#the irony of her having nO IDEA

[cracklewink]

Harmony Syndrome Part 5/5

The last chapter of my mlp infection AU! Thank you to everyone who followed along. Some final thoughts on my twitter @cracklewink if anyone's interested : )

[izzystizzys]

“ - but have you ever considered, I don’t know, not sucking all the time? Just a thought.”

It takes the combined grips of Nuisance and Hound to keep the wriggling, snarling body beneath Fox from throwing him off its back. With three years’ practice of having to fix his own rickety desk chair over and over again, the movement merely ruffles the proverbial fringe on his helmet.

“And I don’t mean that as an insult, necessarily. Well, I do a little bit. But also I have some amount of empathy for the no doubt immense amounts of trauma that had to go into the creation of something so dysfunctional as you, on a very personal level, so have you considered going to the root of that in a way that’s like… useful? Instead of wasting it all on kriffing Kenobi, I mean. Look at the guy. All he does all day is drink tea and commit warcrimes. I bet he knits for fun. Bit of an embarrassing nemesis, don’t you think?”

“I”, says Kenobi, then pauses. The space between his eyebrows is creased with uncertainty, and he looks deeply torn between continuing rocking the shaking Duchess of Mandalore against his chest from his corner of the throne room and re-activating his lightsaber to continue losing his fight against the Darksider Fox is currently sitting on. “I feel like I should object to some part of that, but I’m not entirely clear on what. Or how this happened, again. Isn’t Mandalore a few star systems from your purview, Commander?”

“Probably the warcrimes”, mutters Nuisance underneath his strained breath.

“About as far from my supposed assignment as yours, General”, says Fox a little louder.

Kenobi twitches. Fox cannot claim to know which of them does it. Both, maybe. Probably.

“I will - taste - your - flesh!”, heaves out Darth Maul, snarling and hissing.

“Oooh, kinky!”, calls Grids, from the corner where she’s got her stun-setting aimed at the other Zabrak, currently passed out cold. Fox sighs deeply. He knew he shouldn’t have taken those three - any combination of Grids, Hound and Nuisance in a room together usually spelled chaos.

Unfortunately, it also spelled competence. The Basic alphabet can be funny that way.

The point being: as of some months into the war, one of Fox’s assigned tasks is the surveillance of all GAR-wide communication. All command-class staff theoretically got that memo, but no one seems to have read the fine print where that includes both professional and personal communication, as well as any and all comm devices registered or suspected to be registered to that person. Especially not one Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala.

The point further being, if that sounds both immensely impractical and sort of terrifying in a democratic supposedly non-surveillance state, you’d be bang on the credits, and to Fox’ eternal chagrin the singular person in this whole useless army who’s spent the second of thinking necessary for that conclusion.

The final point being, when one frantic General’s mad dash across the Galaxy to rescue his teenage sweetheart from the spectre of his supposedly dead nemesis crosses his desk on its way to the Chancellor’s inbox, it doesn’t take much time for him to block any and all trace of it across the digital space of the GAR commboard and take matters into his own hands.

“ - which is why I told Thorn to suck it up and be in charge for a few days, and also why you’re still alive, your Highness, very welcome, was no trouble at all”, he concludes, drily. The Duchess stares the wide-eyed look of someone attempting to reconcile clones with ‘sentience’ or perhaps ‘personality’ in her head, but won’t say it outright.

Or the look of someone who’s just been violently overthrown and nearly murdered, perhaps, Fox allows.

“Um -“, Kenobi hedges, blinking rapidly.

“And the reason you’re still alive, probably. You’re welcome for that too, by the way”, Grids calls from the back of the throne room, cheekily.

“Alright”, says Kenobi, loudly. There’s color back in his deathly-pale cheeks, Fox notes, even if that color is a lot of red. It doesn’t fade very gracefully into his beard. “Opinions on whether or not I had everything under control notwithstanding -“

“You really didn’t”, Hound supplies helpfully.

“ - opinions notwithstanding, I am admittedly still lost on why you’re now sitting on Darth Maul and attempting to, to - jeer at him, Marshall Commander!”

