#they clearly don't WANT to be because their actual decisions indicate otherwise

[red-dragon-archfiend]

Honestly I kinda wonder if the reason hate groups are allowed to post freely and break the TOS on the reg is because Tumblr staff (specifically the CEO) hopes they'll chase the rest of us off so they can stop pandering to queer people

[imaluvsj7]

緑 ──── KISS AND MAKE UP ; nishimura riki

SYNOPSIS: riki and reader make up after the argument over text but not only for the argument but also riki learns a little more about relationship PAIRING : idol riki x reader GENRE : fluffy, angst ; WC : 1,379

WARNINGS : to understand the plot better you need to read my riki boyfriend text smau which I have linked here and also all the way down. Not proofread thoroughly, english is not my first language. That's it I don't think there is anything sensitive they have some good talk about relationship.

AUTHORS NOTE : clearly my feminist didn't come over, but honestly to all the girls out there please choose a kind ask generous guy and don't be mother to any guy who takes everything from them I tried to put my message through this fic sorry not sorry if it offends anyone. I hope to make the mother wizard liz girls get it!!! DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise indicated, all the names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents in this book are either the product of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

written in second person pov:

It's been two weeks since you have talked with Riki, one of the reasons was obviously you were upset with him but mainly because you don't know what to even talk about.

He has been sending flowers, food, and little gifts to apologize with a note saying he is sorry. Not only that but he is constantly sending you messages and voicemails. First it was explaining himself and apologizing but now it's all about him apologizing and asking to talk to you in person.

Today you finally thought of responding to him and meeting him because soon he has to prepare for their comeback, which also means there will be a tour announcement. You don't want him to go on without solving everything.

Walking towards the park you guys always meet since him being an idol wasn't an easy task to roam with his girlfriend everywhere. Thoughts have filled your brain that desires to turn around and run away but you kept your decision firm.

Walking towards the bench you guys usually sit you find him eagerly waiting because of his bouncing leg. “Hi” he turns his head and looks at you, soon standing up and nervously trying to stabilize himself.

“H-hi ___ you came hah I was waiting for you to arrive you know to talk and make up I know you wanted to talk and we talk but I wanted to talk so much” he shuts up as realized he was rumbling. “Sorry I am just nervous”.

“It's okay riki let's sit and talk please.” Soon you both sat while there was silence for a few seconds but he was the first one to break it. “___ I know it was my mistake,I said in the heat of the moment. I know it's just an excuse but please I'm genuinely sorry I didn't mean to say that.”

“Riki it's not only about part of me going to your company but also how you didn't understand why I took stand for jake, I explained to you but you didn't even once responded to that text or even mentioned it once, talking about me understanding your idol industry yeah sure I don't experience them I don't understand the same emotions but I have seen you guys working.

I always sat with you whenever you went through rough patches in your idol life. I tried my best to understand never backed away and how can I let someone disrespect Jake when all he was was being too comfortable with him.

Jake was clearly uncomfortable with her actions and he set the boundaries by dismissing her but then she went all defensive talking about how bad Jake was during practice hours so she is trying to help him. She isn't even your guy's choreographer and not only that also went too far saying Jake is acting too tough when all he did was speak for himself.

How can I let someone talk to him like that? I walked inside when she was talking in a disrespectful tone with him and all I did was hold her accountable for her actions and words. As soon as the manager called you and said I was being disrespectful you started giving me silent treatment even after Jake explained to you the whole situation you didn't approach me.

And even after understanding the whole situation you went ahead and said those words.” — you take a breath after letting out all the thoughts and emotions you had suppressed in the two weeks. “I know it was my fault soon after the text Jungwon hyung called everyone to talk about the matter and after discussing with them I realized my mistake and the things I said.

Before the discussion the manager told me Jake hyung did stand for himself and because you're not a part of the company you don't need to come over because of your disrespectful behavior. I knew and even defended you that you definitely did that because of some reason but as soon as the manager said I need to distance myself from you I went blank and felt angry and I just took that out of you even after Jake told me everything.

I was just angry about the situation and in the heat of the moment I thought if Jake did speak up for himself you didn't had to meddle in between which was my fault, I understand what you're coming from baby I was just furious from mangers words and I just took that on your I’m really sorry. I know that's my mistake and I swear I'm ready to do everything to make it right. I just don't want to lose you. I know it's pathetic and corny to say the sentence after doing wrong and all guys say the same thing but I mean it please I will do whatever you want me to.”

“Reflect on yourself then, reflect on your words and actions, it's not only about now it's about everytime we go through anything. I don't want a guy who acts tough and is emotionally unavailable when it's required. I want you to act mature when we have arguments and by that I don't mean you need to always be right or wrong I mean be a generous guy who understands the situation, who knows how to talk and knows how to communicate when it's required.

And it won't be achieved in the next day or the next moment. You need to work on yourself everyday, especially during every argument, it's not only about now but always. Do you understand what I'm saying?” — he quickly nods while looking at your hand and you nod, giving him permission to hold your hand.

“I know I'm definitely not the best guy and I love how mature you're ___ despite being the same age as me but I will try my best to understand your words and work on them, I know I am bad at some point of the relationship and that will never be an excuse to treat you bad but rather I will work of them I will understand situations before acting up. Just please hold my hand to guide me when we are in such situations.”

“I will riki but just know I'm not your mother who is raising a child, I will guide you depending upon the situation but you need to enhance your knowledge about relationship and how to make it work you're old enough to understand some aspects when things go wrong. I will guide you but I'm not your mother to stay emotionally strong through everything you do. I want a partner riki, not a baby.”

“Then lean on me as a partner and walk out when you need to play the role of mother. I don't want to act like a manchild or mommy's boy but as your beloved. Lean on me when we both know the direction and walk out when I push you forward to lead us on the path, lovely.”

Looking at you with teary eyes he asks “I know forgiveness isn't about the text but my behavior so it will take time and I want you to take time, but let's not break apart.” — he pleads with eyes filled with tears. “Who said we are breaking apart you dumb dumb of course not we will make it work” — you said while wiping his tears and hugging him while he breaks down in little sniffles.

“I was scared I thought you're going to break up after you stopped responding to me.” “Well that was because I wasn't mentally prepared to talk, you know.” “It's okay you're my precious so I am a little emotional.” “You sure it's little.” “Stop being mean, I will cry more.” — you laugh lightly at his whiny state while he still has his head in the crook of your neck. Soon after hugging for about ten minutes he pulls his head up and asks.

“So I can please kiss you.” “Well I don't think so.” “Sweetheart please please please.” “Sure you big baby.” — He quickly leans in while meeting your lips and locking them softly while he holds your hands tightly, silently promising himself to do better.

꩜ .ᐟ NOTE : haven't made my taglist yet so please ask in the reply to be added in my permanent taglist for more bangers,,, also I hope this doesn't turns out boring but people genuinely understand my point and for more context read part 1 here!!

꩜ .ᐟ TAGS: @taeminsboogers @mimisxs @nishimurarikisthings @avacelestepereira @whatdoyouwanttocallmefor

˙ . ꒷ 🍰 masterlist taglist. 𖦹˙—

࣪

[starlight-bread-blog]

"Katara Just Needed To Heal Zuko's Scar"

I understand why this argument is being made. After all, she offered to heal Zuko, and so she does. So why are the shippers trying to paint it as some romantic moment? It's a reasonable question. But I'm gonna try to answer it.

Zuko and Katara weren't in love in this scene for two reasons: Firstly, it's their first conversation, making any romantic development feel rushed and unnatural. Secondly, as fictional characters, they don't possess hidden feelings, unless the writers have confirmed otherwise.

So what argument is being made? The argument is that this moment is an example of ship baiting and could have served as romantic build up if the writers decided to go down that route, and I'll explain why.

1# Just because an action was necessary, doesn't mean it can't be seen as romantic

I know how this sounds, but hear me out. Let us take a look at another show, where you'd least expect to see a romantic connection, and the action was completely necessary. I want to discuss Rick and Morty's Beth x Beth.

Beth is the last person who'd have tension with Beth, clearly it's disgusting. And she really did have to install that chip. But the thought did cross your mind, they did get together, and this scene was romantic build up, despite not being romantic in-universe.

Now that we've looked at the most extreme example ever, it's time to look at a classic: Aladdin. One of the most iconic moments in the movie is when Aladdin simply offers his hand to Jasmine so she'd get on the flying carpet, asking "Do you trust me"?

Aladdin isn't asking if Jasmine trusts him because they're deeply bonded, he asks that because she's scared to get on the flying carpet. And he isn't reaching for her hand because he wants to hold her hand, he reaches because she'd needhelp getting on it. And yet, it's universally recognized as an incredibly romantic moment.

Very often writers use the mundane necessities like casual touch to set up romantic tension. This narrative approach allows for the gradual planting of the idea in the audience's mind, even in situations where intimacy may not be overtly present, adding nuance and depth to romantic storylines. And in fiction, it's everywhere.

2# The set up wasn't just necessity, it was an intimate moment

In this section I won't try to prove the gesture was romantic, I simply think it's crucial to understand the scene before analyzing it. Katara offering to heal Zuko's scar wasn't a necessity, the touch was the necessity after she already made the offer. This leaves us with a scene that begins with Katara thinking of Zuko as "the face of the enemy", and ends with Katara attempting to heal Zuko's scar.

The moment became intimate the second Katara brought up her mother, and Zuko, who doesn't normally share his emotions, make and effort to connect. Thus, they began to view the other differently, as someone similar to them.

Still, this is their first conversation. And Katara is under no obligation to be even somewhat nice to him. But she decides to use her spirit water on him, and if she had, Aang would have died. That's how important the spirit water is. Saying she "just needed to heal is scar" is quite reductant in my opinion. Choosing to heal him in and of itself is a radical and intimate decision.

Still, non of what I said so far is indicative of romantic build up. Nor is giving other examples from fiction of necessities being romantic indicative of this one being too. So, it's time to finally talk about the touch.

3# The action wasn't actually necessary, to the point where it makes very little sense

Let's remember how Katara did heal using the spirit water:

She bends the water straight on Aang's back and starts bending it. I repeat: She bends the water straight on the injury.

So writers, please do tell me, if Katara wanted to heal Zuko's scar, where is the water?

No water and no healing, becsuse it wouldn't look as intimate/shippy with water. Instead, what we got is two shots highlighting the pysical touch between them with soft violin sounds in the background.

In literature, what isn't in text isn't important and should be disregarded. Here, on paper Katara is healing Zuko's scar, but in practice there is no water and all of the focus is on the touching. Therefore, it's signaling the viewers that even though she just needs to cure him, it isn't important. With Katara's thumb on Zuko's lips, with a close up shot on the contact, the only thing that matters is, apparently, their pysical touch.

Additonally, they were interrupted before Katara could do actually anything anyway. In a universe where this scene wasn't ship teasing, Katara would take out the water, almost lay them on Zuko's scar, and then Aang and Iroh would break them out of the cave. Logically, Katara's hand shouldn't have gone anywhere near Zuko, and if it did, it should have looked incredibly unappealing.

But it didn't. In this already very intimate moment, the show puts all the focus on the pysicality of the healing, rather than the healing, and breaking its own logic to do so. Thus, they made it look a lot less like a simple necessity, but rather an act of pure intimacy, as often done in fiction when portraying romantic tension. And that's why this scene was ship baiting.

[iamnmbr3]

HI, HELLO, I HAVE A QUESTION. I really like your take on Dumbledore's view on Tom Riddle. Leaning on that post you made about him being obsessed with Tom and seeing him as a seductive femme fatale type villain - do you think Tom would've gone for that? Seducing Dumbledore, I mean. And whether or not it would've worked. We already know from the Grindelore relationship that Albus wouldn't have been taken into the "dark side" with love, but I could see him indluging it on a pretense of "I'm trying to keep an eye on him/fix him" tbh. What do you think? Also what do you think of the ship itself? Thank you, I hope you have a great day. ♡

Thank you very much for your kind words. This is an excellent and very interesting question. (For those wondering anon is referencing this post).

Personally I actually think that Tom probably would not go for that except possibly as a very last resort in a situation of great need. Tom appears to be averse to any type of physical touch in the series. As far as I recall, we only see three instances where he makes physical contact with another person - when Dumbledore solicits a handshake from him when they first meet, when Hepzibah Smith pinches his cheek, and when he touches Harry for a moment in the graveyard to show that he can. Of these instances, only one was initiated by him, and that was out of necessity. The other two were tolerated but clearly made him uncomfortable, especially in the second case.

Other than that he doesn't touch anyone. His followers kiss his robe hem, not his hand or foot. He uses magic to hurt them but never touches them. He also was likely never touched much in the orphanage, except possibly as a punishment, so it probably became something he was neither accustomed to or enjoyed. (He does seem to actively enjoy petting and holding Nagini, which is lowkey weirdly adorable.)

In the case of Hepzibah Smith he does bring flowers to keep her happy (possibly at the behest of his superiors) but otherwise does not act flirtatious at all and in fact seems desperately determined to ignore her advances and keep the conversation focused on work. If he wanted to he could've batted his eyelashes at her and flirted back to try to get information or money/gifts out of her but he actively chooses not to despite being quite poor and having much to gain. Incidentally, this is part of why I think coming across the locket was a coincidence and not a plan, since he doesn't seem to be actively trying to learn anything about what objects she has. (As an aside, given the way she feels entitled to touch him without his consent or any indication that he welcomes such behavior, I think his decision to kill her may have been over more than just the locket.)

There's also Bellatrix. She clearly would like to have a romantic relationship with him and marrying her would have materially benefited him. It would have gotten him more acceptance into the Pureblood circles he was moving in and gotten him access to her tremendous personal assets including her vaults. Note that in book 7, he stores the cup in her vault because he probably doesn't have one of his own and is presumably still #broke. However, he goes out of his way not to marry her. Because he doesn't want to. Because he would rather use up-front means to get what he wants - through compulsion or fear or force or loyalty - than by offering himself in that manner. (Given that he was extremely attractive and that he grew up in a vulnerable position in abject poverty he was probably already familiar with this as an option and actively sought to avoid it, which may have played into his avoidance in later life as well.)

So yeah, I personally think he'd avoid trying to seduce someone into something if he could. That said, I think there's probably fodder for an interesting fic if someone tweaked the circumstances or the characters just right.

As to whether it would have worked, maybe? But it probably would've made everything 1000 times worse. I don't think Dumbledore is someone who would become besotted and easy to manipulate as a result. I think if anything it would make him more dangerous. I could definitely see him doing some mental gymnastics to justify to himself why indulging would be actually very noble and selfless and all for the "greater good." But that mental gymnastics would also come with even more justifications for why this proved Tom was inherently evil and the spawn of Satan. So I don't think it would make him likely to look on Tom more favorably.

If anything, it would make him more likely to want to control and degrade and humiliate him even more than we see in canon. It would also probably make him even more fixated (if that's possible lol) on him than we see in canon. I could also see a scenario where Dumbledore potentially did some mental gymnastics to justify why pursuing Tom would be for 'his own good' / 'the greater good of society' etc. So yeah, all this could again be good fic fodder, but I don't think it would end up working out that great for Tom in the majority of circumstances.

Except perhaps in a scenario where Dumbledore ends up putting off certain plans to destroy him so he could play a more prolonged and personal game to destroy him which also would involve some type of romantic/sexual element as well (definitely purely due to necessity of course) and Tom using this to 1) take advantage of the delay and Dumbledore's own belief in his superiority to put plans of his own into motion and 2) create situations where Dumbledore ends up sacrificing his own people to keep said elaborate game going. But again I don't think Tom would prefer to use that approach, especially with someone like Dumbledore given their history. I think he'd much rather just have a clean and fair fight.

