#tell me one of my special interests is psychology without TELLING me one of my special interests is psychology

[quitethepirategal]

Acanthus   ~   ( Is your muse deceptive, or willing to lie or deceive to achieve certain means?  Why or why not?  ) Lavender   ~   ( How easy is it to gain your muse’s trust?  Once their trust is broken,  how might one go about mending it? ) 

                                                                                                  ~  { @mxdam​ }

     It should be very clearly stated that Red Jessica is both unusually honest and unconventionally trusting, for a pirate.  She herself hates being lied to more than almost anything, and has a firm belief that the truth and open communication are generally more useful tools than lies.  Lies are hard to remember, hard to keep up with, too easy to miss details or timelines or who was told what for what reason.  But the truth happened, done and done.  Easy to remember and easy to recite.  Between her patchy memory, her trusting nature, and her reactive temperament, she tends to think she’s not a terribly good liar anyway.  She’s wrong, and somehow she knows it.  ...I understand that sounds pretty confusing out of context, but the puzzle assembles itself when we explore how her mind tends to work in the context of communicating.

      Shes a firm believer in communication as I said, and in her mind the more information you share, the more likely it is that everyone understands each other or is on the same page; important when both learning and teaching new skills, very important when dealing with trade, and even more important when captaining a crew.   The essays she writes are long and excruciatingly detailed.  The stories she tells are embellished and sound almost rehearsed ( put a pin in this ).  And all manner of discussion outside friendly chatting or small talk, depending on the situation, oscillates wildly between being just thorough or mind numbingly sporadic as she chases tangents like a child running after pigeons. This of course has drawbacks that she is acutely aware of in some situations and completely oblivious to in others.       Red Jessica is the queen of Usually Accidental TmiTM.  She is in no way private or mysterious or secretive - all cards ( but one or so ) are on the table with her.   Oversharing, compensating, info-dumping ( Gods help you if you get her excited ).  She never shut up as a child, and she grew so tired of the embarrassment it brought her by her teens that she just tried to stop talking all together.  All of her twenties was spent relearning how to talk to people and in her thirties, now struck with deafness, she was again too embarrassed to communicate ( internalized ableism ain’t fun, kids ).  Her forties finally showed her how to balance communication and discretion and she spread her social butterfly wings after finding peace in her new disabled reality.  She has the hang of biting her tongue now... mostly..  Well, she knows when to shut up about half of the time but alas, not usually, and most of the time she still doesn’t realize she’s being annoying or dominating or impolite until after the words have rocketed out of her mouth.  She’d also like to think she’s great at keeping secrets and to a degree, she is… but I wouldn’t trust her with any of mine- that I will say.       She doesn’t know why she’s like this, and it only bothers her occasionally now, but we in the modern world would witness this behavior and understand this as a symptom of Autism and / or ADHD. 

     The other side of this communication coin is that she is under the mistaken impression that everyone is as trust worthy as she is.  I’ve said this before but Jessica tends to trust people a tad too quickly and “give too much away” so to speak.  It’s gotten her into trouble, gotten her back stabbed, and even gotten her heart broken a time or two; but for some reason she never really, truly learns.  Even in her 40s and 50s she still constantly has to make an active effort to show restraint and verbally remind herself to trust carefully instead of throwing her heart at a wall.       A tiny part of this is just flat out denial; one of the reasons she’s survived as long as she has despite everything is because she truly believes that humans are a worthy species and that most people are worth knowing or fighting for until proven otherwise ( put a pin in that too ).  She’s not too trusting, she thinks, that person was just deceptive and evil!   Another part of this, perhaps sub or semiconsciously, is deeply tied to her unwavering belief that community is the central pillar of survival, both hers specifically and the human race’s.  She’s a biology student, shes a captain, shes an urchin, she’s a mammal, she’s a primate; even before she read Charles Darwin or John Locke she was living proof that humans only thrive if they thrive together.       So trust is a lifeline that goes both ways, and if you break that trust, you break that lifeline.  There is no recovering broken trust with Captain Red Jessica unless you have damn good evidence that there was merely a misunderstanding.  Breaking trust is the worst thing you can do.  In her mind, again for the most part subconsciously, you are not only a danger to her survival, but to her community’s.  One bad apple and all that.  She will kill you and to her you will deserve it.  For someone with an intense and ingrained love of humanity, she actually has very little regard for human life.  How is that possible?      This is, again, most likely a part the AuDHD experience.  Trying to imagine those around her as not thinking and feeling in the exact way she thinks and feels is extremely difficult ( also contributing to why she assumes people are noble and trustworthy by default ).  She is therefore a practitioner of many seemingly logical contradictions; She has an inflated sense of justice and fairness and indigence while, surprisingly, sporting very little if any real empathy.  She wears her emotions and her sense of self like a loose fitting and removable jacket, her actions and reactions feeling very literally like a constant and careful performance, while still unable to predict or control her flash-point temper or dizzying excitement.  She is sensitive and sympathetic, even treating plants or inanimate objects like they might have feelings, while, again, not having a whole lot of empathy.  She can’t relate to other people’s emotions or sometimes even her own emotions unless they are being felt Right Now while also seeming to understand things about herself and others that most people would never have figured out about themselves.  Leading to my final point. 

     Whether she realizes it or not, whether she likes it or not, and whether she knows how to wield it or not,  Jessica could learn to be a master manipulator if she wanted to be one.  While she herself has a very difficult time with social cues and is woefully unobservant unless something captures her intrest, she is, as stated above, uncannily perceptive and a phenomenal actress.  She had to learn young how to blend in with other people but didn’t quite get the hang of it until she was in her teens.  This late development of her superego allowed a unique look into why people do what they do and why she needed to behave how they behaved, something lost on most allistic people who develop socially by five or six ( in theory anyway ).   She can pick people apart with very little information and understands what makes people tick with imperfect but surprising accuracy.  This makes her excellent at persuasion and getting on peoples good side.  On top of that, as stated before, her perception of the world around her and her own perception of herself is a carefully constructed performance; a behavior we might call masking.  Her gender is an act, her personality is an act, her less intense emotions are an act; they are acts she’s grown comfortable with and are the closest to genuine she can be without just dropping the mask all together, but they are no less performative.  This means that she is actually a pretty convincing actress and, by proxy, a fantastic liar.       Luckily, Jess is mature enough to understand that attempts at manipulation would only alienate her from her wants, survival, comfort, beauty, love, stimulation, and respect, rather than aid in obtaining them.  True love and respect can’t be extorted ( but maybe in making the choice to not manipulate she’s secretly manipulating the situation in her favor ( or she’s just overthinking again )).  But that’s not to say she’s above it, and that’s certainly not to say she thinks lying is bad inherently.  She can lie, just as she can kill or steal or maim, to protect and obtain her interests.  And she can justify the means to her end almost every time.  Her morals are a subject for another time, but I’ll end with this: if mental gymnastics were a sport, Red Jessica would be an Olympian.       Thank you.

[genderqueerdykes]

i got paired up with a new therapist who specializes in and works primarily with neurodivergent patients. i felt comfortable enough to tell her that i'm autistic. she asked if i've ever received a formal diagnosis- i said no, because i've attempted in the past and i've been turned down because i'm "too articulate," i "speak too well," and they see my feminine deadname and that i'm legally AFAB and dismiss me, because "women can't be autistic".

my therapist told me that self-diagnosis is valid.

as we continued to talk through that session, she readily pointed out several autistic behaviors that i had been displaying without even realizing; i began infodumping about queer history and psychology without even realizing it, which she pointed out and then remarked that those are definitely special interests of mine. i felt floored. i knew these things about myself, but she acknowledged them effortlessly without hesitation.

in the next session, she pointed out that my tendency to re-analyze social interactions well past the time that they are over is also an autistic trait, and that i wasn't ruminating anxiously, but rather that's just how many autistic people process- we "over" analyze things in ways that allistics do not. it's difficult for many of us to figure out the entirety of what's happening in the moment, we process over time.

after that, she told me that during our next session, she wanted to spend that appointment talking about my special interests so she could get a better picture of me- specifically using that wording, calling them special interests.

after years of trying and failing to get acknowledgement for my neurotype, all it took was one therapist who specializes in neurodivergence to see the signs. one. sometimes all it takes is one person to make the difference. don't give up if you think you are autistic and are struggling to get a diagnosis or just recognition for it. it doesn't mean you're wrong. the average allistic knows nothing about how autism actually presents itself, only what they know from media, memes and mean jokes. sometimes all it takes is meeting one person who knows what autism looks like.

don't give up. you know who you are.

[the-raven-lady]

(Not) The Savior You Long For [Part 2]

[Masterlist] [My Ko-Fi]

Pairing: Night Lord (OC: Elias Rushorik) x serf!Reader [fem]

Song Inspiration: Jaws - Sleep Token [YouTube] [Spotify] “And I’m not here to be / the savior you long for / Only the one you don’t. / Are you watching me / with eyes of a predator / As you move towards the door?”

Warnings: Violence, cannibalism, explicit and detailed blood and gore, Night Lord things, ownership over reader, accidental voyuerism (sound only), trypanophobia (medical syringe)

Word Count: 3.7k

Author’s Note: 1.6k words of this are just an introduction that I wrote before I even got into the meat of it, completely by accident, because I do not know how to write without adding 30 layers of context and background (4D chess ass writing). Special thank you to @cannibalise for giving me delectable ideas and reading over some of the more graphic parts to help me set the tone!!!

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]

Tag List: @egrets-not-regrets @sleepyfan-blog @kit-williams @bleedingichorhearts @bispecsual

@lemon-russ @moodymisty @dedios-of-the-word @pickpocketing-your-gender @historitor-bookshelf

Even weeks later, you struggle to shake the psychological mark the terminator’s gaze left on you. You make yourself busy sweeping one of the main halls, pushing your broom robotically up and down the grand passageway. The other legion serfs around you serve a similar purpose: readying the ship for the return of your Primarch and his elite troops. The Nightfall had been in orbit of this planet for naught but a week, dealing with a cultish tech-society and its oppressive government, yet the Night Lords managed to convince them to join the Imperium in record time. 

Convince is a strong word. You’re intimately aware that the discussion was had in the language of acts of violence and burned cities. Having once been on the receiving end of the Eighth’s hedonistic wrath, the thought sends an unpleasant chill through you, memories of mutilation and dismemberment still so clear in your mind. It had taken months for you to stop having panic attacks at the metallic tang of fresh blood. The whirr of a heavy flamer still got to you.

On one of your passes, you sweep by the alley leading to the armory and stop, staring down the dark hall. The serf no longer hangs from the torch bracket, and the astartes that attacked you no longer sits limply against the wall. His armor had been picked at and ‘recycled’ back into the legion. You have no idea what became of either body.

Another memory involuntarily takes you back to the night you had been so narrowly saved by the terminator.

—No, you could not call him your savior. He had just wanted his armor shined, and there was something in his way so he removed it. Night Lords are selfish, self-interested and sadistic, and he was no different.

You rested the massive helmet in your lap as you worked, scraping at filth that had built up for who knows how long. It amazed you that the astartes it belonged to could even see through the lenses given how much dried blood was crusted on them. It came off in flakes before dissolving into the moisture of the wash rag. You could have called the stained fabric spotless when you started compared to how soiled with grime it was now; at a glance, no one would be able to tell that it was white before.

The terminator’s eyes watched you like final judgement. The weight of his gaze instilled an unease in your heart, stabbing at every opportunity it could: each time you looked up at him, each time you lost focus, each time you caught a glimpse of the mangled Night Lord on the floor. It all hammered at a primal spike of dread that threatened to overwhelm you, consume you entirely, reminding you that you were only alive because you were useful. The tension was just as strong as when you had been pinned to the wall or huddled on the floor.

Your washcloth eventually reached a point where it was only smearing the grime rather than removing it, and you looked up to your silent master. The power of his presence alone made you hesitant to speak, and you found your throat suddenly parched. When you eventually recovered your voice, it left you as a croak, “I-I need to grab my water pail from the other room.”

He simply continued to stare at you, unmoving. As still as the gargoyles adorning the hall. You thought for a second that maybe he hadn’t heard you, and you opened your mouth to try again.

”I need to—“

”Then do it.”

You flinched. A rolling storm, his simple response left no room for questioning. Carefully placing his helmet onto the bench, you scuttled off to retrieve the bucket from the other room. His gaze burnt holes into your back.

