#this got pretty long and rambly but hopefully you understand my point

[tifaisms]

so something i havent seen around much about togachako is the way that the story is set up as a whole to ask two very important questions.

To me, the two big questions of MHA as a series are - What is a hero? and then later, it asks the question What is a villain?

I believe that these two questions are the core of the series. And the characters all answer it in different ways, and even change the way that they answer it. Deku believes that saving people makes a hero, and bakugo believes it is someone who always wins. All Might teaches them both that they are close, because a hero is someone who wins by saving, and saves by winning.

A villain is initially someone evil, but then we see that the villains are friends. They care about each other. They are outcasts, mistreated and abused by the world around them. Toga is bisexual, Tomura is severely traumatised and has been groomed by a genuinely evil man, Spinner was horribly treated for his appearance, Dabi was a victim of his father and Jin developed severe split personality (apologies if that is an outdated term, pls let me know if it is) after being fired and having his life go downhill. So the line between hero and villain becomes blurred, because they both want to change the world, and they both have people they care about. They are capable of acts of kindness and acts of destruction. With Gentle and La Brava, the line between hero and villain is blurred. Ultimately, the biggest difference between someone who is a villain and someone who is a hero is the world around them. People who turned to crime were mistreated and that resentment was left to fester. But heroes are given support. Deku says the only reason he got this far is because of the people around him supporting him. And he's right.

So when toga and ochako have their fight, we realise that where toga came from a horrible environment where she was forced to hide herself, ochako was in a loving environment, even if she was poor. And as a result, Ochako reacts to Toga with fear. Because she can't understand her. But just like Ochako has her own brand of heroism (wanting to see people smile, and wanting to save heroes, because no one else will) Toga has a brand of villainy - she is a being of love. She just wants to love in her own special way. And she can't. She is called a freak. And to me, that is just a metaphor for being LGBT. Are the optics of LGBT people as unhinged and literally bloodthirsty kinda shit? Maybe, but Toga doesn't WANT to hurt people. She never learned how to have a healthy relationship cause she never had one. She never told her crush her feelings cause she would have been called a freak. Toga is deeply linked to the LGBT experience. And Ochako, another woman, saying "let's talk about romance!" is so important, because Ochako knows she can't understand Toga. But she wants to! And Toga ultimately lets her in, and she is so overwhelmed with pure joy as a result. Because for maybe the first time in her life, Toga has been allowed to just be Toga, without any judgement.

So I hope she lives. And if she doesn't, I can't think of a more fitting end for the character. She believes, so deeply, that taking blood is the ultimate act of love. When she ingests the blood of someone, it is her way of showing love. And her final act (presumably) is not only turning into Ochako (an incredible act of love in her eyes) but giving blood to Ochako (which is another incredible act of love). She will have died loving the way she wanted.

[sanddusted-wisteria]

An update on my fics

hey wow it's been 4 months

Nearly six months on both longfics lmao. I've been busy and will continue to be busy, unfortunately. Grad school is a different beast entirely to undergrad (be careful taking 3 grad classes in a semester. 2 heavy ones can really make you regret it), I need to prepare for job interviews and PhD program applications, and this summer I've been wrangling an internship and research work.

Even so tho, my MTAS brainrot is far from dead. It takes a lot of time and effort, but I still have a lot I want to do with the My Time verse and my OCs, both art and fic. So here's a quick update on where I am and what the plan is with my fics and fic series going forward, and some previews of what I have so far (on a separate post bc this one's already too long lmao)!

TL;DR: busy, but still writing! WIP snippets on the next post.

[Long post and rambling belowwwwww]

Earth and Sky

Currently my primary focus. E&S has evolved a TON since I decided to rewrite it. How much? Well...

[Drafting = first draft is in progress; Revising = draft is plot-complete, set aside for future editing passes]

In fact, I haven't even outlined the ending chapters since I recently had a change of heart in the kind of resolution I wanted. I got stuck on it enough that I decided to forego outlining anything for now and playing that one more by ear. I think any more time I spend tweaking these outlines might put me off this fic altogether :P

As someone that started writing with nameless/generic builders, writing for an OC is a different kind of challenge. I'm working to try and strike a good balance of focus on Wis vs Qi vs them together, and making Wis a very human, if not enjoyable character. Still, I think that this is one of those projects that if I can get right, it will be VERY right. It'll just take a bit to get there first :>

At minimum, I'll wait until most if not all of the chapters in the first third/quarter are done (chapters 1-16) to start posting, though hopefully I'll also have a solid idea for how some of the later chapters will go as well. Those are the really (internal) conflict-heavy chapters and I want to make sure it won't come out as shallow :P But I am excited to show you what I've got cooking!

A Cosmic Garden

This is the broader series for Wis and Qi. E&S will be the biggest fic, but it only goes up to a little beyond MTAS's Act 2. Beyond that, my plan is to write some side stories that go into Wis's Lore(tm), namely her origins as an Old World clone and her interactions with other Wis clones around the Alliance.

Why side stories? Well, a) any plot involving Wis as a clone is relatively spread out across the timeline of MTAS's story, since it's actually not that closely tied to her "main" storyline (being the first clone I made when the clone story was just kind of just a bullet point on their lore descriptions, it's less involved), b) it therefore doesn't really affect the story of how she and Qi get together, and c) I know that people might be far more interested in just the romance story with Qi (which is totally okay! I understand, I'm pretty much in the same camp with OC-centric stories a lot :P)

As for the equivalent of MTAS's Act 3, this won't be one cohesive fic, but a small series of smaller stories, since I don't really have too many ideas for a fully fleshed out telling of Act 3 that doesn't just walk through the main missions without much deviating from that. Some of those stories include:

A series of conversations between Qi and Miguel post Act 2

A Nia/Mi-an story

A silly little oneshot of Qi and Rosie interacting (tentative)

The original idea that Strangeness and Charm sprouted from; Wis and Qi conducting a methodical study on non-sexual intimacy (tentative)

The finale of the MTAS main story

A Builder, a Researcher, and a Rooftop

Currently on pause. For now, there's just too much OC brainrot for fics and on OTAS that I just need to get out. Don't worry! I'm absolutely not abandoning this one. I just can only really focus on one big project at a time lol. We're close to the end of this story's act 2, though not much of the remainder is written. In fact, chapter 34 is already done, but not chapter 33, so I can't quite post it yet. I think after I get the first part of E&S done (or I suppose whenever I feel like picking it up), I'll switch gears to at least get to the end of Act 2. Act 3 will need some reevaluation...I've hemmed and hawed over it forever, but I do want to finalize the plot for that one, and also potentially get started on that as well.