As for what I think of the ship, I think there are potentially interesting things you could do with it, but I see it as something that would end up being an extremely dark ship if we go with the canon dynamic and characterizations - more so, I think, than is the general consensus among those who ship it.

[dr-futbol-blog]

Conversion, Pt. 6

Sheppard is in the infirmary undergoing some tests and given that it was late in the night during the previous scene and it seems now to be broad daylight based on the outside view, the tests seem to have taken quite a bit of time. This is where we start getting further indications that Sheppard is not acting like himself. Sheppard is still being tested as we join in, lying on a gurney with his eyes closed, while Beckett and Weir discuss him further out. And although they think they are having the conversation privately, it is likely that Sheppard actually can overhear them.

Beckett: The retrovirus isn't breaking down in his system like we hoped it would. Weir: You're positive? Beckett: Yes. In fact, it's beginning to alter his DNA. If this is allowed to continue, he'll devolve into a creature similar to what Ellia became.

Given that Ellia's wraithness seemed to be a none-too-subtle analogy for homosexuality, it is notable that they use the words 'retrovirus' and 'positive' in the same context here. Sheppard is 'devolving' into a creature similar to the wraith that had wanted to cure herself from being a wraith, his disease starting with skin lesions. This is not intended as a Very Special Episode but back when the episode aired, they were only in the early stages of developing gene therapy treatments for HIV, so similar research as conducted by Beckett and his team here would have gone into developing cures and treatments for the virus. The analogy is made uncomfortable by the fact that the wraith are so unequivocally evil. And even so, they did very much go there with the previous episode.

Weir: How long do we have? Beckett: I'm not sure exactly. Weir: Ballpark! Months, weeks? Beckett: Days. We have days.

Assuming that Sheppard could overhear them, he knows that he is on borrowed time from this moment onward. This does affect his decisions, his disposition. We can also clearly see how unsettling all of this is for Weir. She is trying to keep herself together, but it is obvious that this is affecting her. She is worried for him, and she cares about him a great deal.

But it also emphasizes the unfairness of it all, how throughout this episode we can see her try to cope with this, we can see her try to comfort him about it, we can see her emote and, later on, even get sympathy from an outsider because of how all this must be affecting her. And at the same time, McKay is not able to react to this any more than he was allowed to react to Sheppard dying at the beginning of the season. We get only one scene in which we can see McKay's heart breaking when he is told that it is time to say his final good-byes to Sheppard, but otherwise he manages to keep all of it concealed the way he always has, the way he must, the way he is expected to.

While Weir can let everyone see how this is affecting her, McKay has to keep his emotions concealed, and this is true both in-universe and toward the audience. Not being allowed comfort when a loved one was dying was one of the heavy costs of DADT, and a well-known one at that:

As the numbness began to wear off, it hit me how incredibly alone I would have been had Joan been killed. The military is known for how it pulls together and helps people; we talk of the "military family," which is a way of saying we always look after each other, especially in times of need. But, none of that support would have been available for me, because under DADT, I didn't exist. DADT's Other Victims: Military Spouses and Families

Weir: OK, what's the plan? Beckett: I've injected him with a viral inhibitor. It should slow down the retrovirus as far as his cognitive abilities are concerned but I'm afraid that's it so far. We're exploring various treatments that may or may not be effective, so... Weir: No, Carson, we don't have any time to explore. Come on, there's gotta be something in the Ancient database that can help you find a treatment! Beckett: I know that, Elizabeth. We're doing our best!

What is strange is that they do not seem to have any use for McKay as they are exploring these options. It does not seem like they have even informed him about any of this going on. We are to think that between McKay getting the splinter removed from his hand and the team going on an egg hunt, he had no contact whatsoever with Sheppard or the rest of his team. That he did not even know any of this was going on even though the first time we do see him, he is already full on dissociating. We have no indication of what he was doing all of this time but supposedly installing Solitaire on the Daedalus consoles is one of the options.

This is not to say that Sheppard and McKay necessarily would have been in contact in the meanwhile, as Sheppard seems to use isolation as punishment for himself, and there is nothing worse he can do to punish himself than to cut McKay off. The fact that he believes that he can safeguard McKay's life with the same action just makes this option more attractive to him. As far as he is concerned, right now not having any contact with McKay has only positives for him. It is the fact that neither Beckett nor Weir think to employ McKay in solving this that is more curious. It is possible that they believe that he is not a neutral party, that he has a conflict of interest enough to want to keep him removed from this because both of them should be aware of what Sheppard and McKay are to each other.

Weir: I'm sorry, I know. Of course you are. Beckett: You should talk to him. He's hiding it very well, but if I was him? I'd be scared to death.

Beckett tells Weir that it is the fact that he can empathize with Sheppard, it is putting himself in Sheppard's shoes that gives him the ability to tell that Sheppard must be frightened. But as mentioned, it may be that neither Beckett nor Sheppard realize that the Ancient DNA facilitates some kind of a connection between them, may have given rise to some small level of partial telepathy between them. Beckett is a doctor that has empathy for his patients, and this is normal for him, this has been how he has been his entire life. Sheppard is good at reading people and their motivations, and this is something that he has been using to his advantage ever since he was a child. Sheppard and Beckett had an immediate rapport as they met each other on the Antarctic base.

What it means here is that Beckett is almost certainly correct about Sheppard being afraid and hiding it, and Sheppard being in need of someone to talk to. And the fact that Sheppard feels like he has no one to talk to? Is evidence of the fact that he has severed his connection to McKay, and this is something that he is most definitely doing not to punish McKay but to punish himself. He thinks that it is what he deserves. He is not thinking about how much it must be hurting McKay because he thinks that it cannot possibly be as great as his own pain, and how ever much it might hurt, it is still better than McKay ending up dying for him just like everyone he loves inevitably do. And given that we later learn that McKay believes Beckett was keeping McKay away from Sheppard on purpose, if Beckett was be aware that Sheppard would not be able to talk to McKay at this time, it would make sense for him to ask Weir to talk to him instead. Whether Beckett understands why Sheppard had asked him to keep McKay away from him or not, Beckett was honouring his request and hence sent Weir in instead.

Sheppard: How am I doing'? Anything that has you speechless has me concerned. Weir: You're gonna be fine.

What this tells us is that this is the way Sheppard himself communicates. When he says that there is nothing to worry about, something is direly wrong. When he says that he is fine, he is actually five flavours of fucked up. It is because to him "fine" means "barely holding it together" that he interprets Weir as meaning the same. Also, he is just confirming the fact that he could overhear them. He is a dead man walking.

Note also that while Sheppard makes the observation that anything that has Weir speechless is concerning, the same could definitely be said about McKay. And while no one makes the observation about him during this episode, we may note that he is uncharacteristically quiet and subdued throughout. McKay is speechless for most of the episode, in fact. Everything that we are able to see Weir express is something that McKay is not allowed to express.

Sheppard: Wow. That's dead man talk. Weir: No, it isn't. Sheppard: Have you seen this? Weir: Beckett is gonna figure this one out.

In The Siege (S01E19), McKay described being forced to undertake a space walk without a tether as the "flight of the dead man," which may have been a reference to the series of poems entitled The Book of the Dead Man by Marvin Bell.* Now, it is interesting that neither McKay nor Sheppard actually says that they are the Dead Man as, with regards to the poems, either one of them could be the Dead Man or the Dead Man's Wife. The poems are not about death so much as they are about life, and they are about love. And let us recall that we have, in fact, seen Sheppard die in 38 Minutes (S01E04), so he literally is "the dead man". And McKay himself is the dead man in the sense that Sheppard had believed him to die on the Ancient weapons platform where the flight of the dead man was mentioned.

Sheppard: I think I already have. You know who I'm starting to feel like? Ford. Weir: Now, what happened to you is completely different.

This seems out of character for Sheppard. Not that he is thinking about the parallels to Ford but the fact that he confesses it to Weir. This is the kind of thing that Sheppard would have kept to himself previously. He would never have admitted it to anyone. Ford is a sore spot for him in more ways than one, and having to admit to himself that he is now becoming something just like the young soldier he had been unable to save requires the kind of self-awareness Sheppard is simply not capable of. It is more likely that Sheppard would be deep into denial about this, and even if he had admitted it to himself in some dark recesses of his mind, he would never confess it to other people.

No matter how close you think the friendship between Sheppard and Weir is, this is out of character for him, and this is the point. Like Sheppard tells her in a moment, he feels the same as being under the influence of Codeine. The way he is talking here? The things he is saying? Are the result of his inhibitions now being lowered. He is talking the kinds of things a drunk man would talk. And Weir never seems to catch on to this fact, merely thinking that Sheppard is confiding in her because they are just close like that.

Sheppard: I know, I know. Still, I can feel it. I mean, I can feel it changing me inside... like he did. Weir: I don't think that's even possible. Look, you're very worried...

Sheppard can feel himself changing mentally, and this is the reason he has made sure that McKay would not be able to get anywhere near him. He does not know what is happening to him but because he thinks that what is happening to him is similar to what had happened to Ford, who had tried to kill McKay -- we were explicitly told by Teyla in Trinity (S02E06) that the reason they had given Ronon "sanctuary" was because he had saved the life of her friend -- who had changed almost instantaneously from someone who had thought of McKay as his friend to someone that was capable of killing him without remorse, it meant that Sheppard was taking no chances. He could not trust his own judgement, he could not trust his own mind about this.

Ever since The Storm (S01E10), Sheppard has feared that he himself was the greatest threat to McKay's life and now it seemed like it would only be a matter of time that he would either seriously injure or try to kill McKay. Whether or not McKay knew about it, whether or not the audience would ever catch on to it, making sure that McKay would not be able to get anywhere near him was the first thing that Sheppard did.

Sheppard: No, no. No, it's... One of the best weeks of my life was when I got my wisdom teeth out. I was on codeine for a full seven days. This is kinda the same. I know I should be in pain, or at the very least freaked out by this, but hey! I'm not... and that freaks me out more than anything.

Now, the thing about the wisdom teeth and the Codeine is again the kind of thing that Sheppard would not normally tell Weir. McKay has a habit of trying to bond with people by sharing personal information about himself, Sheppard does not. Quite the opposite, Sheppard likes to keep things close to his chest, and he prefers to stay a mystery to most people. He does not like sharing personal information about himself, and he certainly does not like to share things about his personal history. It is mostly inadvertently that we ever learn things about him.

This is not Sheppard feeling so close to his best buddy Weir that he wants to share it with her, this is not Sheppard being open and honest with her. Sheppard is, as he tells her here, under the influence. He is saying things he would not normally say. But regardless, we do now learn this about him, and it is rather concerning that this is the case. One of the best weeks of his life was when he was spaced out on drugs, when he could feel no pain. We get no hint as to when this was or how old Sheppard may have been. Some people have their wisdom teeth out when they are teenagers, some when they are adults. The normal time to have them out is between 15-25, and so this could be anywhere between high school and him already being in the army.

And it is possible that what made this week one of the best weeks of his life was that there were other good things taking place during this time, or that he had suffered some terrible pain prior to it and could no longer feel that pain either while on drugs. It does tell us that there have not been that many good times in his life. But it does also tell us, as he says "one of the best," that the has had other good weeks in his life too. The week between the end of The Defiant One (S01E12) and before he had to shoot Dr. Peterson in Hot Zone (S01E13) may have been one. The week between Weir's birthday and the long-range sensors warning them about the imminent attack of the wraith may have been another. He has had some good weeks in his life, but not that many.

And it is interesting that Sheppard says that he thinks he should be in pain. Beckett said that he knows Sheppard has a high pain tolerance earlier, so it could be that he is not even referring to physical pain here. There is a strange scab on his arm, why would that necessarily be causing him pain? But if Sheppard had been in some other kind of pain before this and was now not feeling that pain, well. That might freak him out more than anything.

Weir: We're gonna beat this. Sheppard: 'We're gonna beat this'? 'Beckett will figure this out'? 'You're gonna be fine'? You really suck at the whole bedside manner thing. Weir: I know, I'm sorry. Sheppard: But I appreciate the effort.

Both of these are further evidence of the fact that Sheppard is acting out of character. For one, he would not previously have been as harsh with Weir. But at the same time, his need for a "de-hurtful retraction" seems similarly off. It is this, his final line, that makes him sound more drugged out than anything else. It might all be true, but he normally would not have said any of it out loud and certainly not to Weir. Normally, Sheppard's response to Weir would have been "I'm fine" and that would have been the end of that discussion. He would not have been fine, obviously, but he also knows that talking about it would not have changed anything.

But given that his inhibitions are lowered here, it does raise the question of whether this is how Sheppard normally talks with McKay when other people are not around to hear it. Because Sheppard is clearly disappointed in how Weir responds to what he just shared, he had been expecting something else, some other kind of a reaction. Sheppard points out that Weir is giving him platitudes and that is precisely what he would never get from McKay. McKay's "bedside manner" is very different. He is direct, honest, and rarely if ever says the expected thing. McKay also knows Sheppard intimately, is able to communicate with him in ways that other people could never. We see Weir turn her face away as she says that she's sorry, where McKay made the effort of looking Sheppard in the eye when he was apologizing, even though it was anything but easy for him. Sheppard appreciates when someone shows that they care about him without having to sugarcoat things. Weir may get an A for effort, but she does not actually make him feel any better. What ever Sheppard was looking for, what ever he needed, he could not get it from Weir.

During that scene behind Sheppard's door in Trinity (S02E06), we did not get to hear him say an awful lot, but his tones were much softer than that we usually get to hear. And over the years, we do get the impression that McKay has learned an awful lot of things about Sheppard that were never uttered on screen. So Sheppard has shared things with McKay of this nature. And given that Beckett had ushered Weir to go talk to Sheppard because he thought, for some reason, that Sheppard would have no one else to talk to at this time, it is possible that all of this is a selection of things that Sheppard would actually have wanted to tell McKay. But he could not, not now. He had made sure of that himself.

Continued in Pt. 7

-* One of the poems seems especially relevant for this episode, especially if we interpret McKay as the Dead Man and Sheppard as You (with the hands):

About the Dead Man and Your Hands

Mornings, he keeps out the world awhile, the dead man. The dead man, without looking, believes what you said of the garden. He knows the color of a rose is the color of a rose is the color. He sees the early sky lit by a burn toward which we sidle. He will take care of you, the dead man will do that. He will wait for your hair to grow back. He thinks the things you touched are lucky to be yours. The dead man knows where to be and where not to be, how he survives. He is aware, at all times, of your place, your dog [Shepherd], your rug, your roof, your chairs and tables. Here is his own table, from the basement of the “as is” shop. The dead man is of this old table, he is of his front and back doors, he is of the tea on the burner and the burner, too, he is. It cannot stop the dead man, that others have caught on. The dead man at his worst still looks his best.

(and given that the poems usually come in two, the second one is also interesting as this episode is the only time we see McKay eating soup, and he is the only character we see eating soup; although this one has more of a Sheppard feel to it):

2. More About the Dead Man and Your Hands Nights, he lets in the world, the dead man does it, always. By any late night, he has lost the need to believe. The dead man plays a nighttime piano, he blows a nighttime horn, he sings more after midnight. Dead man's music is nighttime, call it earthly, call it planetary. The dead man feels the high registers heard by animal ears. He feels the rumbly pedal note struck by redwoods enlarging and tectonic plates lurching. What is it about his hands and your hands, is it the absence of certainty? He has stirred distinctions into a broth, a soup, a stew, a gravy. You cannot find yes and no, true or false, in a dead man's soup. So what if they have caught on, the dead man is out front and stays up later. Hence, when the dead man maketh eyes, he's gotcha. He'll care for you, now that he's gotcha, and he hath giveth his hand. He can't talk about the children if you are going to cry.

