#the basic human decency to give due process.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

So, so tired to see all these “in TSR Aang didn’t care about Katara in the slightest but rather forced his culture onto her” lies.

Aang: The monks used to say that revenge is like a two-headed rat viper. While you watch your enemy go down, you're being poisoned yourself.

Come. On!

If this is not “killing this man will traumatize you” then I don’t know what proof they want. He’s clearly showing care and concern for Katara here. And then Aang will let her borrow Appa aka the last living part of his culture and Aang will say that Katara needs to take this journey and to face this man and in the end Aang will be more than happy to hear that she hasn’t taken his forgiveness advice because she has her own way… only for some people to tell that he doesn't give a shit and only thinks about forcing his culture or whatever.

And these are the people who constantly brag about being the only ones in the fandom with media literacy. Their “media literacy” is, in fact, non-existent.

They don't care what the real message or context was, they only care about making Aang look bad. If the roles were somehow reversed and it was Zuko advocating for a non-violent solution while Aang encouraged Katara to get revenge, suddenly there'd be questions as to why the hero's got-to response to pain and rage, no matter how righteous, is going for the kill.

But because Zuko was the one encouraging it, there's no room to talk about how this him relapsing into the old pattern of thinking he can only fix things through violence due to how he was raised (and abused).

Or about how it is VERY disappoiting to see the brave prince that once stood up for his soldiers to now be ready to murder one of them in cold blood for the crime of follwing orders (that were cruel and unjust and that basic human decency says he shouldn't have followed), aka the same thing Zuko himself was doing less than a month ago, when he is not currently posing a threat to anyone.

Or about how he did it all because he felt entitled to Katara's forgiveness and only started to truly empathize with her in the middle of their journey.

Or about how, regardless of if killing that fucker was right or wrong, revegence of justice, cruelty or doing him a favor, it was KATARA'S DECISION to go after him, then to spare him but not forgive him - something both Zuko and AANG respected.

It's an episode about the pain and rage that comes from grief, especially from an unfair death that was caused by a cruel coward, and how it's important to recognize those feelings and process them so they won't consume you. It's about Katara as a character, with Zuko, the former imperialist, representing a self-destructive path of continuing the cicle of violence, and Aang, the pacifist, reminding her that SHE IS NOT A MURDERER!

But zutarians only care about Katara in the context of this made-up love triangle, so they force it onto the episode too.

[matan4il]

omg, you’re a mileapo stan, hi!!! i had to leave twitter i used mainly for ma bc of the sheer number of insane bloodthirsty shit that started flooding out from ppl i followed on there who i thought were normal??? i’ve been seeing the dehumanization of Israelis and the antisemitism over time but i gullibly thought that was due to the shitshow twitter is right now, but holy fuck, the response to the terrorist attack has been so fucking shocking. I can’t stop thinking about how these people who love to virtue signal their progressive stance would turn is in to the nazis for internet points. what the fuck

Hi Nonnie! *hugs*

Yes, I am! :D I hope you enjoy my silly Mileapo posts, they do make me smile a bit even during these dark days, because they represent this deep, beautiful love to me, and we can't give up on that, especially now, can we?

I feel you so much. I avoided Twitter for months, even before this massacre, because I just couldn't handle looking at the antisemitism I'd seen there before. It says something about how much I love Mileapo that eventually I did venture there. But right now? Every social media site has some good people, and each one has vile, inhumane justification for the murder and abuse of innocent people. I just saw someone whose url on Tumblr is the name of a Jewish character, siding with Hamas. The same Hamas that has called for a day of rage today, calling upon Arabs everywhere to kill Jews. I mean... at least have the decency to not use a Jewish character in your url if you're totally cool with real Jews being raped, mutilated and killed just for being Jewish.

I hope you unfollowed/blocked every single person who is justifying the beheading of kids and burning of babies alive. If you can, speak up, but I know that can be too much sometimes. So also take care of yourself! You matter!

I wish I had more encouraging words. The fact that the supposedly liberal crowd, the people who are meant to uphold humanist values and the rights of marginalized groups, are excluding Jews from the right to a humane fate (and ignoring a lot of Jewish history and the persecution of Jews to do so), it's hard to process. What they're doing is unconscionable. All we can do is speak up where we can, remind people that we ARE human beings deserving of basic human decency, get through this, and then have a long memory, make sure that even when the attacks on Israelis are stopped, that we don't forget this and we don't stop calling out antisemitism in ALL of its forms, whenever it comes from ANY camp.

Sending you lots of hugs and love! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here. And if you're in need of a Mileapo smile, click here)

[badoccultadvice]

Dick Van Dyke reads “A Most Non-Political Speech” by Rod Serling

Ladies and gentlemen, this may be the most non-political speech you ever hear. And, indeed, if you look for controversy, what I’m about to say conjures up little conflict.

We have reached a moment in time when restless men, dispossessed men, angry and impatient men, and anguished men look up and reach out for an elusive justice oft promised them, long denied them, but in the eyes of God and man’s conscience is their due and should be their expectation. I say this is non-political and non-controversial. We’re not talking now about miscegenation. Or whether a man can fence his yard. Or a hotdog vendor carefully select his customer. Or an innkeeper choose not to accommodate a particular traveler. These are the ramifications of the problem. They are not the problem. There have to be some bridges built; but first we have to acknowledge the rivers.

This is what I think is basic. This is what I believe to be the most common denominator in this spring of 1964. This must be first, the recognition and then the admission — that the dignity of human beings is not negotiable. The eminent worth of man has no pro and no con. And the desperate need for an understanding and a respect between all men is as fundamental as the process of breathing in and breathing out.

On this spring night we look toward Washington, D.C., and hear the the echoed overtones of a debate. We watch the struggle to invoke a cloture. We hear the voices of the willful foot-draggers and the hopeful sprinters as they trade and compromise and give battle for what they believe. But again, there is something happening on this earth transcendent of the Senates, the governments, the temporal voices of the champions of rights and the filibusters of wrong.

You can’t legislate against prejudice? You would rather perhaps accept it as part of the innate personality of the homo sapien? You would rather say that it’s with us, it’s here to stay, it’s part of the social phenomenon of our time. If this is the premise to be lived with, accepted, and — God help us — embraced, then let us throw away theology. Let us unencumber ourselves of the premise of God. Let us tear up our art, our literature, all of our culture, and let us retire to a rubble of our own making and manufacture barbed wire instead of stained glass.

Hatred is not the norm. Prejudice is not the norm. Suspicion, dislike, jealousy, and scapegoating — none of these things is the transcendent facet of the human personality. They are the diseases. They are the cancers of the soul. They are the infectious and contagious viruses that have bled humanity over the years. But because they have been and are, is it necessary that they shall be?

I think not. If there is one voice left to say “welcome” to a stranger; if there is but one hand outstretched to say “enter and share”; if there is but one mind remaining to think a thought of warmth and friendship, then there is also a future in which we will find more than one hand, more than one voice, and more than one mind dedicated to the cause of man’s equality.

Wishful, hopeful, unassured, problematic, and not to be guaranteed. This is all true. But again, on this spring evening of 1964, a little of man’s awareness has shown itself. A little of his essential decency, his basic goodness, his preeminent dignity, has been made a matter of record. There will be moments of violence and expressions of hatred and an ugly re-echo of intolerance, but these are the clinging vestiges of a decayed past, not the harbingers of the better, cleaner future. To those who tell us that the inequality of the human animal is the necessary evil, we must respond by simply saying that first, it is evil but second, it is not necessary. We prove it, sitting here tonight. We prove it by reaffirming our faith. We prove it by having faith in our reaffirmations.

Horace Mann said, “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” Let’s paraphrase that tonight. Let us be ashamed to live without that victory.

[enkisstories]

Dorothy: “Quite honestly, I’m still a little intimidated by the magnitude of what we’re attempting, but you having taken the first step, son, gives me the strength to follow.”

Logan: “There’s nothing to be anxious about, sweet Dori! Building up a resort is easier than a sawmill, because Curtis will not be limited to working with physically existing resources. Establishing a good reputation is paramount, something that can easily be manipulated. If he makes things appear the way people want them to look, Curtis will do fine.”

Curtis: “I think I’m learning a lot about that these days.”

Logan: “See, Dori? The kid’s a chip off the old boulder."

Logan: “Except for letting stuff lounge on the couch that doesn’t belong on it!”

Daniel: “With all due respect, Sir, but Argus isn’t stuff. I am... stuff. Not the cat.”

Logan: “Exactly what I meant, thank you, Sardines! Take that android off the sofa, by all means! I mean, what if it leaks thirium? Maybe not the AP700, but the other two might!”

Dorothy: !!!

Logan: “You hear me, Dorothy? Your attachment to androids is cute and all, but this is going too far! Argh, having to scold my adult daughter like a little girl, who litters the place with her dolls...”

The human drones on, but not once does he yell at the android in question, who is hogging the sofa.

Mason is just an object to Logan, the one who’s getting the blame for any android’s misbehaviour would always be that one’s owner. Or the one who gave the indecent order, even if that one is his daughter and her own son is watching her get belittled.

Curtis clenches his teeth. In the past days he has went through stages of doubt not unlike an android losing program instability. At the end of that process, or so the media wants people to believe, waits a mindless, violent rampage against the machine’s human owners. Curtis certainly feels like going on one right now, but keeps himself in check.

On the other hand...

Twice today Logan has confirmed that his grandson is, after all, a McGavin not just in name, but also in spirit and, most importantly, in Logan’s perception. It’s like a drug (including the part where you sacrifice what’s left of your basic human decency just to ensure to get more of it).

Logan is impressed when “Anchovies” rises from the sofa without needing prompting from a human. This modern device is really good at reading the room and anticipating orders, very useful! Not just that, in asking “Sardines” to assist it with unpacking Logan’s luggage and preparing the guest room, the AP700 even assumes command over the older PL600 like a butler over the lesser household staff.

The deviants have an ulterior motive in caring so well for the guest:

Logan’s luggage will contain the man’s computer. And that in turn may contain the blueprints of the secure center at Belle Isle or at the very least access to the company’s database.

The time for running and hiding over - now what’s left of Jericho must take initiative!

[millerflintstone]

In fucked up family news, we found out both of Unfriendly's parents died 2 Tuesdays ago. We were emailed by his youngest sister on 2/7 at night. We didn't see it until 2/8 in the morning. And she's almost 52 so she's not clueless due to youth.

The email didn't even begin with your typical, "I'm sorry to give you this news" or anything remotely like that. It began like this - As executor of mom's will, I am writing to inform you that you are a beneficiary of mom's life insurance policy. Since dad passed before mom, all 4 of us are what are called "contingent beneficiaries"

Since the email we got was very formal and only about his mom's life insurance policy, Unfriendly asked his sister by email what was going on. Couldn't call her because her email said that her phone wouldn't be fixed until later that week. So he tried other numbers. No answer.

She replied to him via email the next day. She told him that their dad died on 11/8 (complications from kidney disease and heart failure) and that his mom died on 1/21 (massive stroke). The 21st is also Unfriendly's birthday. Their parents told Unfriendly's 3 siblings and I'm guessing our older niece and nephew not tell Unfriendly when they died. "No matter if we agreed or not we honored their wishes as they were adamant about it"

So why did his younger sister decide to break this promise ? Her reasoning in emailing him was that they felt it was better to give him the info vs an insurance agent calling out of nowhere. And I'm guessing "they" means his siblings.

I'm still kinda dumbfounded that what prompted them to reach out to Unfriendly was the life insurance policy info. He didn't even get confirmation of both his parents being dead until he asked for more details. Money was the reason and not basic human decency or any concept of right or wrong. Hell, even if they didn't want to ruin his birthday they couldn't contact him the day after?

I said to him that if that was the reasoning, his sister should have just not contacted him at all and let the insurance agent do it. He agreed.

We don't have any other information. We're assuming the funerals have already happened. His brother eventually called him back and he sounded so nonchalant in his voice mail message. It was stomach turning.

I've been processing these deaths on top of all the health crap and my own mother's death. His dad died 3 days after my mom.

It's odd. I wasn't super close to them but there was a point where they felt like family. I mourned that loss a while ago. I haven't cried over them yet but I have cried about how they've all treated Unfriendly and how they've never made the effort to understand him. I've cried about how there's no hate quite like what you see in this flavor of Christian. Those tears are frustration, rage, disbelief and sorrow.

There's more of a back story about how our relationship with them fell apart but that's another story for another post.

[basic-otaku]

My thoughts on Xue Yang's character (based on the drama and novel)

Xue Yang is a character I didn’t fully understand until I finished The Untamed. I looked back on him with a bit of pity but little understanding. It wasn’t until I listened to his character song that I truly began to dissect his character. Reading those lyrics completely flipped my perspective on him, and I went back to watch the Yi City arc again. I was shocked by how much I had missed. Xue Yang has since become one of my favorite characters of the series. I’ve spent so much time thinking about him and his motives that I finally decided to write down my thoughts. This analysis comes mostly from what I perceived, so it may differ from other people’s opinions. You are free to disagree with me.

