strength, which is well-written characters interacting with each other and letting good actors just act. but at the same time i dont understand why it exists? it feels like...idk. imagine if you watched the star wars original trilogy but instead of the empire strikes back the middle film was just a feature length film about luke and han surviving on an ice planet with no reference to anything that happens in the last film except the two characters' relationship. and then the next film was still return of the jedi, unchanged. it felt like that

i liked all the weird campy silliness of the star beast and the giggle, and they were both very fun! neil patrick harris gave a fantastic performance, there are a lot of very memorable sequences from the giggle, but it's very very all over the place. so many threads get kind of picked up and go nowhere. the toymaker's haunted house dimension goes nowhere. RTD's eyerolling social media commetnary goes nowhere (thank god tbh but yknow im illustrating something here). even the toymaker kind of goes nowhere, after ncuti gatwa shows up he's bascially an afterthought who loses by dropping a ball. obvious parallels to david tennant's first episode with that ball scene could be made, but just... aren't. it feels like load-bearing sectikons of the plot and themes were cut out to make room for a backdoor pilot for the stupid fucking UNIT spinoff

oh and it goes without saying i fucking hate all the UNIT wank in the star beast and the giggle. i hope space nine eleven 2 happens to their stupid fucking avengers tower i cannot stand kate stewart who is constantly a murderous bonehead (in the giggle alone she gets two pepole killed by not listening to the doctor and assuming that this teleporting godlike entity could be restrainted by Two Guys) who is both in and out of universe just a boring nepo baby with no merit of her own

um. i still dont know what happened with the regeneration. i think the implication is that when david tennant dies hell time travel back to become ncuti gatwa inside himself--at least the rehab dialogue seems to make that implication. but it's not really explained or explored? baffling. i do think that fourteen getting to settle down and live a peaceful life with his friends is cute.

oh yeah and the ask said other than that but goddd there was some good stuff in the star beast and honestly with the state of the UK media i will take any perspective on trans people that includes baseline human erespect but some of those lines made me cringe so bad. anyway overall i am cautiously optimistic for the future of the show--oh ncuti was fucking great did i mention that i instantly bnought him as the doctor he owned the scene, the moment he was there it was clear he was the protagonist, and i liked the church on ruby road well enough too--i am cautiously optimistic but i worry that a big UNIT-shaped tumor will devour huge chunks of it and it'll be annoying. also russel t davies is like 60 and i just dont want to hear what he has to say about twitter so im not looking forward to dot and bubble

[tsukimefuku]

The morning after is still last night

After last night, you and Higuruma share a brief pillow talk.

Tags: Jujutsu Kaisen, mentions of sex, Higuruma x f!reader, this is fluff.

WC: 800

This is part of my "Jujutsu Partners Canon Divergence AU", a sequence of short stories and random drabbles for a Nanami x f!reader x Higuruma fanfic I'll eventually write (eventually). This is the sequence to "The man who played with fire", link here. To see the ever-growing list of one-shots, please visit my masterlist :)

Disclaimer: they’re NOT written and posted in chronological order of events. To see where this story fits in the timeline, please check the masterlist mentioned above.

Higuruma was awakened by the faint stream of light that bled through the curtains and projected onto his face delicately. He was coming to his senses slowly, and realized he was still naked under the bedsheets. Looking by his side, he saw you laying down with your back facing him. He smiled discreetly, realizing you had spent the night — Higuruma was unsure if you’d do so, given you were prone to avoidance, overall.

Examining your back solely with his eyes, he noticed a prominent scar right in the middle, over your spine. It was oval-shaped, and it extended in a straight line to the right side of your back, stopping abruptly. It seemed to have been done by a blade of some sort. Before he realized, his fingers were caressing over it, pulling you gently awake.

“Hey,” you cooed, rolling on your side to face him, “good morning.”

“Good morning.” Higuruma answered, gazing at you before putting his hand over your cheek. “It seems you slept here.”

You smiled at him, putting your hand over his. “I didn’t feel like going back home in the middle of the night.” You also wanted to spend some more time with Higuruma, but spared that detail. You were starting to feel somewhat guilty, like you had used him the night prior. No need to dig this deeper, you thought.

“I’m glad you stayed. I wish I had something to offer for breakfast, but I’m not the great domestic type of person. There isn’t anything in my fridge other than yesterday’s beer.” He answered, blatantly not embarrassed at all.

You chuckled lightly. “There might be an old lemon half. You never know, Higuruma.”

His expression became slightly saddened. “I know the sun is already out, but last night isn’t over until we’re out of bed.”

You dragged your body towards his, stopping a few inches apart, and looked him in the eyes. His gaze was lovely, and you were both nearly whispering, as if to keep the fragile little bubble of this moment intact. “Okay, Hiromi.”

Higuruma instantly smiled, and closed the gap between the two of you, planting a soft kiss on your forehead. “That’s more like it.”

You put your thumb on his chin and guided his face to look at you, sighing deeply. “I can’t stay. And I don’t think we should do this again.” You felt like you’d be only using him, even if you had a thing for Higuruma. You just failed to realize just how deep that “thing” was becoming.

He sighed back, because he realized you were doing that again. Fleeing to avoid touching on sensitive subjects. “I know you can’t stay, but I’d like to discuss that second part before you left.”

“What do you want to discuss?”

“I want to know why we shouldn’t have sex again.” He was a pretty straightforward and honest kind of guy, even if it meant saying the uncomfortable unsaid most of the time.

“Well, I feel like I’d be using you for self satisfaction, and I think you’re a friend I wouldn’t want to drive away by treating you like man candy.” You replied, earnestly.

“Then don’t.” He answered. “Treat me like man candy, I mean. Except if I ask for it.”

You chuckled and covered your face at his antics. “Hiromi, oh my God.”