[lemonhemlock]

bg3 anon, answers under the cut for ease of scrolling! 🤝

Anonymous asked:

"you’re right. i think i’ll perhaps do it as a safety check because i don’t intend to be respectful of the bloodsucker twink lmao. i put him in a ridiculous looking outfit and it’s so hard to take him seriously AT ALL i’ll see how it goes. he’s currently leaving me on ‘Seen’ with an approval rating of 3" Darling (pun intended, sorry, couldn't help myself) it's going to be a problem starting his romance if you're still at 3 approval. I would suggest checking the BG3 wiki, it has most of his approvals and disapprovals listed so you could farm them, but that would be way too immersion breaking to be fair as it goes against the beauty of role playing, at least if you are the type who truly immerses oneself like I am...sometimes I can't bring myself doing things I personally want to do it in a game because it would go against the character I am playing...it's super weird lol.

If romancing him doesn't work out maybe you can go with Gale instead? Or why not maybe Shadowheart will grow on you haha By the way I don't know if I mentioned this but to successfully romance the bloodsucker, you need to sleep with him at least once in act 1. You can't start his romance later.

As for ridiculous looking outfits…here's a suggestion you may want to keep in mind: at the start of act 3 there's a circus where you can loot a clown outfit and buy clown makeup. I put everything on Gale personally because why not? However, sadly the only clown in this whole affair was myself considering I spent 5000 gold on making Astarion a fucking statue, which stayed in my camp for the remainder of act 3. And he didn't even comment on it!!! Well at least I didn't go for the naked version of it, but next time I'm definitely choosing to make a statue for my Tav lmao.

"well the wives are the reason i’ve started to play actually, as counter-productive as that sounds 😂 i have a friend who explained the lore to me, so i know most of astarion’s background and what happens with him, though i don’t remember details, of course. she told me how delulu they are in excusing every thing he does, even his insane decision to become the no 1 ascended vampire boss. how they deceive themselves into believing astarion becomes in love with them if they act like complete doormats and go along with whatever fuckass thing he wants, even if the 'detect thoughts’ option clearly indicates that he thinks badly of them :))"

I didn't want to mention the possible ascension because of spoilers but since you know a lot about him already thanks to your friend…yes, it's all true. The ascension wives are the most unhinged subsect of the Astarion fandom. If you let him do it he even becomes abusive if you are in a romance with him and you'll even have to agree to let him turn into his vampire spawn otherwise he'll break up with you (some of the wives 100% believe he turns you into his vampire bride, but obviously there is nothing in the game confirming this, on the contrary, the evidence is quite flimsy). The craziest thing is the wives think YOU are the abusive one for not letting him sacrifice 7000 souls (including children) in a diabolical ritual, a deal with a fucking archdevil in order to let him ascend, because how can you condemn pookie to a possible life without the sun while still feeling a vampire's hunger? They think you are robbing him of his own agency and infantilizing him. Not to mention that once you get rid of the tadpole, he won't even let you break up with him anymore. Like, at all. You have no choice anymore. He outright laughs at you and says "your future is mine to decide." Also, if you break up with him just before he's about to turn you into his spawn he admits he would've used your love for him against you until "you were nothing", that he appreciates you for doing this, saying he didn't think you had it in you (breaking up with him, that is). Oh and since you mentioned playing the game for meme potential, well, here you also have the option to kick him in the balls when he says "on your knees, darling" to your Tav, before he's about to transform them into a vampire. But be careful, he breaks up and leaves the party permanently after doing this to him lmfao (like any Real Man™ would).

But no, the wives won't hear any of this, in fact they blame you for only choosing the confrontational dialogue options and say that if you are nice to him, he doesn't turn abusive. What??? That's not how this works lmao.

Yes, he has all that power, glory and money if he ascends, but at what cost? He totally loses himself and any positive character growth he had is totally gone and nullified by the ascension. Like yeah he does push for ascending, but does he really need it? There is a difference between wanting something (for all the wrong reasons imho, he can be safe and free without doing this as his good ending proves it) and needing something and you as his friend or lover should know better rather than have him give in into his worst impulses. Tbh I think many of these wives genuinely believe that if he says he wants something, you have to do it because how can you deny your boyfriend this "but he said so!!!". Loving someone doesn't mean agreeing with them every single time, that's not how actual relationships work. That's not to say one can't enjoy toxic relationships in fiction, but that's not what these people are doing here, let's be real. He actually approves and genuinely thanks you if you talk him out of ascending, by the way. He says he was not himself back then when he was just about do it and although he did not appreciate it at the time, is now grateful for saving him from himself, that you saw and believed he is enough just way he is, that now he is "truly and honestly free". The game couldn't be more clear about this, the parallels, the foreshadowings are all there from the very beginning but everything completely flew over these people's heads. Sure, he gets sad when he loses the tadpole and can't be in the sun anymore but eventually he embraces the shadows (in a good way this time) and realizes he can be free and happy like this as well.

Did your friend mention the fact that the wives also harassed and stalked one one of his writers for calling this ending the bad one for him? Because they did this. (tbh personally I do think that writer unprofessional in how they expressed their opinion but they still didn't deserve to be harassed for it…and it's also not like the text itself doesn't confirm what they said).

I do feel bad for those who do like his evil ending for what it is without trying to whitewash it because they often end up catching strays thanks to the crazies, like people telling them they'll be abused in real life by their partners because they like this version of Astarion…which is not a nice thing to say to someone even online. On the other hand these wives claim they are genuine villain fuckers, that they love Astarion as evil as he can be, they also claim to love dark romances but then they totally dumb down the toxic elements of the relationship with him and turn it into uwuuu loving evil power couple. Come on…they genuinely insist his bad and evil ending is the GOOD one! Most characters have a good and evil or bad ending yet fans of other companions don't pretend the bad ones are secretly the good ones "for reasons" or "but they said so, they said they wanted it". I've yet to meet a Shadowheart fan who genuinely thinks her bad ending is in fact her good one, for example. Or a Lae'zel fan.

______________________________________________________________

Darling (pun intended, sorry, couldn't help myself) it's going to be a problem starting his romance if you're still at 3 approval.

i shot up to 28 now! 🤙 without basically doing anything evil, apart from letting him feed on Gandrel (but i kept him alive, at least) out of curiosity, i'm going to go back and see if that gained me any approval points or not

I would suggest checking the BG3 wiki, it has most of his approvals and disapprovals listed so you could farm them, but that would be way too immersion breaking to be fair as it goes against the beauty of role playing, at least if you are the type who truly immerses oneself like I am...sometimes I can't bring myself doing things I personally want to do it in a game because it would go against the character I am playing...it's super weird lol.

oh, i am so tempted, but i'm trying to maintain at least a semblance of unpredictability and candor! i totally get not wanting to do smth if the character would be against it

If romancing him doesn't work out maybe you can go with Gale instead? Or why not maybe Shadowheart will grow on you haha By the way I don't know if I mentioned this but to successfully romance the bloodsucker, you need to sleep with him at least once in act 1. You can't start his romance later.

good to know, soldier! 💪i am not refusing any of his (most likely) cringe sex proposals if i can get them 🤡

As for ridiculous looking outfits…here's a suggestion you may want to keep in mind: at the start of act 3 there's a circus where you can loot a clown outfit and buy clown makeup. I put everything on Gale personally because why not?

LOL i have a mod that gave me a clown outfit and i put it on shadowheart 😂 but gale sounds hilarious, too

However, sadly the only clown in this whole affair was myself considering I spent 5000 gold on making Astarion a fucking statue, which stayed in my camp for the remainder of act 3. And he didn't even comment on it!!! Well at least I didn't go for the naked version of it, but next time I'm definitely choosing to make a statue for my Tav lmao.

i was in tears when i read this :))))))))))))))))))) anon, i'm so sorry :)::):):)::):):):):) i can't imagine

i'm fine with letting astarion drain my blood, but i draw the line at spending so much money on his ungrateful arse 😂 priorities 😂

The ascension wives are the most unhinged subsect of the Astarion fandom.

the stories i've heard reveal such a fascinating level of delusion :)) like you said, not being able to accept the distinction between vampire spawn and vampire bride: he tells you (or least i chose that dialogue option) how one can become an actual, full-blown vampire and that no vampire would create a competitor! straight out of his mouth

Not to mention that once you get rid of the tadpole, he won't even let you break up with him anymore. Like, at all. You have no choice anymore. He outright laughs at you and says "your future is mine to decide." Also, if you break up with him just before he's about to turn you into his spawn he admits he would've used your love for him against you until "you were nothing", that he appreciates you for doing this, saying he didn't think you had it in you (breaking up with him, that is).

to think!! i would crawl straight into the depths of the mariana trench 😭 no way is this loser going to pull this level of insolence on mirta

Oh and since you mentioned playing the game for meme potential, well, here you also have the option to kick him in the balls when he says "on your knees, darling" to your Tav, before he's about to transform them into a vampire. But be careful, he breaks up and leaves the party permanently after doing this to him lmfao (like any Real Man™ would).

i puked a little in my mouth 💀

There is a difference between wanting something (for all the wrong reasons imho, he can be safe and free without doing this as his good ending proves it) and needing something and you as his friend or lover should know better rather than have him give in into his worst impulses.

yeah, that's what i was talking with my friend about, that you'd be out of your mind to accept for him to ascend. and, like you said, it would negate any kind of character growth he might have had until then. so far, my friend was able to talk him out of it and he was grateful, whereas my boyfriend didn't have a good enough approval rating so he had to kill him off. very different outcomes!

but neither of them have managed to fuck him so we'll see on which shores the tides of love take us 🤡

Tbh I think many of these wives genuinely believe that if he says he wants something, you have to do it because how can you deny your boyfriend this "but he said so!!!". Loving someone doesn't mean agreeing with them every single time, that's not how actual relationships work.

very well said!

also, i think that maybe in another game, it would matter more towards making him "happy" if you just went along with everything he says, but the game mechanics here are a little different and it's obviously telegraphing hard that this is Not A Good Path

That's not to say one can't enjoy toxic relationships in fiction, but that's not what these people are doing here, let's be real.

exactly, there needs to be a level of awareness here of what the dynamic actually is, not a senile denial of basic power imbalances

Did your friend mention the fact that the wives also harassed and stalked one one of his writers for calling this ending the bad one for him? Because they did this. (tbh personally I do think that writer unprofessional in how they expressed their opinion but they still didn't deserve to be harassed for it…and it's also not like the text itself doesn't confirm what they said).

not yet, i don't think! she just mentioned that they're very weird with the voice actors as well. she sent me a very long and lachrymose tumblr post, bemoaning that his actor showed his discomfort with ascended!astarion fans during a livestream, how unprofessional and hurt they were by this very normal reaction

on a different note, she showed me the post with the life-sized astarion sex doll someone commissioned

I do feel bad for those who do like his evil ending for what it is without trying to whitewash it because they often end up catching strays thanks to the crazies, like people telling them they'll be abused in real life by their partners because they like this version of Astarion…which is not a nice thing to say to someone even online.

of course, you can enjoy even that ending. i can see myself playing with my friends and making the most idiotic choices, howling with laughter. every one has a kind of setup that allows them to revel in the silliness or (why not) the kink-factor of these situations. it's the "convincing yourself this isn't abusive" part that's the issue

On the other hand these wives claim they are genuine villain fuckers, that they love Astarion as evil as he can be, they also claim to love dark romances but then they totally dumb down the toxic elements of the relationship with him and turn it into uwuuu loving evil power couple.

i wanted to highlight this because it's so true and something i've seen in more fandoms as well. i would say that aly$m0nd was a similar case, where a lot of shippers refused to engage with any potentially problematic aspects of their relationship and just pushed a sanitized true love narrative.

I will address the rest all at once without quoting separately since it's faster. Hopefully I didn't miss anything important:

The spear you found in Withers' place is okay for Shadowheart momentarily but it will soon become obsolete as you will find a much better weapon for her just before entering act 2. It's a mace called "The Blood of Lathander" and is located somewhere within the Githyanki Creche (you will have to go there as it's part of Lae'zel quest). Just deal with the giths first and then go and search for the weapon. It's super good for clerics especially and it's one of those weapons that is effective even in act 3 by the end of the game.

I heard about this mace! I will keep an eye out for it. Add it to my list of items I need to find while still in Act 1.

Entering turn based mode is also a good idea when stealing from merchants.

Yeah the weightless consumables mod is a must have. It seems useless now but when you start collecting all kinds of arrows, potions, scrolls, gold you will become encumbered really, really quick.

I'll see how much longer I'll mentally last with loading and unloading all of the crap I pick up. :))

I think you can sneak past Ethel's masked servants, some players managed to do it (perhaps you could try and make everyone invisible?). Personally I fought them as I didn't want to complicate myself by trying to sneak.

Oh yeah, I go more in detail in my last post about my Ethel adventures.

The Ethel point, if not used on your character, might very well go on one of your companions as I may have said in one of my previous asks. If anyone's main stat is still 17 use it to get it to 18. Then use the ability increase feat to even other odd ability points left? Mayrina will be angry with you no matter what you do so don't worry, it will pass.

So, I requested an INT +1. And my plan currently is to summon the ogres when I go to the goblin camp, make sure they die, if not felled by goblins, then by my hand, and pick up the Circlet of Intelligence or whatever it's called. It pumps INT up to 17, I think? I can then dump all of my INT numbers down to the minimum of 8, add Ethel's +1 and I'm up to 18. With a lot of points free to distribute someplace else. If I can get my hands on the Gloves of Dexterity, too, I can almost turn Mirta into a tank. I feel that secretly she longs for the bloodsong of the battlefield, but is keeping real quiet about it. :))

Nice that you persuaded the ogres to fight for you!!

You got the necromancy book? That's great. Buuuut you might have wanted to take Astarion with you as he has an interest in it. Giving it to him will also grant A LOT of approval (10 points I believe?) which is desirable since you want to romance him. And no, he won't do anything funny with it, the book will be safe in his hands. I mentioned in a previous ask about trusting and agreeing with some of his less insane suggestions, well, this is one of them.

Thank you so much for this suggestion! I wouldn't have known otherwise. There are a lot of details or paths in this game that you could easily miss, some of them very random!

As for your latest incident I should've mentioned that trusting him to NOT drain you dry isn't a good idea lol. I'm sorry once again however it's still extremely funny what he did to poor Mirta. At least she punched him!!

She's in her emo princess era currently. No time like the present to bust out the intense eye makeup!

After you are done with all the side quests in the area you can go to the goblin camp and do what's needed to be done there without needing to kill ALL of them. Rescue Halsin if you want to (he is a nice guy but a boring character overall and the bear sex stunt turned me off his character a bit I fear) and kill the goblin leaders. Not sure if you know, but one of their leaders (Minthara) can be recruited later in act 2 if you knock her out. So no killing - so don't use spells and ranged weapons on her if you want her to survive and have her in your party eventually.

Yeah, the bear sex I honestly find hilarious. I'm going to try to recruit as many as I can, because free labour and help? Why not? Though I'm not sure I can have both Minthara and Halsin in my camp (apparently they can't stand each other?). My bf said I had to choose, but I wonder if I can't get those two crazy cats to get along with my high CHA.

You may want to expose Kagha and the shadow druids before doing the goblin camp.

Good to know, thanks!