“We’re not jeering, we’re trying to create a safe space and lay the groundwork for more open communication”, Fox says, primly.

Maul screams into the ground, attempting for the umpteenth time to rear up and visit great violence upon Fox, which admittedly has him rattling in his crosslegged seat atop his back.

Kenobi raises a perfectly plucked eyebrow. “Safe space?”

“He’s restrained and not stabbing anyone, I personally feel much safer than before”, Grids muses. “Watch the teeth though, Hound. Little biter.”

Indeed. Fox’s right greave will have to be replaced posthaste.

“And anyways, the point isn’t to jeer at him, it’s to make clear that he’s focusing his energy in the wrong places and could be doing much better things with his admittedly not-great life”, Fox adds, shifting to cast a pointed look down at Maul. The Sith is panting open-mouthed into the durasteel floor, sharp teeth gnashing wildly as his piercing yellow eyes shine with barely restrained rage. “I’m just saying - aim higher. You aren’t seeing the forest for the Kenobis, Maul. Can I call you Maul?”

“I will feed you your own entrails”, yowls Maul.

“See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. Right now, I’m an easy target to focus all that built-up rage on, but is killing me really going to help you achieve any of your goals? No! Think about it - when it all comes down to it, who sent you on that mission to Naboo in the first place? Who made sure the Jedi and, by extension, Kenobi would be there to kill you? Who used you as a dejarik piece and then cast you aside the second you outlived your usefulness?”

Beneath him, Maul slowly stills in his struggle, still panting heavily. Hound and Nuisance don’t let it deter them in their vigilance, because they’re damn good vod’e and possess an ounce of common sense.

“And, look, I get it. I could spend the rest of my life punching every civilian who spits on me in the streets and it would even be satisfying. I could hit back the Senators who think of clones as easy targets. Or - I can aim my sights at who’s on top. And I think you know who I mean, because you know as well as I do the same damn man has ruined both our lives.”

Kenobi makes an alarmed noise, and Maul an interested one - not that Fox is going to let him walk out of this place awake. Still, he tilts his head in a way he hopes conveys his helmeted grin successfully to non-vod, as well as the bloodlust behind it. “You’re also welcome for the fact that the Chancellor won’t have heard of your spontaneous resurrection yet, by the way. You’ll retain your element of surprise instead of gambling it away on petty revenge on Kenobi.”

“He cut me in half!”

“He killed my master!”

Fox waves their protests away.

“Also, that’s treason!”, Kenobi adds, sputtering. Fox grins. Kenobi purses his lips, and continues. petulantly, “…do you have any proof?”

“So. Much. Proof”, says Nuisance, dreamily. “Like, do you want it alphabetically or by date?”

Which is when the Duchess, of all people, bursts out into barking, crazed laughter.

“You - you’ve certainly given yourself an edge in that fight, Marshall Commander”, she wheezes, brushing tears from her eyes. Fox raises his eyebrows at her, which she somehow seems to be able to tell, because she gestures at the clunky handle dangling from his belt.

“What, this old thing?” He unclasps the black rectangle from its hook, holding it up in the air. Maul stills strangely beneath him, and Kenobi goes ghostly pale again. Fox is starting to get a bad feeling.

“I took it off Viszla and beat him over the head with it. I figured he’d taken it off a Jedi cadet or something. What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

[falmerbrook]

Early on in the Mages Guild's existence they started a summer reading program aimed at children. It functioned not only to boost awareness of and membership to the guild, but also to encourage critical thinking and research to children, particularly on magical subjects, as well as boost childhood literacy rates.

They kept the program up for many years until it became a victim of bureaucratic nonsense and got cut for "budgetary reasons" during the guild's decline.

[dykedvonte]

RE: Your post on the AU of Jimmy being in the cockpit rather than Curly.

I think that Curly would think that Jimmy was reaping what he had sown, but in a way would feel a twisted sense of relief that Jimmy was brought down by his own actions rather than Curly himself having to be the "executioner" in the situation, so to speak.