The water in your bucket was a rusty brown slop when you returned to it. All of the heavier contaminants had settled to the bottom in a coagulated mass while you were away, gelatinous flesh and tangled hair weaving throughout. You lifted the heavy pail, careful not to spill any of the vile concoction onto yourself. Passing by, you noted that the other serf’s water was substantially less dingy than your own, and you didn’t think twice to grab it instead. It’s not as if it was of any use to her now.

The squelch of meat being torn and defiled echoed suddenly through the otherwise silent armory, instinctually gluing you to your spot on the floor. Cracks and crunches of something solid breaking bounced around you. The abrasive sounds left your heart fluttering and nerves electric, and a panicked tension flowed through your limbs as fight or flight tried its damndest to take over. 

‘It would be safer to hide, hide, retreat to safety,’ it erroneously cried, weighing you down like lead. A comforting lie. 

One you refused to give in to. 

‘There is no safety here,’ you retorted, ‘Only certain death.’ A wolf’s den, and you were the doting lamb. The fear of facing punishment for taking too long far outweighed the hesitation to continue, and you willed yourself to step forward through the icy shackles binding you. 

The sight of the terminator tearing flesh from the body of his former brother froze you as you rounded the corner with your pail. His eyes were glazed in manic pleasure as he ripped off another juicy chunk, sharp teeth effortlessly dissecting muscle fibers from the cooling corpse. Bestial snarling and slurping accompanied every chomp, and growls at a pitch nearly too deep to hear rattled through your bones like a saw. With each gnash of his powerful jaws, blood and spit shot out of the torn hole in his mouth, drooling down his armor in crimson dribbles.

Time itself seemed to stop when his predatory gaze found you. His dilated pupils completely swallowed the outer corners of white— could you even consider them dilated when they took up so much of his eyes already?— and pinned you in place. The ravenous beast swallowed his kill in a silent threat. 

You were about to make a run for it when he lowered the defiled corpse and snarled at you, foreign viscera spewing from his scar.

”Finish.”

You had done exactly as you were told while the terminator continued to make a mess of himself. Once you’d finished his helmet, he made you clean off the rest of his armor as a token of a job well done. 

A strong dissonance contrasted the perfectly shined ceramite and rags of human hide adorning his war gear. You didn’t understand at first why the Night Lords would go through such lengths to clean their armor, only to decorate it with the disgusting tokens of their kills and bathe it in blood again, but over time you began to recognize the mentality. The layers of blood were a byproduct of their work— terrifying in their own right, yes, however ultimately just ‘part of the job’—, but each placement of flesh and bone was deliberate; they chose to wear them. It added terror to their already gruesome countenance.

You figure you must have done well polishing his armor, because the terminator had left you alive in the end. As expected, he gave you no feedback. No thanks or gratitude shown before he simply walked off. For the second time that day, you were left in the armory with a huge mess to clean entirely on your own.

Shaking your head, you return to the present and continue sweeping, pushing the pile of dust around to keep yourself busy. 

Sharp clanks of heavy boots cut through the relative peace. You look down the hall to see other serfs parting ways and scurrying off to make way for a coming company of giants. Their armor dwarfed that of the regular Night Lords, tanks of metal and firepower that razed battlefields in their wake.

The Contekar Elite.

You knew of them from hushed whispers passed between serfs in the chow hall. Units of butchers that sowed despair in the hearts of their foes. Ruthless in how they constantly checked one another, the Contekar took advantage of any perceived weakness to prove their dominance over the rest of the legion. They were notorious for simply killing any commanders they disagreed with, and only the likes of First Captain Sevatarion or the Lord Night Haunter himself could tame them. 

Each colossus carried weapons as long and large as your entire body as they approached: chainblades, flamers, and cavitators, all ready to be used at a moment's notice. You hurried to get out of their way, tucking yourself behind a hallway corner. The monoliths of steel shook the ground with each step, a deafening thunder echoing down the main hall that signaled their arrival. There was no chorus or fanfare amongst them to be found; each marine was as silent as death itself.

They ignored you as they passed by. The Contekar couldn’t care less for the meddlings of a common legion serf, too busy with themselves to notice you, and it brought you shallow comfort.

At least, it would have. 

Preoccupied with watching the marines at your front passing by, you didn’t realize that one of them was headed straight towards you until his footfalls physically rattled the ground beneath you. You whip your head towards him and nearly jump out of your skin, clutching to the corner of the wall as he stares down at you. 

His entire body is marred with blood. Even from where you cower, you can see that he must be at least three meters tall in his armor, if not more. The digits of his power claw have pieces of mangled flesh still caught between their hydraulic pistons, forming webs between them. A mummified head dangles at eye level from a meat hook, and it crosses your mind that it could have been yours. 

You recognize his tusked helmet immediately.

The Contekar studies you. He is a perfect statue: unmoving and silent aside from the faint whirring emanating from the power pack on his back. Behind the scarlet lenses, his eyes scrutinize you down to your very last atom. A lion picking apart its prey.

“Come,” he orders, his gruff voice offering no further explanation. He takes a step away from you with the intent to continue further down the passage, and you suddenly find your limbs leaden and weak, unable to follow. Sensing your trepidation, his head turns back towards you, eyes locking on yours. The faded skull decal isn’t as cute when you’re at the receiving end of its ire.

Pain shoots up your left arm as you’re yanked off of the wall and lifted without another word. The cold metal of the Escaton power claw digs into your bones uncomfortably, sharpened claws at each fingertip poking into your flesh. The terminator grasps you by your forearm and drags you beside him until you can find your footing and walk on your own, stumbling into a jog to keep up. When you retrieve your arm, partially dried pieces of viscera stick to it from where you were grabbed. You brush them off hastily with a grimace; at least the power claw didn’t break skin.

You hug closely to the terminator’s leg as you walk with the group, not wanting to get trampled. The other serfs mostly keep their heads down as you pass them by, but a few give you a sympathetic look. The rest of the Contekar continue to ignore you.

The suites housing the Elite are grander than any part of the ship you have been in thus far. Compared to the regular Night Lord’s dorms, the metal halls leading to their private quarters are pristine. The usual decor of skulls and tanned skins is present, but there is no buildup of filth and grime along the floors and walls. The scent of fresh air is jarring. Most surprising to you is that each of the marines has their own private rooms, which you learn when you are unceremoniously shoved into one. 

The tusked terminator’s room is shockingly comfortable, for a Night Lord. A thin light strip, the same brightness of a full moon on your former world, serves as the only illumination of the dark room. Along the walls are various trophies that you assume are from his time in the field, both of his kills and plunders. A large work table and chair take up the whole of the wall to your right. Instead of a regular astartes-sized cot, there is an actual bed with pillows and a wide plush mattress. In the back corner of the room is a closed door, which you assume leads to a washroom.

Whoever your new charge was, he lives well.

A click catches your attention, and you turn to your left to see him removing the heavy pauldrons of his armor. He places each of them on the sturdy table, then turns his attention to his power claw, his gauntlets, his vambraces— steadily pulling them off one plate at a time. After removing his helmet, shakes out his greasy black hair and turns to look at you with a furrow in his brow. 

You remember your place and jump into action, aiding the marine in removing his sabatons. The plates of ceramite are much too heavy for you to lift on your own, but it’s easier for your smaller hands to get into the creases to release locks and latches. The two of you enter a wordless synergy, pulling off the heavy terminator armor piece by piece and placing each on a designated mantle. You’re extra careful not to get caught on the hooks of his armor. The desiccated head serves as a good reminder.

Even reduced to just his body glove, the astartes is colossal. His height easily dwarfs the majority of his brothers. You have to crane your neck upwards to look at his face, barely coming up to chest level on him. This close, you can see the sprinkling of grey hair within his sideburns and the lines of his face that indicate some arbitrary older age. You never did know how to tell the ages of astartes.

He uses his newfound freedom to stretch his limbs. Each is as broad as a tree trunk, and you figure they’re likely just as immovable. When he catches you staring and waiting, he simply returns the look, quietly raising an eyebrow.

“Would you like your armor shined, my lord?” you try, gesturing vaguely to the table and mantle. His eyes track the movement, looking over his war gear in silence before he gives you a curt nod. He points to a drawer beside his bed, then without further clarification turns his attention to removing his body glove. 

Within the drawer you discover a stack of folded shop towels. Why they’re there is a mystery to you. Judging by the size of the terminator armor, you decide three is enough for now, grabbing them and sliding the drawer shut. You look up to ask if the Contekar has any armor oil around, only to see him half-naked walking through the door in the corner. It swings shut behind him, leaving you once again to solve your problems on your own.

You wonder what force in this universe blessed you with such a communicative master.

It took him three entire days to tell you, “you live here,” instead of simply denying you the ability to leave and making you sleep on the floor. You swore he was going to turn your rib cage into a new trophy when you eventually did get out, trying to navigate your way back to the serfs’ dormitory for much needed food. He had hunted down like a rabbit, snatched you up from behind, and thrown you back into his quarters with a growl to, “stay put.” What the terminator lacked in words, he greatly made up for with his intimidating presence.

He did get you food, though, and an abundance of it. You hadn't seen so much variety since you were still living on your home planet. Delicacies like meat were rare to you, and you eagerly scarfed everything down. In your hunger, you did not ask where the meat came from.

It’s not as if he would have told you anyway, given how scantily he spoke. You haven’t even gotten his name out of him yet.

The only times you were permitted to leave the suite were when you could accompany him. Trips to the armory gave you vital chances to hoard cleaning supplies, having gotten accustomed to the lesser atmosphere of decay around the Elites’ quarters. On top of the standard armor oils, you managed to snag an expensive looking jar of polish, which you hoped would gain you some favor. Your master doesn’t particularly show you signs of care, but he also hasn’t killed you yet, and that has to be worth something.

On your way back to his quarters, a discordant howling rings out from one of the rooms adjacent to his. You flinch at the sound, assuming the worst: that somebody nearby was in the midst of being tortured and flayed alive, and that you would have to hear their slow untimely demise throughout the night. It wouldn’t be the first time you had to fall asleep to the sounds of screams and cries. The Contekar, however, scoffs. His nose scrunches up in annoyance, teeth bared in a disgusted snarl. 

“Don’t understand the appeal,” he grunts, shaking his head and continuing forward. 

Glancing over in confusion, you start to pay more attention to the sound. The rhythmic pattern of each holler and whine. The sound of skin on skin. The quiet pleas of, “more, please, more!” 

Your eyes widen when you put two and two together, ducking your head down to hide the blush steadily rising on your cheeks. That was not the type of torture you were expecting to hear. You pick up the pace and hope the terminator doesn’t recognize your sudden newfound urgency.

He allows you to store your armory stash in his bedside drawer alongside the rags. It nearly knocks you over when he throws an arm out to keep you from closing it, sending you staggering back with a huff. He removes one of the towels, then abruptly drops it over the top of your head. You don’t even get the chance to remove it before you’re being pushed in a direction, blindly stumbling along. A transition strip between some passageway causes you to trip and fall to the floor. Pulling the towel off of your head, your vision clears to the sight of the bathroom. 

You shoot the terminator a bewildered look before he lifts you by the back of your shirt and throws you underneath a showerhead, giving you no warning before turning it on. The cold jet hits you like a hose spray, causing you to yipe at the sudden temperature shock. Freezing water saturates your clothes. 

He breathily laughs at your agonized shiver.

Despite the rude beginning, you return from the washroom refreshed, feeling for the first time like your skin isn’t permanently encrusted with the gunk lining nearly every surface of the ship. It had been weeks since you could last bathe in any capacity. The water did warm up eventually– not warm, but not frigid– and allow you to scrub the filth off.

When you exited the shower, your master was nowhere to be seen, and there was a new uniform on the oversized counter. It wasn’t difficult to tell that it was intended for you, given the vast size difference between you and the Elite. The navy blue outfit bears an embroidery of the Eighth’s winged skull over each shoulder and lines of Nostraman text that you are unable to translate. You’re just happy the new garbs aren’t tattered and fraying like the last, which you gleefully toss. They land in the bucket with a wet squish.

As you approach the door to the main room of the quarters, you’re alerted to the sound of quiet conversation, not expecting there to be anyone but the terminator about. The tonal register is too low and quiet for you to make out any spoken words. 