Others

To the...5 people that read my Grace/Wis miniseries, I really do still want to get that done a;sdlasdralsdrkj It's been hard since my thoughts on how Grace and Wis interact after Act 2 have changed a lot. But even so, I hate to leave it hanging there, so I've started working on it again. It's already outlined, I just need to get it filled in.

Someday I should come back to Quiet Moments in Sandrock... My art's gotten a ton better since then and there's a few ideas I still have leftover that I never got to. Unfortunately I need to make room for it somewhere in the 13438525 other art ideas I have that I can only do like 1 per week at MOST asdlrkasdasdrjksdrj

Sitting on the back burner forever in my writing folder is a fusion of Junji Ito's Uzumaki and MTAS... An MTAS version of Uzumaki's story works SURPRISINGLY well, and Wis and Qi I think make for stronger protagonists in this setting than Kirie and Shuichi in theirs if I do say so myself lol. It's fully outlined and everything, but that's gonna forever be on the back burner until either my longfics get done or I figure out how to write horror, whichever comes first 😂

So all in all...still cooking! Thank you if you read all this, and thank you for your patience, especially if you've been closely following any of my in progress fics. Hopefully once the interview and application cycle is out of the way this fall, I'll have more brain capacity to really plug away at all these and share with you all! :>

[estbela]

Just saw your post and was wondering if you have any SerbRo headcanons?

Yes. A lot. I'm so normal about them (lying). Although they might change and stuff, since I'm still working on my Serbia OC and stuff. At the moment he's mostly just vibes (and not that different from other serbia OCs anyway). Also the moment anyone asks me about anything I tend to forget anything Ive ever thought but I'll try.

Prepare for a lot of rambling. And for possibly regretting asking me this haha. Im also sleep deprived, as usual, so hopefully everything makes sense.

They're childhood best friends. I don't know exactly when they met, but they definitely met when they were children, and so they were best friends ever since.

Serbia was like...I think one of Ro's first friends? Besides Bulgaria. I think, in a way, they were both lonely wild children who were considered outcasts. In part for being nations, in part because they were both often disobedient and stuff, and thus were "bad kids".

They were such troublemakers as kids, and tbh, they still are. Whenever theyre together you gotta prepare for trouble.

they were both huge francophiles during the 19th century, I think. Idk I just picture them bonding about that.

They get along like a house on fire. They also might have lit up a couple of houses on fire together. What's a little arson between friends? :)

They're both animal lovers! It's also one of the things they bonded about when they first met(I can just imagine them being kids and telling eachoter all the animal facts they know). If they lived together it'd be them and a house full of animals I'm guessing.

They bully Bulgaria together. <3

Anyway more about their relationship.

they...understand eachoter. Understand eachoter so deeply. They know things about eachoter that almost no one else does. They talk about anything(like their interests and such), and about shit they would never be brave enough to discuss with anyone else. Show sides of themselves they didn't even know they had.

Yet they've never truly discussed...the fact that they might be more than friends. Or well, it took them a really long time of knowing eachoter to do so.

They're kindred souls. Also slightly codependent in the way, that they've grew up together, and went through so many things together, and even when they were alone, they still had eachoter. They're kind of inseparable at this point.

Yet, they can go on pretty long times of not talking to eachoter, but then they meet again and it's like...nothing really happened. They immediately pick where they left off. Thought, if they were to ever truly lose eachoter they would not deal with it well At All.

Anyway they both eventually have The Realisation, when theyre like teenagers. For Serb, I think it's maybe in the 16th century. I think...it's not exactly one moment that makes him realise it, but rather, multiple moments of just. Not wanting to be anywhere else in the world than with Ro. Just softly looking at him and having so much fun together.

For Ro...it's much of the same, although more reluctant, in some way. He doesn't really wanna fall in love. Something she learns early on in his life is that love between nations is tricky and often ends badly, and she's already got A Thing going on with Bulgaria.

They actually have their first kiss earlier thought. They're young teens, like maybe 13, or a little more, or less. It's the 14th century and theyre both curious about that kinda thing, and wanna practice for when they'll have a relationship.

And so they do eventually figure if out as I said, and they never talk about it, never say it aloud, but they Know. They know, and even if the both of them act so brave and confident most of the time, like they always know what they're doing, in things such as battle and in general facing enemies, they are afraid. Cause at the end of the day they are young and terrified that if they admit their love aloud it might twist and burn, or worse, it might be used against them, and then they'd lose their best friend.

But I think they do things that some ppl might consider to be of a romantic nature, like kissing and making out and cuddling and holding hands. Theyre both so touch starved, and even if Serb doesn't wanna admit it, he's even more clingy than Ro is. And everyone is kinda used to it cause thats just how Ro & Serb are like.

And like. Realising they love eachoter romantically, does not really change their dynamic cause they were already doing all of this stuff before.

Also, from the outside it might look like they make eachoter worse, but somehow, they manage to make eachoter better.

Their first kiss as teens, after The Realisation, was initiated by Ro.

and theyre not really children anymore but sometimes it feels like theyre two kids again, staring at the stars, talking about nothing in particular, as if they were the only things they mattered. They weren't nations, or well, they were, but sometimes they could almost forget that.

I think they do eventually talk about It. They're both shit at feelings, with Ro being slightly more emotionally intelligent i guess. In the 19th century, because their thing that's neither nothing or something was driving both of them a little insane. And they kinda get in an on and off relationship, but they dont use that word.

As far as anyone is concerned, theyre best friends. Best friends who perhaps aren't simply platonic, who have shared more than just friends ought to. But the fact is, calling eachoter best friends is not untrue, because that's what they are, thought they are also lovers.

And they have loved other people, and still continue to do so.

I guess they might try to not be too close, at least nto in public, when one of them is in a relationship of the monogamous kind, and theyre also the first person they go to after a break up.

Back to the understanding eachoter thing. I think they'd be willing to forgive eachoter for a lot of things, even if both of them are usually really petty(especially Serb). They'd also be willing to do things for eachoter they'd rarely do for others. Theyd kill for eachoter tbh.

I know this is very random and very different in tone after everything Ive talked about but they have a height difference and it's so cute. Serbia is like. 180 something centimeters while Ro is barely 170 cms shdhdhdhs. Anyway it's adorable.

Songs that make me think of them: Bad Idea from the musical Waitress, You don't need to love me from If/Then, Across the Overpass by the Solids...and way more that I cant remember.

And that's...not all. But all that I can remember at the moment cause my memory is shit. And woah, I talked so much about them dhdjddjdj. It's like the first time i ever get to ramble about them to anyone (besides one of my friends)

[tequiilasunriise]

Alright, so I just made a Wenclair post but imma make another one right now because oh my LORD I just saw the fandom breaking reviews, so sit down and grab a snack because it’s rambling time.