Let’s start with what we know: Xue Yang was a street kid with a hard childhood. We know he was abandoned at a young age, but we don’t know how young. However, he must have been old enough to survive, so he couldn’t have been younger than four when he started fending for himself. We don’t know who his parents are because he doesn’t remember them, nor does he remember anyone else who had potentially taken care of him. His parents could be dead for all we know, or they could have dumped him somewhere when they no longer wanted to take care of him. It’s all up to speculation. He also has a very high pain tolerance, probably due to constant beatings as a child.

When you’re all alone in the world, you have to learn to put yourself first. There’s no one to care for you, so only you can care for yourself. I believe that Xue Yang wasn’t always a bad person because no one is inherently evil. However, because he was alone, there was no one to nurture him and teach him right from wrong. When all you experience is violence and hatred, that becomes your response to similar situations; you don’t expect kindness or want to give it in return.

One of Xue Yang’s flaws as a child was his naivety — he was much too quick to trust. That’s how he got himself into such a bad situation. He was eager to have something he was never able to have (candy), so he immediately trusted that shopkeeper when he said he could have some as a reward for running an errand. What he got in return wasn’t candy, but a brutal beating and a severed pinky. If Xue Yang had still had any faith left in humanity, this is the point where it would have left him. The remaining childhood innocence in him was gone. This brings me to an interesting piece of dialogue. In Yi City, when Xue Yang confronts Song Lan and tells him what he’s been up to, Song Lan curses at him, calling him an animal. Xue Yang laughs at him and says, “I quit using those words when I was seven.” And what happened to Xue Yang’s finger? “One finger was ground into battered flesh on the spot. The child was seven.” Even Xue Yang himself knows that moment was when everything changed, and he still carries the resentment with him now.

Back to the cart incident. This event scarred him for life and was the primary reason he became a sociopath. Now he’s bent on revenge. He was powerless as a child; just another street rat who shouldn’t be treated like a human being nor spared any pity. So, when he realizes he can do the same to those that hurt him, he takes it much further. When he was old enough and strong enough, he exacts his revenge. He wanted to make the Chang Clan feel his pain — not only for the finger he had lost but for his whole miserable life up to that point. If no one deigned to understand him, then he’d make them understand in the only way he knew how. With violence.

Xue Yang was only fifteen or sixteen when he slaughtered the Chang Clan, killing more than fifty people. This is where he meets Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan. From the first moment, Xue Yang hates Xiao Xingchen. He’s so righteous, so full of light. He thinks he makes the world better just by doing a little good. What a hypocrite. Where was he when he was needed? Where was he when Xue Yang was a seven-year-old boy left crying in the streets after having his finger ground to a pulp? No, nobody can be that good.

When Xue Yang is captured by Wei Wuxian and the others, Xiao Xingchen takes him back to Qinghe to be apprehended, and Xue Yang vows to get his revenge on Xiao Xingchen for it. It isn’t long after he escapes from Qinghe that Xue Yang slaughters Baixue Temple, blinding Song Lan in the process. According to Xue Yang’s logic, hurting Xiao Xingchen’s friend is just as bad as hurting Xiao Xingchen himself. This is what causes the rift between Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan. Without this incident, Xue Yang and Xiao Xingchen may never have met again.

A few years have likely passed while Xue Yang was working for Jin Guangyao. He is probably closer to eighteen or nineteen when Jin Guangyao injures him and throws him out, which is how Xiao Xingchen and A-Qing find him. Xiao Xingchen doesn’t hesitate in bringing Xue Yang back to Yi City with him and A-Qing and caring for his wounds. Xue Yang wakes up pained and disoriented, but he immediately tries to back away when he realizes who is tending to him. He doesn’t know Xiao Xingchen is unaware of his identity, and probably thinks that Xiao Xingchen is getting ready to take him to face justice or something. But Xiao Xingchen insists that he doesn’t need to know who Xue Yang is and that he’s only doing what’s right. Xue Yang is clearly shocked by this admission. He truly cannot comprehend kindness, and this is the first time he’s ever experienced it.

This is also the first time we get to see his genuine smile. It’s shocked and incredulous, like he can’t believe this is happening, but it’s there. Throughout the series, Xue Yang’s snarky words and sly smirk are a token of his character, but now we know they are just a mask he uses to hide the small, broken child inside of him. If no one can see the hurt he hides, then no one can hurt him further. But with just one kind gesture, Xiao Xingchen was able to bring out the young boy who just wanted love and comfort.

This kindness is such a foreign concept to Xue Yang that he doesn’t think it’s genuine for a long time. But as the years pass, Xue Yang comes to realize that Xiao Xingchen isn’t a threat. This is something he scoffs at. Xiao Xingchen is ridiculously naïve; so stupid. If he knew who he was living with, who he was eating with, he wouldn’t act like this. He would treat Xue Yang the same way everyone else had. So, Xue Yang decides to trick Xiao Xingchen into murdering innocent people for revenge. Xue Yang can’t wait for Xiao Xingchen to find out what Xue Yang has made him do because it’ll break him. What this revenge is for is up to interpretation. Maybe he’s still angry about being captured and sent to Qinghe. Maybe he’s angry at the world for treating him so badly. Maybe Xue Yang wants to show Xiao Xingchen that his worldview is stupid and that there are no good or pure people in the world. I choose to believe that it’s the last one.

At least, this is his motivation at first — he slowly loses the will to harm Xiao Xingchen. This brings me to another interesting point. In episode three, Xue Yang says he doesn’t fear death, he fears boredom. But isn’t this domestic life he’s living with Xiao Xingchen and A-Qing considered boring by his standards? I think the boredom he speaks of is really the fear of being alone and having nothing at all. Now he’s happy, however reluctantly he’s willing to admit it. He wouldn’t have put up with A-Qing’s petulant behavior if he didn’t enjoy the time they spent together. Although they didn’t get along at first, Xue Yang protects A-Qing and takes care of her like an annoying older brother. He teases her, sure, but he also cuts her apple slices in the shape of rabbits and gives her advice on how to scare away the people who bully her (even though killing them isn’t great advice). Xiao Xingchen and A-Qing were the family he never had. Now he would do anything to preserve the life he is living.

After about a year, Xue Yang’s plan stopped being about revenge. I’m not completely sure how he justified this change of heart, but I like to think he told himself he was still biding his time and that he’d get back to it eventually (even if he had stopped thinking about hurting Xiao Xingchen). Based on what A-Qing told Song Lan when he arrived at Yi City, Xue Yang hadn’t taken Xiao Xingchen out on one of those night hunts in a long time. And most of the people that Xue Yang made Xiao Xingchen kill were the merchants that made fun of his blindness and cheated him with bad vegetables and high prices. It was a messed-up way to get revenge for Xiao Xingchen. Xue Yang hates being looked down on, so shouldn’t Xiao Xingchen feel the same way?

Nevertheless, the time they spent in Yi City was probably the only time Xue Yang had been happy in his entire life. Xiao Xingchen was so in tune with what Xue Yang needed that Xue Yang came to care for him deeply. Whether those feelings were romantic or platonic in nature is up to the viewer, but I believe Xue Yang had fallen in love with Xiao Xingchen in the only sick and twisted way he could. Xiao Xingchen understood him more than anyone ever had, going so far as to listen to his idle ramblings and bring him a piece of candy every day after hearing that he had loved sweets as a child but could never have any. He managed to tame the savage beast in Xue Yang’s heart with only his presence and basic human decency. Xue Yang’s bloodlust was satiated as long as he had Xiao Xingchen to take care of him. At this point, I don’t think he would ever actually kill Xiao Xingchen. He had stopped wanting to hurt him a long time ago. A-Qing? Sure. She’s expendable, but Xiao Xingchen is irreplaceable. Even if Xue Yang reluctantly came to care about her, it wasn’t the same kind of bond. She had never shown him the same kindness that Xiao Xingchen had. He wouldn’t hesitate to hurt her if she betrayed him, but she was important to Xiao Xingchen, which meant he couldn’t do her any harm if he didn’t want to disrupt their happy life.

If Song Lan hadn’t found them, how long would Xue Yang have stayed? I don’t even think he knew. He just knew that he didn’t want to leave anymore. Xiao Xingchen gave him too much for him to want that. The viewer can easily see the happiness in his eyes when he looks at Xiao Xingchen. Xue Yang acts like a kid around him — playing games, joking around, making him laugh with childish remarks. Even in the quiet moments, he’s happy. This was especially noticeable in the campfire scene. It wasn’t shown in the original drama, but in the special edition, Xue Yang smiled at Xiao Xingchen from across the fire, and the look in his eyes as he gazed at his daozhang was so tender that it honestly caught me off guard. It seemed to catch Xue Yang off guard too because he caught himself, and the smile slowly fell. It’s like he realized what he’s doing and remembered that this should be about revenge.

Where in the past, Xue Yang hated Xiao Xingchen for his righteousness, he now loves him for his naivety. Without it, Xue Yang knows that Xiao Xingchen would be disgusted with himself. There would be no more laughs, no more games, and no more smiles. Then Xue Yang would lose the one person who didn’t treat him like dirt. So, when Song Lan finds them, Xue Yang immediately perceives it as a threat to their domestic life. He knows how important Song Lan is to Xiao Xingchen, and there’s no doubt in his mind that Xiao Xingchen won’t hesitate to leave with Song Lan when he discovers Xue Yang’s identity.

Furthermore, Xue Yang resents Song Lan for taking Xiao Xingchen’s eyes (even though it was voluntary on Xiao Xingchen’s part and was essentially Xue Yang’s fault). His logic tells him that having Xiao Xingchen kill Song Lan would be the perfect way for Xiao Xingchen to get his revenge. What Xue Yang doesn’t understand is that not everyone thinks about things in the context of revenge. I don’t believe Xiao Xingchen ever truly regretted giving up his sight. But Xue Yang can’t comprehend how someone could be that selfless.

This is where it all falls apart. A-Qing sees what happened to Song Lan, and she runs to Xiao Xingchen and tells him everything. When Xiao Xingchen comes back to confront him, Xue Yang spills it all. There’s nothing left for him to lose. His mask falls again, and he basically bares his soul to Xiao Xingchen. This is probably the first time he’s told the story about his finger, and I think he genuinely thought Xiao Xingchen was going to understand him; that if he knew what Xue Yang went through, he’d sympathize with him and justify his action (thereby justifying his feelings). Instead of that, however, Xiao Xingchen calls him disgusting, and it flips a switch inside of Xue Yang. How can Xiao Xingchen call him disgusting when he’s killed people too?

I think one of the reasons Xue Yang led Xiao Xingchen to kill those people was to bring Xiao Xingchen down to his level. Xue Yang doesn’t think that anyone can be as good as Xiao Xingchen claimed to be, so he had to taint his perfect record. Maybe if he killed people, Xiao Xingchen would understand him. Xue Yang thought that when Xiao Xingchen found out, he’d stay with him. Now he’s not the same righteous person he used to be, so how could he be good enough to travel the world with Song Lan? No, he should stay with Xue Yang instead and live a happy life together.

So, when Xiao Xingchen calls him disgusting, Xue Yang was probably confused and upset, which made him instinctively put his mask back up. Being vulnerable only hurt him again, so he’s back to harsh words and smirks, telling Xiao Xingchen that this is why he’s always hated him and that all of this was fun. Fun in every sense of the word: the killing and the happiness.

Xiao Xingchen finding out that he killed Song Lan was the last straw. Xue Yang is still laughing as Xiao Xingchen slits his own throat. It takes a moment for the realization to set in, but as it does, the smile falls from Xue Yang’s lips, and his hands begin to shake. This is the third time his mask has fallen. His eyes begin to well with tears, but he tries to keep up his act, saying that dead ones are easier to control, but the only one he’s acting for is himself.

The next scene is the one that really solidified Xue Yang’s feelings for me. He cleans the blood from Xiao Xingchen’s skin with the same care that Xiao Xingchen had shown him when he first found Xue Yang in that ditch. Xue Yang clearly thinks that Xiao Xingchen is going to come back and that the ritual will work, that he staves off his tears and sets out food for both of them. He considers eating his candy but then decides he should wait until Xiao Xingchen comes back. If he’s back, then Xue Yang is sure to get another piece.

When he realizes that the ritual isn’t working and Xiao Xingchen isn’t coming back, he breaks down. The tantrum he throws is so full of rage and anguish that it really shows the depth of his feelings for Xiao Xingchen. Again, he goes back to acting, trying to guilt Xiao Xingchen’s dead body into coming back to life by telling him all the terrible things he’ll do to Song Lan and A-Qing if he doesn’t reawaken. Obviously, Xiao Xingchen can’t hear him, and Xue Yang knows this, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. He finally dissolves into tears, screaming and crying over Xiao Xingchen’s corpse. This may have been the first time he’s cried since he lost his finger. Crying is for innocent, naïve children, and it doesn’t help anybody. But now Xue Yang has had a taste of pure sweetness and doesn’t want to go back to the bitter life he has known, so he finally lets himself weep for all the things he could have had.

Xue Yang spent the next seven years trying to bring Xiao Xingchen back to life with no success. We don’t know much about his activities after Yi City, but we have gotten information through rumors that Shuanghua was being used to kill innocents. It seems like Xue Yang wanted to keep a part of Xiao Xingchen with him. He even continued his sick revenge plot after Xiao Xingchen’s death by gouging out the eyes of and killing the remains of the Chang Clan, including their leader, Chang Ping, by lingchi. Xue Yang doesn’t blame himself in the slightest; he just thinks that Xiao Xingchen’s death was an unfortunate consequence of the situation. He will put the blame on anyone and everyone other than himself. Thus, instead of performing lingchi on himself like Wei Wuxian suggested, he takes out his anger on the remains of the Chang Clan.