This is weird, when it comes to dialogues you should have the possibility to select the Friends cantrip in the bonus section before you roll the dice. It should be there near Shadowheart's guidance. Once you select it two dices will show up on your screen, then the dice with the higher number will be taken into consideration. You may have a bug if it doesn't show up. But yes other than dialogues, there's not much practicality for it.

You're right about that, I will reconsider the Friends cantrip later on maybe. I imagine I get more cantrip slots as I progress.

Also, if you want access to the Guidance cantrip, there is a necklace that grants you this spell so you won't need to drag Shadowheart around you. (a short video with the location so I don't have to explain it to you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_abMisavwU )

This would be so useful, thank you very much!!! V excited about this!

Yep, Dancing Lights disarming traps and vents is apparently a thing which I found out quite late in the game. I always threw stones and random weapons at vents to cover them and then I had Astarion disarm them and any other traps.

As for lightning and ice spells or cantrips: Shocking Grasp and Ray of Frost are the only cantrips available, but you may want to look into spells. I know the temptation is to not spend your spell slots and focus on cantrips since you can cast them endlessly but trust me, sometimes you'll have to use spells. Once you hit level 5 you'll begin to have access to other cool lightning and ice spells. Lightning Bolt and Glyph of Warding (this one lets you choose the type of damage you will deal and both ice and lightning are available - Shadowheart as a cleric will also have access to this spell) and on later levels there are even more cool ones. You probably missed this one but on early levels there is also Chromatic Orb which is similar to the Glyph.

Oh, yeah, I do use spells, too, but you never know when you might need an elemental cantrip you can cast without limit.

The only items Gale can eat will have a text written under them that should say something like "Gale can absorb this item". He has standards, he won't eat just anything!

Too bad I didn't figure that one out sooner, but no real harm done!

Not you giving Gale the Dancing Lights amulet. You are right that it is redundant but it has sentimental value since it's from Arabella's parents. How could you???

The bard hat must be worn by a bard, even if you gain that ability from Alfira it won't work on your character. Bards, depending on their current level, have a number of "Bardic Inspiration Poins" which are similar to cleric's Guidance cantrip and will grant other party members bonuses when they roll their dices. Some of their attack actions are also dependent on this system and may cost bardic inspiration points. If you don't intend to respect someone into a bard or use multiclass (a feature that's not available on your difficulty level anyway) on a party member, then the hat will be useless and Gale can eat it.

Oh.... Well, it was worth a shot. I did look goofy while wearing it. Gave it to Gale after all.

Gloves of uncommon power? Did you mean gloves of power? They are fine on Lae'zel or maybe even better on Astarion due to the Sleight of Hand +1 bonus. You could give them to Gale and then buy the Gloves of Thievery for Astarion from the Zhentarim merchant (I think you need to deliver the shipment from the caravan to them without opening it in order to have access to them and other cool items from full inventory).

These names sort of blend into each other after a while. :)) I'm writing down the Gloves of Thievery, thanks. :))

thank you for the Magnus Archives podcast link!

You're very welcome, I hope you liked the episode!

Anonymous asked:

"lmao anon don't worry! i genuinely did it for the lols at least i got him to an 18 approval rating for me, more than karlach, lae'zel OR gale somehow (motherfucker, and this is AFTER i gave him an artefact to consume)" Thanks the gods lol, I was surprised a bit since most players did not genuinely trust him to not do something stupid. The fact that you have options to make him stop is enough of a warning imho, the game is pretty much like "are you sure about trusting him, hmm?".

Tell me about it, but you can't really think clearly with vampire fangs down your neck, right? ☠

And how did you manage to have fucking Gale at a lower approval lmao, now I feel stupid for suggesting in my other message to go for him instead if you can't manage to romance the vampire. Gale and Shadowheart were the only ones I managed to have much high numbers compared to Astarion, and quite early on. Karlach was the hardest for me, followed by Lae'zel.

I'll have to check how I stand with them in this post-Ethel administration! 💪 Shadowheart and Wyll are quite keen on me.

"i'm glad he's fucking "happy", what can i say 🤡 maybe now we're not going to fail every perception check in ethel's cave at least. we're going TODAY so i can benefit from this bonus (i did work my arse off for if after all!)" From now on up until the end of the game you can use his bite ability on enemies when in combat and he will gain the "Happy" condition each time, including the +1 bonus. Alternatively, you can also have Mirta become his willing blood bag and invite him to feed on her each night or so lol & the following morning he will gain the condition that way as well, but I think letting him feed on enemies is better.

Yeah, I can imagine the blood bank fics, 😅 but, unfortunately (or fortunately for the sane ones amongst us), Mirta would wake up with some of her abilities depleted at the cost of Astarion's boosts. And that doesn't really work for her since she's discovered her own penchant for dueling after her brush with death. How can she take all that damage enemies frontload on her in combat otherwise? 💬

A fun happening which I forgot to mention previously but there is this Rha*nicent fan art that's been living rent free in my head ever since I saw it back in august (link: https://x.com/kknoahh/status/1825991659835867357) with short haired Rha*nyra, who I genuinely thought to be…Astarion at first. I was like who the fuck started to ship Alicent with him lmao, like can you imagine this crackship.

Oh my goodness, Rhaenyra really does look like him. 😳 Alicent really out there catching all strays and being shipped with anyone with the slightest potential of becoming psychosexually obsessed with her. :))

Have fun at the birthday party!!

Thanks so much, it was nice to go out and see my friends!

Anonymous asked:

Well, Gale isn't in a position to criticize Astarion for hiding his true nature, to be fair. You'll find out soon enough when he confesses the full truth about his condition and why he really needs to consume all those magical artefacts. I don't remember if the rest of your companions have something to say each time after you give items to Gale to eat but after you feed him for the third and final time they should have something to say if you click on them, at least those who are in your active party at the time (again, no exclamation mark will show up above them).

This tip has proven very useful and I always make sure to check on them at the end of the day and after I hit long rest. Most of them did comment on Gale some way the other, but NONE of them had ANYTHING to day that the leech spawn KILLED ME. Forsooth!

Astarion will be like "who would hide something like this from his friends? you can't trust anyone this days", which is quite hilarious considering Gale was more understanding lol.

This line is even funnier if you think he's being self-aware while saying it. :))

I may offer you a hint that won't spoil anything: make a quicksave to be sure just in case and then use Astarion's bite ability on Gale. You'll see that something is wrong with the guy… ;)

He did ask me whose blood I'd suck, which was quite hilarious, and insisted I'd answer. :)) I picked Gale for the lols, hoping it would trigger what you said, but nothing happened. I guess fang boy abides by our deal and keeps to hunting animals? Who would have thought? But maybe I'll try to bite Gale tonight, to see what he does.

Unfortunately, backgrounds don't matter so much, Tav is pretty much a blank slate. You get some specific skill proficiencies and maybe some unique dialogue options here and there but other than that? Pretty much nothing, except for also receiving inspiration points. It's really a missed opportunity and one of my main criticisms of the game, there are plenty of occasions in the game where your background could've been taken into into consideration. You actually gave a good example about perhaps being allowed into spaces common born people aren't, but unless I missed something, nothing like this happens. You even meet Baldurian nobles in act 3 and you have no dialogue options with any of them when normally you should've been familiarized with at least some of them, being a noble yourself. Two of your possible companions, Wyll and Minthara, are of noble birth as well and you can't have a noble to noble conversation with them (you have a noble dialogue option with Minthara but only if you play as a drow noble, other races aren't acknowledged and as far as I can recall, Wyll has no specific dialogue for other nobles).

That's unfortunate. It would have been a great addition. Like, I imagine noble characters could start out with more coin in their pockets or that common-borns could have streets smarts (survival proficiency) or knowledge about the local flora or fauna or small settlements. I sometimes have dialogue with people about aspects my tav should already be aware of, even general world-building stuff, like fellow races or just current events. :))

Also, it's rather annoying to be playing a Baldurian character but they're seemingly unaware of anything going on in Baldur's gate. For example, Mirta should have been aware of Cazador, I feel? At the very least that there's a coven of vampires in her home city and that no one is doing anything about it. :)) Or just generally question Astarion's magistrate background.

Good luck with Ethel!!

Thank you! Whole other post below on my hag struggles. :)

[theographos]

Perilous Trails is not the best representation for Itto...

Itto is a very hard character to comprehend. The base is simple : a troublemaker with a heart of gold, and while he might be all over the place and a bit too competitive for his own good, he has morals that he strictly sticks to.

But in practice it's actually more complicated to show this balance in him than you might think. You have to make him careless enough so that the 'trouble' and 'himbo' parts of his personality are present, but responsible enough to ensure he respects the "Oni Pride".

He do whatever he wants because of the Oni Pride, he's not going to put on a picture perfect act when it's not who he is. But whatever he wants at the end is fairness, equality and the safety of others. And winning in the process is a pretty big bonus.

And while this quest shows some understanding of Itto, (we all saw him punching the door, i'm not going to pretend like it's not something Itto would do because it is, and it's hella funny.) it also lacks some understanding in the other aspects of this character.

For example when he puts up a fight with Yelan at the beginning of the quest. Yes Yelan is an authority figure in this case, yes Itto doesn't care in the slightest if an authority figure approves his decision or not (unless it's Granny Oni or Kuki Shinobu) and he shows it quite well in his character quest with the Tenryou Commission.

But this is not the same context here. He is in an unknown land, in a unknown place and is trying to keep his "savior" (Yanfei) safe. And a random women who quite seem to know what she's doing tells him that this place is dangerous and he shouldn't stay here.

His morals clearly indicates that he should not back down against injustice. And it's clear in this moment that this is not injustice, Yelan is trying to keep everyone safe, including Yanfei.

So based on everything I said so far, it doesn't make much sense that he would get angry against Yelan. He would bargain, try to convince Yelan that he is capable of surviving down here by proposing a duel or even convince everyone to get out of this place and get to safety, meanwhile he and Yelan will do whatever Yanfei needed to do in her place so that she doesn't have to be in danger.

And I get that they needed to put a fight here so that everyone would get stuck in the timeloop (or timehole, i don't know how to describe it). I get that they needed to have some kind of tension beforehand so that you could clearly see them slowly warming up to each other and forming the best of teams.

But this is exactly where the difficulty of storytelling is. You have a bunch of characters with their own flaws and strengths, you have a situation in which you want to put them in and now you have to use those flaws and strengths to make it work. It's not an easy work, no one said otherwise here.

But the fact that this is complicated doesn't mean you can rough up a character's personality, even just a little, so that everything works. The writers could have added some kind of pre existing tension between Yelan and Kuki, a sort of cold relationship like Diluc and Kaeya. Kuki has been to Liyue, Itto considers Kuki as part of the gang and thus a part of his family, so if Yelan let out some passive aggressive comment about Kuki because of some pre existing tension due to an old event between the two of them, then Itto would get mad.

Then Itto would want to fight her, then the situation goes wrong and boum they are stuck in timeloop/timehole.

Same thing for when Itto decided to knock a wall with all his strength to make the arguing stop. The part that triggers me here is not his sacrifice for the good of others, he is able to do that, it's the fact that he does this without saying anything before hand.

Itto is anything but silent that's for certain. Before doing that he would at least yell a big "shut up" to everyone. Maybe he could yell that, hit the wall and say to or three sentences before fainting, because of course he wouldn't have planned the part where something bad would happen to him. He would have thought that he could still have some force left in him after that, because he is full of hope and would only hope for the best.

But in my opinion having him unconscious for the second half of the quest wasn't the best idea in the first place. Firstly because I absolutely adore him and he is literally my main, so having a quest with him being conscious only half of the time isn't what I can call satisfying.

Secondly because at the end for Xiao's sacrifice, I would have absolutely loved it if Yelan AND Itto were the one to go and get him. I mean the two people who caused this whole thing (not entirely, but if they didn't fought in the first place...). Itto would never want to see someone close to him sacrifice themselves for him, Yelan cannot allow that to happen again.

One of them is spontaneous enough to jump, the other one is protective (and traumatized) enough to jump. I don't see why this didn't happen to be honest.

[salora-rainriver]

Deconstructing the Redpill Romantic Ideology #1: Replika is not worthy competition

(i dont actually know if thisll be a series but what i do know is i have essay-level thoughts about a specific brand of redpiller and their hot takes on how romance works and a gang of professional snarkers started begging me to make a blog, which made me realize I already have a blog)

you've seen takes like these and you probably don't need an essay to understand why it's deeply silly.

However, I'm not satisfied with saying "this is deeply silly" and leaving it at that, because the degree and level to which it is deeply silly and yet is a position sincerely held by multiple otherwise probably-fairly-educated-and-intelligent-humans indicates how much a very narrow view of human sexuality has embedded itself inside the human psyche, because takes like these are not only wrong, the mere premise they're built on is utterly fallacious.

so let's explore that premise!

On the surface it's a very simple argument:

AI is getting smarter, robots are getting more realistic, sex work is the oldest profession, and it can be automated. If a robot is a more ideal partner than a human woman, then men will choose the robots over human women, and without these man/woman partnerships, society will collapse and the birth rate will plummet.

but if we dig deeper into this argument, there's a few more premises here than are explicitly stated. you might THINK this is a simple argument because explicit and clearly-stated premises like "AI is getting smarter" and "sex work can be automated" are actually not fallacious. that makes sense, but here's the problem:

"If a robot is a more ideal partner than a human woman, then men will choose the robots over human women"

"without these man/woman partnerships, society will collapse and the birth rate will plummet."

these two statements are assuming a LOT. I don't care to talk about birth rates and reproduction (BLEH), so let's focus on what that first one is assuming to be true. I'll lay it out right now. If what the doomsayers claim is true, and the advent of deeply realistic sex robots and girlfriend AIs will lead men to choose sex robots and girlfriend AIs over women, then the following must also be true:

a) the only romantic or sexual competition women have at the moment is other women b) the sexual desire of women is either totally absent, or irrelevant to this issue c) when someone chooses a partner, they will only choose one d) human beings are perfectly capable of assessing who would be an ideal partner for them e) human beings actively choose who to be sexually and romantically attracted to, and they always make this decision after a careful analysis of every option in front of them. f) men want perfect partners g) companionship and sex are the primary benefits to having a romantic partner, and "companionship" can be replicated with a machine that engages in private one-on-one conversations.

and believe me when I tell you NONE OF THIS IS UNIVERSALLY TRUE.

actually you don't even need to just take my word for it, bcs this is a deranged rant and I'm gonna break it all down. because the level of which these people don't understand is fascinating and I feel like it demonstrated the power of this heteronormative mind trap that most of the world is somehow still caught in!

---------

a) the sexual desire of women is either totally absent, or irrelevant to this issue

this is, I think, the most obvious issue with the premise that people will notice. "hey, women are horny too?" and i think most people also see how this demonstrates the background radiation of blatant misogyny that's constantly permeating these arguments. Bcs come the fuck on, do you not think women are people, or something? they have choices too, they don't just accept shit. they could also replace men with robots if they wanted to.

"okay but this doesn't change anything. you've just demonstrated that the robot threat is still present, it's just working both ways" yeah no, fair enough! But now let's talk about...

b) the only romantic or sexual competition women have at the moment is other women (for the non-gendered version of this, swap out "women" for "people")

this is utterly laughable.

women are most certainly not the only romantic competition of other women. For starters, this assumes exclusive heterosexuality, and gay people exist. bi people exist. sometimes a woman's competition is a man, sometimes a man's competition is a woman. If we start talking about nonbinary people, we're gonna be here forever.

some are ace and don't have romantic or sexual competition at all, because they don't even want to compete!