With "taking responsibility" and the fix-it mentality that he and Jimmy share being the overarching theme, compounded with Jimmy flat out insinuating that all of his crimes on the Tulpar will be "Curly's tragedy" in that one scene, I think Curly would almost find comfort in the irony that the choice was forcibly taken away from him. Which in itself is messed up, but it might be a bit cathartic. There's an interesting polarizing dynamic within Curly's relationship to his own responsibility in that it's his greatest burden and the thing he, too, avoids the most.

I don't think Curly would find any relief in this actually. While Curly didn't/doesn't like the responsibility he had, he defiantly doesn't avoid it, he just goes about it in a weird way.

A thing I noticed is that its less about taking responsibility with Curly and really what that responsibility meant objectively and then subjectively to Curly. The leniency that he applies to Jimmy also applies a bit to the others as well. He thinks his responsibility is more towards keeping the peace and things in order more than dolling out punishment. He has even more choices to make and responsibilities as he literally has to make sure they survive/ration long enough to be saved. Or figure out how to save them himself. The correct issue with Curly and responsibility is the prioritization in his head. He sees the big picture and prioritizes that. He doesn't notice the little things that he should but it's not a active dismissal, perhaps not even conscious despite how dismissive he seemed. He takes too much responsibility, espcially in regards to Jimmy, and I think this situation is when he realizes that is also a bad thing as he can't "fix" all of his wrongs.

I think he'd regret not making a choice, because in the end this happened because he wouldn't directly choose who to comfort and help. He tried to help both and ended up doing nothing for either and letting Jimmy fuck them all over. In this scenario/au he's thinking about all the times he let Jimmy inadvertently make his choice, and how he chose to let it happen. He regrets all of it and would be so bitter that he was giving his choice up for so long. He chose wrong and it affected everyone. The only thing he'd find cathartic is the fucked up truth it will never happen again, not with Jimmy at least.

But he's not happy he's getting joy from that. I think it's a point not a single character other than Jimmy is depicted at deriving joy from another's pain. Even Swansea is being more sarcastic when he cheers on Curly about crashing the ship and ending his sobriety. He's happy Jimmy was forced to take responsibility, but this? He wanted him to learn a lesson and do something with himself, this is hollow in a way it's just embittering. Jimmy didn't get what he wanted, he can be happy about that but no one else did. This isn't justice or closure for Anya, he's stuck in a place he was so desperate to leave with even more pressure on his shoulders. Daisuke is just a kid and Swansea doesn't deserve this after all his year making himself a better man.

Like in his sections, Curly is preoccupied thinking about all the responsibilities he has, taking on things he shouldn't have to and trying to keep the peace when he doesn't have peace in his own mind.

[schneiderenjoyer]

Aracnist's UDIMO

There's not many conversations about it and what people mostly chalk their UDIMO (animal/item suitcase form) up to is that it represents the arcanist as a person. Like symbolism to their personality.

But I also like how it also reflect how they're raised and what their upbringing is like.

The main ones being people raised under the Foundation, or taken it at a young impressionable age, are all dog UDIMOs. Sonetto, Horrorpedia, Medicine Pocket. Arcanists that are likely taken in by the Foundation before their arcanum has fully manifested. They're all dog UDIMOs so far. (It could as be a jab at Pavlov reference to having experimented on mainly dogs, which is fucked up) And even arcanists like X is a lil lab rat UDIMO.

I find it fascinating that UDIMO has so much more symbolism to them than just their nature as a person, but also reflects their upbringing and overall viewed by a greater narrative.

[scary-yuri]

There's a good chance that Klaasje would ruin my life and leave me devastated, but I don't even care. There can never be too much toxic yuri in this world.

[seagullcharmer]

[maegalkarven]

In light of Alicole reveal, let me just say that I will absolutely LOSE my mind (in the best possible way) if the reason Daeron was sent to Oldtown is because he has brown hair.

[deathbydarkelves]

I may have mentioned kaldorei berserking in my AU in passing before, but here's a more in-depth post about it.