Everything Xue Yang does in the present is tied to Xiao Xingchen, yet he still can’t bring him back. So, when he heard that the Yiling Patriarch had suddenly come back to life, Xue Yang knew it was his last chance. The sword ghost/ghost arm is what led Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji to Yi City. It was pointing to its murderer. I’m sure Xue Yang could have avoided a confrontation if he wanted, but this was intentional. As for the juniors, I have a feeling that Xue Yang was behind the cat corpses that led them to meet up with Wei Wuxian. This is still unclear though because Xue Yang doesn’t have a real reason to get them involved. The only person he needs is Wei Wuxian.

Xue Yang has tried everything at this point. So, when Wei Wuxian finds him in Yi City, pretending to be Xiao Xingchen, he is completely desperate. I do wonder if that is something he has done more than once. Did he often go around dressed as Xiao Xingchen? Was he playing with the life they had in Yi City? Pretending he was still there? Or was it a one-time thing to trick Wei Wuxian into dropping his guard? I also wonder how often he used his own sword because only after Lan Zhan took Shuanghua from him did he pull out Jiangzai. That could be because he was acting as Xiao Xingchen, but we can’t be sure. However, that isn’t the point. Right now, Wei Wuxian was Xue Yang’s only option because the Yiling Patriarch surely knew things he didn’t. Xue Yang had lived with Xiao Xingchen’s corpse for those seven years, keeping him in pristine condition. I’m pretty sure the only way Xue Yang could have done this was by giving him spiritual energy every day, which would be incredibly draining. I don’t think Xue Yang had an exceptionally strong golden core to begin with either. He is primarily a demonic cultivator, which means he doesn’t use his golden core often. It must have taken most of his strength to keep Xiao Xingchen’s body in such good condition. But anything for daozhang, right? Xue Yang needed Xiao Xingchen’s body to be perfect when he returned. He also put aside his pride and used Song Lan for protection all those years. He kept the one person he continued to hate with a burning passion around him for so long.

When Wei Wuxian tells Xue Yang he can’t bring Xiao Xingchen back to life because his soul is too broken, Xue Yang refuses to believe it. It’s been seven years already; he can’t give up now. Deep down, I believe Xue Yang knows Xiao Xingchen wouldn’t want anything to do with him even if he did come back, but he can’t figure out why. Because nothing was his fault, of course.

Something Wei Wuxian said really struck me as I went back to rewatch episode 39. Before the fight, Wei Wuxian turns to Xue Yang and says, “you disgust him to the core, yet you still want to pull him back to play this stupid game.” Xue Yang responds with “I want nothing of the kind.” And he’s being honest. He doesn’t want a stupid game — he wants something real. He wants a life where Xiao Xingchen knows his identity and stays with him in spite of it. He just wants one person to accept him as he is, but that will never, nor could ever, happen —not with all the crimes he has committed.

When Lan Wangji cut off his arm, leaving Xue Yang bleeding on the ground, I think he knew it was over. There was nothing left for him now. He was never getting Xiao Xingchen back. He never had him in the first place, not in any way that counted. So he laughs, blood spilling from his lips, to cover up the tears he wishes he could cry.

He’s ready when Song Lan stabs him, dying with a smile on his face as he gazes at the last piece of candy Xiao Xingchen had ever given him. It’s blackened and inedible, yet Xue Yang held on to it for so long; it was a reminder of his daozhang and of why he was fighting so hard. Like his character song said, he was “too determined to let go.”

It’s kind of sad that even in death, he was never respected by anyone other than Xiao Xingchen, and all of that was built on a lie. He didn’t even get a proper burial, although I suppose he kind of deserved it. Xue Yang is the character I pity the most in this series. He isn’t a good person, nowhere near it, and he deserved the end he got, but I wish things could have been different. What hurts is that it just as easily could have been Wei Wuxian. If Xue Yang had been taken in as a child; if he’d had his own Jiang Fengmian, his own Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli, he could have been happier. Maybe none of this would have happened. Maybe he would have met Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan and started a sect with them. Realistically, he and Xiao Xingchen would never be lovers because Xiao Xingchen was so strongly connected to Song Lan, but I think they could have been friends.

However, one question I still have is did Xue Yang fall in love with Xiao Xingchen because of how he treated him or because of the person Xiao Xingchen really was? If they had met under different circumstances (and if Xue Yang had had a support system when he was young), would Xue Yang have still fallen in love with him? I guess that’s up to the viewer to decide.

Ultimately, Xue Yang is still a sociopath who can’t understand empathy or feel remorse, so I don’t think he regretted any of his crimes. However, I do believe that Xue Yang regretted the consequences of his actions in Yi City. He didn’t want Xiao Xingchen to die, but his actions were what caused his death. It’s more of a dissatisfaction with where things ended up than feeling guilty for his death. Although I don’t think Xue Yang felt remorseful, that doesn’t mean he wasn’t grieving, nor does it mean his feelings for Xiao Xingchen weren’t as genuine as they could have been.

I don’t know where Xue Yang or Xiao Xingchen will end up now, but I hope they’ll both be happy in their next lives. The same goes for A-Qing and Song Lan (when he finally meets his true end). There are so many things that contributed to Xue Yang’s unstable mind, but I think the moral of the story is that it pays to be kind. If just one person had taken pity on him as a child — had shown him that there was good in the world — I wonder what kind of person he would have become.

I already know how cruel fate is

Not looking, not asking, not grieving, not hating

Waiting to relive my life just for a single person

Ups and downs in life

I would leave no regrets

I tried searching in the darkness of night

When I am trapped in the past

I still hope that a flicker of light will appear in my heart

The legend of this lonely city

Who came here before?

And gifted to me my karma

I am waiting for this karma to liberate spirits, liberate souls, and liberate me

Even though I am already too determined to let go

If I get rid of these inner demons

Would you forgive me?

Gaining freedom from destiny, starting all over again

[black-girls-wizdom]

It’s Been A While. . .

Hey Wizdomettes,

I hope all is well and everyone and their families have remained untouched from COVID-19. With that out the way, I’ve been dugged up out of my “Pandemic Grave” because I wanted to discuss the topic of the Covid vaccines/getting vaccinated. My question is: What is it that actually makes you think the government is trying to poison you? What possess you think that this vaccine is some sort of biological chemical warfare? What gives you the audacity to “TRY” and control a woman’s uterus but we can’t even ask you ungrateful bastards to wear a mask, wash your hands, and get vaccinated without hearing about some unwritten constitutional rights being trampled upon. This human population control theory and rhetoric has begun to get old and stale quick. I understood being hesitant in the beginning, I was hesitant in the beginning as well, so I let the first round go first, and they’re still here. However, 700,000+ Americans aren’t here because COVID KILLED THEM. COVID KILLED THEM! Not the vaccine. COVID has successfully exterminated more people than ALL 3 COVID vaccines combined! Now,I understand everyone hoping on the bandwagon of some celebrity calling it a hoax, I get it, I do, because we regular folks think that they some how have the upper hand, some New World Order organization is sliding them information that we don’t know about. NEWS FLASH: Beyonce and Ellen or whom you mf’ers look up to is not sitting around a table with the elite plotting on our demise. The FUCKING Rockafellars aren’t sitting plotting our demise.

Y’all so damn smart you’re dumb. One, it was much better ways to take out billions of people much faster than this. Just think about it. Analyze it, and ask yourself if it makes sense. Secondly, YOU, YES YOU are paying the top 1% their money.  You work for them, why would they intentionally eliminate basically they’re slaves? Why? A cease in their everyday Net Income gone make everybody think twice. Lastly, they need you patriotic Americans to fight in wars that only benefits them.

Another thing, I don’t give af if you’re democrat or republican, black/white/green, gay or straight, atheist or Christian we ALL bleed RED blood. Our genotypes may differ in certain DNA sequences but we ALL bleed RED blood. CORONA, however, don’t care about any of that, all Corona thinking about is attaching to a warm-blooded homosapien-sapien and thriving until it leaves you in an ICU bed, with machines alarming every minute, your family can’t be there, and you’re gasping for air. That feeling is real! THIS SHIT IS REAL! This shit way above Donald Trump and Joe Biden. It’s way above black/white/Asian/Hispanic. COVID is killing all of us. You know damn well politicians are using it for political gain and y'all falling for the okey doke, easily. Use your common sense, Pick up a book on Virology and learn a thing or five. Use your brain, you don’t go to a politician when you’re sick, you go to the doctor, right? So, why in the hell are you getting health recommendations from fucking Ted Cruz and Beto O’Rourke, why? Lastly, what gives you the authority to feel as if your right to autonomy trumps my right to live. We all deserve the common decency to wear a mask in public; unlike you healthy individuals out there who lacks the knowledge of how it really is to be ill, I, as an immunocompromised black woman, my 80 year old grandmother, your 80 year old mother, your dad with diabetes, your 6 month old cousin, and children under the age of 5 do; we have the same the rights under the Constitution of these United States that says and I quote:

“No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States;nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” 

Loosely translated to:

“If you can monopolize off of my pussy to win an election, I can damn sure tell your ass to get vaccinated.”

Take that “TeaPinion” and run with it! 

On that note I’m out Wizdomettes,

Stay wise and stay radiant💜🌻🪄

[tazwren]

My two cents on the devolution of fandom spaces...

As a former mod of a fandom space and a woman of colour, I do not feel safe.

Seeing what has been done to so many in this fandom, by a particular group of white American women, in the name of moral policing is both abhorrent and demoralising. As it also is to repeatedly see the same narrative being shoved at everyone as the gospel truth.

A narrative that very conveniently either becomes about fic or has nothing to do with fic, depending on how people want to swing things. A narrative that will accuse a person of Jewish heritage of anti-Semitism, a person of colour of racism, a practising Muslim of being an Islamaphobe. A narrative that will define for you and me and all of us comprising this myriad of multitudes in the world what generational or personal trauma includes and what induces the same.

Those of you who know me, know what I’ve been dealing with the past few days & why I haven’t spoken up before now. Before I logged out a couple days ago, I saw what looked like more of the usual nonsense by the same group of people I’ve kept my distance from once their true colours were revealed. What I didn’t expect is that they would think themselves so above the norms of human decency and accountability that they would go after not one but two women of colour this time around in their rabidity. And many others who spoke up, as it turns out.

It hurts to see what these women, that I know of, have had to endure and to see the passivity of the community, save for a few voices, in sitting back and letting the circus rampage through town. It hurt when I was at the receiving end of it and it hurts now.

Why? Because it shows me a microcosm of the world that I don’t really relate to, that makes no sense to me with the values I was brought up with, and which reduces basic human decency to a commodity to be trampled upon and for you to be seen as weak for having. Because people who willingly laud you for your art / writing / wit, meet you with effusive claims of love and affection and friendship, who have no qualms in taking your help when it suits them, will throw you under the bus and let the wolves ravage you when it doesn't.

Before I get into that, let me talk a little bit about what has transpired over the past few days to a week, and what has been systemically taking place over perhaps the past year in this fandom.

One thing is that everyone who makes a statement about anything suddenly has people in their mentions demanding they show what gives them the right to hold that particular opinion. A critical thing people forget about fandom is that it is a place where people hide their identity for a variety of reasons, all valid, and this approach to fiction and conversations where everyone has to reveal every part of their past and identity as a means of establishing their "credentials" in order to present their views comes in direct contradiction with how fandoms operate. It violates people's rights to privacy.

The other is that there has been an increase in the voices that purportedly stand up to “speak for” the marginalised, the abused, those discriminated against and those who belong to minorities who “need to be protected / kept safe”. An admirable sentiment, to be sure. If it weren’t for the fact that none of these groups of people needed saving, speaking for or the protection of this particular group of voices.

Voices who only want to define and use these people as "model victims" to hurt other white women and establish their supremacy over both them and other POC. Voices that will present their "truth" as they see fit and sans context or present you with screenshots of snippets of conversations held in supposedly secure spaces that they have no qualms in violating in the interest of the "greater good" and claim offense / silencing if the misdemeanour is pointed out or action is taken against them, Voices that will conveniently categorize you as a "token POC" or "white adjacent" when you do not support or align with their narrative. Voices that belong to a predominantly white American group of women, whose real agenda, as is evidenced by their modus operandi, has nothing to do with real altruism or a drive for justice or indeed to right wrongs.

No, their agenda is purely power.

To hold sway over groups of followers, to shepherd them as though they are sheep who cannot think for themselves, and to set themselves up as white saviours who call out those who step out of line, or are deemed to be problematic and toxic and unsafe. To be the owners of the only "safe spaces" in fandom and to drive other groups and spaces to be boycotted or worse.

Now, I've long wondered, who indeed are these women to decide that for anyone? In a world comprising multiple cultures, religions, groups, subgroups, genders and which contains multitudes, who are these women and what gives them the right to foist their puritanical standards on everyone, very conveniently disguised as concern for the moral well being of everyone and the consumption, of all things, of fiction?