I see that many of you are discouraged from the prospect of Wenclair not being canon, this is understandable as I myself am really invested in these two. Hopefully this goes without saying, but NO ONE should hate on the show, the actors, etc etc. I refuse to let such toxicity run through this fandom. Like, this is just reviews for the first season. Please, I really, really don’t want a repeat of the Voltron fandom and cries of queerbaiting (and I wasn’t even remotely near being part of the Voltron fandom! It just got THAT bad that even I knew of its notorious reputation). Again, the show isn’t even out yet. Who’s to say Hunter going ‘fighting for Wenclair’ didn’t mean the course of their relationship in future seasons? We only have information on a first season that isn’t even out yet, so please, calm down on any hate and queerbaiting accusations.

That being said- y’all telling me you’re not buckled down for a slow burn? Wednesday is a character who needs a LOT of time and effort to build trust with on a romantic relationship level, so getting Wenclair all in one season would have been cool or whatever, but it also would’ve been pretty OOC since season one has confirmed only 8 episodes. On the flipside, the payoff of Wenclair’s growing friendship, that blooming trust, the eventual deep bond between them that not even Wednesday herself can deny? Is that not peak sapphic experience? Frenemies to begrudging allies to ‘I find your existence… not the worst’ ‘ppfft, thanks, Addams’ to friends to friends who would murder fer each other to ‘you are the sun that burns and enchants me, I hope this drought lasts a lifetime’. LIKE C’MON??? THE FLAVOR?? Don’t give up on Wenclair just yet y’all. (That being said, the line about droughts should be in a fanfic so imma mark that down fer later.)

And like, I think this next point is the most important thing to note. We all acknowledged our love for Wenclair as a delusion, ever since the beginning we knew we were pulling crumbs and making silly little headcanons. Yes, I would love if Wenclair became canon. Would I stop shipping it if it never does, though? Let’s see, I am a veteran Whiterose shipper of several years. Those two barely had a conversation in the entirety of Volume 8 and I am STILL willing to die on this hill fer them. I am a Lightcannon enjoyer despite the next to NOTHING crumbs in the entirety of their respective existences. Oh, you would not believe how many rarepairs I hold dear in the Pokémon world. The list goes on and on and on. Canon is cool and all but I hoard my random ships like a dragon of ye olde. Just look at what we, the OG Wenclair Warriors, made with just a few trailers and interviews and random instagram comments. The lovely art, the heart wrenching fanfics, the god tier headcanons. I dunno bout yall, but I’m not ready to give that all up just because canon said ‘mmmm no’. If no one got me, ao3 got me.

Trust me, I am well-aware the importance of good representation and I’m not saying you can’t be disappointed over this. What I am saying, however, is that you shouldn’t always let canon 100% dictate how you’re going to consume and enjoy a piece of media. So what if Wenclair isn’t canon? Their dynamic is AMAZING and nothing can take that away from me. There’s still potential and writing room for future seasons, and to that I say buckle down homies, we in it fer a long time and a good time.

[acstation206]

<< = • 💿 NOW LOADING: ACSTATION INTRODUCTORY POST 909 💿 • = >>

…

Oh, hi! Didn’t see you there.

==

The name’s AC and I run this little convenience store of productions at the edge of the universe called ACSTATION. And yeah, as you can tell, at this point I’m pretty much your friendly-neighborhood enthusiast of basically anything 2000s - 2010s (or something in-between or related idk).

But aside from that, those productions in question have animations, general art / fanart, edits, memes, music, comics, OCs, etc. (at least in the near future hopefully) and they’re made primarily on the ibisPaint X, FlipaClip and GarageBand apps on iPhone.

==

Specifically for this site we also have:

= MASTERPOST(S) =

• “THE AMAZING DIGITAL ARCADE PARTY” 🕹️ - basically just an AU of The Amazing Digital Circus by the incredible Gooseworx except it’s arcade themed or whatever

==

= TAGS =

• "ac talks with you" 🎙️ - whenever I answer people's questions when they press the button by the top of this blog page that reads "i'm feeling curious :)" or just document the things that I like or the bits that happen throughout my daily life for fun or so... and maybe a peek behind the scenes of some art stuff I might be at right now... Again, for funsies. :)

• “ac art” 🎨- whenever I post art or animations featuring my own characters and some other random stuff… maybe some behind the scenes too if we’re lucky

• "ac music" 🎵 - same as ac art except it's... well, music and all that

• “ac analysis” 🤓 - when I geek out and ramble on in excruciating detail about a certain thing I hold dear to my heart or so, I guess this might be what the very first tag above is for in some cases but whatevs, just for organization sakes y’know?

==

= BOUNDARIES =

For now I only have a few of these and they're all obvious. "How original," yeah I get it. Though they're all are subject to change and might add some more depending on how I feel and what from I've seen and experienced on this site thus far.

ABSOLUTELY NO NSFW / OFFENSIVE ASKS + REQUESTS. Do that and you'll get an instant block, yadda yadda. Let's just keep it PG-13 in here, alright? -

By sending me a request doodle, you are fully aware and understand that I can't guarantee I'll have every correct detail unless it's been already specified as the request has been sent. I am a human being with responsibilities and can only do so much for so long. That being said, I would greatly appriciate it if you remain paitient and do not take it too personally if there's anything I missed or got wrong. -

You are more than welcome to use my art and music! Have it as a background on your Windows PC, have it as a thumbnail on a YouTube video, your profile picture, anything! Just credit me and we all good :)

Anyway, that’s all there is to it for now. Thanks for stopping by and have a nice day! :)

==

* Let’s stay in touch! *

https://acstation206.carrd.co/

[adelle-ein]

h!rry p0tter stans are pathetic, disgusting brats and i want them all to block me now so i'm going ahead and posting a rant about the terrible wizard books and their terrible fandom and their embarrassing fucking behavior just to get it off my chest and hopefully get them to STOP FUCKING FOLLOWING ME i swear they just keep popping up with their dumbass usernames and slytherclaw in their descriptions. this is long and rambling but i just really need to scream into the void for a bit

this also goes 99% only for adult hp fans. if you are fourteen and still obsessed with hp that's okay. you're fourteen. you'll grow up someday.