“I mean it! We’re adults, and the lifespan of a jujutsu sorcerer isn’t that long from what I could tell, anyway. It doesn’t mean this will taint our friendship, as you pointed out, and we can always talk about it if things get strange in a bad way.” He negotiated with you. This was so much different from being lectured that you couldn’t help but feel glad to be sharing this moment with Higuruma.

You stayed quiet, studying his features as he awaited for a response, and your gaze wound up resting on his lips for a while, something he noticed. He approached you carefully, brushing his lips to yours, and it instantly made your heart race. You could hear each pump in the back of your ears, as you pressed your lips against his quickly, pulling apart before you both could get entangled together again for round two, after you explicitly told him you shouldn’t.

“Can I think about it?” You asked.

“Of course. But please, do think about it, and don’t just take time to stall on an answer.” Higuruma replied, ash colored eyes piercing through you.

“Oh, stalling to not give you an answer about something uncomfortable or compromising? That definitely doesn’t sound like me.” You answered, mockingly. You were aware of your intimacy issues.

He smiled and pressed his forehead against yours. “ I’m a lawyer, I’m quite familiar with buying time to avoid consequences.”

“Consequences, huh?” You asked, rolling to the opposite side of the bed. “Come on, Hiromi. Time to start the day.”

Defeated, he rolled on his back and stared at the ceiling, as your feet touched the cold morning floor.

[tarisilmarwen]

RobStar Week 2024, Day 3 - Training

(Late in posting, was not having a good day today, but here be Day 3!)

---

"Where did you say you trained again?" panted Robin, splayed face up and flat on his back on the mats of the floor, his middle still aching from Starfire's last unexpected tap.

"Okaara," she explained, sheepishly holding her hand out for him to grasp. "Are you injured?" she asked anxiously. "I was trying to pull the blow."

Robin grasped her offered hand firmly, using it as an anchor to drag himself up to a sitting position. His diaphragm twinged a bit at the motion but the ache soon subsided. "I'm fine," he assured her, waving her off. He got to his feet stiffly. "I've had worse hits, trust me."

Starfire's hand still hovered next to him in concern, lips pinched, eyes wide with worry. Robin huffed as he straightened, getting his breath back. For a moment there was nothing but his breathing and the clink-clank of Cyborg on the weights on the other side of the gym.

"So... Okaara," Robin said, to divert the conversation. "Tell me about it."

Starfire tapped the end of his staff a bit shyly on the floor, fidgeting. "There is not much to tell. The Warlords of Okaara are fierce and skilled," she told him. "They are also great philosophers and scholars. Their planet is a neighbor to Tamaran and..." She trailed off for a moment, lost in memories. "...they have long been our allies in the war against the Gordanians and The Citadel."

Robin's hackles bristled slightly at the mention of them, remembering how Starfire talked about being taken to them as some kind of "prize". A war trophy, he realized now, with context.

He didn't want to think about that.

"And... you learned how to fight there?" he prompted.

Starfire perked up a bit. "Oh! Combat training was already a part of our education on Tamaran," she explained, brightening. "I was instructed in personal self defense and I had teachers for many traditional and standard Tamarian weapons. But I received more extensive lessons on Okaara for a time."

She smiled ruefully.

"It was deemed safer there. There were fewer bombardments."

Robin grimaced internally. Crap, he'd gone and made her sad again. Starfire had been preoccupied all day, distracted, talking about Tamaran and the Gordanians more than usual. Robin had assured her that the Lantern Corps was taking great pains to try to make contact with the Vega system, with her people, but the planet was still blockaded and it would take time and possible negotiations to get through. She'd been worried and agitated about it the whole day.

His detective mind had calculated it out from the bits and snatches she'd let slip, that it was some kind of anniversary, possibly of the war's beginning? He still wasn't clear.

In any case, he'd suggested joining Cyborg in the gym to try and take her mind off things but it seemed like he was just reminding her all over again of her worries and fears.

"Show me that move again," he suggested, coming up to stand next to her.

Starfire demonstrated it, lifting the end of his bo staff and repeating the sequence that had led to Robin being sprawled on the floor.

"It is like so," she explained. "Lift up, duck the end, and thrust."

The staff audibly whooshed through the air as she moved it.

Robin studied the move with interest. "Huh," he said. "That's actually pretty similar to something in jiu-jitsu."

He reached to take his staff back from her, hands finding their correct positions quickly.

He jabbed the staff in a practiced, careful moveset, something he'd drilled a thousand times before, and Starfire watched with rapt attention.

"Backstep, pivot, turn and—"

He ended the move, stabbing the air.

Starfire clapped lightly, impressed. Robin felt a little thrill go through him at that.

"Your motions are so sharp and disciplined!" Starfire was complimenting. "Please, is it the form itself that has such polished movement or it is merely your skill?"

"Bit of both, I think," Robin confessed, rubbing a hand through the back of his hair with a slight blush.

"Okaaran combat forms typically emphasize the power and brutality of an attack," Starfire explained in a rush, pantomiming a powerful uppercut. "They are designed to take full advantage of Tamaranian strength. We do not typically need to pull our punches, so we do not quite have as much grace about it as you do."

Robin grinned. "Hey, we all play to our own strengths," he quipped.

"Can you show me more?" Starfire asked eagerly. "How many Earth combat forms do you know?"

"Lost count at twenty," Robin joked. "My mentor knows more, but we only really had time to focus on a few major ones for me. Here." He stepped back, getting some clear room before he showed her.

She watched with rapt admiration as he showed her different forms—Northern Shaolin and Kenpo and Aikido one right after another. He explained how Batman had helped him incorporate his circus acrobat skills into his own personal style.

All the while her eyes glimmered with interest and his heart gave an occasional odd out-of-place thump seeing her.