You enter the space in time to watch your master sit at the table and place his arm out flat upon it. An apothecary stands beside him unpackaging a syringe. He stabilizes the terminator’s arm in the crux of his shoulder, turning his palm upwards and pressing the bevel of the needle into a prominent vein running distally from the elbow. Crimson liquid slowly fills the barrel as he pulls the plunger back.

The apothecary’s cart bears instruments uncharacteristic of typical medicae. Replacing scalpels and suturing utensils are various packaged needles and pigment bottles. A large battery pack wires into a small rectangular box, the screen and dials illegible to you from your current distance, with a strange metal stylus connected to it. Sitting atop a stack of disposable napkins is a tall wash bottle containing a clear substance. The apothecary flicks the syringe until the bubbles have all risen to the top, slowly venting the air until only blood remains, and he carefully ejects a drop into each of the waiting ink cups.

Your gaze falls back on the Contekar in time to see him rising from his chair and walking towards you. You cower back on instinct, anxiety creeping up from your chest. 

He wipes a stray drop of blood from his arm with a thumb, and when you move to question what’s going on, he jams the digit into your mouth. The coppery taste spreads over your tongue as you gag from the intrusion, unable to pull away due to the unyielding grip he has on your jaw. He jerks your head upwards, forcing you to look at him, and the abyss of his black eyes swallows you whole.

“Strip.”

Not everyone saw the art the first time around, so here's your Mans

[Part 3]

[sophieinwonderland]

Now, why would you dare me to embarrass you and your pals like that?

I appreciate how you wanted my attention so bad you posted me to not one, but two subreddits.

Makes a girl feel special! 🤣

I have actually never seen Wikipedia cited as a source about endogenic plurality. Though I do see anti-endos all the time, when asked for sources, telling people to just Google things.

Anyway, here's @guardianssystem's document filled with academic papers about endogenic plurality:

I've compiled my own, but honestly, theirs is better organized than mine.

And in the interest of fairness, here are all the anti-endo papers debunking endogenic plurality:

Sorry, I forgot. Those don't exist. Oops. 🤷‍♀️

Echo chamber? LOL!

Weren't you the one spouting a bunch of lies on Tumblr, got totally debunked, posted the people who debunked you to r/systemscringe to have a hugbox where fakeclaimers could assure you how the people who contradicted you are all fakers, and then blocked everyone who disagreed with you?

Weren't you also the one who, when shown a quote from an expert in dissociative disorders who worked on the DSM-5 saying that a disorder isn't a disorder if it doesn't cause distress, argued that the people who defined what disorder are must be wrong about that definition?

You're a misinformation machine who can only find support when huddled in cringe subreddits. Don't try to talk about people in echo chambers.

Also, you know most of psychology is just... listening to people? That's how it's been as long as the field existed. DID (or MPD at the time) was a recognized disorder since long before the first brain scans were conducted on DID patients. It's saying something though when basically every single scientist who has ever researched endogenic plurality has said they believe it's a real thing, or that it could be. While absolutely zero academic papers have expressed that it's fake.

There is also an fMRI study into tulpa systems that's been in the works, but results have yet to be published.

Sure, if that's what you'd like me to call you, Crazy. 😊

Anyway, Crazy, you should know that just because you personally find something scary doesn't mean everyone will or that the thing is bad. Personal preferences are a thing.

In a study of tulpamancers though, most generally reported their lives becoming better after the practice.

78% reported improvements in their mental health, and 91% on overall life.

There are many out there who would jump at the chance to have someone there with them that knows them intimately, and to never have to be alone again.

If it's not for you, then so be it.

But it's certainly not something to be afraid of.

And maybe, for those who are willing to commit to the practice while America struggles with an epidemic of loneliness, it's something worth being open to.

This is actually pretty fair.

But that's now, and I'm looking at course of history and trends of plural acceptance.

300 years ago, any plural would be viewed as demon possessed and end up tortured or killed for their plurality.

70 years ago, all plurality was seen as a mental illness, and it was common to force plurals, as well as anyone else associated with mental illnesses, into asylums.

30 years ago, the first real plural communities were able to connect on the internet and form in small numbers.

8 years ago, the first studies into endogenic plurality started being conducted. 4 years ago, the ICD-11 acknowledged that you could have multiple distinct personality states without a disorder. 2023 marked the first, but certainly not the last, time a system used their system name as an author of an academic paper.

Recently, new plural resources have been designed and put into use. More servers than ever are using Pluralkit. And Simply Plural went from 100k users at the end of 2021 to 210k at the end of 2022.

Progress is happening far more rapidly than you realize. And you had best be ready for it.

BOO! 👻

Oh, hey, I just realized... this is literal pluralphobia!

Liberté!

Egalité!

Fraternité!

And yes, The Future is Plural! 😜

[steviebunny]

Pretty Astute Observations

Coquilles

___

06:00

Will Graham walks through the foyer of Hannibal Lectors home, bags still dark and heavy beneath his eyes. 

“Is it safe to assume you are not sleep walking now?”

“I’m sorry its so early”

“Office hours are for patients. My kitchen is always open to friends… and their partners.”

“Lena?”

“Came to see me just an hour ago, an interesting conversation was had on the topic of evil. Perhaps reaching out to her would be your best course of action. That's why Jack recruited her, is it not?” He says while fiddling with the espresso machine.

“I uh- I don’t know her very well.”

“One could always use more friends.”

“What about you doctor?”

“I’ll have you both…If you’ll have me” The innuendo could almost be unsettling if it wasn’t for Hannibal's air of confidence blanketing the statement. “Onset of adult sleepwalking is less common than in children.”

“Could it be a seizure?” Will asks gratefully accepting a glass from Hannibal.

“I’d argue, good old-fashioned post-traumatic stress. Jack Crawford has gotten your hands very dirty ”

“I wasn’t forced back into the field” 

“I wouldn't say ‘forced’, manipulated is the word I’d choose.”

“I can handle it.”

“Somewhere between denying horrible events, and calling them out lies the truth of psychological trauma.”

“So I can’t handle it.”

“Your experience may have overwhelmed ordinary functions that give you a sense of control.”

“If my body is walking around without my permission, you’d say thats a loss of control?”

“Wouldn’t you?” Hannibal asks, taking a sip of his own coffee. “Sleepwalkers demonstrate a difficulty handling aggression. Are you experiencing difficulty with aggressive feelings?”

“You said Jack sees me as fine china used for special guests. I'm beginning to feel more like an old mug.”

“You entered into a devil's bargain with Jack Crawford. It takes a toll.”

“Jack isn't the devil.”

“When it comes to how far he's willing to push you to get what he wants, he's certainly no Saint.”

—-

08:50

“You know, Hannibal seems to think we should be friends.” The statement shocked Lena, of all the things she expected Will Graham to say at a motel crime scene that was not one of them.

“Does he really, and what makes you think I’d like to be your friend?” 

“....I have dogs?”

“Are you asking me, or telling me?”

“Telling.” 

“Good. I love dogs, and now that we have that settled. Room was registered to a John Smith, big surprise there “

“An appalling failure of imagination.”

“They paid cash. There are no security cameras on the premises... another big surprise.”

“John Smith one of the victims?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Anderson, according to the register. They were mutilated and displayed. Jack and Zeller think it’s the Ripper but there were no surgical trophies taken, and the Ripper doesn’t exactly profile like the type of man who would vomit at his own crime scene”

“How can you be sure it wasn’t one of the victims?”

“They were strung up antemortem, and the sick was on the bedside table, once you see their positioning you’ll get why thats improbable.”

“Should I brace myself?”

“Definitely. It's not good in there.”

—

“Hooks were bored into the ceiling. A fishing line was used to hold up the bodies and... the wings. At least we know he's a fisherman.”

“Or a Viking.” Zeller chimed in.

“Vikings do this?

“Vikings used to execute Christians by breaking their ribs, bending them back, and draping the lungs over them to resemble wings. They used to call it a "blood eagle." Pagans mocking the Godfearing.” Lena laughed at Zeller’s ‘fun fact’. He raised a brow in her direction at the gesture prompting her to reply.

“Well you can’t say the Christians didn’t deserve it, they bullied their way into a foreign land, tried to murder those who wouldn’t give up their beliefs in the name of the church then moved their ‘savior’s’ birthday from spring to winter so that they could take over the pagan holiday of Yule for themselves. And pagans were also ‘god-fearing’ just not in a monotheistic sense”

“How do you know all that?”

“When I was with the BAU, the resident boy genius was going on a theology kick for a good few months. Each ride on the jet was at least a couple hours…I picked up some things.”

Zeller admonishes the idea and goes back to impatiently swab collecting with Beverly, She and Price laugh under their breath at the man’s childish behavior.

“No, he isn't mocking them. The unsub thinks he’s…transforming them. Elevating them in some way. 

I need a plastic sheet for the bed.”

—-

This is not who you are. 

This is my gift to you. 

I allow you to become angels. 

And now, I lay me down to sleep.

—

"Death makes angels of us all and gives us wings where we had shoulders smooth as raven's claws."

“Robert Frost.”

“Jim Morrison.”

“Even a drunk with a flair for the dramatic can convince himself he's God. Or the lizard king.”

“God makes angels. Jesus was fond of fishermen.”

“Are we talking hardcore Judeo-Christian upsetting, or just upsetting in general?”

“This is a very specific upsetting.”

“Increased serotonin in the wounds is much higher than the free histamines, so, uh, she lived for about 15 minutes after she was skinned.” Zeller announced.

“Powder residue on the neck of the soda bottle shows Vecuronium... scotch and soda and a paralytic agent.”

“Kneeling in supplication at the feet of g-dash-d.”

“Supplication is the most common form of prayer.Gimme, gimme, gimme.”

“They weren't praying to him. They were praying for him. He's afraid.”

“What is somebody who could do something like this afraid of?”

“What's in his vomit?”

“Uh, Dexamethasone...That's used for patients with tumors.”

“Kepra... He's epileptic. Radiation?”

“Gamma four, Steroids for the inflammation, anticonvulsants for the seizures, radiation for the chemotherapy.”

“Our guy has a brain tumor.”

“He's afraid of dying in his sleep.  He's making angels to watch over him.”

—-

An eclectically dressed woman, speed walks in her high-heeled shoes down the halls of the FBI looking for her target. Penelope Garcia won tickets to the most exclusive karaoke bar in Virginia (okay maybe she rigged the competition a little, who has to know?) and she’ll be damned if any member of her precious found family denies her invitation. The moment she spots Lena she grabs the woman’s arm pulling her into the commissary.

“You owe me.”

“What-” 

“Technically I’m not supposed to be helping out your team, and- and well you owe me, so you can’t say no to me!”

“Penny, what are you talking about?”

“This weekend, karaoke, you, me, BAU.”

“I’m on a case right now, sweetie. If Crawford doesn’t have us in the field I’ll be there.”

“Oh, you’ll be there alright. I’ll make sure of it!” The grin on Penelope’s face is contagious even as she rushes back off to her fortress of solitude.

—-

12:00

“There is no one and only spiritual center of the brain”

“Any idea of God comes from many different areas of the mind working together in unison.”

“Maybe I was wrong.”  Being wrong in this case seems like an unnatural event no matter how true or untrue it may be.

“How do you profile someone who has an anomaly in their head changing the way they think?”

“A tumor can definitely affect brain function, even cause vivid hallucinations. However, what appears to be driving your angel maker to create heaven on earth is a simple issue of mortality. Can't beat God, become him?”

“You said he was afraid.”

“He feels abandoned.”

“Ever feel abandoned, Will?”

“Less and less each day, if you and Jack keep encouraging me to make friends, either way, abandonment requires expectation.”

“What were your expectations of Jack Crawford and the FBI?”

“Jack hasn't abandoned me…I didn't expect to be working so closely with others…Lena wants to meet my dogs or rather insinuates she wants to meet my dogs. Definitely didn't expect that.” 

“Perhaps Jack hasn't abandoned you in a discernable way.”

“Perhaps in the way gods abandon their creations.”

“Is Jack God to you?”

“No more than you are.” If Will had looked at Hannibal's face he might have just seen a smile.

“You say he hasn't abandoned you, but at the same time you find yourself wandering around Wolf Trap in the middle of the night.”

“Well... This should be interesting…Please, doctor, proceed.”

“Jack gave you his word he would protect your headspace, yet he leaves you to your mental devices”

“Are you trying to alienate me from Jack Crawford?”

“I'm trying to help you set proper boundaries between employee and employer…I am also trying to help you understand this angel maker you seek. Well, help me understand how to catch him. If he were a classic paranoid schizophrenic, you might be able to influence him to become visible. What, scare him out into the daylight?”