Unfortunately i must give my stupid "qualifications" to hate hp and its fans first i guess. Yes, from ages 8-17ish maybe, I loved hp, it was my main special interest/ocd obsession for pretty much the entirety of that time. blah blah read the books a zillion times wrote fanfic first tumblr fandom *checks watch* went to the theme park owned merch was in the high school hp club etc. I still unfortunately have a hp username in some old things where usernames are permanent. Stuck and unchangeable! Alas. Okay are we done? Do you understand that i used to be one of you morons before i got old enough to have critical thinking? am i deemed worthy to talk about this now???

cool great thanks. Anyway. I'm TIRED of being expected to be patient with hp stans!!!. It's their childhood! It's nostalgic! It's their hyperfixation and their special interest! Wizard boy SAVED THEIR LIVES and you have to be PATIENT with their clinging to it twenty fucking years later!!! ...No actually. No i fucking don't. No trans person, no jewish person, nobody needs to put up with your sobbing speeches about how actually you HATE jkr but you just LOVE hp so goddamn much and you're sTILL A REAL ALLY. can you at least, at the bare minimum, if you MUST engage with HP content, SHUT UP about it?? why can't you even do that??? good god.

I think people are still clinging to the idea that JKR is actually a liberal who's just really stupid on trans rights. Don't get me wrong: that's still awful that they're willing to throw trans people under the bus like that! If that was true I would still be saying to not support her and to shut up about hp for thirty fucking seconds! However, that is just...objectively not true. Woman is a fascist. Woman is constantly expressing support for conservative laws and measures. She has done effectively nothing to support abortion rights or feminism or lgb rights in years, she LITERALLY ONLY cares about hurting trans people and preventing Scottish independence and keeping her taxes low. I believe she recently dusted off her old fucking charity to sponsor the education of some women in Iran? She used to do stuff like that pretty regularly but now she so, so rarely does. And even when she does it's just like. ticking off a box and she's back to going on another unhinged rant about trans people. The people she has allied herself with are far-right, neo-nazi, white supremacist groups. She has happily expressed support for anti-abortion activists, pro-LGB conversion therapy pundits, self-professed fascists, people who believed jews control the universe, and even rapists including depp and m. manson and various horrific "gender criticals". OVER AND OVER. She's fash! She's far-right all the way fash! Any "lefty" terf who's allying themselves with her is straight up in the frog/scorpion situation and i will point and laugh while also being amazed just how incredibly stupid and selfish people are. And she keeps siccing her followers on small trans accounts without money or fame on their side, who then get harassed for fucking YEARS on end! She knows what she is doing! She is a bitter, twisted, evil lady!!!

anyway. What I know most about, being jewish, is what she's said and done in the jew hating department. so now i'm gonna rant about that specifically jewish stuff.

I am sick of her antisemitism being reduced to "there are goblins" and similar. Especially bc people then point to, like, fucking owl house and whatever and go "see this is also antisemitic!!" Well, technically, yeah. it is. but like...accidentally. I'm pretty used to seeing evil big-nosed money-loving freaks and lizard people all over media, I've just kind of grown up with that. Jo's antisemitism is not accidental. Joanne has Griphook as the *literal* devil on Harry's shoulder throughout the gringotts saga of book 7. He's the one who convinces Harry to start using unforgivable curses (remember that shaun video in which he points out that the potterverse has no "bad actions" only "bad people?" yeah harry uses the torture and mind control spells like, repeatedly, with ZERO FUCKING REFLECTION OR CONSEQUENCES OR CARE and it's fine, they're such bad books man.) Griphook literally leads harry away from the light of christ and backstabs him. bill warns harry that goblins are Not Like Us, because they have evil and weird and unholy traditions and magic and steal power from wizards. jo specialized in studying the historical roots of legends and fairy tales throughout uni and has talked about them at length. she literally dual majored in "classics" (and french, strangely, considering how she writes french people lmao. failing upwards?) And yet she managed to go as dark and bad as possible on every occasion. Joanne knew exactly what she was writing. AND EVEN IF SHE DIDN'T, somehow, she has doubled down in subsequent years. There was no, "yeah, sorry about the goblins and the house elf shit, I dunno what I was thinking but we won't be doing that anymore!" House elves and goblins continue to be featured and doubled down on, between pottermore, the terrible fantastic beasts movies, and this game (you can own your own slaves in the game i believe, hooray!) Fantastic beasts even features a ***part-house-elf*** woman. Let THAT horror sink in. The franchise has doubled down on and actively CHOSEN TO FOCUS ON its worst and darkest parts and there is no more way to hide behind any semblance of ignorance at this point.

(The same goes for Umbridge being raped by centaurs. There is NO FUCKING WAY that was not deliberate. The woman literally studied english fairy tales for school. SHE KNEW. Rape is a punishment in HPland. Hermione literally gets sexually assaulted by a guy and Harry tells her it serves her right for leading him on and the book nods right along with him. Joanne hates cis women too lol)

People have written at length about the game's plot and why it is clear, blatant, not accidental antisemitism and blood libel. The game's original director was a far right gamergate lunatic and I SINCERELY doubt he was the only one of the crew who was. None of this was an "oopsie poopsie we made a big nosed shady advisor" and the devs are not the sweet widdle victims you morons want them to be! And continuing deeper into the franchise: there's a whole lot of nazi imagery surrounding Grindelwald in Fantastic Beasts (originally played by fucking Depp the wifebeater who collects nazi memorabilia for kicks so that's on the nose). Guess which main character turns to the dark side and starts doing evil nazi shit? The one named Goldstein. The Jew. Yay! Also she was, like, mind controlling her good christian boyfriend to force him to marry her, so there's a lot going all the way down on that one huh.

And honestly, even when people are expressing allyship it's all so fucking performative! You all just keep going "oh there's goblins" and then recommending fucking alternatives. I don't want to hear about how pjo/earthsea/witch hat atelier/owl house/twilight/animorphs/whatever is Wholesome And Perfect and Good! This is not an opportunity to stan! Do you people really think, when discussing a violently antisemitic game that's part of a franchise made by a fascist, the appropriate way to end your twee little thread is by promoing some OTHER children's media that you think has the morally pure high ground? Do you realize how performative that makes your so-called allyship feel?? Do you genuinely believe that these GROWN ASS ADULTS simply did not know that other children's media about wizards and magic exists in the world and that is the only thing driving them to keep worshiping at joanne's feet even now?? You think they just genuinely believed this video game is the only video game in the universe? The really rich rec I keep seeing people give is fucking NARNIA, which features all the blatantly Muslim-coded characters being rejected from heaven and presumably ending up in hell when the world ends. Like Susan will one day, because she turned away from Jesus and is a disgusting slut who likes boys and lipstick too much. Narnia fucking sucks. Even the shriekcast people cannot stop sucking off narnia it's so goddamn annoying