But of course you could argue that queer people are a minority so this statement still stands for the vast majority of people. even if it didn't, we're still looking at a situation where the only romantic and sexual competition people have is other people.

and uh,

no.

come on, we're on the internet. here's a short list of things that have at least slightly substituted for romantic and sexual contact for like, MOST people:

fictional characters, sex toys, pornography, sex workers, dating sims, self-insert fanfiction, and unhealthy parasocial crushes on celebrities.

there's also other secondary benefits to having a partner that can be readily substituted with things that aren't romantic or sexual, such as:

really close friendships, pets, dolls, plushies, plants, virtual pets, more parasocial relationships, and family members.

there's a lot of fucking competition out there when it comes to something assessing whether or not they actually need your services as a romantic partner. Shockingly, this has not destroyed society, and the institution of marriage has not been systematically dismantled by beatlemania, Sasuke Uchiha, playboy magazine, strip clubs, BDSM clubs, the concept of a 'waifu', the entire romance novel industry, self-insert fanfiction, queerplatonic partnerships, glory holes, cat ladies, plant mamas, HuniePop, adults with stuffed animal collections, RealDolls, or your really sweet grandma who's always there for you.

so forgive me if I'm skeptical of the idea that a realistic ai-powered sex doll is going to take the dating world by storm, because this is already a hotly competitive field where many niches have already been filled. What can this sexbot offer that isn't just a slight improvement to the girlfriend-replacers already on the market? seriously.

but also, the entire concept of conceiving of the process of human mate selection like a marketplace is full of problematic assumptions. for starters...

c) when someone chooses a partner, they will only choose one

"not everyone's polyamorous, gaby" THIS ISN'T ABOUT POLYAMORY, HAVE YOU NOT NOTICED THE LEVEL OF INFIDELITY THAT HAPPENS IN NORMAL SOCIETY WITH NORMAL PEOPLE?

people get hella greedy. Even if we take the most stereotypical average guy and put him in this hypothetical situation where he's picking between perfect robot and imperfect human woman, why are we assuming he won't fuck them both? let's not be fucking naiive.

honestly, given how men and women treat their fictional crushes when they simultaneously have actual real life partners, even a faithful monogamous man will probably consider the sex doll with the same level of romantic commitment as his gf considers her vibrator: "eh, when the bae isn't around".

and while we're deconstructing the perception of human mate-selection as a marketplace of romance, let's talk about the classic problem of idealized market economics:

d) human beings are perfectly capable of assessing who would be an ideal partner for them

most folks get easily tricked into buying inferior products, so why are we so confident in the assertion that people will actually understand what an ideal romantic partner looks like? also consider how little information we tend to have on the "product" we are "buying".

people fall for abusive relationships much like they fall for scams: they're ill-informed on both the product and their best interests, they're subjected to manipulative communication strategies, their judgement may be impaired by internal or external sources, and then they're pressured into hasty decisions.

and unless sexbot companies get really fucking aggressive with their marketing, I'm not sure they'll be able to compete with your average toxic person.

"but Gaby, that's a really dystopian situation you're describing. in fact, it's more dystopian than what the sexbot doomsayers are predicting" YES, IT IS! in fact, if this was the only flaw of the premise, I would actively be speaking out against the development of sexbots, specifically because I'm aware of how insidious marketing is at convincing you that an inferior product is top of the line. honestly the fact that you're not considering the factor of deception and abuse in this situation shows that you need to get back to the books and get a better perspective on what human romance and sexuality truly entails beyond idealized formulaic scenarios.

but also... there's a way more fundamental assumption we're making with all of this:

e) human beings actively choose who to be sexually and romantically attracted to, and they always make this decision after a careful analysis of every option in front of them.

the more you think about this one, the more baffling it is.

Read that sentence again. visualize what it's describing. does that feel true to you? does that look like human behavior? does that at all align with what you've seen happening in the world?

Do I... really need to explain to you that people very rarely choose to fall in love, that love is sudden, seemingly arbitrary, illogical, subjected to raw whim, and scarcely understood? You... you already know that.

You've grown up reading this, watching this, hearing about this, feeling it. You know that the decision to love someone isn't

so... how exactly can the world of human romance ever be even remotely like a marketplace? the analogy is completely broken at even the most basic level, so why do we cling to it? has our market-based economy completely infected our minds?

You could use this perfect idealized robot as your replacement girlfriend for your entire life, but never love her, because she's not actually a person, and then you look at a new friend and you realize you *want* her. Not someone like her, not someone as good or better than her, just *her*.

Superior competition can't kill love, because love doesn't understand the meaning of 'superior'.

f) men want perfect partners

Breaking this down would just copy a bunch of what I talked about in the previous section, but I'd like to discuss where logical decisions do factor into mate decision, when immediate and obvious feelings of love aren't present, and the person is forced to consider the pros and cons of a partnership with... i guess you could say 'logic'.

let's face it, lots of people find perfection boring. Humans will actively seek out flawed partners for lots of reasons.

Sometimes they don't feel like it's a flaw. I for one think that blemishes, spots, and wrinkles are beautiful in their own way. It's fun for me to draw those sorts of faces, because it's more difficult to properly capture than the idealized smoothed-out doll face, and I love looking at them, because there can be so much detail and expression. even at their most perfectly gorgeous and realistic, I'd probably find the sex doll butt-ugly.

Some people are into the flaws on a level higher than I am, even. there's a kink for everything, and if you're here, you're probably aware of chubby chasers, hybristophiliacs, monsterfuckers, and whoever the fuck is the target audience for the yandere archetype. I don't think a sanitized sex doll will appeal to them.

Some look at a broken person and want to fix them, to care for them.

... Some look for broken people because they're easier to manipulate and turn loyal.

and all of that, of course, could hypothetically be accounted by the sex doll manufacturers. older-woman-with-cellulite doll. big nose doll. yandere doll. abuse survivor doll. maybe in the sex doll dystopia, there's a doll for everyone.

... the problem is that companies are lazy. and cowardly. if a type of appeal is too niche, no one will want to make it. these dolls are going to take a lot of work and money to produce. think about the videogame industry. lots of people with lots of different personal tastes. and it's a huge industry catering to all of those tastes... but most really big, really expensive games are middle of the road "safe" options, designed to appeal to as many as possible.

and now let's remember how poorly business executives can understand the desires of their target audience.

you're not gonna get your perfect partner. you're gonna get a bland idea of a "perfect partner" for "everyone", and she's gonna be boring. all the interesting sex bots will be low-budget and less realistic.

g) companionship and sex are the primary benefits to having a romantic partner

... and there's gonna be some things a robot and ai could never give you.

for starters, an AI can't touch you. lots of humans want a partner for the simple reason that they're touch-starved. I've heard predictions that the sexbots of the future will have realistic and warm human touch, but I do wonder how feasible that will truly be ...and there's something psychological about being touch-starved, too. People have created soft things to simulate the warmth and pressure of human touch, and I've tried some of those, and the thing is, even knowing there's not a real human makes the feeling different. no matter how realistic the sexbot is, you're gonna know she's not real.

and... some humans want children. again, someone may argue you could create a false robotic child very easily, but again, you would know that's just a doll.

and sometimes the people who want a partner are looking for someone to not just emotionally, but materially support them. Sexbots cannot do labor. they can't pay the bills. they can't cook. they can't clean. At best, maybe it'll be a virtual secretary you can fuck, but it's not exactly sound groundbreaking to put SIRI and a girlfriend AI into a blow-up doll, now does it?

and maybe you've forgotten... we're all in a society. Some people look for a partner solely because they want the status of not being single. the status of getting laid. the status of 'bagging' a girl. the status of having physical proof that you're desirable.

a fake girlfriend is never going to give you that, no matter how realistic she is.

----

and all of that's just... obvious, isn't it? I mean, normally I'd do heavy research if I wanted to deconstruct a widespread idea, but here, that'd be excessive. What, I'm supposed to prove with empirical data that love is irrational? that people get into relationships just to seek social status, financial stability, or a live-in maid you can fuck? that people want children, real children and not just dolls of children? that abusers seek out the vulnerable? that some people want to fuck Jason Voorhees? that men sometimes cheat on their gfs because they just wanted to bang another woman? that human beings aren't perfectly rational buyers? that gay people exist and women get horny?

This is... all common knowledge. So why does this bizarre view of the world of dating, sex, and romance as some sort of marketplace of perfect rational customers even exist? what sort of brainworm has captured our society to such an extent that we've all accepted this viewpoint as a valid take? why have so many fallen for it?

I suppose the easy explanation is "these men just hate women. they've never loved a woman and they don't know what it's like, so they imagine it'd be the same as what they feel when jacking off to their favorite porn," but that doesn't...

surely there isn't an epidemic of straight men who've never fallen in love. and even if there was, surely they've seen other straight men falling in love. and if they haven't... why not?

or do they think it's all a lie, that such kinds of love only happen in movies and books? are they lonely in other ways, no friends, no acquaintances, no casual parties or people-watching or talking about others with a coworker or neighbor? how deep is the bubble they're in to have them never encounter even one of the things I've discussed above, or at the least to never consider the implications of them as embodied refutations of this deeply cynical view of human relationships?

is it just that you don't care what women want, or you don't think their desires would ever produce realistic male sexbots for whatever reason?

do you think that all the porn and waifus in the world haven't cured your loneliness so you're not sure why they'd ever be in competition with real women?

or conversely, you're fully aware that they're competing with women, you think they're superior to women in every way, and you just see sexbots as the next step towards the impending obsolescence of women?

do you comprehend perfectly the notion of infidelity and non-monogamous coupling, but simply envision that no reasonable guy would want to cheat on Replika with a real woman?

do you see the fallibility of human rationality as irrelevant... or alternately, that these AI girlfriends offer a security that real women cannot give, because the AI will never surprise you?

have you never experienced a sudden and irrational desire for a very specific person, not someone like them, but only them, and you think the people who claim to have felt this are lying?

do you think the men who fall for and desire the imperfect are either lying or fundamentally broken? same for the men who want a woman capable of supporting them financially?

is the concept of wanting to care for another human being on an intimate level, just for the sake of seeing them become happier and healthier, an innately alien concept to you?

do you think yourself so deeply in the trenches of social status that you've come to spite the entire concept of it, resigned yourself to a life of being intensely undesirable, and thus how could you ever get better than this facsimile... and yet you still think your departure from the dating pool will be missed by those who've never wanted you?

have you just been holding mutually exclusive beliefs in your head this entire time, and simply never had the moment to stop, look at yourself, and realize this?

What else has broken in your mind, that you think a corporate product in the shape of a sex object will absolve you of any need for human connection?

and.... do you think we're all like that?

[avaetin]

In your recent post, the three kids are the Fates right? That's the name of the Fates. But then in your post they call Nico Mother and maybe Chronos Father. But in pjo it's Nyx who is officially their mother though. Also they're old ladies in the books. Can you pls explain? I'm invested in this au and want to know more. Thanks

This is very interesting, and to be honest, I'm surprised anyone would ask lol. Just for sending an interesting ask, I hope I can return an interesting set of answers.

To confirm, in my recent post, the three kids were the Fates. Yes, they are canonically depicted as old ladies with cotton robes, wearing white bandanas on their heads.

First of all, we're not going the canon route. Fun fact, there is actually some interesting articles which suggests that how you see The Fates depends on how you've lived your life. This doesn't explain clearly why Nico sees the Fates as children (because that is essential to the plot and I'm not willing to share at the moment), but it somewhat explains why the rest of the Seven and Reyna see The Fates in the same way - because their experiences in life are essentially the same.

Second, yes, they call Nico as 'Mother' and Chronos as 'Father'. Yes, canonically, Nyx was said to be their mother in The House of Hades. Though I think Rick forgot that in "Percy Jackson's Greek Gods", he stated they were the children of Zeus and Themis. Again, we are going off the canon route LOL.

In my headcanon post, I indicated The Fates as "self-created" under Ananke's section. In my notes, I think I have a chapter or two that explains that. Ananke being their mother... well, in some texts, Ananke is considered as the Mother of the Fates because she is considered the most powerful dictator of fate and circumstance and is thought to be the only being to influence the decisions of The Fates. She was created before The Fates, and with what she represents, it makes sense. Incorporating it into the story, another headcanon of mine is that while the protegonos are the only ones who dare to challenge the Fates (this is canon because even gods don't dare), only Ananke (their mother) can truly tamper and defy them.

As for Chronos being their father, in truth, he isn't. But they acknowledge him as their father because Ananke is their mother. Only Phanes was created by both Chronos and Ananke. So you can consider Chronos as their stepfather or something LOL!

For this story though, we're going to follow through with Nyx claiming that they are hers though, and a certain primordial responding to it otherwise lol.

Hope the above answers help!

[beck-a-leck]

how do luke and leia find out about padme? b/c luke is closer with anakin here, i can't see him being as dedicated to finding their father as leia is (from his point of view, it makes no sense that his sister's chasing after a man who clearly didn't want them). but leia would probably be a little obsessed with finding her dad, especially when she starts picking up on the fact that anakin very clearly Doesn't Want To Talk About It

Oh man, Nonny, idek if you're still here after almost a month. Sorry I didn't mean to drop this thread in the middle. I got busy around that time and responding to asks fell through the swiss cheese holes in my brain. Sorry!

I think how the twins find out who their father is greatly would depend on the details of the AU.

Like if Padme has been present in their lives the whole time, I imagine the twins wouldn't have had a father identified while they were children. Like he's still there, he's part of their lives, he's not going to get too upset that they don't know he's their father. It's what they have to do so he can still see his kids, because otherwise the Jedi likely wouldn't be okay with it. (Like, the jedi are still suspiciously side-eyeing that whole relationship between Padme and Anakin and her kids, because it's not not allowed that Anakin have outside friendships, and single-parenting is hard and she's allowed to have her support structure wherever it comes from. But they're also watching those relationships for potential compromising attachments because they know Anakin has a history with those)

He and Anakin probably came to the decision when the twins were still babies so they could grow up in the temple and get the benefits of their Jedi training and education and still have their father in their life. They probably would be told once they're 18 or so, grown adults who can actually make their own decisions about their personal lives. And also being adults now the rules about knowledge/contact with a Jedi's birth family becomes a little more lax. They would probably have a whole formal sit-down, serious conversation about it.

I imagine in this situation both Luke and Leia would have a "What do you mean we've known our father ALL OUR LIVES!?!?! And you never said ANYTHING!" ('Honestly, Leia, in retrospect, it's kind of obvious.' 'Seriously, Luke, they kept that secret for eighteen years! HOW?)

If in the AU Padme ended up not being in his kids lives, for whatever reason, be it a "this is too painful for me, I can't be here seeing them but not being able to know them. tell them when they're old enough and can come find me." or other less amiable reasons. I think Anakin would still not tell the kids who their father is until they're old enough to understand the circumstances. But given that she Definitely Doesn't Want To Talk About It Ever whenever the kids ask, and likely gives no indication of "I'll tell you everything when you're 18" or something, they probably would be more determined to figure out the mystery. If anything just to have an answer to a question the adults in their life refuse to answer. They probably would dig a little harder and jump to their own conclusions as to who their father is with more fervor.

I think the refusal of an answer is what bothers the twins more than the actual question.

I don't think not having a father/potentially not being wanted would necessarily bother them. Nobody in the Jedi temple has a traditional family, and most of the kids they're growing up with won't know either of their parents. I don't think the cultural pressure of knowing who you are based upon your parents is as heavy. (And let's be honest, Anakin's basically a Jedi Superstar, none of the twins' peers are gonna care one bit who their father is because their mom is SO COOL!)