“Might even get him to hurt himself, if he hasn't already. If he were self destructive, he-he..he wouldn't be so careful.”

“Unless he's careful about being self-destructive, making angels to pray over him when he sleeps.”

“Sleep is sacred, and who prays over us when we sleep?”

---

19:00

“Why angels?”

“Well, it isn't biblical. His angels have wings.”

“Um, angels in sculptures and paintings can fly, but not in scripture.”

“Technically not…if we're accounting for the angels that amass as giant winged amalgamations of eyeballs one would assume they could fly too?” Lena now always being a foot behind him is a fact he'll need to get used to at scenes.

“He's drawing from secular sources?”

“His mind has turned against him and there's no one there to help.”

“Uh, Jack... look at this.”

Are those… What are those?”

“Somebody got an orchiectomy real cheap.”

“Doesn't look like the victim.”

“So they're the angel maker's?”

Lena might just need to stop threatening to castrate men who frustrate her now, something about actually seeing the after-effects is more than unsettling.

“He castrated himself?”

“So he isn't just making angels; He's getting ready to become one. Angels don't have genitalia.”

“So he was afraid of dying. Now he's, what, getting used to the idea?”

“He's accepting it or he's bargaining. Heh, bargaining chips!”

“So, does this mean that he's done making angels, or is he just getting started?”

“I don't know.”

“Well, he's not just killing them when he's sleepy. I mean, how is he choosing them?”

“I don't know. Ask him.” Will begins to sweat almost profusely, removing his glasses and wiping his brow.

“I'm asking you.”

“You're the head of the behavioral science unit, Jack. Why don't you come up with your own answers if you don't like mine!?” Will’s voice raises in frustration. Crawford's face begins to morph into a threatening scowl.

“I did not hear that! Did I?!” he screams back at Will. Lena steps forward separating the two men.

“Jack I think its time for you to take a step back.”

“Do NOT get involved Gibbs”

“You brought me in to get involved! He’s obviously overwhelmed and looks like he’s on the verge of passing out, pushing your team won’t get you shit.”

“I know how far I can push my own team”

“Graham isn't officially on the team, you made that clear, and I’m telling you he’s done with the psycho-predicting today”

“I don’t need to be protected, I can see the rest of the scene,” Will says with a dejected rasp.

“I didn’t say we’re leaving, just to stop getting into the Angel Maker's head. I’m sure Dr. Lecter would agree with me if he’d seen that interaction.”

Jack's face screws back up and he storms away from Will and Lena. Beverly then approaches with a friendly smile and a gentle hand on Will’s shoulder. “My ears rang like the first time I heard my mom use the f-word. Are you ok?’ (he chuckles) ‘I know it's a stupid question considering that none of us could possibly be ok doing what we do, but… are you ok?”

“Do I seem different?”

“You're a little different, but you've always been a little different.”

“Brilliant strategy… that way no one ever knows if something's up with you.”

“Maybe not anymore, you’ve got a guard dog now.” Bev smiles and nods at Lena, then leads the two behind her further into the scene.

—-

19:20

“Meet Roger and Marilyn Brunner. You might recognize them from such lists as most wanted.”

“He likes to rape and murder, she likes to watch.”

“We got a DNA match. They falsified the motel registry and were driving a stolen car, so it took a second to identify them.”

“I wonder how long it took Angel Maker to identify them.”

“He didn't choose them randomly. He knows something about them.”

“He sees something we don’t.” It gets harder to not think of Sherlock, why the hell is Virgina so full of artistic and metaphorically motivated criminals?

“The murdered security guard wasn't actually a security guard. He was a convicted felon.”

“Could Angel Maker be a vigilante?”

“Well, vigilantes are pragmatic, they're purposeful; They don't lay down and sleep under their crimes.”

“In his mind, he was doing God's work. That spells vigilante.” Feels eerily similar to a certain terrorist too.

“Well, playing at God has other advantages. One of them…Is always being alone. So he makes angels out of demons.”

“How does he know they're demons?”

“He doesn't have to know. All he has to do is believe.

—

22:00

Will escorts Lena to a joint session with Hannibal practically the second after the both of them had been dismissed from duty for the evening.

“It's difficult to lie still and fear going to sleep.”

“What is there to think about?”

“You listen to your breathing in the dark and the tiny clicks of your blinking eyes.”

“I dream more now than I used to.”

“Well, your dreams were the one place you could be physically safe, relinquishing control. Not anymore.”

“Yeah, I thought about zipping myself up into a sleeping bag before I go to sleep, but it, heh, sounds like a poor man's straight jacket.”

“I’ve always found another body to be helpful…Sherlock would drape himself over me like a blanket when we slept. Bit hard to thrash during a nightmare if you’re simultaneously being squished.”

“Are you offering yourself to Will as a duvet, Lena?”

She laughs dismissively “We don’t know each other that well yet, Lecter. I’m sure at least one of your dogs is large enough to keep Graham still.” 

Will grimaces and huffs, “The dogs don’t sleep in my bed, I sweat sort of profusely…so even if they start there they’ll move off during the night at some point.”

“Well, then I guess I’m getting you an expensive sleeping bag for Christmas.” Will can’t actually tell whether she means that sarcastically or not, he looks to Dr. Lecter prompting the psychiatrist's next question.

“Have you two determined how this angel maker is choosing his victims?”

“Our killer, Well, he doesn't see people how everyone else sees them. He can tell if you're naughty or nice, or he thinks he can.”

“So God has given this person insight into the souls of men.”

“God didn't give him insight; God gave him a tumor.”

“God… rapidly dividing cells that keep trucking along. Seems so human, what deity would work so hard?”

“He's just a man whose brain is playing tricks on him.”

“You are not unlike this killer.”

“My brain is playing tricks on me?”

“You want to feel such sweet and easy peace. The angel maker wants that same peace .He hopes to feel his way cautiously inside and then find it's endless, all around him.”

“He's gonna be disappointed.”

“You accept the impossibility of such a feeling, whereas the angel maker is still chasing it.”

“I don’t think peace is impossible, I think the point of life is just striving for it, having it for a short amount of time. Then chaos ensues again. Balance, good and bad, Evil and righteousness. Peace and terror.”

“ And what or your life Lena has it been balanced between this sense of peace and terror?”

“More terror than peace, lately. But I think the scales are starting to level again.”

“If the Angel Maker got close to peace, that's why he will look for it again. I've tried to reconstruct his thinking and find his patterns.”

“Instead you find yourself in a behavior pattern you can't break. You realize you have a choice.”

“What is it?”

“Angel Maker will be destroyed by what's happening inside his head; You don't have to be.”

“That would require him telling Jack to screw off and stop pushing him,” Lena says as Hannibal stands from his place at his desk.

“Do you feel that Jack Crawford has bad intentions when it comes to dear Will?” 

“I’ve known Jack a long time. We’ve always had an antagonistic relationship, we first met through his wife when I was young. She helped my father on a case…he was not thrilled, I’ve never known why. He then tried to poach me back when I was with the BAU, but he chose to wait until our unit chief was going through difficulty…I suspect he might have even had a hand in convincing Director Strauss of her ‘motivations’. I didn’t want to be manipulated so I left. Went to Scotland Yard, and well… you know the rest, terror struck, Crawford sunk his claws in and here I am. The least I could do in my task to help Will is make Jack's life a little more annoying don't you think?”

Both men seemed to take in Lena’s perspective though whether her opinions on Crawford landed with Will is unknown. Hannibal seemed a bit more accepting. Nodding as he leaned into Will, sniffing the detective.

“Did you just smell me?”

“Difficult to avoid. I really must introduce you to a finer aftershave. That smells like something with a ship on the bottle.”

“Well, I keep getting it for Christmas.”

“Have your headaches been any worse lately? More frequent?”

“Yes, actually.” 

“ I'd change the aftershave.”

—-

07:00

“Elliot Budish: 35-year-old truck driver.”

“He's got a fishing license too. Uh, match came from the national cancer database.”

“Married, two kids… they haven't seen him in four months.”

“He was diagnosed five months ago.”

“Meet the angel maker.”

—-

“This'll be the last one.”

“It's Budish?”

“He made himself into an angel.”

“It wasn't God, it wasn't man. It was his choice to die.”

“His choice?”

“As much as he can make it.”

“I don't know how much longer I can be all that useful to you, Jack.”

“Really? You caught three. The last three we had, you caught. You caught three of them.”

“No, I didn't catch this one. Elliot Budish… surrendered.”

“You know, I'm used to my wife not talking to me. I don't have to get used to you not talking to me too.”

“No one wants to know your relationship issues Jack.” That earns Lena a glare, and if it was anyone else probably the uptick of a certain favorite finger.

“It's getting harder and harder to make myself look.”

“Well, nobody's asking you to look alone.” He says, angling a hand to the red-head.

“All due respect I am looking alone.”

“None taken, I’ve kinda made a career of playing sidekick.”

“You wanna go back to your lecture hall? Read about this stuff on tattlecrime.com?”

“Would you let him?” Lena says at the same moment Will announces “No, I don't…But that may be what I have to do. This is bad for me.”

“You go back to your classroom. When there's k*lling going on that you could've prevented, it will sour your classroom forever.”

“Maybe. And then maybe I'll find a job as a diesel mechanic in a boatyard.”

“You wanna quit? Quit.”

—

Entree (part 1)

“In the night. In the dark. Journey’s end and yet lover’s meeting.”

[shygirl4991]

SMG3 Sussy Notebook

ima tag smg3 sussy notebook spoilers and have the pics of the notebook under read more so you can pick if ya wanna see the notebook! These are highlights and not every page!

now that we have the pw for club penguin we can all log in and get all the cool skins, honestly i feel if mario just guess the password it wouldnt take him long to get it xD be faster then stealing the notebook and all

ah yes the start of the worlds longest slowburn its a super funny thought that right out the usb he gets his notebook and goes this bitch here ima make him my life rival

oh shit shout out to these two that showed up in SMG3 Gauntlet of gloom

suuuure buddy keep telling yourself that, seems even tho SMG3 marked him as his rival and hated him over what happen in college he still wanted to hang out with 4 and be friends but its not like he cares or anything...baka!

lmao the censor on what happen in the igloo ah yes nothing but hugging happen there nothing to M rated xD im guessing the real book in universe might have it a bit more detail given the big deal it was for wotfi 2023

we really dont talk about that hug

did...did i call it in my fic that this man legit is crazy about beans and hot sauce im dying i guess when your the bad guy with low budget for food you get use to the good classic beans and hot sauce

oh honey thats not how that works xD this man is smart but also oh so dumb i think he gets that from his avatar that and he is a few years fresh from the usb Update: @alianarepasa let me know its from a mad max episode i manage to miss it was a fun watch and now i understand what this means xD these peeps really went wild without internet poor toad

pifft im guessing he has masters degree specialized in psychology? other wise idk how he is a psychologist and he seems to be a good one from what we have seen but who knows he could be bullshitting his way through how evil xD

both our boys are ready to ride forklifts into the sunset someone draw this please xD

im laughing i guess SMG3 isnt much a fan of boopkins but seems he really enjoys being with the crew he wont say it but im sure he is a happy bean to finally be with the cool kids after years of being jealous.

he says but give this man eggdog or eggdog memes and he becomes Tari in a second

hey lads we found the page from SMG4 We Dont Talk About What Happened in the Elevator

he wants a castle but ended up with a sick lair in a coffee shop i think thats better!

okay putting my shipping heart away this is so interesting to me like he starts off thinking 4 is a loser and makes him his rival then gets jealous he has these friends and he isnt apart of them. We know SMG3 is lonely and lost as he doesn't know his purpose before becoming lord of the graveyard now being apart of the crew and now knowing who is he, SMG3 is much happier and closer to the crew. But the way he writes this feels like he likes the close contact with 4 and while he doesnt want to admit it could it be he legit does have romantic feelings? idk i feel these past episodes and this part really gets me thinking they have something here to really make smg34 canon naturally and not have the way they act with each other be to different might go more into this later.

this sparks joy thank you for including this and thats it for my ted talk thanks for reading again this is just my highlights i dont want to post the whole notebook here just stuff that gets my mind going!