The whole thing reminds me of how, at peak 3h-popularity-fighting, there were many long threads going around twitter about how Hubert falls into the "shady advisor" stereotype and how Rhea and co are secretly lizards and how that's not great. Yeah, sure, not great, old stereotypes rooted in antisemitism that media can't seem to turn away from. And then those SAME PEOPLE would talk about "instead stan tellius!" Tellius which features these characters, who form a tribe specifically known for being backstabbing greedy traitors obsessed with money, who sell one of their blond white beautiful allies into slavery for money. THAT tellius. And that's what i mean by performative fucking allyship. Based on their own behavior, none of those people appeared to give a real shit about Jews. It looked like they were only pretending to so they could come up with a way to dunk on Modern Fire Emblem and encourage people to play Classic Fire Emblem. And not that the modern games didn't deserve criticizing! But it was so, so clear that none of them had any fucking clue what they were talking about, were just pointing to tropes and going "antisemitic!" without bothering to learn the hows and whys and critically analyze the context. So I do strongly encourage people to try and learn about WHY certain media is so bad and, while intent certainly isn't the be and end all, why certain portrayals are so much worse than others. Naesala is a damn sight more of an antisemitic caricature than Rhea, and fucking obviously the wizard school game is worse than owl house! Also reminder that the great ace attorney localization uses antisemitic slurs and everyone in the fandom ignored that :) performative asses

aNyhoo. The antisemitism in HP is not just "there are goblins." It is much worse, much more insidious, and Warner Bros, avalanche, etc have all joined right in, doubled down, and made it very clear that antisemitism as well as slavery apologism is a key part of the series and not going away for a good long time by making it EVEN WORSE in the games and movies. even if she wasn't seeing a penny of any of it (lol!) her ideas are being happily and uncritically spread by you fucking lunatics.

and every time someone gets an anon going "maybe don't support hp?" and you clutch your fucking pearls and fall to the floor crying about how it's TRANSFORMATIVE and YOU HEADCANON HARRY AS TRANS and IT WAS YOUR CHILDHOOD and blah blah fucking blah i both lose even more respect for you and become even more certain that this franchise is not worth transforming. it's simply not. hp is rapidly becoming a symbol of hate, one that fascists flock around and support (yes, they were burning the books twenty years ago, but IT IS NOT TWENTY YEARS AGO YOU ARE AN ADULT NOW MARJORIE, it's a franchise that the fash love now, and why wouldn't they? it espouses all their ideals!)

Just grow up. It is really, and i mean this from the bottom of my heart, genuinely unhealthy and sad to still be so deeply tied to your favorite book when you were ten. It's time to move on. It's past time to move on. Thank the books for what they did for you and let them go. Personally, I can't engage with any HP media. I derive zero joy from it and haven't since like...I don't know, 2016ish maybe. Even the last dregs I clung to were more fond memories of sharing the books with friends and family. I truly don't understand how anyone can still like them knowing what they now stand for. But even if you're not like me, even if you've managed to fool yourself into believing this is a franchise about love and kindness and leftism (lol), it's time, it's PAST time, to move forward. Nothing wrong with liking old media or children's media or even problematic media (to an extent ofc). But when a series is doing this much tangible harm, when you are so deeply entwined with it that you feel you have no identity without it, when nostalgia has become more important than your principles...then you need to let it go. If you don't care enough about trans people, or Jewish people, or rape victims or Black people or Chinese people or Irish people or Scottish people or gay people, then do it for yourself, because being shackled to your childhood like that is simply not healthy.

Okay that was the only paragraph I was going to be nice in back to bitching. Read another fucking book, engage with other fucking media and no i am not going to give you recs and hold your hand and tell you you're a good person for doing it!! do it yourselves you are ADULTS. and remember: the difference between kanye and jo is that one of them has lost his filter and is saying the quietest parts the loudest, and also is black, and you should think long and hard as to WHY you find one of them acceptable to support and not the other, because they very much share the same views and have expressed support and love for the same people.

Personally I don't see why you'd even fucking pirate this game. It looks like another cookie cutter blandass triple a runs like shit but gets straight 9/10 mess. like it's just cyberpunk again but wizards. it's yet another flat bland Skyrim Two. by devs who are known for their crappy shovelware. And every hp game that has come out has sucked (did you know they had a pokemon go clone? i think it only lasted like a year. lots and lots of shitty f2p stuff in general.) Why do you need this game so badly? why are you SO wrapped up in nostalgia that you're willing to support terrible shit and play a meh game? there is something fundamentally wrong with your morals if this is where they end. always the same people who cry about how there are good slytherins or whatever but don't give enough of a shit about people to care about, like, real things.

Also if you truly believe you need to "support the devs" by buying this game: where do you draw the line, then? What makes these particular AAA devs need my $60 so badly? By that logic I apparently need to buy every single game in the world to support every single dev in the world?? WHAT??? If you say this you are PROBABLY lying, but if you truly believe it you are incredibly stupid. thanks.

Also professor fig dies at the end in all endings and rookwood is the one behind anna's curse he framed the goblins for it <3

(also this all goes for diehard aot stans too i want you and your nazi propaganda anime to fuck off too thanks)

[babacontainsmultitudes]

hello!!! hope you are well!!!!! asking all the dndads folks this .. what are your hopes / predictions for next episode

Hi you!!! Hope you’re doing well too :]

Hopes and predictions huh? Hmmm…

Haven’t put too much thought into the realm of actual predictions for this one, truthfully! I’m *hoping* it’ll be a pretty Linc-centric episode (well, Linc and Grant!), which feels reasonable enough to expect?

Very excited for whatever Matt is gonna bring to the table more generally, really. Aside from Lincoln just being the bestest fucking boy, I think Matt more than all the other players (granted Beth excels here as well) just does a phenomenal job at remembering the core themes of the show (“Family!!!” I scream from the rooftops, “This is a show about family!”) and accordingly pays a lot of attention not just to the arc of his own character but to that of Grant as well (and of course all the intricate ways in which the two are intertwined)- a fact that I think is obvious just by looking at how many of Matt’s dad and teen facts revolve around Grant actually! But that’s another post lol. But yeah, even in last week’s teen talk he stated:

“I’m sure Scary won’t be happy with Grant but like, I think, the thing I’m more concerned [with] is obviously Grant- is gonna be how Grant feels about himself. Him screaming “no” after he did it is like, that’s rough”

Which is just- ugh it’s everything to me. That to say, I’m really pumped for what’s to come on that front, since I have a lot of faith in Matt to steer things in a direction that is narratively satisfying for both Lincoln and Grant. Also, it’s such a small thing relative to all that’s going on but, I really do hope that Anthony remembers that Grant hasn’t heard Lincoln’s new voice yet lol, I don’t want that to go unaddressed! Ugh I almost wanna go and relisten to “The Staircase” just thinking about all of this- I’ve been waiting for Grant and Linc to confront each other for *SO LONGGG* hahaha. As a final note on Grant, cause if not I could go on forever, in the teen talk Anthony stated:

“(…) I’ve already had some thoughts as to what he [Willy] wrote onto Grant’s collar”

Which seems to imply that the kiddads don’t all have the same thing written on their collars, which is very interesting! Makes me wonder about Lark and Sparrow as well (<- this got me thinking: “what if Lark and Sparrow’s collars had things written on them that forced them to be apart from each other” or something to that effect OUGH that’d be so rad anyways anyways total tangent loool).