Very few kaldorei (like <5% of the population), depending on genetic chance and circumstance, can enter a berserking state like their troll cousins. It manifests differently in everyone. Some are lucid in this state, some aren't; some can enter it by choice, some can't. For some it lasts only minutes or until the perceived threat has disappeared. And an unlucky few will enter it only once in their lives, leaving it when the overwhelming stress on their body takes them to the grave.

In 'proper' kaldorei society, it's taboo in all its forms. Without a troll's regeneration, it's only a liability. You are to keep your head in combat, or you will get yourself or your allies killed.

Due to its similarity to the madness experienced by the first worgen, many believe it to be a sign of Goldrinn's displeasure. Him cursing the children of those who have offended him. Expecting parents may shower his shrines with gifts as a preventative measure, especially if one of their relatives has showed signs in the past. This belief is the origin of the condition's Darnassian name: Thor'drinn, or "wolf's fury." Those with thor'drinn are called "wolf-touched", though that's also used as a derogatory by more unpleasant types for anyone prone to violent outbursts, impulsivity, or just anyone they want to insult. "Are you wolf-touched, boy?", that sort of thing.

Usually this condition is noticed in childhood -- though plenty go years without knowing, only learning this about themselves the first time their lives are truly at risk -- and every self-respecting parent is expected to take extensive measures to keep their child from ever entering that state again. This, of course, means no one with thor'drinn who was raised this way knows how to manage it when it does happen again.

Tarinne is one of those people. She's only done it a few times in her life, and never intentionally. The most recent time was when she escaped the Alliance encampment in which she'd been imprisoned for ~2 weeks during the Third War.

[ajaxbread]

[wonder-worker]

"The feast of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist being appointed as the day upon which the coronation of the king [Edward V] would take place without fail, all both hoped for and expected a season of prosperity for the kingdom."

-Excerpt from the Croyland Continuator / David Horspool, Richard III: A Ruler and Reputation

Even though Edward IV’s death was unexpected, after twelve years of peace there need not have been too much of a sense of foreboding about the succession. The great dynastic wound from which the Wars of the Roses had grown had not so much been healed as cauterized by the extinction of the House of Lancaster. There was no rush for London, as had happened in earlier, disputed successions. The royal party didn’t set out from Ludlow for ten days after hearing the news of Edward IV’s death, while Richard took his time, too. And the new king had [his mother the dowager queen and] two uncles to support him: his mother’s brother, the sophisticated, cultured, highly experienced Earl Rivers; and his father’s, the loyal and reliable Duke of Gloucester, to whom Edward IV had entrusted unprecedented power and vital military command.

... [Richard of Gloucester] had achieved his goal by a mixture of luck and ruthlessness, and if he made it appear, or even believed himself, that destiny played a part, this only made him a man in step with his times. Modern historians have no time for destiny, but sometimes the more ‘structuralist’ interpretations of the events surrounding the usurpation can come close to it. When we read that ‘the chances of preserving an unchallenged succession were . . . weakened by the estrangement of many of the rank-and-file nobility from . . . high politics, which was partly a consequence of the Wars of the Roses and partly of Edward IV’s own policies’, it is hard not to conclude that an unforeseeable turn of events is being recast as a predictable one. But without one overriding factor – the actions of Richard, Duke of Gloucester after he took the decision to make himself King Richard III – none of this could have happened. That is, when the same author concedes ‘Nor can we discount Richard’s own forceful character’, he is pitching it rather low*.

Edward IV had not left behind a factional fault line waiting to be shaken apart. Richard of Gloucester’s decision to usurp was a political earthquake that could not have been forecast on 9 April, when Edward died. After all, Simon Stallworth did not even anticipate it on 21 June, the day before Richard went public. We should be wary of allowing hindsight to give us more clairvoyance than the well-informed contemporary who had no idea ‘what schall happyne’. This is not to argue that Richard’s will alone allowed him to take the Crown. Clearly, the circumstances of a minority, the existence of powerful magnates with access to private forces, and the reasonably recent examples of resorts to violence and deposition of kings, made Richard’s path a more conceivable one. But Richard’s own tactics, his arrest of Rivers, Vaughan and Grey, the rounding up of Hastings and the bishops, relied on surprise. If men as close as these to the workings of high politics at a delicate juncture had no inkling of what might happen, the least historians can do is to reflect that uncertainty [...].