[tanadrin]

@ill-posed-problem

I'm in favour of most cosmetic surgeries but I think you're missing the point, these leftists aren't against bodily autonomy, they don't think it applies when the person isn't thinking clearly. If someone wanted to amputate their arm because having it reminds them of past trauma and someone objected, you'd have to be pretty dense to conclude they are against bodily autonomy.

I think this is a really poorly thought out counterargument, for multiple reasons.

One--"this person isn't thinking clearly" is not, in itself, a good reason to deny bodily autonomy. This excuse has been used to deny people bodily autonomy countless times in the past, whether forcing on them medical interventions they don't want (like lobotomies) or preventing them from access care they do want (as many young women seeking procedures like tubal ligation or hysterectomies can attest). Ultimately because you can choose a standard of "thinking clearly" arbitrarily, you are saying simply, with heartfelt condescension, "if someone has preferences I disagree with strongly enough, I can deny their preferences and substitute my own."

Two--it's a bad example. People don't want to cut their arm off because of trauma. There are people who want to have otherwise healthy limbs amputated, and people with body dysmorphia (NB people sometimes mix these up--"dysmorphia" and "dysphoria" are different words with different usages) who are perennially unhappy with their appearance no matter how many cosmetic procedures they get. But, crucially, these people are still adults who can make their own decisions. If (big if!) their conditions are treatable by talk therapy, you can't force them into talk therapy against their will. And since in this application this argument is exactly isomorphic to the arguments deployed against trans people (down to assuming there exists some magical super-effective form of talk therapy that can arbitrarily alter people's preferences), I take a very jaundiced view of it!

There are conditions that, as a society, we tend to view as sufficiently mentally disabling that we don't treat the preferences expressed within those conditions as authentic, like actual psychosis, mania, being very drunk, or being very depressed. We can dispute which conditions can be classified in this way, but I think a key attribute of most of them is that the preferences expressed are not consistent and are in conflict with preferences expressed when these conditions are less severe or absent. People often regret things they do when suffering from psychosis or mania; drunkenness directly affects our self-control; people may express preferences when very depressed (like a preference to die) that they later regret if their depression goes into remission or is successfully treated.

Body integrity identity disorder (the medical term for people who want a healthy limb amputated) is rare, and seems to me to not typically be accompanied by (say) psychosis. It also seems resistant to treatment, and is more akin to body dysmorphia, and there is, IIRC, some indication that people with BIID who do successfully get the offending part amputated are often quite happy with the outcome. It is much better that this should happen in a hospital, rather than in some home amputation scenario where they might bleed out and die. There are also people into castration as a sexual fetish, for instance--these are not people who have had a break with reality, they are under no illusions as to the medical consequences of such a thing, and if that's their turn-on, they should probably be allowed to pursue it! That's a bullet I can easily bite. I don't get it. I certainly don't share that preference. But "you like things that spook the normies" is not a reason to deny someone a free choice. That argument has been used against LGBT people for decades, and it's horseshit.

Lastly--very many more common body modifications (tattoos, boob jobs, rhinoplasties, piercings) have consequences that are just as permanent, it's just that, as a culture, we happen to classify them as normal, because they are common. It's quite a circular logic, isn't it? If we define as acceptable only preferences that are widely shared, we are not building a liberal society, but one of reactionary conformism where any notable deviation is punished, and people are afraid to express their preferences out of fear theirs will be seen as too strange and they will be punished for it.

We also do not ban people from joining the military, or skydiving in those super-dangerous wingsuits, or doing daredevil motorcycle stunts, or drinking because they might regret it, even though those all are, to some extent, notably risky activities that might seriously harm your body. So even the criterion of "your preferences might eventually change" is a pretty bad one!

not a big fan of how bodily autonomy as a value seems to be strongly rejected by a lot of leftists

[darklinaforever]

Daemon as parent :

Many believe that Daemon is portrayed as a bad father because of the deleted scene where he hugs his daughters after Laena's death. And while it was a shitty decision to cut that scene, to say that without it Daemon is portrayed as a bad dad is just plain wrong.

I'm going to split the pear between those who think Daemon is actually a great dad, and others who think he's a crap dad, saying, like Laena:

“He is doing his best. »

Note that in the first place, episode 6 shows us only a tiny and tiny part of the family life that Daemon has led until now. And during the episode, we are clearly shown, as on the side of Rhaenyra, the worst pass of this current life. So judging Daemon's paternity through this brief moment in his life isn't very fair/fair.

Going back to her relationship with her daughters, I think people easily forget that short but very cute scene where we see Daemon teaching Baela the High Valerian, and before she goes to bed, she kisses both her father and her mother. The relationship between Daemon and his daughter Baela therefore seems good, and nothing indicates otherwise.

A little later in the episode, however, we learn that Rhaena, Daemon's second daughter, unlike her sister, has still not seen her dragon egg hatch. The little one therefore seems full of uncertainty, even going so far as to place herself below the other members of her family, judging herself less important because she has no dragon. In that same scene, she also states that Daemon is ignoring her. However, before taking Rhaena's words at face value, it is important to remember that it is very common for a child of this age to feel ignored by a parent, or to think they are less loved than their siblings, especially if the child in question has a particular insecurity. Which, here, is the case for Rhaena.

Another important detail, Laena defends Daemon to her daughter, saying, as I said before, that he does his best.

And I sincerely think it is, otherwise the episode would have shown us Daemon being a horrible father, and probably Laena taking him back on that. However, once again, she defends him instead.

Laena is not a victim. She's a Velaryon. She of Targaryen blood, descends from ancient Valerya and rides Vaghar, the greatest dragon in the world. It's certainly not Daemon who will scare him.

We see that she confronts him on the subjects that bother him. She takes him back to his current state. That he's not himself, that he actually has no interest in Pentos, hides in the books of the library, hardly sleeps anymore, that he lies saying that his brother and his house don't he doesn't miss it. Hell, she even tells him she knows she's not the woman he wanted. (And we all know she knows about Rhaenyra) If Daemon was mistreating Rhaena, as some idiots think since this episode, she definitely would have reprimanded him about it.

Moreover, this discussion between Laena and Daemon takes place after the discussion between Laena and Rhaena. An important detail to note. The little one is full of her father's behavior, Laena defends him and goes to talk to him right after, finally letting us finally understand as a spectator that Daemon is in fact in a very bad situation.

What we see in this episode is actually a brooding, self-exiling Daemon trying to be content with his current life and family, but missing Viserys and more specifically Rhaenyra, which plunges him into an undeniable depression.

He tones down his true nature in an attempt to be happy, but it doesn't work, and gets worse over time. Laena will tell him “The man I married was worth more than that. which shows that their marriage wasn't always like this.

Daemon has always been a chaotic being, having trouble expressing his emotions properly. But with his current state, it's even worse.

I don't think he dislikes Rhaena because she doesn't have a dragon. It's stupid to say that. Viserys doesn't have a dragon either, I remind you, and yet we all know that Daemon undeniably loves his big brother.

But technically, Viserys, in addition to being his older brother, was also his father figure for much of his life. It is therefore normal that Daemon particularly likes him. Although it may also explain Daemon's difficulties with being a father, in addition to his depression. Let's not forget after all that Viserys made mistakes, and wasn't the best father or brother in the world.

Personally, I think Daemon may not really know how to comfort Rhaena about her lack of a dragon, or even how to properly broach this subject. The fact that Baela's egg has hatched presumably allows Daemon to facilitate a connection with his daughter. From what we've seen in the series so far, I think Baela's impulsiveness is the one who looks the most like Daemon, which must have helped a lot in their relationship as well.

But to say he likes Rhaena less than Baela, ignores her or mistreats her because we haven't seen any direct scenes between them is ridiculous.

In episode 8 we see Daemon being affectionate with his son Viserys II, but not really with Aegon III when he introduces them to his brother along with Rhaenyra. Does that mean Daemon likes Aegon III less than Viserys II? Ignore him or mistreat him? I do not think so.

As for Daemon finally not hugging his daughters, I can understand that. In view of his depression presented in the episode, plus the death of Laena, he must have felt lost and confused. Such an event is hard to manage, even more so to explain it to your own children. Also, I don't find that he seems cold with them during this scene, but rather tense, giving the impression of not knowing what to say or do exactly at such a time.

This is not to say that Daemon is ignoring his daughters, which is at odds with the scene where he is seen having the High Valerian study at Baela earlier in Episode 6.

Let's move on to episode 7, where Daemon remains alone during Laena's funeral. At this point, Daemon is still in a depressed state, from which he will only come out at the end of the episode with his marriage to Rhaenyra. That he stays away from his daughters here is not inconsistent if he is still in this negative phase. It would have made sense even if he had taken it upon himself to console them (as he should have been, stupid director) in Episode 6.

Then we have a scene where Daemon tells Viserys that his home is Pentos and HIS children's, showing that he considers and thinks of them both. Not just Baela.

Some might say that was hypocritical, as he eventually decides to stay to be with Rhaenyra. But there is a difference though. Viserys' proposal brings him nothing. Go back to the course and its endless problems? What would that bring to him and his children? Not to mention that Otto is back as a hand, and I doubt Daemon wants to hang out with him, or his kids around. How long can he stay? His next exile? In comparison, Rhaenyra offers him everything he ever wanted. Her to start with. Then a position to assist her and their House. Not to mention a family that will really care about him and make him feel important and exist. There's also living in Dragonstone, the literal birthplace of their House. Daemon would definitely feel at home there, and I'm sure he would love to live there and raise his children there.

For those who criticize that Daemon didn't react to Baela and Rhaena when they were injured, unlike Rhaenyra who rushed to his sons, let me explain my point.

Already, it is important to note that Daemon and Rhaenyra arrive together in the great hall. However, Daemon stays behind, only glancing a little before leaning against the wall, almost as if trying not to be noticed. Besides, apart from Otto, no one seems to have done so. Here I think it's worth remembering that Daemon returned with a half scruffy Rhaenyra from a "night walk". If he had gone to his daughters, as Rhaenyra did to her sons, people, despite the commotion, seeing that they were arriving together would have speculated as to his reasons, especially in view of the state of the clothes. and Rhaenyra's hairstyle. Not to mention that 10 years ago, Rhaenyra and Daemon were at the heart of a huge scandal, accused of being lovers. I clearly think Daemon wanted to avoid drawing attention to them in the first place. After all, they buried Laena just hours ago. Imagine the scandal!

Then, as I said before, Daemon took one look before leaning against the wall to start observing the scene.

I think that by taking a quick look, Daemon must have seen that his daughters were with their grandparents, (more particularly their grandmother Rhaenys) and therefore that they weren't risking anything. In fact, it is even sure, since they were directly in his song of vision if one observes well. What is to be put in context, since the children of Rhaenyra, them, had nobody to supervise them, Laenor (their official father and husband of Rhaenyra) being absent. Logical therefore that Rhaenyra, the only rampart between her children and a possible danger, rushes towards them.

Daemon on the other hand does not have this problem, as his daughters are not alone. I probably think that after seeing where they were, and were fine, Daemon must have wanted to stay in his corner to observe and understand what exactly was going on.

Despite the chaos, the situation is still clear. There was an accident. Aemond has his eye gouged out. Rhaenyra's sons and Daemon's daughters scuffled with him. Here it is important to remember that Daemon is a warrior. So I don't think a fight between kids would freak him out. Even in Episode 8, it doesn't seem to particularly affect him, more like making him laugh. Daemon did not seem to take into account the concept of “gender” so far. If he had had boys I definitely think he would have reacted the same way. Another important element, here are the sons of Rhaenyra and do not have the daughters of Daemon the targets as for the wound of Aemond. This moment is therefore about Rhaenyra. And that, I think Daemon understood perfectly. Clearly, whatever her daughters had in it, they fear nothing because Rhaenyra's sons were with them. So the focus will automatically shift to the boys, already frowned upon for being "bastards", and Daemon wants to see how Rhaenyra will handle it all.

Daemon in this scene stands back, not because he's cold or indifferent but because he probably wants to see the big picture and be able to properly observe it. This is Daemon's chance to see how these people he hasn't seen in 10 years behave. I also suspect that he particularly enjoys the show. After all, Daemon is an agent of chaos, and chaos begets chaos. It's a real chaotic scene that unfolds before Daemon's eyes at this moment. His life having been pretty quiet for the past 10 years, I think a part of him must have loved seeing that.

Episode 8 now, which should bury once and for all the idea that Daemon is a bad father.

Already, we can see that Daemon is clearly out of her depression, happy for 6 years with Rhaenyra in Dragonstone. This can be seen just with his first scene where he is very happy to have recovered 3 eggs from Syrax for his 3 children with Rhaenyra, to the point that he repeats “3 eggs” twice. It's adorable, and the first time we've seen him so happy since the start of the series.

During the episode, we can also see Daemon being affectionate with Viserys II, running his hand through his hair, or trying to calm him down with a grimace when he starts crying, frightened by the appearance of Viseyrys I. We also have Daemon beheading Vaemond for (among other things) insulting his step sons Jacaerys, Lucerys and Joeffrey as bastards.

But what about Daemon and his daughters? Already, we have Baela writing to Daemon at the start of the episode warning him of Vaemond's plans for the Lamark claim. Technically it shows Daemon and Baela's relationship isn't bad. (It would have been surprising since she was never shown as such) If so, Baela would have written to Rhaenyra. And if all of their relationships had been bad for the past few years, Baela might not have written to them at all.

As for the character of Rhaena, it's true that we don't see her much during the episode, but from the little that we saw of her, she seemed happy and satisfied with her life, and without any apparent grudge towards her father. . She even sits next to Daemon during dinner. An interesting detail in my opinion, since she wasn't in episode 6, where she felt she was being ignored by her father.

Then we have Daemon coming between Aemond and ALL of his family. Because yes, even if he basically intervened to prevent yet another fight between Lucerys, Jacaerys and Aemond, in the end he is still between Aemond and ALL his family. Not just boys. It's not just Lucerys and Jacaerys behind Daemon, but also Rhaenyra, Rhaena, and Baela. This is important to note, knowing that Aemond becomes the strongest enemy of the opposing camp later and it is Daemon who will face him. So here we have Daemon, placed (as always) as protector of his family. I like this scene all the more that Rhaenyra, while Daemon serves as a shield against Aemond, sends all the children back to their rooms.

It's also interesting to see how Daemyra's children are different from Alicent's. We see that all their children seem happy and fulfilled, unlike those of Alicent who are all in a rather deplorable mental state… This alone proves that they were good parents. Their family seems to be united in the best possible way.