*Otherwise*, FUCK ANTHONY BETTER REMEMBER NICKY. Lmaooo he better parachute in at some point in this episode or else!!! I’d love to see him have to confront Terry’s death, I’d LOOOVE to see him confront/interact with Grant, and I really hope that his reactions to either of those things isn’t just “fuck this shit I’m out” and then he poofs away as he is one to do. Especially now that Anthony decided for convenience’ sake that Nicky can’t make portals anymore- at least keep that consistent lmao. If he *did* try to just dip though, my hope would be that Taylor steps in and actually confronts his dad about that trend of his. Because really, ever since Waterdeep when you think about it we’ve seen that Nick has this bad habit of running away from his problems rather than confronting them (granted his behavior is I think pretty understandable in a good chunk of those cases) and so… Well I guess now that Taylor has become more attached to his dad I would like to see him actually call Nicky out on those behaviors and how it affects him as his son and let his dad know that, well, he doesn’t want Nick to walk out of his life again, y’know?

Hopefully that makes some sense haha, didn’t mean for this ramble to be so long! But yeah, I guess those are the main things running through my head atm (I’ve also been thinking about Scary and Terry and how all that shit is gonna play out ofc, but nothing concrete to say on the matter as it stands).

:3 Wbu???

[shynmighty]

🖊️🖊️ for Taijax and Vhespasian?

This makes me so happy, I do love an excuse to ramble!

Here we go with Taijax!

First of all, I'm so glad you asked about him because I feel like he falls by the wayside a lot (which is totally my fault), so I've been trying to show him more love! Thank you!!

I've mentioned this in some of the descriptions I've done for him, but he's my little mystic woo woo. He is perhaps overenthusiastic about sharing his knowledge of Jedi proverbs and mystic lore. Whatever crazy adventure he finds himself roped into, you can bet he 100% would rather be lost in some ancient library. He's a nerd, but he embraces that about himself.

His heritage and culture are also a point of fascination for him, but more in an academic sense. He's interested in the Chiss because it helps him better understand himself as a Jedi.

His full name is Srost'aija'xani. That was all the information that was given to the Jedi when he was given to the order. The pair of Chiss who handed him over as an infant were never seen or heard from again.

As part of the Silverblade legacy, he is not the Barsen'thor but does become a reputable Jedi master, and obtains a seat on the council for a time. When he is not seeking out lost knowledge or exploring ancient ruins, he accompanies Aeseca and her crew, which is how he eventually meets and falls in love with Nadia Grell.

He and Aeseca are old friends, and they grew up together in the Jedi Enclave overseen by Aeseca's mother. When the enclave was destroyed by the Sith, he and Aeseca remained good friends, to the point where they were separated for an alleged romance. This never took place, but it would be years before they saw one another again, this time as adults. As Yuon Par's apprentice prior to taking on Aeseca, Taijax had a vested interest in curing his old master from the plague inflicted on her by Lord Vivicar. He traveled with Aeseca during this time, and assisted her in ending the threat.

This got pretty long-winded... let's move on to Vhespasian!

This guy! I created him totally by accident and he's become one of my favorite OCs. Galactic Seasons told me to complete a few missions as an Imperial Agent and I made him to delete later... except he was really freakin' cute and I couldn't bring myself to get rid of him. So with him began the Imperial side of the Silverblade family.

Vhespasian is the youngest in his family, and great things were expected of him, even when he proved to not be Force sensitive. He took this to heart, throwing himself into every challenge he faced with all the passion and gusto a good Imperial baby should display. Unfortunately for him, his efforts went mostly overlooked by his Sith grandfather, the Silverblade patriarch, Darth Aemnos.

Perhaps predictably, all this negative reinforcement had an adverse effect on Vhespasian psychologically. Although he excelled academically and rose meteorically to the rank of Cipher Nine within Imperial Intelligence, his accomplishments never delivered what he thought he truly wanted: his grandfather's love and acceptance.

Needless to say, his class story went and messed him up. He came out of it, however, more devoted to the Empire and helping it become the best version of itself. He realizes there's a lot that needs to change... but he also knows that as a phantom agent with the galaxy's secrets at his fingertips, he's in a fantastic position to help that along.

It should also come as no surprise that Vhespasian has some difficulty forming lasting connections with other people. Especially romantically. His love life is a disaster. While quite adept at the art of seduction, the thought of commitment still makes him uneasy. Hopefully, someone someday will come along and sweep him off his feet. Raina Temple came very close, but Vhespasian backed out of the relationship when she asked where it was going.

I'm still back and forth-ing over who he should romance, if anyone. Major Anri is my top contender at the moment, but I can also picture him with someone like Empress Acina (I'd just headcanon it, I know she can't be fully romanced) and of course I could always just make a new OC and pair them up... It's a conundrum. I'm open to suggestions!

I should probably wrap this up, but I'm always happy to answer questions if I raised any! Thank you so much for the ask!!! 😁

[dullanyan]

finally beat pikmin 4 :}

spoilers under the cut as i ramble.

first off: my complaints.

biggest issue thats on my mind rn since it was effecting me just now in the final fight: if i throw my pikmin but they arent too far from me, they just come back to me??? i was trying to put them on a ledge so the final boss' heat wave wouldnt kill them. bc some of them like the purples werent thrown far, they kept coming back. that feature kind of sucks!

second: not sure why they made bootleg versions of pikmin 3 captains. i get why they werent in the game (though, they couldve been castaways with a side quest of gathering all the fruit treasures but, whatever) but i dont get why they needed bootleg versions. nelle couldve been an entirely different looking npc, yknow? one of them was even alph's brother...

third: caves werent nearly as long. aside from the final cave being 20 floors (and just like a boss rush for the most part, but also there were some like that in 2 so its fine) every cave was like 1-5 floors. i wouldve appreciated longer caves.. its definitely a possibility since you can choose which sublevel to go to after leaving a cave, so u dont have to do a long one entirely over.

also, the "only 3 pikmin at a time" was a little annoying. im glad you can have more than 3 types in a cave, at least, but you cant bring more than 3 with you which sucks. i get putting a limit, but i think a good limit wouldve been 5. 20 of each to have 100, like pikmin 2 and 3! also probably wouldve let caves be more interesting with more varieties to bring.

just a nitpick at this point but i don't quite understand the "existing enemy but just larger with no visual difference aside from size" trend. sovereign bulblax is slightly visually different, so i can accept that. but the jumbo bulborb and blowhogs, aside from different movesets, were just scaled up models. i think doing something to make them look a little different wouldve been nice, even if it was just a color difference or smth.

final complaint: i love glow pikmin but why must they replace bulbmin :{

the glow seeds are nice... but bulbmin are so everything to me. reserving glowmin 2 night time only and bulbmin in select caves wouldve been nice. i get it but also. i miss them....