(*The author who Horspool is referencing and disagreeing with is Charles Ross)

[arty-ffxiv]

Count(Down) to Dawntrail: Day V - Endwalker

“She’s late,” Hades gumbled to himself.

“Be patient- you know she’s not the type to forget.” Hades let out a long, heavy sigh. Hythlodaeus was nothing if not an optimist. Irritatingly so.

A warm breeze picked up, sending the sweet scent of flowers dancing across Elpis. Another beautiful, peaceful day.

And yet.

She was late.

“I can’t wait all day,” Hades began again, “Unlike some, I have important work to do.”

If Hythlodaeus heard his comment, he didn’t give any indication. He continued to lounge on the strewn carpets of the Mourning Dew, watching as a minuscule petalouma fluttered upon his outstretched finger. Hades didn’t know where he’d found it, nor who had decided to make the beast so absurdly small.

Hades scowled and scoffed again, louder this time.

“If she’s not here in the next-”

“-Hades, I’m hurt! You didn’t think I’d leave you waiting too long, now?” The feminine voice chastised playfully and Hades’ gaze snapped up to meet hers.

“About time, Azem.”

“Bah, formalities!” She grimaced, making Hythlodaeus laugh.

“It’s good to see you again,” Hythlodaeus sat up and petted the ground at his side. She grinned, taking Hades’ arm in hers despite his protests and dragging him over to sit with them.

“It's good to be back! Thank you both for meeting me- it’s been too long since we had the chance to share the same space.”

Hades rolled his eyes, but then she grinned at him with such disarming, radiant joy that he couldn’t help but let his earlier irritation abate. His greeting came at a whisper.

“...Welcome home, Hestia.”

[torgawl]

can we talk about sukuna and rika and why the king and queen of curses having a dispute is also narratively fitting? if sukuna is an heian era sorcerer with an antipathy and disregard of human emotions and the weak's will to live, blind to love and unable to comprehend the value of relationships with others then rika, as his counterpart, works especially well. rika is just a kid, or was just a kid. an innocent young girl who ended up dying tragically and saw herself transform into a vengeful spirit after being cursed by love. not only does she represent the weak (remember when sukuna's slaughter of women and children was implied?), she represents love itself. with her feelings lingering after death, she clinged onto her existence with the sole wish of protecting yuuta. it counteracts so well with sukuna's selfish will to kill time before his final breathe, which he admitted to be his will and motivation.

before i move on to my next idea, which let me preface by saying that it might be a little out there and dives into theory territory, i'm going to contextualise it with some information on the symbolism of "king and queen" that might help understand why this thought may make - at least some - sense.

in alchemy the king usually appears in conjunction with the queen, representing the sun-and-moon duality. in accordance with the theory of sulfur and mercury, which together, after alchemist purification, form the philosopher’s stone (also called the elixir of life, associated with rejuvenation and immortality), usually represented by the crowned hermetic androgyne (the union of the complementary male and female, achieving perfection or completion in the human state). according to jung, the king and queen also signify the spiritual conjunction that takes place when the process of individuation is complete, with the harmonious union of the unconscious and consciousness. jungian psychology has subjected the alchemistic tradition to extensive analysis and views the king less as an image of paternal authority and more as an archetype of higher insight and wisdom.