Certainly, there are many things in this world that people regard with justifiably equal dislike / horror / sadness. At the same time, there is much that is not shared, that is particular to a culture and to a person’s background. There is a multitude of perspectives that make the whole. And the white women of the United States of America have not cornered the market on what those are, or indeed even own any curatorship or censorship of the same. They cannot, because each person’s culture and background and joy and trauma is their own, as are their ways of dealing with it all.

That being said, let’s talk about their pack behaviour and the devolution I’ve witnessed on social media as basic human decency is bartered for clout.

I’m all for standing up for someone who doesn’t have a voice or a platform, or maybe afraid of repercussions to voice dissent. I’m all for being there for our fellow human beings as they face struggles of often unconscionable and unfathomable proportions. I’m all for holding people accountable for their negative behaviours as they impact the larger community.

What I am unequivocally NOT for is treating such situations as an opportunity to preach, to virtue-signal, to shame and to put on blast the alleged wrong-doers. I say alleged because that’s what most accusations are on these platforms—allegations to do with things that disturb our sense of balance or make us wrinkle our noses or that we deem bad, and therefore make the accused deserving of the full force of the community’s misbehaviour and censure.

I ask you if you were found guilty of a crime in real life—you know, the one away from your phones and keyboards—would you not have an opportunity to retain a lawyer, to plead your case in a court of law, to acquit yourself? Or, if found guilty, would you not have the opportunity for correction and rehabilitation? Yes, you say? (If you say no, then that explains the spate of state-perpetuated injustices across the USA, but that is a different matter).

Why then are people treated so abhorrently in this court of public opinion? What gives you, me, any one of us the right to judge people so vilely and with a metaphorical gun to their heads? What gives anyone the right to say you better agree with everything I say, retract everything you said and grovel for it or we will eviscerate you in public, shame you, force you to change or delete the content that offends us and still ostracise you and in some cases even threaten you with bodily harm or death, or doxx you?

Why is there no grace in how people are approached or dealt with? Whatever happened to allowing people to learn from their mistakes, where applicable, or hearing them out and giving them a chance to explain their side of something we may not fully understand?

Why is there no accountability for such behaviour on the part of the accusers?

What makes the rest of you sit back and allow this to happen? What makes you think this is in any shape or form okay to watch? Today, it is a virtual stranger at the receiving end, one you can distance yourself from quite conveniently saying Oh, she just mods a group I am in, or I only read their fics a couple times or I only followed them for their art or jokes or whatever flavour of excuse you choose. Tomorrow, it will be one of your own - or it may very well be you. And you'd better hope there's someone left to speak up for you.

The irony is you will have allowed it to happen by letting the wolf in the fold. By letting these white women manipulate you, and the community you claim to be a part of, so unapologetically, so maliciously and so unashamedly that before you can do anything about it the cancer has taken hold.

If this was happening in the world outside of social media, they would have to follow due process, to present real evidence based on facts (not based on emotions, rumours or perceptions) and would have to allow the person they are accusing to present a counter-argument, to defend themselves or be defended. Failure to do so is a miscarriage of justice and, depending on whether this is a professional or legal proceeding, they would either seriously risk their jobs or have the case thrown out of court. If not face action themselves for attempting to derail the process of justice.

Why then are they permitted to range so freely through the landscape of fandom, snarling and biting at who they please, or who displeases them?

I have no shame in saying I was at the receiving end of their behaviour for defending a friend they put on blast and I will tell you right here and now, I am a woman of colour who feels unsafe and attacked by these so-called self-appointed white saviours of your social media experience, these so-called upholders of the common morality—whatever that means—who will fight for you the evils of problematic and toxic writers who dare to have an opinion not aligned with theirs and who do not bow to their clout. Not that they care, so long as they can ignore this fact since it doesn’t fit their narrative. So long as they can ignore what has just been done to so many people in the name of cleansing the fandom.

If any one of these women were truly interested in alleviating the troubles and pains of the discriminated, the marginalized, the trauma-affected, I invite them to please come roll their sleeves up and help in the multitudes of troubles that wrack this world, not just in the backyards of their minds. My country is amidst a struggle for the basics of human life in this horrific pandemic and, prior to that, for basic constitutional rights for religious minorities. Do not patronize me and lecture me on trauma and racism and discrimination. Do not marginalise me in your attempt to pontificate and set your pearl-clutching puritanical selves above the rest, or assuage your white guilt.

A largely American audience or fanbase in this fandom is purely a function of access and interest—other cultures have vast followings for things you couldn't begin to fathom—and it doesn't mean you are entitled in any shape or form to be spokespeople for the rest of the world. We have no interest in being colonized again by white oppressors.

If you disagree with what I have said, I congratulate you on being a part of their coterie and wish you much joy in being the sheep in their fold. Kindly unfollow or block me on the way off of this post.

[onesunofagun]

Undeath in the Era of the Hero of Time : 1

aka Seeing the Hero’s Shade in this TP replay shook up all my feelings of agony again and now I’m working backwards from there because I like to hurt myself.

Part One: An Overview of How Fucked Things Are ™

aka The Blood Soaked Hyrule of OoT’s time 

Take it as you will, in the Zeldaverse, the colour green has an overwhelming association with undeath. 

Sure, sure, life too, I hear you. Farore came down and produced all the living beings that would uphold the law, apparently (specifically not claiming monsters and demons, but that’s another thing). On the surface, that make sense. Forests, lush green fields, prosperity, all of those good things. Green the colour of the most common rupee, green the colour of the Hero’s tunic. Green the colour of magic, and potions that revitalise the body and spirit.

The thing is, revitalising the body and spirit is a flexible idea. To imbue something with new life and vitality can have a lot of implications, especially when you stop talking about the strictly living. 

I feel vitality is certainly the best word, not only because of it’s association with life and potency ala the Goddess origin stories, but in the ways that the game uses green itself, such as a measure of both magic and stamina. Green is the colour chosen to represent the unlocked potential within young Heroes. 

Vitality specifically refers to a state of being strong and active, and it also refers to the continuance of something to exist. That’s a great thing for plants, or economies, or a potion taken by a young Link who’s swung their sword around or fired off a spell one too many times and feels a little low.

But the dead, though?

As it happens, Hyrule is absolutely littered with human remains, in no small part due to the very recently ended civil wars. 

The Civil War, if you need the reminder, is described as a time when the many races of Hyrule were divided and each focused on establishing dominion over the Sacred Realm (because Triforce). I touched on this in my last meta post, but basically, its no holds barred to stop that from happening because if the wrong person gets into the Sacred Realm and makes a wish, it immediately malfunctions. 

The criteria for getting into the Sacred Realm and touching the Triforce without royally fucking everything, is basically impossible for anybody not chosen by Hylia. 

If you are neither of Hylia’s Bloodline (The Hyrulean Royal Family) or one of her Chosen Avatars (The current incarnation of the Hero), you are not supposed to touch the Triforce. Ever. You WILL be found wanting, it WILL shatter, the Sacred Realm WILL be corrupted by your selfish desires, it WILL unleash and onslaught of mystical influence (reflecting your heart) onto the country.

Now, if it’s Zelda or Link who touches it, that’s fine. Good vibes will pour out. An age of prosperity will ensue. The Sacred Realm is in its default state, a blank and neutral wellspring of magical force.

The game has been rigged from the get go because Hylia still had a job to do. She had to get creative because Demise almost captured the flag, so to speak, leading to the snafu of the Cycle and all that because she cheated at the game, but ultimately Hylia’s task was to guard the Triforce. And that still remains true, for the most part. The Hyrulian Royal Family (and the Shiekah by extension) had to stop at absolutely nothing to win the wars and unify the country, and retain the stasis of the Realm and Triforce, because that’s what their divine orders are.

That’s what they’re supposed to do, ‘the very reason that they’re born’, to lend a quote from King Daphnes. With Hylia on their side by default, they’re willing to do a lot of fucked up things to make sure that happens, ‘for the greater good’.

These dark times are a result of our deeds... -- TP Zelda

In OoT The Sheikah are known as the Shadow Folk. They are heavily associated with death, whether that is caring for the dead’s rest in the graveyard, or working as spies and assassins on behalf of the Royals, or dabbling in various forms of necromancy. Red eyes are an established trait of their people. I will note that, at least from a Japanese point of view, red is often used with the intention of intimidating evil spirits. But it is also a color identified with power and vitality.

So, one could suppose, the Sheikah red eye also symbolises power/control over evil and darkness (spiritually).

That’s a little something that plays nicely with things like the OoT Manga’s explanation of the tear on the eye (and the previous betrayal of the Royal family) and the high probability of a Shiekah faction defaulting during the wars and being banished with other traitors to become the Twili. I know the manga isn’t canon and also SS Impa has a tear, but if you squint, that might be because of her own feelings of personal failure to the Goddess after Hylia’s shedding of her Divinity. You could headcanon that. The existence of the Yiga later in BoTW as a similar happening of division and betrayal lend some more weight to things.

Also, Sheikah who defaulted during the civil war might have even been the ones who actually utilised the Shadow Temple. 

Headline: Necromancer ninjas in the process of torturing enough info out of the enemies of the Royal family, who were reportedly seeking the Sacred Realm, decide ‘hey fuck it, let’s take it ourselves’. 

That certainly fits into the description of, ‘interloper skilled with dark magic started to appear, seeking dominion of the Sacred Realm’, for me.

Anyway, to the point.

In ostensibly one of the most haunted areas of the game, Kakariko village, we’re treated to the Graveyard and the Royal Family’s Tomb, the Shadow Temple, and the Bottom of the Well. All of these showcase the obvious death and torture that went on, as well as the creepy byproducts of places so saturated with blood, pain, regret, and hatred.

There are skulls in little alcoves on the walls of the catacombs, literally built of bones, who deliver messages to Link. The ones that whisper these messages are all marked by the glowing green eye sockets. Here, the green is used to make the presence of a ghostly sentience inhabiting the skull. 

Unsettling. Musty. 4/10 heebie-jeebies.

The Deadhand, giver of childhood trauma that it is, really does its job to hammer home the fact that there has been so many deaths, so much anguish and horror, that those remains can seemingly form into entirely new monstrosities. An amalgamate of undead flesh and nightmare fuel, made up of the body parts of torture victims and the grudges of lingering spirits, seeking to consume the living vitality of whatever comes near-- Link wearing green around the thing might as well be red to a bull.

When defeated in game, it typically drops a small green pot that refuels Link’s magic.

This is a common theme with undead enemies, specifically the ones that are of the zombie flavour. Redeads, Gibdos, Deadhands. All of them generally give up, effectively, distilled magic as a drop item.

Terrifying. Probably smells even worse. 11/10 heebie-jeebies.

Literal torture device. So many people died here, the room has a green tinge to it. It is soaked in the spiritual imprint of the pain and anguish that took place here. Blood sits here looking freshly spilled, despite the civil war ending many years prior and the Shiekah having ‘died out’, save Impa.

Elsewhere in the temple and under the well, blood splatters are darker red and at least have the decency to pretend to be old. This means one of two things:

Impa still has to make sacrifices to the Seal that contains Bongo Bongo, or feeds people to the undead creatures who lurk down in the dark so they don’t wander up. (Cue the gasp of ‘so that’s why she let the Hylians into Kakariko! Every so often one of them goes missing!’)

Which is a fun dark headcanon to play with, but probably not the case.

Or more likely, the residual spiritual energy that the green haze suggests manifests fresh blood in a manner typical of extreme hauntings. For the victims, their hatred and pain persists so strongly, that their blood seeps up from the cracks no matter how long it has been.

Poltergeist shit. Slip hazard. 8/10 heebie-jeebies.

Then there is this. Some people say its just another torture thing, it could have been intended to convey some sort of acid dip. If not torture, maybe bodily disposal. And sure, that’s a reasonable guess. 

But it is at the very bottom most cavern of the Well of Three Features, and if it were acid-- for how long the bodies have just been marinating in it-- you can assume nothing would be left of them to stick out. And the fact that all the bodies are neatly spaced, with the arms oddly preserved. They’re presumably like that from lowering bodies in from the wooden beams, the victims may have been tied up with their arms straight upwards. 

But, given the Redeads wandering around nearby, I’m pretty sure that’s what this thing does. Make Redeads.

The liquid itself hurts Link, but Link is also alive, and this pool seems to be lacking much of a glow. It’s green, sure, but it’s not exactly teeming with energy. And I think that might be part of its designated purpose-- extracting that green vital energy from living prisoners, draining them until they’re dead. I’m talking juicing people and scooping out the good stuff like the pulp from a really disturbing OJ. 

But still steeped in the juice as a corpse, you’re basically pickled in magic brine, so then those gross husks crawl out as Redeads. (Hey, you know what’s handy in wartime? Scaring the shit out of enemy forces by sending some zombies at them. And if they kill them, you’ve lost nothing. If the Sheikah could actually control them? Undead soldiers. Excellent stuff.)

But all the pulpy good stuff is gone, and has been for a while, so most of the bodies in there haven’t pickled in enough magic to reanimate, I suppose.

Human juicer that churns out zombies. Out of juice currently. 6/10 heebie-jeebies.

Now, THIS is active zombie juice, if I’ve ever seen it.

This is the Royal Family’s Tomb, by the way. Note the skeletons, picked clean, missing a lot of bones. And that’s a choice they made, because there are also full skeletons around to find. 