---

ANYWAYS. complaints out of the way.

i thought i wouldnt like the "basically back to 1 captain" thing, but it was actually pretty good! oatchi is basically like a captain as well but with more capabilities, so i think it was pretty good. the upgrade system was also real nice imo!! with your character, oatchi and the onions, it was neat. it gives a better feeling of progression, and doesnt make things TOO easy from the beginning, getting as many red pikmin as possible to kill everything.

also i wasnt sold on the series reboot thing, but i think it works fine. i get having to reboot it to integrate the dogs into the story! (i still want to believe pikmin 3 will happen in this timeline sort of. i doubt olimar and louie would be present, but yknow.)

im also happy there were so many areas, and even with ~230 (239?) treasure types, i liked that there were a lot of repeats. without having to make so many different models, we got a ton of treasure to pick up.

the old bosses brought back were fun, too!! submerged castle 2 was really intense and fun. a little unsure why baldy long legs was back, but not shaggy... are they all permanently hairless now?

overall very good game. im not sure if its going to dethrone 2 as my favorite, but its certainly my 2nd fav! (3 being 3rd, 1 being 4th. 1 is very janky and unforgiving, so its just not as fun.)

the platforming elements brought in with the introduction of oatchi were really good. pikmin platforming.. its very cool and works really well! i was worried abt it, but honestly it wasnt too overdone, but not neglected at all. and better than pikmin sidescroller.

at this point, all i can hope for is maybe some free updates for the future... if not, hopefully a substantial dlc that would feel worth paying for. (the dlc for pikmin 3 was kind of a joke.)

dandori stages and battles, as well as night mode were kind of hard for me to adjust to, but once i got it figured out it was really satisfying. still not a big fan of vs dandori, but somehow i managed to at least get bronze and silver on the last 2 on my first try. night mode... that final stage was. a bit much. 2 proggs, 3 emperors i think it was? and a long legs??? it felt a little ridiculous, and i DID have to look up a guide, but i got it.

overall probably a 9/10 for me (even pikmin 2 isnt a 10/10, dont worry). its definitely the longest of pikmin games which i love, i was hoping for a super long game and it delivered pretty well! i think i spent close to 50 hours playing just one file to 100% completion. much better than the few hours you can spend playing pikmin 3.

now im going to start a new file, this time doing a no death run. i only lost 14 pikmin total, so i absolutely can do it!!

[1d1195]

Hiii Sam!! It feels like it’s been forever omg😭😭 I will try my best to respond without it being so long lol

I think by now all the guys have posted about it and ngl that was brutal for so many reasons! I didn’t even know what Louis had to go through and now with this it’s so :( and it’s okay! I feel like we all have para-social tendencies especially if we’re fangirls or whatever. But it’s understandable since you basically grew up with them and they were your everything at one point! and for better or for worse knowing about his own grief and how he deals with it is expected.

We did talk about it! And it is cute that people took the time to check in! I think it took everyone by surprise so of course checking up on friends who were/are in love with them seemed like a nice thing to do! Oh I definitely don’t agree with the stamens that you’re forgettable!! I think for the people who take time to know you, like actually know you, to them you are more than just a girl who loved 1D!

Sadly no new hot TA updates 😔 though he did come with his shirt basically it buttoned again one day so YES THIS MF KNOWS WTF HES DOING!!! My first thought when I saw him that day was “whore” BUT I MEAN IT IN THE MOST LOVING WAY😭 And I know I’m not the only one who thinks he’s hot like I’m sure I overheard a convo while going into the room lol

I LOVE when you ramble!! Even if they don’t make sense, they make sense to me!!!! I think you did mention the series!! DID YOU GET THAT NEW BOOK?!? HOW IS IT?! Will it replace the current book bfs?! Or will he be a new one on his own??

How are YOU doing though? I think the last time we talked you mentioned being busy and just not feeling good. Are you able to take a bit of a break for yourself? Please do so if you can!!

I’ve missed you so much it’s crazy😭 met someone from Boston last weekend and their name was Sammy??! So my brain immediately thought about you and how lame it’s been not being able to chat 😭 it’s been so busy these past two weeks I can’t! I simply don’t have time :( School is crazy like midterm season is here and I can’t lol I haven’t even been able to read your newest story yet😭 definitely a priority when i hopefully have time!

Missed you so so much my love!! Hope the week is treating you well! ILY!!-💜

OMG you lapped me in messages 😭

This week absolutely curb stomped me. But it's over. It’s fine. I was really overwhelmed and had a couple REALLY long and not so great days. Very drained. Slept a lot Friday into Saturday so I’m hoping this means I’ll be on the mend. I didn’t get to take a break for myself. but I DID read the book even when I had a 100 other things to do. It was good, but I liked some of the others in the series more. It was a little lackluster for me. Still sweet and I enjoyed it but the others deserve more hype than this one.

I know EXACTLY what you mean calling your TA a whore hahahahahaha he sounds pretty slutty to me tbh 🤣

I'm doing okay about Liam for the most part but I see some sad tiktoks. One that really got to me was a pic of him on the first slide and then the second slide is a picture of 1d when they were babies in 2012ish and the song in the background is "you start to wish you could've been 16 forever, cause you know your favorite band ain't getting back together" which is just gutting really for obviously 100 reasons. It's just so sad and I guess it's good I had such a bad week and a million other things to do so I could distract myself from how sad it is and not listen to this sad fucking song 😭

I'm sorry you've also been so busy! I hope you're taking time for yourself. Don't worry about reading, ever. I know you like to but it's not like the stories are going anywhere 💕 I know you're going to do well on your midterms and I hope you're not too stressed 💕 Sammy from Boston! How funny! I assure you it wasn't me as I wasn't near the west coast last weekend hehehehe

I'm excited to read what you wrote about the story, I hope you're having a great weekend 💕

xoxo

[fadebolt]

Welp, not a lot of people seemed to care about my voiceover video, but still I ended up sending it over for my video editing assignment, and actually managed to get a 10/10 on it

Which I very much didn't expect, cus like, there were a bunch of others that did way fancier editing, or had way more creativity, and none of them were cringe enough to send in a freaking video game sequence (though it was said that we could pick any topic we wanted, and I thought it would be a great motivator if I worked on something I actually deeply cared about and ejoyed, you know).