with that in mind, i think it's easy to understand where i'm headed but i want to add something else. remember jjk 0? geto's plan at the time was to obtain rika so he could use her power and move forward with his plan to annihilate all no-sorcerers. he believed her to be the key to achieve his goal and was willing to risk his own life for it. furthermore, the story is highly based on buddhist concepts and one of the core aspects of jujutsu kaisen is the cycles of suffering the characters are subjected to. in buddhism the goal is to become free of the samsara (continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth), eliminate suffering and achieve nirvana (enlightment). this ties withe the name of the series as kaisen is comprised of the kanji 'kai', meaning cycle, and 'sen', meaning battle, which combined with jujutsu (which means magic/sorcery but contains the word curse) describe the story as an endless battle of curses. and in a sense, the story also repeats itself, between generations and storyline-wise with the events circling back to how it all began. yuuta managed to land a fatal strike on geto once again, but now rika is pointed to be in a direct confrontation with sukuna as the queen of curses. now that i went through all the context needed to understand this, is it possible rika is once again in danger of being taken away? the idea of achieving a state of perfection with the unity between king and queen is quite intriguing. sukuna finally addressing yuuji as a worthy rival because of his unshakable resolve and unbreakable soul, is almost directly implying yuuji to be the one with whom sukuna has his last battle. an ultimate power-up (or the equivalent to), would be veyy cathartic before a final fight where yuuji would have the opportunity to finally go all out and have his well awaited and deserved protagonism (in my eyes, at least).

[basilpaste]

Hgi if ur just wanting like reqs for connie ficlets. Id love to see him like interacting w more of the party. I wanna know more abt his dynamics w them

You've found that you have a much easier time writing expressions than you do reading them. This is, of course, because memory likes to dramatize them. A smile is much more solid in your mind's eye than it might be on a face.

That's... usually the case, at least. Perhaps it's a Vaugardian thing. Maybe just happenstance! But. Well. You're Vaugardian companions certainly all wear their hearts on their sleeves.

Mirabelle is fretting over something. This much is obvious. She's rocking back and forth on her heels, biting her thumb nail, clearly lost in thought. Her expression is furrowed and her large eyes clouded with worry.

Really, it's very easy to tell with her.

"Mirabelle, dear!" You stalk over to her, placing a hand softly on her shoulder.

She jolts out of her trance, hand flying to her rapier, "WAA!? Conifleur??? Sir?"

You smile, "The one and only!"

"You scared me!"

"I noticed." You hum, slipping your hand off of her and moving to face her properly, "You certainly seemed lost in thought."

"Oh, um... It was nothing, really!!"

"Ahh... I don't quite buy that, Love." You tell her simply, "I could hear the gears in your head turning all the way from camp. What's on your mind, Miss. Mirabelle?"

She holds her hands to her chest, almost as if in prayer. You do it differently in Poteria but you've lived here long enough to recognize the gesture, now. Mirabelle won't quite look at you. That's more than alright! You have time before you have to return to camp.

"We're getting close to the fourth orb. And the curse is spreading faster than ever. If we're not careful... one of us could...." She trails off.

"We won't." You tell her, with much more confidence than you really have, "All of us are determined to see this through, Dear."

"But!-"

"Ah!" You put a finger to her lip. "No buts! What kind of story would it be if the heroes lost?"

"This isn't a story!" She argues.

"I know," you concede, "but it is our story, is it not? May as well stay optimistic."

[aroace-cat-lady]

Today's been a Fucking Day™

[marvelstars]

Anakin Skywalker and the ¿Rebellion?

One of my favorite parts of the Clone Wars series is how given the increasing number of problems all over the galaxy as a result of the Clone Wars, there just wasn´t enough Jedi or Clone soldiers to cover them so Anakin´s idea to approach this problem was teaching civilians how to defend themselves and other kind of guerrilla tactics, one of the people who was trained was Saw Guerrera and his group, later he would become one of the biggest leaders in the rebel alliance, who had a big role protecting Galen and Jyn erso which would give the rebellion the plans for the first Death Star.

It´s even better the fact Obi-Wan and the Council called this tactic "terrorism" while Anakin called them "rebels" :)

This gives a new meaning to the fact Vader called the rebellion traitors to the Empire but never terrorists, even if looking at them that way would have gotten the Empire some points in the eyes of the public.

Vader tempted Luke by calling for an end to this "destructive conflict" and put "order in the galaxy" even in the darkside, Vader didn´t deny the rebels had reason to their actions and the Empire was part of the problem even if he didn´t agree with the rebellion.