There are plenty of Redeads down there, for good measure, so I’m going to assume the skeletons are potential graverobbers who were eaten. If Sheikah can presumably command the dead, then the Redeads down there might actually be a counter measure against thieves. If a thief freaks out in the dark when he realises there’s undead down there trying to eat their face, there is also a good likelihood they’ll trip and splash into this green death. A few seconds of exposure is probably enough to kill the average person, and then if their corpse stews for a bit, you have another Redead. 

Their living energy revitalises the goop. Their body becomes bolstered security measures. It’s a self sustaining system.

Horrific but effective. 5/10 heebie-jeebies.

Also, there’s a chance that a couple of the skeletons or one or two Redeads down there are the remains of the Composer Brothers. But they will get their own special part in this series, covering Poes in particular.

But for the moment, let it be noted: their eyes are also that ghostly green.

Poes are spirits that are unable to move on and who have the unfortunate fate, if left unattended, of turning into phantom monsters who forget their human selves and prey on the living. They tend to pop up the most in two places. One, the Kakariko Graveyard, is obvious and somewhat expected. Dead people, lots of lingering spirits, most of them probably Sheikah and Knights of renown who died in the line of duty. Understandable.

So when you apply the same thought to the fact that Hyrule field is the second most common place to find them, you may as well be concluding that it’s an enormous mass grave of war casualties.

We have established that mass quantities of concentrated death, especially earth that is saturated by the spilled blood of strong soldiers and highly skilled warriors (full of life and magic, as it were), can result in creepy shit made from human remains reanimating over time. 

Poes share their haunting of the field with these bumpkins:

These hauntings are not the result of Ganondorf, or the corruption of the Sacred realm. They are not a particular curse placed by anybody.

The Poes and Stalfolk are present in the game from the very beginning, and quite normal fare for Hyrulean life. Lon Lon ranch and castle town are walled off for good reason, and the drawbridge raises at night specifically in response to the literal skeleton monsters who roam around at night. 

Stalchildren, specifically, seem akin to the Deadhand in that they are not a direct reanimation of any one particular set of remains. Rather, they seem to be mutated amalgamations of various parts. In the case of the Stalchildren, they rise up under the dark of night, a not-quite-human formation of bone and magic. They seem to possess an aimless drive to attack, perhaps possessed still by the orders of the soldiers who died there. 

Interestingly, in a somewhat similar fashion to BotW’s blood moon reanimating the fallen monsters (due to the potency of Malice in the land peaking at those times), Stalchildren only seem to be active under the moonlight. They disintegrate when the sunlight touches them, which promotes the idea that they are the bones of the fallen possessed by the ghostly memory of the war.

They also appear to wear raggy leather kilts, which is a feature they share with the related monster, the Stalfos, who are often acting out the part of a soldier as well. Even better, those bastards are actually WEARING GREEN, to boot, which given the history of Hyrulean Knights prior and their uniforms (SS and Minish cap) is pretty self evident. 

Stalfos, however, are also confirmed as humans who have died under certain unique circumstance (such as the magical influences of the Lost Woods) and reanimated as a consequence of what I assume is basically magic poisoning.

It could be a bit like an overdose, succumbing under the intense mystical forces at play within proximity to the Deku Tree (which the strong of spirit can resist). It could be a draining effect, maybe even just a gaseous version of what’s happening when people come into contact with the green goo, except extracted by the forest spirits and plants (also possible that the strong of spirit might resist). That could go either way.

The forest absolutely does eat people’s spiritual energy, though. RIP to Grog and Link’s mother. They’re Stalfos now.

"Anybody who comes into the forest will be lost. Everybody will become a Stalfos. Everybody, Stalfos."

Upon killing both kind of Stal, however, the bones rapidly deteriorate into flames.

You guessed it: green.

I’ve already pointed out a BoTW reference already, but to add more context back into this thing about the tie between green and things in Hyrule that refuse to die properly:

That last one is cheap of me I’m sorry but we’ll get to him too

So we have established that green has an overwhelming association with not only life, but states of undeath.

The overview is, things were already pretty fucked in OoT Era before Ganondorf got the Triforce.

On to part 2!

[thebeautyoffanfics]

Hey! I always loved your writing and you actually inspired me to write some myself so I want to request if it’s alright…

Can I have Hanako x f!reader who doesn’t believe in love (this having to due with her parents never getting along). She says that it’s just a little word people say to make them feel better about themselves and it’s a waste of time.

But she can’t help but fall in love with Hanako and gets on flustered when he’s around but tries to tell herself it’s not love. Oneshot please!

Thank you and feel free to ignore if you want!

hanako x f!reader

a/n: hello hello!! thank you so much for the compliment- that’s really sweet, and it genuinely means the world to me;; but, sure thing! (ahh, the fact that i wrote a rengoku fic about the reader feeling that way not long ago- this is a topic I’m familiar with, so I hope that it makes it turn out even better? haha) thank you so much for requesting, and I hope this turns out alright!!! <333 also, if you ever want to share your writings, do feel free to tag me/let me know somehow! I’m sure they’re amazing, and I’d love to read them, should you be comfortable with it!! :DD

bro i guess this request resonated with me bc i genuinely like,,, went off. So it’s,,, pretty long- i hope that’s alright haanofnaoinf-

warnings: implied parental issues?

word count: 2,363

Love was ridiculous. It was a stupid idea. An overused word, thrown onto any situation in which you felt something other than anger, fear, sadness, or disgust. If something made you even a little happy, you’d claim to love it. If someone showed you basic human decency, you’d claim to love them.

You hated it. It made you feel sick.

It’s not like you could control what everyone else did, you supposed. So, you’d continue on normally. If you didn’t fall in love, then there was no worry about falling out of it- that’s what you figured. That’s what you told yourself. Love wasn’t real in the first place- how could such an overused word hold any true meaning? It was like a 1st grade pinky promise. It was easily broken, as if it held any truth to it when the kids exchanged a deal. No matter how much either part of it trusted the promise, it made it no more real or true.

Yep… love was best put as a 1st grade pinky promise.

Maybe not-

Still, such a strong opinion on love, an unmoving opinion, with your own “proof” to back it up… made it hard when you thought that it may be put to question. You walked near the bathroom, the girls’ bathroom, and heard a girl from your class shout something. You couldn’t tell what, but you did notice her slightly annoyed expression as she left the bathroom.

Ah, the girl who seemed to be constantly head-over-heels for boys- particularly Minamoto-senpai, you had noted. It wasn’t like he’d return the feelings, you figured. It’s not like her “love” was anything more than an obsession.

Still, you figured there must have been some other girl in the bathroom. Yashiro probably had friends- she talked to Aoi a lot. Maybe the school’s princess was teasing her friend. You pushed open the door, noticing that all the stalls were empty. The only other entity in the bathroom was… a floating, slightly-transparent boy. He was laughing, and you went ahead and assumed it was at Yashiro’s annoyance.

You sighed, running a hand through your hair. Honestly, you just needed to pee, but it shouldn’t have surprised you. Little mokke running around the school constantly, weird things happening, a boy in the girls’ bathroom wasn’t life-changing. Or so you figured.

You grumbled, making some comment you weren’t even sure you got, as you stepped into a stall. Not acknowledging him would surely be best. You were fairly new to the school, and it wasn’t like you were insanely fond of public restrooms anyway. You’d never have to see him again. Plus, if he was anything like the other supernaturals, you were sure he’d be a handful. That was your thought process, as you washed your hands, glimpsing up at the mirror hung above the sink- you caught another glimpse at him.

An old uniform. Brown, almost shaggy, hair. His eyes were amber, and rather large- the way he held his hands, you silently compared him to a puppy. Innocent face, playful eyes- almost too alive for a ghost. He turned his head, nearly making eye contact, but you continued to study his appearance. A white… bandage? Sticker? Something- stuck to his face, the kanji for “seal” written in red.

Weird.

“My, you look as if you’ve seen a ghost,” He spoke, bringing a hand to his mouth, as a mischievous smirk came to his face.

A pain in the neck.

Your eyebrows furrowed, as you looked back down, turning off the sink and drying your hands.

“Oh? Gonna pretend you didn’t see me? How cruel,”

Still, you ignored him. He couldn’t be serious. How was he so sure you didn’t simply think you caught something out of the corner of your eye? Was he messing with you, or trying to lighten the mood?

“I don’t think I want to associate with a pervy ghost,” You said, shutting the door behind you. As if right on time, the bell rang, signaling that lunch was over. With that, you made your way to class, hoping to not have to deal with any more paranormal things.

…

Unfortunately, things don’t always go as planned. As the rest of the day took it’s sweet time to pass, you sat, spacing out as you thought about that boy. He was one of the first humanoid supernaturals you had seen at the school- honestly, you half-hoped that all of them were cute little bunnies. Not… strangely eye-catching boys… how weird.

You sighed, clicking your pen, letting the quiet sound drown the teacher’s ramblings out a bit. Ca-click, click-click, ca-click, click-click.

“Y’know, people find that little sound annoying sometimes. It never bothered me, but teachers seem to be so sensitive about it.”

Jumping, you turned your head a bit, only to be practically nose-to-nose with the boy from the bathroom. Your heartbeat increased from the surprise, but you placed your hand on your chin, pretending to not have seen anything. Not only did you not want to give him much of your time or energy, but you definitely didn’t want to attract negative attention from the normal kids around you. Your eyes scanned the room, and you noticed Yashiro looking in your direction, most likely at the boy. Yes, she definitely saw him too.

“Waaah, Yashirooooo, the new girl’s totally ignoring me!” He sighed, floating over to her. She looked away as well, focusing intensely on whatever the teacher had to say. You weren’t even sure by this point, watching the two out of the corner of your eye. You stopped clicking your pen, watching as he stood behind Yashiro, leaning against her as he peered at her notes.

He glanced at you again, and you looked away. The boy, who you were now curious as to what his name could be, floated back over to your desk, glancing at your notes.

“You really aren’t paying attention, huh! Yashiro’s not much better- her page is mainly doodles. How on earth do you plan to pass like this, haha?”

You glared at him slightly, before lifting your pen, and clicking it open. Annoyed, you flipped to another page, and scribbled something down. He leaned forward a bit, looking at whatever it is you wrote.

“Leave me alone, toilet boy.”

He laughed, patting your back. “Toilet boy? What’s with all the insults, I barely know youuuuuu- plus, I have a name. I’m Hanako. School Mystery Number 7, Hanako-san of the toilet! Not ‘toilet boy’, nor a pervy ghost.”

You raised your eyebrows, writing once more.

“Wonderful. Now leave me alone, ‘Hanako-san of the toilet’.”

Days passed, and he certainly didn’t leave you alone. In fact, you grew to find yourself spending more time than you expected to with him. You assisted with supernaturals from time to time, even meeting his two other friends properly- Kou Minamoto and Yashiro Nene. You all slowly, but surely, became friends.

“I’m done wiping the mirrors,” You said, tossing the dirty rag into the bucket.

“I’m done mopping!” Yashiro exclaimed, sighing as she leaned against the mop.

“I’ve finished dusting too,” Kou added.

Hanako nodded, clapping cheerfully. “Great job, everyone! Can’t wait to see the same enthusiasm tomorrow!!”

The three of you collectively groaned, rolling your eyes. “Yes, yes, just like that,” Hanako laughed, moving his legs to sit in the air in a criss-cross fashion. Light conversation picked up, Kou talking to Yashiro, and Hanako throwing in a comment every so often. You stood, leaning against the sink, watching your friends look so happy. Hanako glanced at you, closing his eyes as he grinned.

Your heart rate picked up, and you felt your face grow warm. Your eyebrows furrowed just slightly, as you glanced away. It wasn’t the first time a little action like that made your heart go haywire. Not just your heart- your stomach, your legs, your arms. The moment Hanako grinned at you, hugged you, or emptily flirted, you felt as though you lost the ability to function. It couldn’t be love… no, you didn’t want to fall in love.

“Right, but it's getting late, guys. I should really head home,” Yashiro spoke, putting the mop up as she did so. Kou nodded, glancing over at the clock. “I’ve got to get home and work on dinner,” He said, putting the duster away, and grabbing his things.

Hanako glanced at you.

“I don’t really have any plans. I finished homework in class, so I think I’ll linger around for a bit more.”

“Alright! Be safe when you head home, (Y/N)! I’ll see you guys tomorrow,” Yashiro spoke, waving as she left the room. “Bye guys! Be safe!” Kou added, leaving not long after she did. Silence filled the room for a moment, the only thing breaking it being the sound of your shoes as you made your way to the window seal. Taking a seat, you looked at Hanako expectantly.

“Well? Any more stories of the things I missed out on?”

...

“The Confession Tree?” You questioned, the other two humans long gone by now, leaving Hanako to recount to you previous adventures they had gone on.

“Yep! Yashiro and I took care of that one- it was honestly easier than most of them were. He’s still around, just nothing bigger than one of those pre-cut broccolis. The rumor was, you’d confess under him, and he’d make the feelings mutual~, buuut, it obviously got way out of control.”

“That’s so stupid.”

Hanako raised his eyebrows, not expecting such a distasteful tone of voice. “What is?”

“A supernatural forcing some kids to ‘fall in love’,” You made air quotes, before continuing, “it’s pretty gross. Love’s nothing more than some overused word. It’s tagged onto everything, and it’s basically used to make you feel better. It’s all a waste.”