[fluffypotatey]

*puts on my Professor glasses* Macky really knows EXACTLY how to talk to Wukong, let's dissect it! M: Looks like things are going smoothly. W: I say, you've been here the whole time, haven't you? M: FFM is your home, but it's also mine. W: Did you find anything? M: Still nothing, however. Now the Jade Emperor is no longer present. The Celestial Realm already gives me an unsettling feeling. M: Wukong...that kid. W: I understand. M: You have to go and talk to him. W: I know! But...he still isn't ready. M: I see. You're the one who isn't ready, yet. How did you even become a teacher! M: He has to be. We all have to be realistic. W: He's just a kid. We can't let him... M: Who says he's just a kid! Why is it him? When you chose him, did you know? W: I didn't know, I really didn't know! I just followed...a feeling. M: Are you not the least bit worried?! This child has all of your special powers, and he always runs into trouble. Have you never questioned this before? Not a single person knows where he came from. Is it not strange?! M: We still have no clue as to whoever let out Azure Lion. All your old foes returned in one swoop. Are you not even a little- W: Then what about you? You also suddenly came back. M: Argh- M: I say, someone must be manipulating us behind our backs. Especially Xiaotian. But they still haven't succeeded. W: Then tell me. What about you? M: Tell me do you want my help or not?! / W: Not long ago you were still against me! / M: I see, you're just a- / W: ...after I assume you'll teach me how to train my own disciples? ~ Xiaotian Interupts ~ M: Look. That kid has made you his idol. You're his one true hero, but you... W: But I what? M: He has to understand, he doesn't need to carry these burdens. You have to do better. You can really tell whose the chatty one in this relationship XD Wukong might be a lil annoyed, but he's tolerant. And Macky is a little playful turd as always. Where Wukong gets gloomy and concerned, Mac swaps between teasing and serious in a blink. Then things get a lot more strained and tense, but unlike their previous fights, it never escalates into violence. Never a growl, never a raised fist. They're right at the edge, and they drop it. I'm very much interested in the psychology of arguments and when it comes to people latching onto (1) thing a person says and relating it slightly off topic to avoid talking about that other thing, like Wukong is doing here. It's so cool seeing how physical they are in trying to visibly control their emotions around each other, and how they keep trying to hold themselves back from tearing in further, always pausing and halting, and switching to another thing. They're TRYING. Ugh. I think Mac was trying to give a comforting smile at the end, but it's kinda warped by the whole ~ everything else. ~ Anyhow, I like how this starts with Wukong establishing, or rather cementing to Macaque that he believes MK is a kid. And while Macaque argues against that, he did also say before that Wukong should talk to him. And they have their squabble, with Mac pushing Wukong's buttons to get him to say something, BUT the fact this gets resolved with he needs to understand he doesn't need to carry these burdens. YOU HAVE TO DO BETTER. Like of all things Mac could have chosen. He's playing right into what Wukong himself believes, that will overwrite the "MK isn't ready" thing. Because let's face it. Mac is right when he says Wukong also isn't ready for that talk yet. He's so down throughout all this, Wukong probably feels himself that he needs to be better. AND by appealing to the fact MK is a kid, without explicitly stating that, just a statement that cannot be denied, BUT is a subject that undoubtedly, even Wukong cannot avoid. Because he wants better for MK. For him to not walk down the same path as him. Macaque has basically nudged Wukong into having that talk he wanted with MK by reframing it differently from what Wukong wasn't ready for. Thoughts? Critique?

*squishes you* anon…anon, you’re telling me..that this was the actual dialogue between SWK and Macky in 5x01. that what i just read is the translated version of the Mandarin dub. correct?

ok ok cool. i’m cool. gucci. feeling fantastic lemme just

WHAT THE FUCK LMK

ok so i ranted in the tags but realized i forgot to say more things (also i was worried i’d exceed the tag limit bc that is a real thing what do you know!)

so, anon, you said Macky knows how to talk to Wukong and yeah agreed but for me it’s for of the sense of “Macky knows how to get his words under Wukong’s skin”

he knows how to let his words sink in and fester in Wukong’s mind, making him reconsider things or another to help speed up certain decisions or choices Wukong is hesitating on. and ain’t it fascinating how despite how long it’s been since either character have talked or interacted with each other, they still know the ins and outs of their behavior and thoughts.

Macky knows Wukong needs to talk to MK but is holding back. Macky after one answer from Wukong realizes that it’s Wukong who isn’t ready for that conversation and switches tactics to try and breach that mental block

Wukong, in a need to avoid the conversation, brings up the questions surrounding Macky’s reason for even being alive again because that is information neither have talked about and oh hey! Macky is avoiding that conversation too! and it’s an important one to have so he pushes for it, but Macky knows it’s being pushed to avoid their original discussion and is annoyed bc “classic Wukong, never wanting to delve too deep into topics where he’ll need to be vulnerable for” (especially when said vulnerability is with his newly re-allied ex friend Macaroni himself)

god i love them

[natashaslittlegirl]

I need an assistant - Romanoff's Assistant

DO NOT COPY ANY OF MY WORKS. MINORS DNI +18 ONLY.

Summary: You find your dream job in a not-so-expected way.

Boss ! Natasha Romanoff x Assistant ! Reader

Warnings: none.

Natasha Romanoff's Masterlist RA Masterlist RA account Chapter I aesthetic

The morning started like any other, doing your skincare routine, going for a walk to your favorite coffee shop in the whole world, or well, at least in New York. With your beige coat, black dress pants and a white shirt. It's october, autumn is here, so the cold. You grabbed your handbag and your folder, say goodbye to Lena, your cat and start your way.

It's been a month since you graduated from uni in Psychology, so as you all may be thinking, yes, You're looking for a job.

You got in to The Barista, you've been coming here every day for about two years now, you'll see a student needs a lot of coffee and a quiet place to work, this is the ideal place.

"Y/N! Morning! the usual?" Kate asked you, she is a very special girl, always happy with a bright smile, you have known her since a year ago when she started working here, you became very close, you two go to get lunch or drinks together, fun fact, she loves to tease you even though you both know that you only share a beautiful friendship.

"Good morning, my favorite barista, yes please, I need your coffee." you wink at her, yes, you also like to tease her.

"I'm the only barista, of course I'm your favorite! Also, if you keep winking at me I'll start giving you free coffee every morning."

"Well, I think I'm going to keep doing it."

Kate moves to one side preparing your coffee to go, you have to go deliver your curriculum to some companies and studios that you have seen that need an assistant, yeah, you graduated in psychology, but first you have to make money to be able to have your own studio. Once you're called to pick up your drink, you hand Kate the money, but she tells you that's on the house, you thank her and continue your way to the front door. Distracted and without looking, you ended up bumping into a redhead making your folder with all your documents fall. Grateful that your coffee hasn't spilled, you see the woman in front of you bends down to pick up your things.

"I'm so sorry, let me help you." In your shorts twenty-one years on earth you have never seen a woman as beautiful as the one in front of me and for some reason you feel like you know her. You lock eyes as she stands up and hands you the papers, except for one. Your curriculum.

"Looking for a job, huh?" She says with raspy voice as she reads.

"Yeah, I was about to go deliver it."

"Well, I think today is your lucky day because, I need an assistant, Natasha Romanoff." And just like that your frozen in place, is this real? God, you seriously can't believe it. Since the beginning of your career you've been following her work, you have almost never seen photos just one, you think, that's why you feel strange about her, cause you do know who she is. Your dream was one day to be able to work with her. 

"I can't believe it, I was about to drop off my resume at your company, I'm Y/N Y/L/N, it's nice to finally meet you"

"Finally?" she asks you, confused.

"Uhm yes, since the beginning of my career I have followed your work, your research, you are my role model." You said excitedly, she smiles at you and looks at the sheet again.

"Okay, let me see," her gaze dropped to the written paper "So, you're just graduated in psychology with a master's degree in child psychology, criminology, neuropsychology and mindfulness. Impressive." You can't help but smile, at the same time you play with the rings on my fingers, a sign of your nervousness. "If you wait for me to get my coffee we can go to my company together. I'm very interested in what you have to offer and I would like to give you a chance."

You can't believe anything that is happening to you, the feel that at any moment your alarm is going to ring or you're going to fall out of my bed is tickling in your brain.

"Yes, of course, I'll wait, thank you very much, Miss Romanoff." And with nothing more to say, she hands you the foil and goes to order her coffee. You listened to her order, coffee with almond milk, extra hot, without sugar and only the cup 70% full, you made a mental reminder, just in case.

She hands Kate the money plus a generous tip once she receives her coffee, turns back and walks towards you. You open the door for her to go out first, turn your head to Kate, who is with a thumbs up and a smile from ear to ear muttering 'good luck'. You laughed at her enthusiasm, sure she heard everything

You get out and walk to Miss Romanoff's side. Her Company is only two avenues away, you go in silence, enjoying your coffee. As you get closer you see her building, tall mirrored glass floor to celling with at least 20 floors, Romanoff's company.

You go ahead and open the door for her, again she murmurs a thank you and leads your way. You entered to the elevator and as you thought, this building has more than twenty floors, twenty seven to be exact. That's the number Miss Romanoff rings, her office. When it opens the doors you see a long glass desk, behind a shelf with several folders, suppose are her patients. Computer, notebook and ipad, agenda and pens, highlighters, post it, everything an assistant would need.

Glass panels surround her office that separate it from the other one, although you can not see through it, they are mirrored.  She opens the door letting you in and closes it behind her, walks past you and sits at her large glass desk. Her office is minimalist. Excellent view towards central park, obviously, white sofa to one side, carpet under it, a small table in front and two armchairs. The furniture is white also the marble floor with shiny grayish tones without a trace of dust.

"Sit down, let's get started." She points to the chair in front of her desk. You sit and cross your legs, she scans you up and down until her eyes meet your, and you do no other than gulp, loud, Miss Romanoff smirks.

"Why do you want to work as an assistant and not as a psychologist?" She asks you and relaxes her posture by leaning back in her chair.

"I would like first to gain experience, gather all the knowledge I can to later develop myself better, I would like to open my own studio." You answer without hesitation, you're very clear about what you want.

"Why at Romanoff's company?" 

"As I said before, Miss Romanoff, I admire you, I admire your work, I would like to be able to learn as many things as possible and gain skills in the field. I would like to contribute all my knowledge and be able to be your help whenever you need it, I will do anything yo ask me."

"Anything I ask for?" She quicks an eyebrow.

"Yes, Miss Romanoff." She asks you for your foil again and you handed it to her, as she reads better than she did in the café, you take your time to scan her. Red straight hair, plump lips and green eyes with large lashes, delicate eyebrows, define jawline that looks it could cut. Her face is perfect, magazine worthy. Her large neck, adorned with a white shirt, two buttons undone, matching black suit and heels of the same color. She smells like vainilla, so intoxicating, you sigh and she looks at you, feeling the burn in your cheecks, shit.

Her eyes go back to the letters in the paper. "I'm massive impressive, Miss Y/L/N." and looks at you again, "How old are you exactly?"

"Twenty-one, Miss Romanoff." Her eyes open wide, she thought you were older.

"You're twenty-one and you already graduated from college with four masters degrees, always top of your class, Harvard. You have such a potencial" 

Now you can't believe what she's saying, it's what, 10am? And this day couldn't go any better. 

"I need you to know that I don't usually do this, but my previous assistant quit and I need one now. You got the Job, Miss Y/L/N, I want you here monday at 8am, you have a week-test, one day late, one mistake and your gone. Understand?" well, it went better.

"Yes, Miss Romanoff." You nodded.

"Great." She stands up and leads you to your new office. When you tell Kate all this she's not going to believe it. When you wake up this morning you didn't think that you were going to be hired, by no one else than the most powerful women on this country, if not the continent, to work for her in the company you always dreamed, all this happened too fast.

Miss Romanoff starts to tell you what you have to do. As you thought, receive calls, schedule appointments with patients, organize her agenda, see upcoming events and trips, nothing pretty much than the usual things an assistant does. She scolds you to the elevator door and that's the last glimpse of her until Monday, what a good form to start the day.

Next Chapter

[theeasistwayofdoingthings]

Character sheet

(link for notion)

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Read(about the sheet)

My first language isn't English, so if there are any grammatical problems, I'll be glad if you correct me.

If you have any suggestions of things to add in this sheet feel free to tell me, I can make personalized character sheets too(Character sheets with specific themes, ex: strawberry themed sheet), so if you wanna one you can ask :)

Read:

I'm planning on making more sheets not exclusively Character creation sheets, but maybe sheets for, potion creation, musical group sheets, things like that So if you'll have any suggestions feel free to tell me.