I think this episode for sure breaks the idea, based on episode 6 for some, that Daemon is a bad father when he was at that time in a period of depression without Rhaenyra and his brother. I don't see how people could continue to think/say that at this point. (Although I would still hate that they cut the hug between Daemon and his daughters in episode 6… You morons)

[laundryandtaxes]

It is really not the fault of any particular justice on the court that Americans have grown so accustomed to paying their Congressmen to do absolutely nothing that they've come to think of the role of Supreme Court as meting out entirely new rights rather than primarily as acting as a check on the power of the other two branches of government, and it is also not the fault of anyone on the court that Congressional gridlock has lead presidents to allow agencies to outright make up new laws to enforce as they go, rather than appropriately waiting for Congress to give them new powers they don't have, or to put forth a new rule for them to enforce, because otherwise they have almost no hope of making any agenda a reality. I think a lot of liberals are seeing what their government was intended to look like right now and finding that they strongly dislike it, but that's not the same as any particular ruling being "illegitimate," it's an indicator that they personally dislike the way this government was framed. With the EPA case in particular, it is astonishing that media has reported on the case primarily through the impact it will have, but it is absolutely true that presidents have allowed and encouraged federal agencies to just pretend laws exist that they wish did, in order to get those agencies to do things they want without having to go through Congress because almost nothing makes it through Congress except warwaging funds and a functional budget; agencies pretending laws exist that don't is not a small deal and then enforcing them, it can lead outright to the end of democracies as unelected bureaucrats take up powers never given to them by the legislators who ostensibly represent the people. One example that has personally irritated me has been the ATF suddenly deciding that bump stocks are machine guns (even though they absolutely are not firearms or even a crucial firearm component, and they certainly do not meet the definition of a machine gun offered up by Congress via legislation) and banning them on that clearly illegitimate and outright fraudulent basis. But even people who care about access to bump stocks just don't actually care that much about access to bump stocks, so it doesn't worry people. But if federal agencies get to literally just decide the law doesn't matter when it comes to their aims and what they are entasked with doing, they could do all sorts of things. Imagine if Trump, who attempted toward the end of his term to reign in this kind of behavior from federal agencies, had leaned into it instead and been smart enough to figure out that he could have used the precedent of rogue agency action to his advantage and easily claimed he was not doing anything new or unusual- he could have had an important agency decide that "elector" or "vote" for instance, just didn't mean what the law said it meant, and used that agency to enforce non-existing law. Imagine some administration redefining "speech" pertaining to freedom of speech. It's easy to get angry at justices whose job was not intended to be making decisions about the daily lives of Americans, much harder to hold your Congress members to account for their abject refusal to do the job for which they are paid astounding sums and fix problems.

[omegasamwilson]

I literally had a panic attack when I watched Ayo take off Bucky's arm. I was born without my left arm and see a lot of myself in Bucky. I have a prosthetic and had to stop the episode and watch it later. And it really hurt me to see your completely disregard that and say I have no right to be upset. It really pisses me off. I'm fully acknowledging that Bucky did a terrible thing, and he needed to be stopped. But she didn't have to remove his arm. He wouldn't have hurt her. To see you refer to his arm in the tags as a weapon further hurt me. It's not a fucking weapon, it's his fucking arm. You're trying to twist this into a race issue when it's about fucking ableism. I'm brown not black so I don't know if you'll accept my concerns with your post

Hi, one, I apologize for what is sure to be a very long and very frustrated statement. But I’m dealing with a lot of shit rn (actually related to race and ableism specifically) but I wanted to respond because my ADHD ass will forget otherwise.

Okay. One, you say “he wouldn’t have hurt her.”

We, the audience, knows that. Ayo did not. What she knows is that the man before her was an assassin and sniper, even before he was captured and forced to kill by HYDRA. He was a WWII sniper and seemed to be quite skilled (I’m going to assume that’s one of the reasons HYDRA tried to experiment on him and picked him to he the winter soldier.) In any case, this newly reformed (and at the time, just barely reformed. As in, he was healed a month, maybe two months before the events of infinity war. So he’s been healed for a whopping seven months.) This newly reformed assassin, who had been the victim of either chemical or otherwise mental subjugation freed a terrorist from prison.

Not only did he free a terrorist from prison, he freed a terrorist that was obsessed with HYDRA. If any terrorist knew a back door to unlock the winter soldier again, it would be Baron Zemo, who knew each and every one of HYDRA’s secrets.

While Shuri is definitely brilliant, it’s entirely possible that HYDRA buried a safety within their “asset” just in case he was able to break his programming. It’s entirely possible that it was so well buried amongst the labyrinth that is the brain that even Shuri couldn’t find it. After all, Shuri isn’t a neuroscientist, and the brain is largely regarded as the final frontier. So it’s entirely possible that she missed buried programming.

So, we have a person that got rid of HYDRA’s programming seven months ago that just freed one of the only people on the planet that could have the information that could potentially reactivate the winter soldier. And THEN, we have a video of this man “acting” as the winter soldier in madripoor. This was uploaded on the internet and I’m assuming that Ayo saw it.

What proof does Ayo have that he won’t hurt her? That she won’t weaponize his arm and hurt her? What proof does she have that he’s not under Zemo’s control, that Zemo can’t control him in a second. The only thing she knows are that Bucky Barnes freed a terrorist that had access to all of HYDRA’s information, the terrorist appeared to control the winter soldier in madripoor, and it is entirely possible that there is buried programming designed to deactivate the winter soldier.

She deactivates it, realizes he’s fully in control of himself and says, “bast damn you, James.” As in, “fuck you for freeing a terrorist and acting like it isn’t a big deal. You are clearly acting on your own accord in this.”

And yes, it’s different being Black vs. being Brown. It isn’t to say that racism and ableism don’t intersect with Brown folks because obviously it does.

But l specifically asked for Black opinions bc of the demonization of Black folks, especially the trope of “big scary Black women” or “big scary Black men.”

It’s ironic I see this today when I have a story that is so relevant and anger inducing.

I work with white parents of Black children, usually through adoption since I work primarily with lgbt parents, but I do have some cis het white parents raising Black biological kids. One of the parents and friends got into it today because her autistic Black child got into it with their sibling (also disabled). The sibling intentionally triggered their older sibling and punched them and it escalated to the point where the bigger sibling finally reacted and shoved the younger sibling. It broke the younger kid’s glasses. The youngest is legally blind and needs very expensive and specific prescription classes to even have 20/40 vision.

The mom called the police on her child and the kid was arrested and charged. She is 15. Mom described the kid as aggressive and awful and terrible and all sorts of names. A ww called the police on her Black 15 year old child having a meltdown. And she played into stereotypes that Black people, Black women, are aggressive/scary/angry. A ww could’ve gotten her child killed for having a meltdown because she broke a white child’s disability aid.)

A ww couldve gotten her child killed because she played into anti-Black stereotypes. That white people need protection from them. Even when the white child was initially the aggressor in the scenario.

Sure, it’s different, but it plays to the same stereotypes. Poor white disabled person needs protection from the aggressive scary Black person, and we’re just going to assume that the Black person was being unnecessarily aggressive because it plays into all of the stereotypes about Black people. No, there’s no way that this Black person was making a decision based on a series of evidence that could point to them genuinely being harmed.

(By the way, in the scenario of the two kids, I think they both needed help and support, and that the police shouldn’t have been called period.)

Nope, it’s just an aggressive Black person being ableist.

The same systems that have everyone seeing Bucky as a cute little uwu cinnamon roll in need of protection are what caused everyone to see Ayo as an aggressive ableist Black woman. White people usually get the benefit of the doubt. The best intentions are believed even when the evidence clearly says otherwise.

The evidence Ayo had indicated that she had no idea whether the winter soldier could’ve been reactivated and whether or not Bucky could’ve been under zemo’s control. She had no idea. None. She made a decision based off that information. And the fact that Bucky didn’t react strongly indicated that he was acting on his own accord.

Mayhaps, Ayo might even have been trying to trigger the winter soldier. I just thought of this but it makes sense. That the WS would react very defensively and even potentially deadly to that level of fighting, even if his previous orders were different.

In any case, this situation isn’t comparable to every day disabled people because our disability aids to not double as weapons. Most people can’t do more harm with a prosthetic limb than they can with a regular limb. Bucky can. Bucky’s arm is also a weapon and that fact complicates matters considerably. If bucky’s arm were simply a regular arm with typical strength, it’d be a no brainer situation. But it’s not. We don’t know the wakanda enhancements of his arms, but we know in the comics, he could kill with a single punch using his arm. He uses his arm tactically to map his surroundings. He uses his arm to send off EMPs that can disabled weaponry. It even has a retractable blade for close combat. It is a disability aid that it also a weapon. It was designed to be a weapon. The normal conversations around disability aids don’t fit it because no one today has a disability aid that could kill someone in seconds and even cause larger scale damage with a targeted EMP.

And finally, I want to say this, I am truly sorry that you had a panic attack while watching the episode. That is never fair and it’s never fun to be triggered by television shows.

I do hope this helped to better explain and clarify my perspective.

[blossomingimagines]

Icarus

Harley Quinn x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2,703

Summary: Like Icarus she had flown too close to the sun and fell-- though you were certain the fall Icarus suffered from wasn't a descent into madness. It was unfortunate that she had always been your own sun. Always pulling you in no matter how far you may go to escape. You just hope you won't get too close this time. As you were sure this fall would be the greatest of all.

Notes: I saw this idea floating about and decided to give it a try. Hopefully it isn't too disappointing for you all. This is going to be left open-ended in case you all want more in this universe, which I don't know if you will. (You knew Harley Quinn before she was Harley Quinn. You were rivals, in whatever capacity, and she always beat you. Until suddenly you were her therapist at Arkham.)

I also got the idea from @kiraimagine. (Wanted to give credit where credit is due as this idea was a really good one and I enjoyed writing it.)

Warnings: Mental illnesses as depicted in Arkham.

The tale of Icarus was one that you were familiar with. How he had dreamed of something for his entire life and that had ended up being his downfall. Flying too close to the sun, despite the many warnings beforehand, and his plummet back to Earth. It was a tale that you associated with personally. For you were Icarus-- wanting something so bad that you would do anything to achieve it. No matter how far you would fall because of it.

Harleen Quinzel was your sun.

You had known her for most of your life. Meeting on the playground at the start of fifth grade-- you had tripped over something and ended up sprawled in front of her and her friends. Her golden-white locks pulled back into a loose ponytail as she stood above you. Her blue eyes mocking as she took in your expression. You had scrambled to your feet with fumbling apologies escaping your mouth. Your face became as red as the shirt she had been wearing. Despite your efforts, however pathetic they may have been, she had barely given you a second glance before walking away. Her ever-loyal posse following along like lap dogs. And, even as you turned to head back towards your friends, you couldn’t get her bright blue eyes out of your head. Making you feel like you were falling all over again. 

From then on a rivalry was born between the two of you-- whether you were aware of it or not. You were a person that wasn’t even in the same galaxy as her radar and suddenly you became the direct center of it. Whatever things you took interest in, Harleen always followed. Of course, it always looked like a complete coincidence that she ended up taking the same courses as you. Always excelling at everything she put her mind to-- you in a close second. 

Even as you aged, going from knobby-kneed kids to maturing teenagers, Harleen had made it her mission in life to always one-up you. To always make sure that she was around no matter what. The first day of your sophomore year had been a clear indicator of that fact.

The crowded hallways of Gotham High were roaring with life. From incoming freshmen that were trying to get their bearings to returning seniors that were establishing their claim as the rulers of the school. You just rolled your eyes at all the showboating that was going on as you made your way to your locker. A hand clutching on your bag as you were jostled for the millionth time by a football player. 

Finally catching sight of your locker was like a breath of fresh air. A small sliver of sanctuary that you needed within the bustling halls. However, as quickly as the happy feeling appeared it vanished without a trace at the sight of the woman leaning against the locker adjacent to yours. 

Harleen Quinzel-- in all her glory. 

Light blonde hair falling loosely past her shoulders. Painted lips pulled into a smirk as she listened to the jock standing before her. Though you could clearly tell she wasn’t actually listening. As her, normally sharp blue eyes were dull at the incessant rambling of the boy. 

Hoping that you could quickly open your locker and deposit everything before she noticed, you slowly made your way towards them. Seeing that she was still distracted by the jock, you felt a small smile tug at your lips. Glad that at least something was going your way today. 

You shouldn’t have celebrated so early. 

The moment you made contact with your lock a perfectly manicured hand appeared on top of yours. Your heart-stopping at the feeling of her smooth skin on yours. Your wide eyes meeting her devious blue as she smirked at you. Numbly you noted that they were once again the sparkling blue that you were so familiar with. Though you couldn’t find it within yourself to celebrate the fact. Not when she was leaning towards you ever-so-slightly. 

“Y/N,” she purrs. “I was wondering when you were going to show up. The school is not the same with my best girl gone.”

For a moment you actually think she cared for your wellbeing, but the glimmer in her eyes made you think otherwise. Your lips thin into a line as your annoyance grows. You didn’t think you had the patience to deal with her today. 

“What do you want, Harleen?” 

A faux look of hurt flashed across her face. “I’m wounded that you think I need something from you, Y/N.” Her other hand rubs your arm-- you try to desperately ignore the goosebumps that appeared because of the action. Though you were certain she was aware of it-- if the look on her face was anything to go by. “I was just wondering if you knew that we were both in the same AP classes?”

Your stomach drops at the news. Her devious smile only causes your nerves to fray even more. “How? I changed my schedule three times.” 

Harleen shrugs. “Looks like it was a match made in heaven.” 

You shake your head with a frown starting to furrow your brow. “No, I know you did something. There’s no way we accidentally ended up in the same classes again.” Your annoyed gaze meets her amused one. “Why? Why do you like doing this to me? Don’t you have better things to do?” 

At your questions, her smile falls from her lips. A sharp look flashing across her face as she leaned closer to you-- almost to the point of her nose brushing against yours. You wanted to take a step back but the hand on your bicep stopped you. You had never seen Harleen look so angry before. Even if she wasn’t completely showing you everything she was feeling. You could tell by the darkening of her eyes-- an almost desperate quality hiding underneath. 

“I think you know exactly why I do what I do,” she hisses. “You just refuse to see what’s standing right in front of you. You choose to be blind to everything.”

Her voice elevates slightly towards the end of her sentence. An almost shrill quality to her tone that you had never heard before. It causes a small wince to flash across your face. Your eyes glancing towards the other occupants of the hallway. You didn’t want anyone to be listening in on this… whatever this was.

Harleen, noticing where your attention had diverted to, seems to pull herself together as she takes a step back from you. Her hand finally releasing your bicep out of the death grip she had imprisoned it in. Though the same darkened expression in her eyes remained even as she smiled at you.

“But that’s no matter,” she continues in a calmer tone. As if her outburst had never happened. “Just know that until you realize what you’ve been blind to I’ll always be here.” Harleen inclines her head ever-so-slightly towards you, her voice dropping into a whisper. “Nothing will ever be better than that.”

Then she was gone. 

Only leaving behind the faint scent of her perfume and the confused feeling in your very soul. 

Even now you still had no idea what she had meant. High school passed you by in the same manner as your other school years. In a standoff with Harleen Quinzel for the top student position, which she won by barely a point. Not that you were too surprised she beat you at that too. No matter how egotistical she may be, you could admit that she was highly intelligent. In another life, you could even see yourself being friends with her. If only life had turned out slightly differently for you both… 

College seemed to be the only reprieve you were ever going to get from her. So you were excited to apply to as many as you could. Wanting to have as many options to choose from as possible. Anything to minimize the chance of Harleen choosing the same one-- even if deep in your heart you wanted nothing more than for her to do just that. 

Learning at graduation that she was going to Metropolis for school had been a shock. As you had been deliberating going there as well. That was before your mother got sick and you decided to stay in Gotham, however. A fact that you didn’t think twice about sharing with Harleen. 

Sometimes you look back at the night and curse yourself for opening your mouth. 

The party was already in full swing as you stepped into the house. Loud music blaring through the speakers. The sound waves caused the very house to shake. It was lucky that the host of the party lived so far away from anyone else. It wouldn’t do to have the party shut down by what was left of Gotham’s police force. Moving deeper into the party, you bypass throngs of people dancing to the beat of the song and random couples that were lost in each other. Your eyes scan the room for a quieter place that you could just rest in until the rest of your friends arrived. 

Thankfully, the search didn’t take that long as you quickly found a relatively abandoned corner. You gratefully lean against a wall once you reach it. Thankful that you had been able to find a spot that you could hide away in. As the party scene had never been a place you thrived in. Rolling your neck, you try to get rid of some of the tension that had settled over your shoulders from the past few days. Things at home were only getting more complicated but you know you made the right decision in deciding to stay. Even if Metropolis would have been a hell of a lot nicer than Gotham. 