For once, he was silent. Several questions began to circulate in his mind, but a part of him was… somewhat hurt.

“But what if I love you?” He questioned, tilting his head. His face felt warm, but he tried to steady his heartbeat. It wasn’t a direct confession. No, just a question. A ‘what if.’

You blinked, your face feeling warm. You understood- of course, it was nothing more than a ‘what if.’ “It wouldn’t be love. You’d be interested in me, only for the interest to go away eventually- even if it took a week. Even if it took years. Just… trust me, Hanako. I’m not the smartest person in the world, but- once you see it happen to the two people who are supposed to be there for you forever, you get the memo. It isn’t love. Never was, never will be.”

Those words you spoke… you didn’t like the fact that you questioned their sincerity. Especially when you were blushing, the boy who made you question those words looking at you with his big, rather beautiful eyes. “Or… that’s… what I think,” You added, the heat rising to your face only making you feel worse, as he blinked. His undivided attention on you- on what you said- made your heart beat much faster than you wished it would.

And suddenly, he was closer. Too close. Way too close. His eyes began to shut, as his face drew closer to yours. Your heart began to beat quicker than it had before- your face grew hotter than it already was- your eyes widened, as you silently questioned what on earth he was going.

One of his hands grabbed your wrist, and you looked over at your arm he was holding, then back up at him. His face was still close, so close you were sure you’d smell him if he still had a scent. So close he could probably feel the heat radiating off of your face, if he could still distinguish hot from cold.

“Then why is your heart beating so fast?” He finally questioned, thumb pressed against your radial artery, as if the warmth of your face wasn’t enough of a sign.

“Because- you’re… way too close.”

“But you aren’t pushing me away? I’ll scoot back if you want. I’m not a mind reader though, so just use your words.”

Your mouth felt dry. Why weren’t you saying anything? You could speak. Open your mouth and tell him to move. Take your free hand and shove him.

But… a part of you didn’t want him to move.

Hanako smiled once more, his eyebrows drawn together slightly, as if he were saddened by something. “I’m sorry that you were dealt a hand like that in life. It’s easy to look around and find all the negatives in life. But,” He leaned forward a bit more, nose nearly touching yours, “you aren’t your parents. You don’t need to follow in their footsteps. Don’t let their problems influence you so heavily to where you miss out on potentially great things. It’s okay to be sad about it. It’s okay to be scared. But it’s still your life, not theirs. If everyone’s overuse of it bothers you, then only say it when you mean it. Still, if you feel love, embrace it.”

Your eyes felt slightly prickly, as they watered up a bit. His sincerity… your racing heart. Maybe, just maybe… you were in love.

“I… think I love you, Hanako,” You muttered. You were scared. You were scared that he’d tell you he was joking- or that maybe this wasn’t love. Scared of so many things, stemming from one little word. Yet, you tried to embrace it.

“I love you, (Y/N). And nothing will change that,” He said, his smile widening. Quickly, he closed his eyes, closing the distance between the two of you. His lips were… cold. His touch was the only thing that reminded you that he wasn’t alive. Still, the warmth of his words made up for it, as you closed your eyes into the kiss.

His encouragement wouldn’t drown out the fear completely. He couldn’t take the memories away. But he tried… he told you that he loved you, so… you’d believe him. After all, you hadn’t heard him overusing the word. It only made that moment feel that much more genuine.

[nottinghil1]

"Ymir basically controlled Historia and made her completely dependent on her. She treated her like her own personal toy. She would talk over her and talk down to her (saying she had a suicide wish when she was just desperate for validation). Historia had become so co-dependent that she tried to follow Ymir with Reiner and Bertholdt (even going so far to say she doesn't care if Historia was hurt as long as she had her). And after Ymir left she had a complete mental breakdown and then shut down for days. It's not a healthy relationship. Historia completely relied on Ymir for any kind of stability, and she didn't grow and find any stability until Ymir left and she couldn't rely on her for control. Ymir didn't do a single genuinely good thing until she helped Reiner and Bertholdt and her feelings for Historia are not real caring, it was more of an obsession"

hi! i understand you have a different opinion and different opinions are fine!! but! you’ve come back to my page after i asked you to leave me alone and disrespected me. so, i will give you my reasoning, point by point. i also request that you leave my page and leave me alone. sadly, i cannot block you. so, out of human decency, please leave me alone.

“ymir basically controlled historia and made her completely dependent on her.”

ymir did not control historia. the decisions that historia made were from asks from ymir. like when ymir ASKED historia to live for herself or when ymir ASKED historia to tell ymir her name when she exposed her secret. those were just asks and historia did not have to comply. ymir wasn’t holding anything over her head.

ymir also did not make her dependent on her. historia had no one else. her mom was dead and her father was out of the picture (talking about pre season 3). it makes perfect sense why historia would be dependent on her.

if you haven’t noticed, their character arcs revolve around each other. there would be no historia without ymir. ymir is the sole reason why there is historia and not krista.

“she treated her like her own personal toy”

again, ymir was very respectful of historia. she only asked something, she didn’t expect anything in return. ymir treated her like another person, which had never happened to historia before. everytime before ymir, she was treated as an object.

“she would talk over her and talk down to her (saying she had a suicide wish when she was just desperate for validation.)”

historia was suicidal. it is clearly obvious that what she was doing on the mountain, was an act of suicide.

historia wanted to die, she had every reason to want to. but, we have to remember that she was krista at that time. krista was the girl that was good to everyone. she was never an inconvenience. she was an angel! so, krista would never kill herself in a way that would never make it difficult for others. if she died on that mountain, everyone would think she was trying to be a good person and just messed up.

ymir had been observing her from months to years at that point. she had realized from what she heard at the church and what she had observed, that historia was running from something BAD. it would make perfect sense for historia to want to die.

in that moment, historia needed someone to talk down to her and wake her up. suicide is not an easy conversation. you need to be upfront and be an ass to people sometimes. historia is a very stubborn character. she has been from her very first scene. ymir knew that. ymir knew that she couldn’t beat around the bush. she had to be direct to historia.

“historia had become so co-dependent that she tried to follow ymir with reiner and bertholdt (even going so far to say she doesn’t care if historia was hurt as long as she had her).”

again, historia is co-dependent because no one else treated her like a person and she had no one else. of course, she is going to follow the one person who has ever shown that they care about her. she would be foolish not to.

now, we have to look at ymirs character.

ymirs first promise to herself after waking up again (after turning back into a human) is that she will live for herself and she will be selfish. ymir knew that her chances of living were better if she had historia. marley wouldn’t have killed historia, they knew better to let someone of royal blood die. we know that with dina, if they knew she had royal blood, then she would have lived. the same would have happened to historia.

ymir may have wanted to be selfish and be with historia, but obviously, we know that didn’t happen. she chose to sacrifice herself to keep historia safe.

“and after ymir left she had a complete mental breakdown and then shut down for days.”

yes she did! but why?

let’s look back at her childhood!

in stressful and scary situations, our minds will do what is reasonable and best for us. however, when someone has trauma, they do what their brain thinks is the safest and most comfortable from past experiences.

we see that when historia’s mother denied her affection and eventually left her, historia was betrayed by her mother. what happened? she was by herself with no one else around her. she was all by herself.

next, we see that when she meets her father, he later denies being her father and leaves her once again. she was betrayed by her father. she was all by herself again.

what both of these situations have in common is betrayal and being shut out by herself. this is what she is used to. so, when a betrayal will happen, her brain will tell her that she needs to be alone. she needs to be shut down to process it.

we have to remember that ymir is the first person that historia really opens up to and is honest to. no one else. now that she had lost the only person she was honest to, obviously she was going to shut down and lose it.

that is what happens when ymir leaves. it is not a healthy reaction. but that is not due to their relationship. it is due to the fact that historia has unsolved trauma and that event triggered it.

“it’s not a healthy relationship.”

it is a lot healthier than historia being forced to get pregnant and eren doing nothing about it. but oh he cares so much!!

“historia completely relied on ymir for any kind of stability, and she didn’t grow and find any stability until ymir left and she couldn’t rely on her for control.”

historia had not known any type of stability her whole life (again pre season three)! she had no father! a mom that left her and died! ymir was there for her for three years! of course she would rely on her for stability! but it wasn’t unhealthy.

historia did grow in season two. we saw that she was making her own decisions (like choosing to be historia) and that was growth.

in season three, before she turns into a titan, she thinks back to ymir telling her to live her life with pride. funny how it’s ymir that she thinks of in her most important moment of her life? her growth is directly tied to ymir. there is no historia without ymir. again, their arcs are tied to each other.

“ymir didnt do a single genuinely good thing until she helped reiner and bertholdt and her feelings for historia are not real caring, it was more of an obsession.”

again!!! ymir is the only reason why we have historia and not krista. she gave krista the confidence to be historia and to do what she wants because she wants to do it. their arcs revolve around each other! ymir was the person that historia needed to live and to find purpose in life. thanks to ymir, historia found a will to live and wanted to keep living for herself.

it was not an obsession. ymir just cared about historia and historia cared about her too. they both equally cared about each other and wanted to live together and live for themselves.

i doubt you’ve read this, but i am asking again. please leave my page. i am not in the mood to deal with this, truly. i am sorry you think they are an abusive relationship. i am sorry that you don’t understand what abuse is. i don’t care that you don’t ship them. but, please leave my page. it doesn’t matter and i don’t want to hear your opinions so please stop.

[vanquishedvaliant]

What's your opinion about GreyTroath, i think she deserve more love after reading the archive file and in chapter 6, can you make character analysis about her please?

I agree, Greythroat is an interesting character that I like quite a lot.

She's an interesting case because she gives us a very different perspective on the origins of infected prejudice in  Terra. An explanation, but not as a way to excuse it, rather, she ends up being somewhat of a testament of the strength of character required to break free from the overwhelming societal stigma associated with Oripathy.

Greythroat's parents were oripathy researchers; she witnessed them die, watched others be killed, be betrayed and suffer because of not only the disease and those infected by it, but the systems that oppress them. And that harrowing experience from her youth deeply, irrevocably traumatized her and left a mark deep in her psyche.

While it matters little in terms of how you actually treat people, I think it's important to contextualize how Greythroat sees Oripathy. It's not so much that she has a specific hatred or discrimination against the people themselves that are infected, but more that she appears to have a deep seated traumatic fear of the disease itself. Her unconscious uncontrolled phobia is so severe that she's been driven to self harm at even the slightest risk of infection, obsessively checking her blood levels and using all the protective equipment she can get her hands on.

Even later on in her story after she'd done much to confront her prejudice, we're given a story about how she saves an infected comrade's life in battle by giving them first aid- and her body is uncontrollably trembling due to her fear. The operator says he didn't feel she was prejudiced against him anymore; but her fear and trauma is bodily, automatic, and not something she can simply get over.

So Greythroat ends up being an incredible case of personal strength in growth where she's overcoming not just the moral justice of treating the infected as people and recognizing their plight. She's not simply a person who bought into the propaganda and needs to learn otherwise, she has to actively suppress a panic attack and nausea in order to do the right thing. But by the current time in the story, this is indeed what she does through immense and continuous effort.

But even so, this distinction she seems to have between the virus and the people still makes her come across extremely cold and callous towards them, and her general blunt and to-the-point personality only further hampers communication. Her attitude about the Infected after meeting Amiya and learning to extend the same human decency and rights to the Infected also basically... curtails some of her sympathies.

I don't shy away from sensitive topics regarding the Infected? That's correct, they're not like us, which should be obvious, but they're also like us in the sense that they have the right to seize hope. Therefore, there's no need for me to take extra care of them. That's equality, is it not`

Greythroat believes that they deserve to be treated with humanity, but not pity. She is still often separating the effects of the disease from the shared identity of the people suffering from it, which makes talking to characters like Blaze- who resonate strongly with the 'Infected' identity thrust upon them- rather difficult when she struggles to connect the realities of their lives as infected with their social treatment.

But she's gradually trying to do better; through Chapter 6 we see her always asking questions, always wondering why. She's asking very blunt and insensitive questions because she wants to understand and that bluntness grates upon people like Blaze who are so used to those questions being asked dismissively or in malice.

This is also reflected in her confusion facing down with Faust. She doesn't understand the identity politics of being Infected, so the existence of a revolutionary movement like Reunion gives her pause. She’s been hurt before by the infected lashing out at their circumstances, and from her experience this only spread the pain further. 

But she finds it equally difficult to raise arms against the infected because she's learned to treat them as equals, she knows they are trying to save them and to heal them. Fighting against Reunion and seeing that same humanity and decency in their ranks muddies the whole conversation for her. It forces her to further reconsider her views and to tackle the sociopolitical aspect of the infected prejudice, to see someone on the other side that mirrors her and someone she can respect, that teaches her more about their struggle.

In the end I think this makes her a deeply fascinating character and one that really enriches Arknight's worldbuilding and storytelling. We're given a character so deeply mired in prejudice that other people, good people, never believe she'll be able to turn around. And it's not an easy process, but she's doing her best to overcome her own biases, her own fears, to do whats right. She doesn't always get it right, and the sensitivity and politics of it don't always please those around her, but she's getting better everyday through exposure to them, learning from their experiences and developing her own views.