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If you prefer to see directly without the link:

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“Character quote”

General information

Name:

Pronunciation:

Meaning:

Middle name:

Pronunciation:

Meaning:

It's an honor to a family member?

Surname:

Pronunciation:

Meaning:

Nicknames:

Titles:

Hometown:

Current city:

Gender identity:

Birthday:

Dominant hand:

Sign:

Mbti:

Symbol (if they have):

Handwriting:

Signature:

Appearance

Height:

Weight:

Specie:

Race:

Blood type:

Skin Color:

Extra member(if they have):

Birthmarks:

— How is It:

— Where is it:

Piercings:

— Name of the piercing:

— Where is it:

— Piercing jewelry:

Scars:

— How it is:

— Where it is:

— How they get it:

Tattoos:

— How is it:

— Where is it:

— Have any personal meaning?

Hair color:

Hair length:

Hair type(if is straight, wavy, curly or coily):

Haircut/hairstyle:

Ear shape(if are human ears,pointy, etc...):

Eye color:

Eye shape:

Eyebrows:

Nose shape:

Teeth:

Nails size:

Nails shape:

Face shape:

Facial hair:

Fur:

Fur length:

Fur color:

Fur pattern:

Tail color:

Tail size:

Tail type:

Tail pattern:

Wings color:

Wings size:

Scent:

Walking style:

Running style:

Health

Diet:

Exercise:

Posture:

Reflexes:

Eating habits:

Sleep habits:

Allergies:

Illnesses:

Disorders:

Syndromes:

Imperfections :

Broken bones:

Abnormalities:

Disability:

Meds:

Psychological

Memory:

Temperament:

Vocabulary:

Mental health:

Emotional stability:

Instincts:

Learning style:

Interpersonal:

Intrapersonal:

How they see the world:

How they see their life:

Linguistics:

logical-mathematical:

Perception

Sight:

Hearing:

Smell:

Touch:

Taste:

Intuition:

Philosophy

Religion:

Devotion:

Superstitions:

Animal spirit:

Morals:

Etiquette:

Attitude:

Mantras:

Taboos:

Character

Main goal:

Secondary goal:

Priorities:

Motivations:

Self-confidence:

Self-control:

Self-esteem:

Hobbies:

Personal hobbies:

Guilty pleasure:

Habits:

Desires:

Manias:

Afflictions :

Traumas:

Concerns :

nervous tics :

soft spots:

Achievements :

Greatest achievement:

failures:

Greatest failures:

Favorite dream:

Worst nightmare:

Latest memory:

Earliest memory:

Happiest memory:

Saddest memory:

Funniest memory:

Vocabulary

Compliments:

Insults:

most used words:

Greetings:

Preferences

Likes:

Dislikes:

Special interests:

Most favorite things/subjects :

Least favorite things/subjects:

Combat Skills

Martial arts:

Resistance:

Strong points:

Weak points:

Specialties:

Special move:

Speed: From 0 to 10=

Dexterity: From 0 to 10=

Agility: From 0 to 10=

Flexibility: From 0 to 10=

Stamina: From 0 to 10=

Home, job, education

Hometown:

Current City:

Home traditions:

Routine:

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Employer/boss:

Job:

Rank:

Do they like their job?

Experience:

Community service:

Supervisor:

Job hours:

Work ethics:

Method of transport to work:

Criminal record:

Dream job:

Salary:

Expenses?

Dependents:

Savings:

Debts:

Budget:

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Primary school:

Elementary School:

Middle school:

High school:

College:

Extracurricular activities:

Special education?

Average grades:

Study habits:

Graduation year:

Specialties:

PETS

Pet #1

Name:

Specie:

Race:

Sex:

Age:

Is neutered:

Is it a service animal?

Social life

Best friends:

Best friend #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Friends:

Friend #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Allies:

Allie #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Acquaintances:

Acquaintance#1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

followers:

Follower #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Subordinates:

Subordinate#1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Rivals:

Rival #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

— Why we don't get along:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Enemies:

Enemy #1

— Relationship with me:

— Have we known each other for a long time?:

— When we meet each other:

— Where we meet each other:

— Why we don't get along:

- Nicknames that they receive:

- Nicknames that they give:

Inspirations:

— Why is it an inspiration?

Heroes:

Mentors:

Communicative:

Cooperative:

Discriminations :

Reputation:

Sociability:

Status:

Social class:

Community:

Family

Mother:

— how is their relationship with her?

Father:

— How is their relationship with him?

Siblings:

Sibling #1

— How is their relationship with them?

Children:

Child #1

— How is their relationship with them?

Relatives:

Distant relatives:

ancestry:

Love life

First love:

Romantic interest:

Marital status:

S/O, Romantic partner:

Sexual orientation:

Romantic orientation:

Love language:

Information about their partner

— who asked to date?

How many years of dating:

When was the dating ask:

Where it was:

How it was:

— Who proposed ?

How many years married:

When was the propose:

Where was the propose:

How it was:

informations for the story

Archetypes:

Enneagram:

Mbti:

Tropes:

Cliches:

Role:

Voice actor:

Symbolizes something:

Inspiration:

One word:

Theme song:

Soundtrack:

Date of creation:

First appearance(Date, local, event):

Latest appearance(Date, local, event):

Last appearance(Date, local, event):

Impressions

First impressions:

How they see themselves:

How the family see them:

How their partner see them:

How their friends see them:

How the authorities see then:

How strangers see them:

How their enemies see them:

Development

Personal:

Social:

Physical:

Mentally:

How they Express

Angry

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Anxiety

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Confusion

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Depression

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Embarrassment

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Enthusiasm

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Fear

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Guilty

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Happiness

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Repentance/Regret

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Nervous

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Offended

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Gratitude

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Sadness

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Stressed

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Thoughtful

Facial expression:

Body language:

Attitudes:

Biography

Infancy (0-3):

Childhood (4-12):

Adolescence (13-19):

Adulthood (20-54):

Seniority (55+):

—What you can put in the biography:

Birth name?

Born with health?

Where they were born?

Way of birth?

First words?

— if they are dead you can put:

Death date?

Where they die?

How they die?

Where was they buried? Was they buried?

Death wish?

Last words?

[schizosupport]

so with brain stuff or whatever

Who am I supposed to bring stuff up to at the start?

I'm currently in the middle of a lot of changes (trying to switch primary doctor and get a therapist and stuff) and one of the reasons for me changing that stuff is that my brain is very weird and I need to figure out why/get help with it

But when I'm bringing up symptoms or whatever, I had very much assumed that would be therapist but I'm also not fully sure who does what in a system like that (primary doctor vs therapist vs psychologist) and in the past have had some problems with that (still don't really know who the hell is supposed to diagnose sensory processing disorder)

Also any suggestions for like... what's a good area or amount to start with when trying to bring stuff up? I haven't talked to someone about mental health type things in a really long time and have had problems with derealization/depersonalization, possible depression, possible ocd, some weird situations in which I wasn't really sure what was real, a couple anxiety spirals over illogical things, intrusive thoughts, etc and I don't really know what to prioritize or how much to say in a way where I wouldn't overwhelm someone new, wouldn't be worried about telling them too much, but would also be able to give enough information about something to lead to a diagnosis or help

Sorry if this is too long or too much information or too many questions or anything like that

Hi there!

Okay so the annoying truth is that this depends a lot on the healthcare system where you live, and I don't know where you live (nor do I know the system everywhere) but I can try to give you some general pointers.

Your primary doctor is the first person to talk to, if you need a referral to see any of the other professionals you mentioned, but usually the primary doctor isn't the one doing the diagnosis or treatment (though they may prescribe some types of psych medication, and they often take over prescribing from a psychiatrist once the right meds have been found).

The psychiatrist is a type of doctor, and they are the person to talk to if you're interested in medication, and in some systems psychiatrists may also be who refers you to see a therapist. In a lot of systems it's primarily psychiatrists who diagnose people, too. Sometimes clinical psychologists also do diagnoses, but psychiatrists always do diagnosis + medication (and only very rarely do they engage in therapy).

A psychologist is someone who's educated in the field of psychology, so they (ideally) have an in-depth understanding of general human psychology, and they often are also educated in mental disorders and in different approaches to therapy. In terms of treating mental illness, some psychologist do diagnose, but the most common function is for them to do talk therapy.

Therapists can technically have any educational background, and refers to anyone who "does therapy".

If you're looking for a mental health professional to treat you with talk therapy, you ideally want a therapist who has a degree in psychology. If you're looking for a mental health professional to diagnose you and prescribe medication, you're looking for a psychiatrist (doctor of medicine who specializes in psychiatry).

If you have the ability to see any of these professionals without a referral, you can choose which one based on what you are looking for. And if you need a referral, then the first step is your primary doctor.

With a primary doctor you want to give them enough information to ensure getting a referral, but you don't have to throw your whole heart out there. If you are in a diagnostic setting, usually (ideally) they follow a semi-standardized questionnaire like the PSE, so a lot of the time they are the ones leading the conversation and asking you questions. Sometimes they will do an initial interview where you tell them freely about what's bothering you. Try to focus on the things that are causing you the most distress, and try to avoid clinical language.

With a therapist, the goal is to build a therapeutic relationship, and you can approach it based on feels - it's ok not to open up about everything at once, but it can also be helpful to take time to define the goals of therapy together (which would include what you're struggling with and wanting to work on).

Hope this was at all helpful,

Best of luck!

[7-ratsinatrenchcoat]

Two things I wanna know! (feel free to ignore obviously ^^ )

What are your top 5 favorite characters and why are they your favorite? Could be current favorites, favorites over the years that you still like, favorites in general, etc. Also any media

And/or gimme 1-5 of your ocs - whether they're your favorite, most recent, the one you've been having fun with recently, etc. Tell me some fun facts about them, and why you picked them!

Hope you're having a great day/night - and remember to stay hydrated!

TOP 5 CHARACTERS (AT THE MOMENT, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

Elizabeth

My pookie! She got done so dirty by Nakaba, I could write a dissertation about how she deserves a better character arc than she was given and exactly how to do it. My version of her is so OOC that when I watch the series, it feels weird for her to be so different from how I think of her.

Nezuko

Okay, maybe I'm a sucker for poorly written female characters that deserve a better story. I wrote a fic where she learns sign and actually has complicated feelings about her brother, the Hashira and Urokodaki, which I wish the series would have explored more outside of 'oh it's fine/I forgot'.

Sukuna

I AM NOT HORNY ABOUT HIM. I AM A BIG FAT DYKE. I do think he's a well written villain in the sense that he's likeable enough not to be annoying, but not so likeable that he stops being an antagonist. It's hard to put your main villain and hero in the same body, but I think Gege does it wonderfully.

Meliodas

This list would be incomplete without him. Like Elizabeth, I have such a different conception of him in my brain than exists in canon, when I watch the series it feels like a different character completely. His concept is so good and juicy, he just happened to be written by a man.

Cast of Neon Genesis Evangelion

They gave us so much. My first mecha anime and my first psychological/existential/philosophical anime all in one! I can't think of a badly written character in this entire show, but it definitely exists on a different scope to me. It's just so far beyond what a lot of other shows want to say/have the writing to say. That said I do think Cyberpunk Edgerunner was a great show to follow it with, matched the futuristic vibes, complex characters and philosophical message well.

TOP 5 OCs (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

Hikari (NNT)

I think she is my oldest OC out of this entire list at 5 years old this spring. I've seriously put her through so much for the plot, and at this point I think she and her entire universe have safely exited hyperfixation and entered special interest territory. Her ass is going nowhere soon, and even if I spend time with other OCs, it always comes back to her. I have her entire life developed from birth to at least ~50, and trust me, it's not all pretty. Some of it is! But not all of it.

Tristan (NNT)

He's only younger than Hikari by about two weeks, so almost 5 years for him. Not the same as 4KOTA Tristan, I heard that the canon melizabeth kid was named Tristan and went 'oh, sounds good I'll take it' before 4KOTA even came out. The two could not be more different. I almost put him and Hikari in the same entry, they come as a unit like that, but he deserves his own paragraph. He has also gone through more than any normal person would have put him through, but I am no normal bitch. I need a shirt that says 'I put blond men in situations'.