Movement from in front of you causes your eyes to widen as a solo cup is thrust into your hands. The flimsy plastic bending in your hands as you stared at the woman who had given it to you. Your mouth pressing into a thin line at the sight of her devious smirk. 

Harleen Quinzel, of course. 

“I’m really not in the mood right now, Harleen,” you sigh. “Why don’t you go hang out with your friends and leave me alone?”

Harleen pouts. “But you’re my best girl, Y/N. Why would I leave you all alone?”

“Because your friends are probably looking for you.” You try to offer in hopes that she would just leave you alone. You didn’t feel like hearing her gloat about getting the valedictorian spot. Her laughter was not the response you were expecting, however. 

“Oh, Y/N/N, what am I going to do with you?” She asks but you’re sure it was rhetorical. Though at your continued silence her eyes flash with annoyance. “You still don’t get it, do you?”

You sigh, Harleen and her mind games were not what you signed up for when you agreed to come to the party. “I don’t know what it is I’m supposed to be getting, Harleen. Maybe if you actually told me then I might.”

She grins at you. “Now where’s the fun in that?” Her head tilts ever-so-slightly as she appraises you. As if she suddenly realized that you were wearing a low-cut dress-- courtesy of your best friend. Her blue eyes shone with varying emotions that you couldn’t even begin to decipher. Though they soon snapped back up to your face as if she suddenly realized something. “But that doesn’t matter really. I’m certain you’ll figure it out when we’re in college.”

Her words make your stomach drop. “What?” 

“When we’re in college, Y/N.” Harleen drawls. ���You know the place where we’re going to be going for the next four years?”

“What do you mean we?” 

Her laughter, once again, catches you off guard. “Didn’t you know? We’re going to be going to the same college. I heard through the grapevine that we both got accepted to Metropolis University. Go Sharks.” 

You frown, your next words coming out before you could even think. “But I’m not going to Metropolis University.” 

Harleen completely freezes at that. Her eyes turn razor-sharp as the smile falls from her face. “What?”

You gulp. “I’m not going to Metropolis University, Harleen. I was but then some personal issues came up so I’ve decided to stay in Gotham.” You shrug with a rueful smile pulling at your lips. “I’m going to Gotham University. So it looks like I’m going to be a Nighthawk and you’re going to be a Shark.”

The smile falls from your face, however, at the look, Harleen gives you because of the joke. Her expression darkened even more as each second ticked by. Only the call of her name from her friends pulled her attention from you-- though she seemed more annoyed at the interruption. Thinking about the quickest escape routes you could take, to hell with your friends, you begin to shift away from the wall. Only to have Harleen suddenly grab both of your forearms and yank you towards her. Your face almost smashed against hers as she held you. Her voice coming out in a low whisper.

“We’ll see about that.” 

Before you could react, her lips pressed against yours in a brief kiss before she was gone. 

Only the scent of her perfume and the feel of her on your lips remaining. 

You hadn’t been surprised that come fall she had appeared in your lecture hall. Her ever-present smirk flashing towards you as she took her seat a few rows in front of you. You weren’t even surprised that she had taken the same major as you. After all, you both had always been eerily similar in your interests in that regard. 

Sometimes you wish you had chosen something else. 

Anything else. 

That’s all that could run through your mind as you made your way down darkened halls. Your heels clicking against the floor with a resounding presence that almost made you wince. The faint moans of the criminally insane echo from deeper recesses in the building. You try to not tense at the sounds. Your armed escort led you down various halls and security checkpoints before you finally reached your destination. 

A door, plain as all the others, stood between you and the reason you had returned to Gotham. You didn’t want to, God did you not want to, but getting a call from Mayor Hill had changed things. You had met the man on several occasions and you had never even considered the possibility of him begging anyone. Hearing the desperate plea within his words flashed you back to a time when your mother was still alive. When there wasn’t a giant bat protecting the streets of Gotham. You hadn’t had the heart to decline.

Even if you wish you had now. 

Turning to one of the guards stationed at the door, you nod. Steeling yourself for what you are about to witness. Your back straightened as your hands tightened on the various files you were holding. Your resolve only wavering as you stepped into the room. Your eyes take in the large abundance of space that surrounds the single cage in the direct center of the room. A single figure entwined with silk in the middle of it. 

Moving down the staircase, you try to ignore the way the figure's burning gaze followed you. The intensity behind it is both so familiar and completely foreign. Standing directly before the cage, you finally are close enough to the figure to see the way burning blue eyes took in every small aspect of you. A familiar smirk began to make its way onto her face when she finally met your gaze with hers. 

“There’s my best girl.” A grin takes the place of her smirk. A sight that causes your heart to lurch in your chest. Yet another reminder of why you didn’t want to come back to Gotham. Why you never wanted to return to the place that had taken everything from you. “I was wondering when you were going to visit me.”

“Hello, Harleen.”

[dracowars]

hideaway | anakin skywalker

pairing: anakin x nonjedi!reader

word count: 2,3k

summary: where y/n wants to surprise anakin but is in for a big surprise herself

a/n: anakin owns my whole heart. hope you enjoy it~

warnings: none

universe: star wars

The smell of freshly roasted vegetables and meat fills your nostrils as you turn the stove up a notch, humming to yourself. You are by no means a five star chef, but your cooking skills are still very good. After all, your mother always made sure that you learn from her amazing skills in the kitchen. In the end what matters is how it tastes and until now you have never failed.

You keep checking the time on the clock on the wall, waiting for it to point at a certain time. You can't wait until he finally comes home. You've been counting the days and hours, even minutes until Anakin arrives back from his mission with Obi-Wan on Naboo. Anakin wasn't allowed to tell you anything about the mission of course, so you can only hope that it was a peaceful mission. Not only do you not want him to get injured, but then your planned surprise meal after his return would also be superfluous.

According to your calculation, it should take another half an hour for their spaceship to land on Coruscant, plus the time it takes Anakin to get to his apartment, where you currently are. The mission was scheduled for five days and you spent the entire time in his apartment. He gave you a spare key months ago because he noticed how much you always miss him every time he is not on the planet. In fact, it actually helped. Everything here makes it feel like he is only in the next room and not on a whole different planet and thus makes your fear for him less.

You've thought and talked about moving in together before, but there is one tiny little problem with that: nobody knows about your and Anakin Skywalker's relationship. Since he is a Jedi, a great and powerful one at that, he has to follow the Jedi Code. A Code that governs the behavior of its followers which, in this case, forbids Jedis from forming attachments. While they do not ban romantic feelings in general, Jedi's are not meant to get married or built up a family. Their only task is to bring peace to the galaxy.

And if the Jedi Order finds out about this relationship, it won't end well for neither of you. Until now you've always been able to hide it well, even if there were occasional moments when it almost got blown up. Somehow you always managed to keep it a secret though and you are very happy about that.

You stir the vegetables one more time and then throw yourself onto the large leather couch while you wait. And wait and wait. No matter how long you close your eyes and just breathe in the pleasent smell around you, time still doesn't go by faster.

You just want to hug him again, kiss him again and just be with him. It may have only been five days, but you still feel like you haven't seen him in months when it wasn't even a whole week. You have been a couple for two years now, have known each other for five of them and loved each other for four, and yet you love him like you did on the first day. There is just something special about him that makes your heart flutter every single time.

The way he looks at you, the way his eyes light up when he smiles - god, his whole apperance in general - you can't help but fall in love with him all over again. Anakin Skywalker is the love of your life and you can't imagine him to not be part of your life anymore.

While being indulged in your thoughts you don't even hear the steps approaching the front door at first and the electronic door opening a few seconds later. You jump up from the sofa immediately and are just about to go in the hallway leading directly to the door full of anticipation when you suddenly hear a different voice than Anakin's, which causes you to stiffly pause in your movement.

"I will send report about our successful mission to the Jedi Council instantly", you hear the male voice say, realizing that it is no other than Obi-Wan. Your eyes widen in shock. If Obi-Wan finds you here, in the middle of Anakin's apartment, it's over.

Looking back and forth, you search for a suitable hiding spot. You notice the cupboard at the end of the entrance area that would provide perfect protection, which you can only get to by walking past the hallway while risking to be seen. Since you can't think of anything better in this hurry, you sneak to the hallway as quietly as possible.

You look around the corner carefully just to see both men, still dressed in their full gear, standing in front of the entrance, Obi-Wan holding a holoprojector in his left hand and seemingly struggling with making it work the way he wants. Your gaze wanders to Anakin, who is standing in front of his master and trys to help him with the device. You can't help but stare at him for a few seconds. He looks breathtaking and you can feel your heart skip a beat.

And suddenly it feels like your heart completely stops at the exact moment where Anakins turns around and directly looks at you. The confusion is clearly written on his beautiful face, - which, to your surprise, doesn't have any bad injuries this time - but if you only knew how much he would love to just run to you and take you his his arms tightly, lifting you off the floor. But since Obi-Wan is still in the room, that turns out to be difficult.

With a slight head movement you indicate to the cupboard, Anakin understanding your intention immediately. Just as Obi-Wan looks up, Anakin steps in his way so that there is no possibility for him to spot you. "Let me see the holoprojector, master", Anakin tells him, reaching out for it, distracting him from what you are doing in the background.

You tiptoe across the hallway and climb into the cupboard without making any sound the very moment Anakin got the projector working. The closet is pretty narrow and you even keep your breathing quiet.

"I think I don't tell you this enough but you actually did very good out there. I'm proud of you, Anakin", Obi-Wan tells his Padawan as they walk past you and internally you feel how happy Anakin is about those words. "But was it really necessary to blow up the escaping droids?", Obi-Wan adds with serious tone but lets out a laugh soon after that.

You take in a deep breath which suddenly makes you realize that there still is something you haven't even thought about before: the food. It's still boiling on the stove, spreading a delicious smell through the rooms. How is Anakin supposed to explain that, when he didn't even know about it himself?

"Anakin. You should have listend to me when you- What is this burnt smell?", Obi-Wan interrupts himself while speaking, smelling the same odour as you did moments before. Seconds later you can hear their steps moving away as they run into the kitchen. "What is happening here?! Why is there food cooking?", Obi-Wan shouts but you can't hear more as the sound of steaming water drowns out their conversation. Anakin must have thrown the pan in the sink or otherwise you can't explain where the noise is supposed to be coming from.

"It was probably the.. the cleaning lady! Yes, the cleaning lady must have forgotten it by mistake", Anakin trys to talk his way out of the situation after the noise has quiet down. "Since when do you have a cleaner?", his master asks suspiciously. "Not very long. Since the last.. month?", Anakin explains - or tries to - not really convincingly.

Silence. There is an unbearable silence before Obi-Wan starts laughing out loud all of a sudden. "You should definetely find another one if she almost burns your appartment down. However, I could use one too..", he advises his Padawan and you can hear him coming back, lowering your breath again instantly.

"I better go now and send off the report to the Council. Master Yoda wanted to talk to me later anyway. You still have a bit of cleaning to do and..", Obi-Wan pauses in the middle of his sentence, making your breath hitch. "You should really get that lady out of your closet before she suffocates."

Your whole body stiffens at his words and the door to your hiding place opens. "Hello there", Obi-Wan looks at you expectantly. "Y/N, isn't it?" You nod carefully and look to the ground in shame after climbing out of the closet.

"It's- It's not what it looks like, master", Anakin stutters out and pulls you behind him, protecting you from whatever is coming towards you next. "Well, what does it look like?", Obi-Wan counters and crosses his arms.

You touch Anakin's arm lightly, searching for support, and look past him to Obi-Wan, who is watching you both closely. "I'm waiting", Obi-Wan sighs and puts his arms on his hips. "I don't have all day, you know."

You take all your courage and take a step forward. "It's my fault. I wanted.. I just wanted to surprise Anakin and welcome him back home", you explain with a low voice, not daring to look at Obi-Wan directly. "That still doesn't explain why you are in his appartment in the first place", he says with raised eyebrows and you look back at Anakin.

Anakin looks like he's contemplating about what to do next and then takes your hand in his as he made his decision, standing next to you now. "Master. I'm in love with Y/N and she loves me. We.. secretly dated and got together. I wanted to tell you. I always wanted to tell you, but there just wasn't the right opportunity and-"

"And you thought it would be better to not tell me about this at all? Ever?", Obi-Wan finishs Anakin's sentence. "Where do you think you are going with this? You know the Jedi Code, Anakin. You broke the rules."

"This stupid code is totally outdated and unnecessary anyway! We never meant to fall in love with each other, sometimes it just happens. We knew the day would come when someone finds out about us. We know that it.. has no future. But you can't just turn off your feelings. It is not possible", you rant and feel Anakin's hold on your hand tighten. "Please don't tell the Jedi Council and please don't throw Anakin out. You can punish me, but not him. He dedicated all his life to the Jedi Code and.. I don't want his life to get destroyed because of me."

You feel yourself get pulled to the side harshly. "What are you even saying, Y/N?! Stop that nonsense!", Anakin whisper-yells at you. "I can't live with the thought that I will destroy your future, Ani. I could never be happy agai-"

"Who said I would tell anyone?", Obi-Wan interrupts you two, making both of you look at him in confusion. "Listen, I don't support Anakin's or your actions but what happend, happend, we can't change that and I'm actually kind of happy that Anakin found someone who stays by his side."

Your mouth opens wide in shock and you look at him with pure disbelieve. "You.. what?", Anakin bursts out, seeming equally shocked and confused. "Why shouldn't I be happy for my Padawan, who is like a brother to me, when he finds the right woman, maybe his soulmate?", Obi-Wan tells you and the corners of his mouth rise. "I won't tell anyone about it, but you have to be really careful. If Master Windu oder Master Yoda find out about your relationship, I won't be able to help you. It will be over. You can be glad that it's just me who found out."

Without thinking twice, you happily hug Obi-Wan and Anakin does the same. "Thank you, Obi-Wan", Anakin smiles and lays an arm around your waist as soon as you move away from Obi-Wan. "I'll correct what I said earlier: You both still have a lot to clean up. Enjoy yourselves", Obi-Wan giggles and turns around to go back to the elevator.

Before he leaves though, he turns around one last time. "And for your information: I already felt that she is in here before we even got into the apartment. Good evening", Obi-Wan bows down slightly and leaves.

Silence spreads again, but this time a pleasant one. "What did just happen?", Anakin asks and shakes his head to get a clear thought, brushing through his hair with his mechanical hand. "I have no idea but I think we got away with it", you answer and turn to look at him, both of his hands now on each side of your waist.

"I missed you so much, Anakin", you smile and take in every feature of his beautiful structured face. Your hand comes up to his cheek and you softly stroke over his skin with your thumb. "I missed you more", he whispers and turns his face to lightly kiss the inside of your hand, which makes you giggle. He slowly leans in and finally connects your lips again. His scent flows around you and your hand clings to his brown locks.

When he breaks the sensual kiss, he leans his forehead against yours and smiles at you gently. You can feel his hands sneak around your hip as he suddenly lifts you off the floor and spins you around a few times, making you both laugh. After he puts you onto the ground again, he pecks your lips one more time before retreating completely, only keeping your hands connected.

"So, you wanted to surprise me with food?", he teases with that stupid smile on his face that you love so much. Feeling offended, you hit his arm playfully. In response, he chuckles and just pulls you behind him into the kitchen, where you clean up the mess you made before settling yourself up on the couch, cuddling for the rest of the day.