She shows us how even good people can develop vicious prejudices and biases, how unconscious fear and the biology of the disease itself drives the hatred and discrimination, but how those instincts are ultimately wrong and something to overcome. 

I find her deeply refreshing as not someone we see as a paragon of righteousness, but rather one coming from a deeply flawed place on the axis of morality that lies at the center of Arknight's themes. And steadily climbing that ladder from its depths doesn't show us that this prejudice is omnipresent and undefeatable, or that it's justified...

It shows us that it's something that with the right time and approach, can be defeated. And that with the proper education and understanding, even those people that are stricken by fear and hatred for Oripathy and the Infected can be turned around into staunch allies through Rhodes Island's vision.

[missholland]

The one(s) who never stop searching

I sometimes wonder whether Hanguang Jun grew up with a role model, is there anyone he looks up to, or that just doesn’t exist because LWJ is too busy being admired and respected by pretty much everyone else (apart from his biggest anti-fan Su She).

Of course, he adores his soulmate. BUT, now rewatching the Coffin Town arc, I just really want to write something about LWJ and his admiration for Xiao Xingchen/Song Lan.

LWJ first met XXC and SL in episode 10 when checking out Chang clan’s manor in Yue Yang with WWX and JC. The duo captured Xue Yang there, and introduced themselves to the gang.

‘Xiao Xingchen, the moon in the breeze. Song Zichen, the Gentry despite the frost. Your decency is known to us’. This was probably the longest sentence LWJ said to another human being since the beginning of the series. Even his eyes scream ‘I’m a fan’ and makes WWX turn around in surprise. 

During their later conversation as NHS and JGY arrive, XXC and SL talk about how they’re not interested in bloodlines and just cherish those with same ambitions. LWJ has obviously been listening very carefully, and even actually asks where they cultivate and how others can find them. I mean, since LWJ has not really opened up by that point, it’s truly impressive coming across new characters that manage to generate so much interest from LWJ within a very short time. Let me repeat. he even ASKS PERSONAL QUESTIONS!

His admiration becomes VERY clear just a few minutes after during the farewell scene. It’s probably only the 3rd time LWJ gives us a mellow facial expression since episode 1. He watches on as XXC and SL depart - quite a long look with a mix of emotions: appreciating, pondering, wondering, with a tiny bit of sorrow, somehow. He was clearly in his own world until WWX calls him back down to earth. He then gives his soulmate a soft look before nodding and following the gang. WWX clearly senses that LWJ has something in mind, as they walk, he turns and looks at LWJ.

This is how I interpret LWJ’s thought process in that sequence. As he looks on XXC and SL leaving, it feels like he has a bunch of ‘What if...’ questions in his head. Probably something along the line of ‘Darn, wouldn’t it be nice to just roam the world with your lifelong confidant, protect the weak, exorcise the evil without the burden of playing clan politics? What if I was not restricted by 3,500 rules at Gusu? What if I could actually live a life as in my name WangJi - to not seek fame or wealth, forget about worldly matters, and be at peace with the world?’. As soon as WWX calls him he turns around and.... ‘What if I could live that life with this person?’.

I’m convinced from this point, LWJ already has a vision in his head about going on adventures with his soulmate. We know he eventually got his dream come true from episode 34 onward, but it was a very very long and painful way for him to get there. At the end of episode 35, when filling WWX in about what happened to XXC and SL, LWJ was visibly upset which led him into having himself a drink. Some may argue that his frustration is due to people still shitting on WWX after all these years, or about the injustice related to Jin clan and Xue Yang rather than XXC and SL. I still think that being reminded of the duo’s tragic fate when talking to WWX does have some impact on LWJ’s emotion. 

It was a clear case of extreme clan-related injustice that brought so much pain to the lives of 2 people who are not even attached to any sect whatsoever, 2 people who just purely wanted to protect the world from evil while not taking side. They were simply caught up in the whole major clans corruption shamble, and clearly the last people on earth who deserved to die/gone missing because of the clans’ mess. For someone who has long admired their decency, how would that NOT frustrate LWJ - someone who’s already in a long battle against injustice that screwed over his soulmate’s life?

Fast forward to the end of the Coffin Town arc in episode 39, it’s now revealed that Xue Yang murdered everyone at Snow White Pavilion, turned SL blind and led XXC to give his eyes to SL. As LWJ was searching for WWX, elsewhere, someone else was also looking for their other half. Unfortunately, SL arrived to find XXC being deceived by Xue Yang, and basically all of them ended up with tragic fates. Once all of the misunderstanding is finally clarified, we find WangXian and the junior disciples in front of A Qing’s grave. Once again, WWX notices LWJ being miles away in his own thoughts. He looks up and stares into his soulmate’s beautifully surreal face. It has an odd sense of relief in his vision, mixed with a bit of fear - a ‘close call’ type of fear, like... ‘Something even more awful could have happened’. 

LWJ then mumbles ‘Fortunately...’ to a confused WWX and probably because of censorship, we never get to hear the end of that sentence. Putting in the context of everything that just happened to them, it’s not too difficult to work out that LWJ was acknowledging how extremely lucky he was being able to reunite with WWX safe and sound. Sadly, XXC and SL did not get that chance.

 They then returned to XXC’s coffin to find SL. LWJ looks on, apologetically, as WWX gives SL what’s left of XXC’s spiritual cognition. Just a quick side note, I cry EVERY SINGLE TIME watching SL write in the soil with this sword ‘Roam this world with Frostwork. Exorcise evil beings alongside Xingchen’. 

LWJ then looks up to SL and it feels so strongly that he wanted to say something. He’s been there - he saw his soulmate falling off the cliff. He started to invest most of his time searching for WWX, from appearing whenever chaos was to communicating with spirits asking for WWX’s whereabouts. 16 years of mourning the dead and living with the pain, feeling incomplete and empty without his counterpart. 

LWJ is the only person who can relate to SL. And that’s probably why he knows there’s nothing to be said that could ease the pain. He proceeds to respectfully present SL with XXC’s Frostwork and bow. 

LWJ, with sadness in his eyes,  watches SL walk away, this time without XXC by his side. The scene cuts to WWX thinking to himself ‘I wonder if the two of them would be able to meet each other again’. The same thought must have gone through LWJ’s mind as well. WangXian then exchange a mournful look - if only the camera has stuck around longer for us right here, as I’m sure, this could have been the ‘We should be thankful that we are still standing in front of each other’.

I really appreciate The Untamed crew setting a good 3-episode arc aside to tell the tragic story of XXC/SL/XY the best way they could. It’s also a good idea to change the timeline of certain event so that XXC and SL cross path with WangXian in WWX’s first life, as it lets us see from very early on that LWJ is not just a rigid guy to follow rules all the time. He doesn’t have all the answers to everything in his life just because he reads all the books at Gusu. He does have certain insecurity and curiosity about a different path, now that there’s someone in his life that make it worth considering. It also provides more context to the unfortunate contrary between the fates of WangXian and SongXiao.

If you’re also impressed with this arc as much as I am, I would strongly recommend checking out the novel as it tells us a lot more about SongXiao origin story and how their feud with Xue Yang started. Besides the main couple whom all of us obviously stan, this storyline definitely impressed me the most rather than anything else. I really wish one day Song Lan would succeed in nursing Xiao Xingchen’s spiritual recognition back to wholeness and they would meet again.

[bruciewayne]

birthday suits and booty shorts

stevetony, fluff, humour, getting together, 2k

“Oh god,” Tony groans, “Please tell me you that you weren’t wearing a fucking nylon suit in the Battle last year?”

“Um,” Steve says, intelligently, “it’s flexible?”

Tony gives him an unimpressed look, which isn’t anything particularly out of the ordinary, “So are leggings, but you’re not going to fight gods in them!”

Steve has a sudden flashback to the time Bucky yelled at him for going into the HYDRA base in costume, not armour. It hurts less than it used to.

“Only HYDRA,” Steve quips, with a smile.

Tony looks like he’s going to have an aneurysm. 

“I thought that was made up.”

“Howard told you!?”

“Called it heroic.”

“Buck called it moronic, so did Pegs.”

Tony laughs at that, “Yeah, he once mentioned it around her, and she gave me explicit instructions to never go into any sort of battle in booty shorts.”

“She always did give sound advice,” Steve says, deciding to ignore the ‘booty shorts’ comment (and if it’s because he agrees, then that’s not relevant).

Tony narrows his eyes, and Steve hasn’t known him long, but he knows him enough that he can clearly identify that as his ‘I’m thinking, shut up’ face.

“Didn’t she shoot you?”

“Four times.”

Tony looks at him incredulously, “Sounds like her, but this,” he says, waving his uniform about, “no bueno.”

-

Three days later, Tony has the suit made, reinforced kevlar, carbon nanotubes, biometric tracker, and a small ‘Captain Rogers’ on the breastbone. Of course, he only got it made this fast to get it out of the way, and not because he cared in any way whatsoever about Captain Uptight (that initial assessment may be incorrect and in need of revising, but he’ll get to that later).

Steve, predictably, is in the gym when Tony asks JARVIS of his location. Unpredictable is what he’s wearing. He’s doing Planche push-ups when Tony comes in, so all Tony can see of his godawful gear is the ‘PROPAGANDA’ scrawled over his ass, and damn, science in the 40s should get far more credit than it did.

Just before Tony goes to poke him, or kick him in his foot, Steve lowers his feet to the ground and jumps up, grinning and sweaty, “Hey.”

Tony would reply, with a normal, human comment, and/or greeting, but he’s too busy staring at his chest, and for all the wrong reasons, YOU ARE NOT IMMUNE TO PROPAGANDA. 

Steve notices, and the light flush from exercise deepens, “It was a gag gift. From Nat.”

“Well,” Tony says, against his better judgement, “it’s not wrong.”

-

The thing is, they are friends, pretty good ones now, at that, but Tony has an incredibly difficult time being in public with someone who wears jeans that tight.

“Aren’t your balls like, crushed?” Tony asks, as they’re walking through the park, because that’s just something they do now. 

“You’re awfully concerned with my balls,” Steve comments, taking a long lick of his ice-cream.

“I’m just saying!” Tony defends. Steve just laughs, and overly assures him that he definitely believes him. Totally.

Tony attempts to reach up to tug a leaf off a branch to throw at Steve, because, for your information, he thinks about his ass far more than his balls, but, even on his tiptoes he can’t reach it, and he’s not about to make a fool of himself jumping to reach a branch. 

Steve laughs even more, and even Tony’s man enough to admit that he lost all of his dignity in the 90s, so jumping to get a leaf to throw at his no good, very bad friend is barely news. So he does. And, predictably, he falls. 

And less predictably, just as he readies himself for mud-covered Armani (because, whilst Steve is young enough to dress like a fuckboy, Tony, unfortunately, is a rich businessman who has to look the part (not that he’d particularly want to have to spray-paint on his jeans every morning (not that he’s allowed to wear jeans to board meeting, because, ‘Tony, you’re  older now, and they expect something from you’)), and he cannot, and just as he should hit the ground, Steve’s around him, arms bracing him, strong and sure.

Steve’s lips quirk up into a smile, boyish and joyful, and the sun shining down from above highlights his hair in a way that makes Tony think, not for the first time, that Steve’s been sent down from heaven, for god knows what reason, because there’s no logical way that someone that good, someone so unpolluted in the face of all he’s had to fear, comes from humanity and-- oh fuck.

“I’m surprised you can bend like that in those jeans,” Tony says, too softly to pretend that’s all that’s running through his mind.

“I’m Superman,” Steve says, cheekily, rightening them both, and maybe it’s just Tony’s imagination, but he seems to linger longer than should be necessary. But he moves away, and the moment is broken, less like shattering glass and more like chalk falling barely a foot, broken beyond repair, but not the end of the world, which, in their careers, is a damn good place to be.

-

Tony takes it all back. 

“You’ve never followed an instruction in your life, one day that might just end it,” Steve growls, still in uniform, because they saved New York again, and they’re fighting about god knows what, because god knows why.

“Don’t pretend to be concerned about my life when all you really care about is controlling the team, your perfect little soldiers,” Tony hisses.

Steve glowers even more. “Stop twisting my words.”

“Stop making bullshit calls,” Tony counters.

“It’s not bullshit and you know it.”

He’s not even loud, or explosive, like Tony, then, he’s quiet, still, unbelievably angry, but calm. And something about that lights a fire inside Tony, unstable and destructive.

“They never should have pulled you from the ice if all you’re good for is pure bullshit!”

For one, rage-coloured, gleeful, glorious moment, Tony revels in where he’s clearly managed to get a hit on him: his face lights with anger, the calm from earlier rapidly fades away, practically melting off his face.

And then his face, his body, his entire demeanour drop heavily, a slave to gravity, like the common man, like a puppet torn from its strings. The guilt floods into Tony’s system milliseconds before Steve turns on his heel and walks out without another word.

Tony realises, after he’s put himself in blackout mode, that the fight hadn’t changed a thing about the other day - Steve was always going to be ridiculously infuriatingly stubborn, hell, that’s why he’s so impossibly infatuated with him, he never gives up, never runs away, never stops, and for him to not fight Tony… he’s fucked up. Bad. 