Natsuri Fujikawa (Demon Slayer)

She's much younger than the twins at about 1.5, but I'm still loving her storyline and plot development. She's in the Demon Slayer universe, and is only 10 when she goes through the Horrors, which might be a mary-sue type deal but I really don't care. It brings me joy. Does it say something about me that forced cannibalism, kidnapping and psychological torture sparks joy? Maybe. I haven't written any of her stuff down yet, I should probably do that.

Misoka (HXH)

Older than Natsuri but younger than the twins, let's call it about two years. Her story is a little looser, but goes through more ups and downs than straight misery punctuated by moments of brightness. She's fun for when I need a little more variety in the delusions, but is still versatile enough for me to put her in Situations and have it feel normal. I probably owe her an apology for making her try to kill her adoptive family.

Claudia and One (OG)

The original strangers -> friends -> lovers. I wrote a hundred pages of angst and whump about you before it was flagged by my middle school and I got called into the counselor's office because of it. Shoutout to the social worker who told me it was good writing and that I should keep working on it, I just had to move it off of my school account. You were a real one.

[dpdcultureis]

can i get a run down of typical dpd traits and what it's like to have the disorder??? i didn't realize this was a disorder (which- as someone with a special interest in psychology it came as a surprise-) and i'm genuinely curious and want to learn more... i have suspicions about myself and some friends of mine now... 😅

also, if you'd rather dm me answers than post, that's totally fine too! i may end up with follow up questions too 😅

(also i'm so sorry if this isn't the type of ask you prefer and you don't have to answer at all if you don't want, i'm just curious and usually talking to ppl w i t h the specific disorders is sm more helpful and accurate than google 💀)

hey hi!! i'll answer with regards to how it presents for me, but keep in mind that it'll probably look a bit different for me because i have other mental illnesses (including personality disorders) that also influence my behaviour ^^ any of my followers are free to chime in with their experiences too, and just looking through the #actually dpd or #actually dependent tags might be a good pursuit too!!

for me it manifests as being very anxious about making my own decisions (even when i don't necessarily recognise it as such; sometimes it presents so casually - asking about something that really doesn't need external input - that i don't notice when it happens). it also causes a deep fear of living alone and being abandoned/losing the people close to me, although the first one may be partially influenced by the fact i'm physically disabled, and the latter is common in some other PDs too. i typically seek validation over little things and share as much of what i'm doing as possible to my close friends in an attempt to reaffirm my acceptance and the fact they care about me, in a way?

for me i also seem to get a bit clingy, which if left unchecked could progress into something worse like overprotectiveness/jealousy and the like. for me that doesn't happen because my other PDs mask that aspect, but i do sometimes feel that possessiveness that i worry about, especially around my depended (DPD's version of the BPD 'favourite person', for lack of a better way to explain it)

being asked to guess or make my own decision causes me some anxiety, and doing things without permission causes a similar stress. i still tell my parents whenever i'm leaving the house and what i'm doing, and sometimes ask if i can go out, and i turn 20 later this year 😭

i can't really think of much else to talk about that isn't just reiterating what i've already said but with different examples, so now i'll leave this open for any followers here to rb/comment and add their own experiences!

(if you're curious, the other PDs i believe i have are AvPD and BPD, which overlap somewhat with these symptoms, but also work to mask some of them too. bc of that, a lot of my experience with DPD is internal)

[thelostgirl21]

"My number-one priority, which I said to her, was just to make sure that we were doing it right and that we did it sensitively with a care and a kinship, and I wanted to avoid all kinds of stereotyping, really. So there was an awful lot of script rewrites and things like that. We deleted whole scenes in favour of songs. So I brought in a new song, and I said: 'Can we just cut all this dialogue, and I can just sing something?'" - Joey Batey, Digital Spy interview

The first time I watched that scene, when Jaskier started singing that last part to Prince Radovid:

Of them, I’ve had enough. With you, I have enough. With you, I am enough. I am… I am enough...

I literally started crying. Because, although it's played for laughs, since the beginning of the show, Jaskier's often been portrayed like this "annoying character" that tries too hard to be liked, wanted, and involved in his friends' lives... to find his "forever home"...

But often, he just gets punched in the gut, blamed for everything going wrong in other people's lives, gets told off when he tries to introduce himself or be included in moments where people are there to offer each other comfort (but apparently want none from him) as a result...

Season 2 started to make some progress on that, with Yennefer and Geralt allowing themselves to show more vulnerability around him, and telling him that his help his needed...

Season 3 saw characters that are usually so quick to dismiss him and treat him harshly (ex: Yarpen Zigrin) actually thank him, when they realize how selfless Jaskier can be, and the risks he is willing to take to help others (even those that treat him like an annoying nuisance)...

But still, he'd gotten used, at some point, to being "barely tolerated" rather than "wanted". And his "break up" with Geralt broke his heart and hurt him so much that, although forgiven, I believe it did leave some scars...

As someone with ADHD (that has a tendency to get overexcited about a bunch of things without noticing that it doesn't interest people, impulsively interrupt them with my thoughts, follow them around, and "impose my presence" without meaning to) and associated rejection sensitive dysphoria, Jaskier's behavior and emotional responses are something very easy for me to identify with.

And having him sing "With you I am enough. I am enough," hit me right in the feels, in the most cathartic way!

Prince Radovid is the first person we met on the show, I think, that was shown as being immediately happy to meet Jaskier, wished to adopt that puppy and bring him home right away, saw him as being irresistible and special, envied Geralt for having Jaskier as a friend/companion, couldn't get enough of his singing, and listened when he talked to the things he didn't say...

Knowing that it is Joey himself that just decided to basically show up to work with that song he'd written, and ask if he could sing it instead of using the dialogue in the script, just ended up offering yet another layer to that scene.

When hearing him sing:

"It’s not a want, it’s a need, it is paying no heed to what others say to sing."

now, I can't help but feel like there's some kind of "meta" dimension to those lyrics, as the actor chose to sing what he - as the person embodying Jaskier - wanted to sing, rather than what had been scripted and what others would have wanted him to sing.

That song feels deeply personal, born out of a very intimate understanding of the character, and how being treated the way that he used to be treated would have emotionally and psychologically affected him.

I'll be 100% honest, when Joey was talking about the sapioromantic connection between the characters, and explaining how Radovid wore a mask, was a bit of a mystery to him, and how Jaskier would become fascinated and wish to figure him out...

...I was genuinely concerned that they'd somehow manage to "romanticize" yet another toxic relationship, where the two characters would constantly be trying to outsmart and play mind games with each other.

But that's not it at all. They are both seeing what they try so hard to hide from others. Prince Radovid's environment is highly toxic and dysfunctional (as Jaskier aptly described, he's stuck in a vipers' den) - knowing too much, or not enough - can mean life or death for him.

Whereas Jaskier tries so hard to meet expectations and be what others need or want him to be - give voice to other people's issues, stories and problems - that he all but becomes invisible to others himself as a process.

Sure, they know his name and his songs. But they don't know Jaskier's own soul or story. He fades away in the background for the benefit of others.

They are both trying to figure each other out not because they are people that enjoy indulging in court intrigues, manipulating others, and dominating "the game" for their own gain...

They are trying to emotionally connect with the good, beautiful, and vulnerable parts of themselves that they have been forced to hide from the rest of the world to survive.

They are highly insightful empathetic individuals using their gifts on each other to empower each other, rather than malignant narcissists using their perceptiveness to control each other.

This is an extremely refreshing and healthy relation dynamic that I was sort of hoping for - since Joey put so much emphasis on how important it was for him to offer a relationship that may be flawed, but handled sensitively and carefully without resorting to stereotypes - but this totally went above and beyond my expectations!

If Joey Batey himself isn't queer, then he's got such a capacity for love and emotional empathy that he's apparently able to care about queer issues with the intensity and insightfulness of someone that has experienced them.

The fact that he's using queer labels and sub-categories that are often lesser known by people outside of the LGBTQ+ community to describe Jaskier's sexuality (sapioromantic, panromantic or pansexual...), as well as talking about issues affecting non-monosexuals, such as the desire to avoid bisexual erasure, brings some much needed attention towards the richness and diversity of the LGBTQ+ community!

I sincerely couldn't be happier, or more grateful...

Apparently, there are plans to further explore Ciri's bisexuality, too, with the introduction of Mistle in Season 3!

Here's hoping they'll be using Jaskier as "queer consultant" for the other queer romances on the show...

Also, the relationship between our sweet Bi!Ciri and her weird Pan!Uncle Jaskier means everything to me...

I'm trying to remember if Ciri has been exposed to any models of queer romances in her life...

I mean, most unions between princes and princesses, or kings and queens, are often political alliances. They might have same gender consorts, but I'm not sure that this is something they would have educated younger princesses about, or made very "public".

I sort of want to have her catch Jaskier and Radovid while they are kissing at some point, and realize that the innocent crush she had on Triss in Season 2 is something that is perfectly normal, and that she shouldn't be afraid nor ashamed of that part of herself.

Maybe even go to him and start asking him questions about it... That would be a very thoughtful and sensitive way to explore what being queer means in the world of the Witcher; having Ciri learn, directly from Jaskier, about the potential risks associated with being in an openly gay relationship.

There would really be such an opportunity for the two of them to continue to bond over something like this, and Ciri would know that she's got someone that genuinely loves her and that she can trust to support her and the choices she makes regarding her love life in the future, no matter what.

I can see so many possibilities, though I'm trying to be cautiously optimistic about this (since if they went that route, it would just seem too good to be true!)...

[caffiene-fueled-fuckery]

hiiii can you do a deep dive into hawkeye's attachment styles pretty please :') i don't know much about attachment styles but i love psychology and i'm super normal about that guy (lying) so this is all fascinating 2 me !!!

Hi! I can certainly try!

I'm by no means an expert on attachment theory but I guess I can maybe talk about it since I'm studying it right now and have for a few years. I'm a psych major specializing in psychological development, and a lot of my interests and papers in the last few years have been on attachment theory specifically in adults bc believe it or not, most people think that it's only a thing when you're in infancy and early childhood. False! You actually grow an attachment network as you go from adolescence into adulthood and that's how it stays essentially, but your attachment style is important for the people you choose to be around and how relationship dynamics work (there's more nuance to this but I'm not really sure how to explain it without going super in depth). Anyway... Maybe I should do a general post about attachment theory.

For Hawkeye I think he's definitely in the preoccupied type, but he can also sometimes be a bit dismissing. Let's be real, Hawkeye has abandonment issues. If you think about it, he lost his mom when he was a kid, and it was pretty sudden. She got sick and he didn't really know what was going on, and his dad didn't tell him how bad it was. Then a few days later she was gone. Not only did he very suddenly lose a primary attachment figure, but he likely felt a sense of betrayal from his other primary attachment figure due to his dad not being honest with him. Yes, he was only a kid, but that doesn't stop him from feeling that way. That is still the case to a degree, he mentions it in that one episode... I think it's called Sons and Bowlers? When his dad was going into surgery for something serious and Hawkeye thought it could be cancer but he didn't find out until his dad was already in surgery and he spent forever trying to get through to the hospital. He was rantic and said something about his dad doing it again, likely meaning holding back the severity of an illness from him to protect him.

The loss of a primary caregiver is devestating to a young child even if they don't really understand what happened. The person they've relied on, who they knew was going to keep them safe and take care of them is just no longer there, whether they know why or not doesn't matter. Now, hawkeye I think was a bit older... 10, maybe? So he understood that it wasn't his Mom's intention, but that doesn't stop the pain. It seems very much like he clung to his dad after that, and he seems to have a very secure attachment to him. But I don't think that overall he has a secure attachment style. Definitely not.

The preoccupied attachment style is typically characterized by people who have positive views of others but negative views of the self. This usually means that they want close relationships but don't feel they're deserving of it necessarily or that they can trust others. In a modern sense, they'd be the person who'd text you a thousand times if you didn't respond. They can be clingy and they need reassurance. And while Hawkeye can be arrogant, I don't think he really likes himself that much. I can't think of anything speciifc he says but he definitely seems to think he's not a good person. He probably doesn't think he's ideal for a relationship. And we can see that in his interactions with his ex.

Carly and Hawkeye lived together for over a year, and he was devastated when she left him. Again, abandonment by another primary attachment figure. When she showed up at the 4077th he was hurt and a bit bitter, but when he talked to her he was desperate. He would do anything to keep her by his side, including marriage. And she knew it was desperation. A lot of it was his work that got between them, as she said, because he isn't someone who can put his work second. But another piece of those commitment issues might be that doubt or anxiety around relationships that are more than just sex.