“Sir, if I may, an apology may be due,” and isn’t that sad, his AI had to listen to him rant aloud and then urge him to show basic human decency and at least attempt to preserve a relationship (one that’s somehow, sometime, become to absurdly important to Tony, the more he thinks of it, the more he wants to deck his old self in the nose (and if he ever did make a time machine, he knows that the punch he’d throw would be perfect form, thanks to Steve’s tutelage)).

“Yeah. Yeah,” Tony says heavily. 

Unsurprisingly, JARVIS directs Tony toward the gym, where Steve’s beating apart a punching bag. He’s taken off the top part of his uniform and left it hanging around his waist, undershirt soaked through with sweat, hiding the aggregate sum of none of the strength contained in his muscles.

Even stripped down like this, the suit dirty and torn, no shield, no cowl in sight there’s no denying his raw power.

“Hey,” Tony starts, “what I said was uncalled for.”

Steve only stills his barrage when Tony began to speak, even though he must have heard him come in, but he doesn’t turn around.

“I… I’m not unaware of my flaws, Tony,” Steve says quietly, still not facing him, “nor do I believe that you’re needlessly reckless with your life.”

Tony takes a minute to process that. The air is still between them, rebuilding after the storm. They’ve gotten delightfully efficient at rebuilding, and with better adapted infrastructure, it doesn’t take long, but it still destroys something, still hurts a little.

“I’m glad that you were found,” Tony replies, this is the closest they’ve come to saying the forbidden ‘sorry’ aloud, and even though Steve’s the one to be facing away now, Tony knows that, had Steve been looking at him, whichever expression, he would be the one to turn away.

Small steps.

Steve nods, a sharp, short downward jerk of his head, and Tony takes that as his signal to leave, feeling lighter all for it. Maybe his earlier assessment of Steve has been right. 

-

“I want you to know,” Tony starts, just as they’re about to initiate what’s definitely going to be the most violent game of 6 people water polo that’s ever conspired, “that this is one, an awful idea, and two, going to flood this entire floor.”

“You can sit out, if you really want to,” Steve suggests, partly out of care, partly because it would disadvantage their team.

Tony laugh aloud at that, “Absolutely not, you know I’d never pass up an opportunity to beat your ass, Rogers.”

“I thought you weren’t immune to it,” Steve says, grinning back.

Thor looks supremely confused, “Your humans’ trash talk is not dissimilar to Asgardians’ courting.”

“It’s not human’s trash talk,” Natasha says, tossing the ball between her hands, “it’s just Steve and Tony trash talk.”

Both of them, in displays of the utmost maturity, splash her with water.

JARVIS takes that as a cue to start the game timer, and it’s just as aggressive and chaotic as Tony thought - what else would you get from pitting four of the most capable humans in Northern America against a god and a guy who pretty much qualifies?

It’s water and it’s violent, two things which, historically, hadn’t been the greatest of situations for Tony, but there’s no point during this where he feels unsafe, or out of control (quite possibly losing, definitely).

He’s not nearly as ashamed as he should be to admit that he spent most of the time wrestling Steve.

He was fine during the beginning - when Steve’s waist was below the surface, and he was too busy staring at his face and chest, but after he’d jumped high enough that his feet were out the water, and he’d exposed those illegally tight speedos…

It made no sense whatsoever, all of them, bar Nat, were wearing regular, normal, socially acceptable, swimwear that didn’t expose just how big their dicks were, and he knows with relative certainty that they didn’t have speedos in the 40s, so where he got them fr-- Natasha.

-

“We only lost,” Tony says, panting, “because your speedos were a distraction.” Everyone else had gone to the showers, reluctantly congratulating Steve and Thor, and deciding on a rematch, leaving Steve and Tony in the pool, treading water in the shallower end.

“Would you rather I take them off?”

Tony looks at him, expecting at least that adorable light flush on his cheeks, but all he gets is a grin see-sawing the line between cheeky and joking and a proposition.

“I’d hate to miss out on you finally finding your true style,” Tony replies, matching him in tone.

Steve’s laugh echoes off the tiles, and Tony just has to kiss him, he just has to crash into him with absolutely no abandon, feeling reminiscent of his teen years, kissing in a pool, tugging off Steve’s ridiculous shorts.

Through half-lidded eyes, Steve tracks him up and down once he’d ripped off Tony’s swim shorts, breathing hard, “You should never wear clothes again,” he declares, sinking to his knees. Any and all thoughts of Steve and his questionable-at-times fashion choices leave Tony’s mind along with most forms of higher function.

-

masterpost 

[petty-revenge-stories]

Falsely report me for sexual harrassment enjoy coworkers turning on you

WARNING: post does contain some language but its important to the story.

As I stated in my previous post I worked for a Korean car manufacturer for 3 years as a Quality Control Manager. I have hearing difficulties and am classified as hard of hearing/deaf and require hearing aids which I don't wear to work. All of this is important to the story.

I was not the person that did the revenge, but they were my coworkers.

quick cast list CW1-4: coworker 1,2,3,4, SB: stuck-up bitch, MM: my manager, HR: human resources person, OW: Office worker, Me: that one guy

TL:DR at the bottom as this will be a little lengthy

We had recently installed new machines that produced an important part that was in high demand due to recent changes in the manufacturing process. We had to hire more people due to the fact that these machines are not calibrated perfectly and my department had to check every part before it was shipped, which is about 2000 per shift and about 4000 every day. When they are completed they are too hot to handle even with heat resistant gloves. We had to wait 6+ hours for them to cool down. This makes the volume needing to be checked and shipped very high. One of the people who was hired was SB. Now on to the story.

So me, CW1, and CW2 are checking parts in one group along with SB, CW3, and CW4 in another group with about 30-40ft between groups.

My group had been playing xbox recently after work to relax .

CW1: dude we got f*cked last night in that match

Me: yeah I know that was bullsh*t that guy f*cking us up

CW2: yeah I couldn't do sh*t against him

We talked like this for a good 20-30min before MM came around and told us to load what we had on the truck and get started on a new batch.

About 10 min before I had noticed that SB had disappeared and assumed she went to the restroom. I was very wrong.

Out of the corner of my eye I see SB, MM, HR, and OW walking towards us and SB has a smug look on her face.

MM: Can you step over here please?

Me: sure whats up?

HR: It has come to our attention that you have been harassing SB, using vulgar terms as well as sexual comments.

Me: I am quite certain that I did not and the only thing I have said to SB is instructions on what she needs to be doing today. You can ask CW1, CW2, CW3, and CW4 if you dont believe me.

MM: I will do that and get them to sign the same paperwork that you need to sign with your side of the event.

MM, HR, and OW end up questioning my coworkers and they all sign the paper saying that I didnt say anything to SB. There was alot of swearing from our group though which we admitted to. SB more than likely heard us talking since without my hearing aids in I speak loudly and those that know me wont correct me since I go back to being loud quite quickly.

HR: Due to that fact that you admitted to the language we will be giving you a warning but dont let it happen again or we will have to let you go.

Now I understand that the rules at my work stated that swearing would get you in trouble, but everyone else has the decency to ask you not to swear in front of them if it makes them uncomfortable.

This is where the coworkers I was with that day showed me support. They made sure that this incident which was supposed to be confidential was told to everyone that worked there. As I was basically friends or on good terms with most of the employees I had, people were asking if I was getting fired and basically telling me there were going to get back at SB which I discouraged but did so halfheartedly.

After the incident everyone was watching and listening for SB to slip up and anytime they heard SB swear or say anything every seemingly inappropriate they reported it and was written up. As one of the managers I had to check and file the write ups and make sure that SB signed the write ups. After 2 months SB had 20 incidents. I made sure I wasnt the one telling MM and HR but got another floor manger to mention SBs file had a lot of write ups.

HR found out and went ballistic because first SB reported me so they were watching me like a hawk. Then they find out SB was getting reported for similar issues with many more witnesses. Needless to say they let SB go and informed the other manufacturers in the area of the incident so they wouldn't hire her either.

TL;DR SB reports me on false sexual harassment employees give her a taste of her own medicine

(source) story by (/u/deafscholar)

[official-michael-afton]

okay so get this i took an intro to psychology course 4 years ago so I clearly dont know what I’m doing bUT THAT HASN’T STOPPED ME BEFORE SO LET’S GET INTO SOME BACKSTORY AND THE COMPLEXITY OF RED’S AND MIKE’S RELATIONSHIP

UNDER THE CUT BECAUSE I RAMBLED WAAAAY MORE THAN I THOUGHT I WOULD

I never bothered much on how close Mike and Red are- they’re siblings after all! And of COURSE Red is overprotective of Mike- look at how much trouble Mike gets into! And Mike is super affectionate towards Red because- he’s Michael! He’s affectionate to all of his loved ones! BUT WHAT IF WE TOOK IT A STEP FURTHER AND GAVE THEIR RELATIONSHIP MUCH MORE CONTEXT

ENTER: CHILDHOOD

Red is a very interesting perspective to look at- being trans and autistic, sadly, made it hard to connect with others in a social setting. It was hard for him to make friends as not only was he trying to convince his peers that he was a boy, he also had a lot of trouble with social cues. This caused him to focus a lot more on schoolwork since he didn’t spend much time with peers. He especially excelled in math and science, after all numbers are concrete and don’t change, numbers make sense, it’s people that are complicated(*sweats in self projection*) So because of this, he tends to be a straight A student. A “pleasure to have in class”, if you will. He’s not spending every second of every day studying, but he finds that good grades come pretty naturally to him.

Michael, on the other hand, is a bit on the opposite. Due to having ADHD, he still had trouble socializing, but found it a bit easier to make friends than Red. In school, Mike was more of a B-C student, very average. He’s intelligent, but due to ADHD often had trouble remembering to do homework or focusing in class. His grades didn’t bother him much, though.

Once their mother died, things got complicated.

Michael, understandably, had a lot of trouble coping. Who wouldn’t? When his father became a lot more aloof, he didn’t have anyone to turn to. He tries to keep up friendships, but in being desperate to have any connection with anyone, he gets some… not-so-good friends(the fnaf 4 bullies)

Red is having just as much trouble coping. Unlike Michael, who looks for external sources of comfort in his grieving, Red internalizes all of his feelings. He bottles them up, fakes the smile, and thinks that that… is okay. Even though it’s not(keep in mind they’re like 13-14, far too young to understand emotional maturity in coping). With William far more distant, Red takes it on himself to force himself to grow up, to take care of not only Michael but also Elizabeth and Anthony.

Michael’s grades begin to slip as his depression worsens. He gets increasingly frustrated because his father doesn’t comfort him anymore, he’s not proud of him anymore because he’s failing all of his classes… while giving a “good job” to Red for another round of straight A’s. His shitty friends make fun of him for crying or accusing him of being gay(which, he is, but in his friends’ eyes that’s “bad”). He then starts to internalize this toxic masculinity: trying to work out more, trying to look and act more tough, bullying Anthony for crying, etc.

And Michael… really starts to hate Red. Red seems to have it all together: the good grades, being comfortable in being LGBT and not worrying about fitting in, taking care of the family- Red becomes more and more of the “good” twin while Michael becomes the “problematic” twin. He hates Red out of jealousy and his inferiority complex, not because he has anything against Red himself. 

Red, who has been internalizing his feelings for so long, begins to develop severe, crippling anxiety, though he’s very good at hiding it. This causes him to develop insomnia, which really starts to make him a lot more… agitated. Especially with Michael getting worse and worse and William doing jack shit to stop this(other than occasionally yelling at Michael… which makes things even worse as Michael will deliberately get in trouble since getting negative attention is better than no attention in Michael’s eyes). So Red, forcing himself to be the “responsible” one, and not understanding social cues enough to understand why Michael is developing such shitty traits, begins to chastise the hell out of him. He’s the one calling Mike out on everything and scolding him whenever he’s bullying Anthony.

This makes Mike really start to abhor Red since- now he’s starting to think that Red thinks he’s better than Mike. This isn’t true of course, but Mike’s inferiority complex is starting to tell him this. This makes Mike develop even more of a rebel complex, and really drives that wedge between then. 

Michael and Red hate each other.

…

Then 1983 happens. And everything changes. Michael, of course, fucking breaks. He just killed his little brother over a stupid prank. His friends leave him, his father is- Michael is currently dead to William, and overall Michael is alone. Red can’t even bring himself to chastise Michael because everything William says to him- everything Michael says to himself- is so, so much worse than anything Red could ever say.

It’s then Mike finally opens up to Red about everything(while having an emotional breakdown, of course). Michael comes to the realization that he can’t push his twin away from him, and taking out all of his insecurities on Red was- really not okay! He needed to start to communicate his thoughts and feelings! Red also realizes that he hasn’t been empathizing with Mike whatsoever. In trying to take a constant moral high ground, he realizes that he was acting more like a strict parent than a twin brother/best friend to the one guy who just needed a good friend more than anything!

At this point, Michael really starts to get more attached to Red(who doesn’t bully him for crying/being feminine/being gay! yay for basic human decency!), and Red starts to become really protective of Michael(he’s still overbearing at times, but he does try his best to just be a good brother/friend rather than a good guardian). Of course, the recovery process is excruciatingly slow, especially when Elizabeth dies and all they have is each other, but it is a step in the right direction.

AND NOW LOOK AT EM THEYRE ALL HEALTHY AND BROTHERLY AND CUTE AND SHIT