This isn't just in romantic relationships. Think about how he reacted when Trapper left. He was so hurt that Trapper didn't even leave a note and chased after him to try and catch him before he left despite knowing he had little chance of catching him. He and Trapper were always together and he seemed a bit more secure in that friendship... but that went out the window when he left. Now, I don't really know that much about Trapper, esp since he was only in 3/11 seasons. But the effect he had on Hawkeye was immense.

You can see that in the way he interacts with BJ. He's clingy. He needs validation. He's scared of being abandoned again, whether or not he wants to admit it. And in GFA, he gets so irritated when BJ won't say goodbye. Hawkeye knows they won't see each other again, so leaving without a goodbye and a promise of seeing each other again is the same as being abandoned. BJ is important to him.

This validation isn't even just with BJ. It's pretty much with everyone. He cracks jokes and the laughter is validation. Sleeping with one of the nurses is validation. To me at least, he seems to feel inferior when comes to anything that's not surgery. Just as a person. But he also seems to have a defense against that, acting like all he needs are one night stands. Keeping the nurses at an arm's length, never going further emotionally than just sex. Which is why I said he could also fit the dismissing style a little bit, too. It's a defense mechanism so he doesn't get hurt. Dismissing is when someone has a positive view of self and a negative view of others, usually relying on being self-sufficient and independent, not needing close relationships even though they desperately want them. He just thinks people will leave him so he doesn't let people get to close to him. That seems to more be the case with women.

I hope this makes some sense! He has a bit of a mix of styles but I think more preoccupied than anything else. I wanna give poor Hawkeye a hug :(

[zebulontheplanet]

Special interests with memory issues

When you’re autistic, you’re expected to have a special interest or something you know a ton about and are obsessed with. But what about the people with memory issues?

I’m one of the autistic people with memory issues. I have PTSD, Schizoaffective disorder, dissociative amnesia, and multiple other issues that have caused memory issues and continue to cause memory issues in me. Because of this, I don’t have a special interest that I know a ton of knowledge about.

I like to say that I have special interest, such as autism, psychology, and more. However, if you ask me about these without knowing about it yourself, then I won’t know what to tell you and will struggle greatly with even knowing much of anything about these topics (even if I know a ton. My mind kinda just freezes). I like to say that I have muscle memory. Some facts even I don’t know i have until they’re spewing out of my mouth. I love fox’s, I have stuffed animals, and just love everything about them. But do I know a ton of facts about fox’s? No. Have I tried to memorize a bunch of facts and failed? Absolutely!

People with memory issues are valid, and aren’t any less for not having a special interest or having very small special interests.

[pb-dot]

Film Friday: Inception

Today I'm writing about a movie that's a bit outside of my regular wheelhouse. Inception is not my favorite movie, it probably doesn't even get on the Top 10 shortlist if I'm honest, but it's probably one of my favorite movies ever to think about for a couple of reasons that I suspect are a bit unusual. This is all to say I'm going to go a bit deeper into Film Nerd mode than usual for this one. I'd apologize, but I'm not sorry. Inception spoilers beneath the cut.

So, to start off, I'm not particularly fond of Nolan as a filmmaker. He's extremely gifted on the technical side of filmmaking for sure, and his authorial voice is very strong. That said, his oeuvre seems entirely too cold and clinical to me. Sharp suits, sharp men, complex plans that pivot on perfect twists, near-realistic aesthetics. If there are any emotions involved it's what's ruining everybody's shit. Sometimes, Batman is there. You know, the whole bag.

Nolan makes complex clockwork movies that frequently fuck with time in an interesting way, but there's an emotional distance, or perhaps I should say "distance from emotion" to the whole thing which makes very few of them stick in any meaningful way. For example: I remember Dunkirk being a technically impressive movie that did some spicy things what narrative pacing is considered, but I couldn't tell you a single thing about who it was about, or even what those spicy narrative decisions were in service of.

There is, however, one notable exception. In his 2010 movie Inception, Nolan assembles one of, if not the most complex mechanism yet, and somehow it manages to be his most emotionally honest film. It's quite the impressive magic trick, and I would argue he achieves it by reaching a level of emotional honesty that one seldom sees from mainstream filmmakers.

Inception is a film about a crew of exceptional thieves specializing in cracking the final vault, the human mind. Using technology that lets them enter the dreams of their targets, they seek to extract company secrets, classified intel, and other pieces of knowledge that can most easily be hidden in memory. However, their troubled leader Cobb finds himself compelled to attempt a job thought impossible, Inception. Their mission is to plant in the mind of energy company heir Robert Fischer the idea of breaking up his company through a dream heist. This heist is complicated not only by the sheer deftness the crew must show in planting an idea without leaving any trace, but also by Cobb's own psychological scars that threaten to destabilize the carefully planned multi-level heist.

The first level I want to look at here is the central metaphor of the Mind Heist gang being analogous to a filmmaking crew. They're all creative and immensely focused people coming together under the direction of a man with a vision, Cobb. This description is perhaps a bit over-general, but what elevates the Filmmaking-as-heist idea to me is how the heists in Inception are specifically about creating a narrative. It is especially important with the main heist as creating a narrative in the head of the target is part and parcel of the inception, but even in the other heist we get to see, setting up a narrative is pivotal to stealing the information they're looking for.

As an aside, this narrative-making and the need for realism that comes with it also justifies what I consider to be my main sticking point with the film, in that the dreams are so very true to life and low-tech, while dreams in my experience tend to be strange, surreal and malleable experiences. This explains at least from the Watsonian perspective. From a Doylist point of view, it's more likely because Nolan is most comfortable with a near-realistic style of narrative, and this strict adherence to something approaching the realitylike makes his complex drama puzzleboxes easier to follow.

So, the heist crew are, essentially, filmmakers, which would, at least in today's Western film tradition, would make Cobb the director. In much the same way as Roy Neary in Close Encounters Of The Third Kind can be read as a stand-in for director Steven Spielberg, Cobb functions as our Nolan stand-in for Inception. Cobb is, however, far from a blank slate, or frankly a particularly idolized self. He is, in short, a mess.

After going deeper into the world of dreaming than anyone before him, Cobb has crossed some ethical Rubicons, especially when attempting to deal with his now-dead wife Mal and her reluctance to leave the world of dreaming. After performing the first-ever inception to plant the idea in Mal's head that the dream world is, indeed, not the real world, Cobb finds himself constantly troubled by anxiety as to whether he's asleep or awake. Whether this is a direct consequence or reaction to the act of inception, paranoia stemming from such a perspective-shifting thing even being possible, a manifestation of the guilt he feels over Mal's return to the waking world ending with her suicide, or even a sign that Mal did some incepting of her own, is something we can only speculate on.

Regardless of what exactly is eating Cobb, it manifests in his work. The heist crew frequently finds their efforts frustrated by incursions from Cobb's mind. The most common of these is Mal, or at least Cobb's mental recreation of her, throwing a wrench in their plans, and, in one particularly memorable case, a freight train running through an area a freight train really has no business being. Cobb tries to minimize the risk of this by not taking point and not being too directly involved, but this does little to dissuade his cocktail of trauma and troubled emotions from coming damn close to upending the entire thing.

The heist, however, does succeed. Through a series of bluffs and maneuvers, they manage to navigate Fischer Jr. to what he believes to be the deepest corner of his mind, where lies the comprehension, represented by a deathbed conversation with the man. Through this, Fischer realizes his recently departed father wishes for Robert to break up the energy conglomerate Fischer Sr. built, and instead make something for himself. It's a scene of high drama, and no small amount of catharsis as the troubled Robert realizes his father was never disappointed in him, and merely wanted his boy to be the best version of himself he could be. It's quite stirring stuff.

It is, however, a lie. This isn't Fischer Sr. revealing himself to be a caring father with trouble communicating the same, hell, it isn't even Robert's interpretation of the man. It is a scenario set up by the dream heist team with the express intention of making the dreaming Fischer Jr. believe this was his unconscious mind telling him to break up his energy conglomerate. It isn't Fischer Sr., not even as an imperfect mental construct by Fischer Jr., it's a construction of the heist crew. It's an act of manipulation, a triumphant act of manipulation, yes, but an act of manipulation all the same.

And still, even upon rewatching the movie with this knowledge well in hand, it's hard to not be swept along by the sheer force of emotion in that moment. Part of it is because it feels so necessary for the character. Fischer Jr. isn't just a target in the context of the scene, he's a troubled man with a complicated relationship to his father. He needs to settle his self-doubt and dismay with the stern and aloof parent he grew up with, and after his death, he still needs the catharsis. So in a way, it doesn't matter much that Fischer Sr. isn't the real deal, Fischer Jr. knows he's in a dream at this point, hell, it maybe doesn't even matter if the dream construct isn't his own. Perhaps what the dream-construct father says is what the wayward son needs to hear, although it'll certainly change the energy market in some pretty dramatic ways. Perhaps, or perhaps Cobb has become such a skilled manipulator his reach extends to the audience, but returning to our metaphor of Cobb as a Nolan stand-in, what is filmmaking if not manipulating and eliciting emotional reactions?

To further reinforce the point that this cathartic, but fake, heart-to-heart isn't the climax of the story, Cobb's journey isn't done. In the process of doing something thought impossible for the second time, Cobb is forced to do something impossible yet again, parallel to Fischer's revelation. This time, it is to dive deeper into the layered dreaming still in pursuit of his exit strategy, to the unconscious, chaotic under-realm of Limbo, from which there is no waking. This was from whence he managed to rescue himself and Mal back after the first inception, and although it is far from pleasant, he yet again manages to pull through and emerge from the dream.

Or does he? The movie does play with the possibility that the reality that Cobb emerges into is merely another dream in Limbo. It could be because of this the cinematography gets somewhat less focused as the heist concludes and Cobb finds his highest wish fulfilled, exoneration both in the eyes of the law and himself from any wrongdoing in Mal's death and the opportunity to return to his children.

Now, before I bring this all home, I feel I should speak briefly on Totems in Inception. The Totem is a series of different objects made by the various members of the heist crew. These items, Cobb's is a spinning top, are modified by each individual member and is only to be handled by them. The logic here is that these items are supposed to be a way to check whether you're in somebody else's dream, as you can check the object and how it interacts with the world to verify that it's doing what it's supposed to do, the weighted die falls to the number it's supposed to, the spinning top spins out and tips over like you'd expect it to. Throughout the movie, Cobb has a spinning top he checks regularly, some would say with obsessively, only feeling fully safe once the top tips over.

This is all to explain the lead-up to the final moment of the movie. Cobb, true to his habit, spins his top before meeting his children. He does, however, not wait for it to tip over, and instead goes to meet his children. The camera remains on the top, and moments before it becomes clear whether the top will fall over or continue, the movie cuts to credits.

Many have taken this as a challenge of sorts, a call to action to analyze the logic and events of the movie for signs. Is this a movie about a man succeeding or about a man succumbing? Is what we see in the closing minutes of the movie real, or is it a comfortable lie Limbo has formed around Cobb like it once did around him and Mal?

Personally, I say it does not matter. The story of Cobb ends with him leaving behind his totem for a reason. He has rid himself of the fear that has plagued him since emerging from Limbo and Mal's death. What if it was Mal who was right, and the quote-unquote real world was nothing more than a particularly elaborate Limbo dream. What if he never incepted anything, what if he's still dreaming within dreaming, stuck in a holding pattern until the impossibly long dream ends, his mind rent asunder by experiencing more time and place than a human mind is meant to bear. What if the top never stops spinning?

As my sequence of retelling might imply, I believe it was experiencing the inception scene with Fischer that helped Cobb clear the final hurdle and face his fears. Even if what Fischer experienced wasn't real, it had a powerful, arguably positive effect on the man. It gave him something he'd never get in the real world, closure. It wasn't real, but it was real enough.

So that is, I believe, what we're meant to take from that spinning top. The point isn't whether the top has stopped spinning or not, but rather that Cobb has stopped checking. Spin or not, Cobb's journey is not real. It's a movie, told by a crew of talented creatives, guided by a man with a vision and the willingness to show us things that aren't real to give us catharsis, show us wonder and terror, entertain us, and perhaps, give us some closure. "Try not to dwell on it," the movie says, as if aware of the deluge of movie buffs and wannabe theorists that would descend on this movie like they do on every movie with their red circles and reading metaphors as mechanics, "Even if it's fake, it's Real Enough."