I guess it's sort of possible that everyone got the ten points, but I won't let that discourage me. After all, I'm literally just getting started with video making, and that is basically the perfect format for all the ramblings I like to do on the internet (RW room ratings would honestly be a real blast in a video format... though it would probably be pretty time consuming to keep putting them up on a daily basis, as a beginner).

Either way, I just wanted to ramble about this, cus I'm still super busy, and everything is a freaking struggle, but at least there will always be a thing or two that can keep me happy and sane. And I suppose it's probably better that way, even if the negative things can sometimes become a little much (...but that is mainly just that whole SC fiasco. I'm glad most of my good pals are still happily sticking around, but it really sucks that such a pleasant environment had to take so much unnecessary damage thanks to the carelessness of some popular figures in the community. I understand why they did what they did, and I'm not mad at them, but it's gonna take a really long time for the server and all its members to fully recover from everything, and I very much hate to see that :/)

Good news is that I'm already done with a boatload of tasks, there won't be any more lectures whatsoever, and my room analysis posts will likely get shorter, since I won't have an enormous list of stuff I'll be needing to cover. So hopefully I'll get to make more fun stuff, which is great, cus my head is buzzing with ideas :D

[ms-scarletwings]

My last two braincells staring at this discourse hot plate I’ve avoided touching for this long like

And ah….

Fuck it. Someone is going to ask me sooner or later or start over-assuming a world of stuff and I’d rather be on the record than not about the elephant in the room if we get to that point. It’s a question I care to try answering genuinely.

So, I wasn’t really an active participant in the larger “fandom” back when fanbase culture, especially on tumblr, was memorably a whole different ballgame. If anything, I just remember being in high school and seeing this ship actually held up as so omnipresent and near rabidly supported among same-aged fans that it makes the current popularity of it feel almost niche by comparison.

Note I said feel, because lord knows I don’t have any actual backing on this besides a personal anecdote. Someone mentioned a valid point about how people who invest a lot of energy into character shipping generally calmed the hell down relative to what it looked like in the early 2010s and I have to agree with that perspective. But I’m also rambling really off-topic now.

I don’t Ship ZaDR and in fact I actually could be counted in that crowd of strong dislikers of it. Like 7/10 times I’m a personal cringer and those 3/10 times is probs under special circumstances. I just know a lot of it squicks me out for the hopefully obvious reasons unless you tweak ages and get way into OOC range. Most of the kind of ZaDR content that would gross me tf out is, I remind myself all the time, usually from pretty young fans who just don’t understand the gap is there and how steep it is in canon. It’s not just a numbers technicality. Zim being roughly 16 in Irk years does not translate to his equivalence to a 16 Earth-year old human anymore than we can say a 6 year old… idk, kobold is developmentally level to a 6 old human child. (For non DnD fans, Kobolds are full egg-laying adults at that age even though they can live to be around 120).

Dib is a human tween, and Zim is not just at the maturity rate for his species, he’s got over an earth century of military training/service and a little fry cooking on his resume. He went through the same underground educational class with The current Tallests. Zim, Skoodge, Red, and Purple are all from the same-aged generation of Irken stock. It’s sometimes easy to forget that when Zim’s a uniquely petite, whimsical creature and the characters he spends the most time interacting with are literal middle schoolers. Imagine shipping Red with Dib instead and you might realize we really let the height, mannerisms, and voice shape a lot of perception here. Or hey, maybe that’s just my take.

I can’t make any definitive comment on the dozens of iterations of ZaDR that are changing canon factors around since A. I don’t go looking for and researching any of that out of a personal disinterest. B. Something something, idk. Eat, Drink, and be Merry, and C. It’s flatly easier and I have more to say about the show as it exists because that’s the material I have on hand to speak for. I’m not here for high school tier media literacy and moralizing shit-flinging over imaginary scenarios about imaginary people either, just continuing a Fan to Fans dialogue on the matter.

So, as best as I can manage to be both some pretend outside observer and also in a position to agree with ZaDR hate, these are the main points I believe driving the most disapproval of this ship (as perceived on face value)

• ZaDR is a ship between characters which are unquestionably considered to be an adult and child by the canon setting.

Zim, is around 16 in Irk Years, 126-150+ something or older in Earth years, and “we have no actual idea” in equivalent human years, but definitely past that of cultural and physical adult maturity. There’s no real if, ands, or buts about that reality of the show and I think this is the single thing most driving the modern push against the ship or at least the vitriolic intensity behind that push. The fact that it’s remembered as a children’s cartoon makes anything that remotely smells like a pedophilla-adjacent topic, even if/when that smell comes from kneejerk assumptions or rumors, does to shipping discourse what mishandled gasoline does to an open bonfire. Predictably and reliably. And that is something that’s been ticking up in many other fandoms right now, just so happening to also include this one.

• ZaDR taken literally is very arguably incomprehensible outside of an OOC or AU context.

And this is the kind of thing I would otherwise love to have some fervent and good faith in-depth conversations with other fans about and elaborate on if they want to contest that, but as far as I have seen, most ZaDR shippers don’t to any degree of aggressiveness that antis try to characterize of them (appealing again to limited experience). And that’s something respectable in its own right if I’m making a correct observation. Like as far as I know these characters it's borderline a stretch already to conclude that Irkens, which are uniformly asexual cyborgs, will readily bond and affectionate in a way comparable to human romantic love.

• Jhonen Vasquez openly doesn’t like ZaDR.

Not that it matters to my opinion or that there’s any prescriptive weight to his stance, but I’d wager it’s probably from some combination of the above two points. Though, those who hate the ship enough to devote entire websites or blogs to fill their time up maintaining a crusade with probably point to Vasquez’s input here more like a post-hoc justification rather than an original motivation. But it gets brought up enough that I found it worth keeping in mind in understanding the crowd.

• A possible contrarian sentiment against what can be viewed as a recent trend of every canon hero/villain rivalry becoming an etl within common fanon. Maybe also a contrarian sentiment against romantically shipping every fictional duo with a speck of chemistry by default when a friendship interpretation is no less valid.

This idea I’m kind of just speculating about instead of reporting on. Maybe also projecting…Was just kind of a gut hunch that I can understand, even if I’d still find it more than anything else on the table to be a trivial reason to be downright destructive or confrontational about broad fandom engagement. It’s also a point not remotely unique to IZ pairings. I’d feel the same way if I saw people shipping Doofensmirtz and Perry the Platypus, or, SpongeBob and squidward in a “Problematics discussion aside, this just feels like a random bandwagon because someone could” sense. I really wouldn’t be hasty to assume this is homophia based, as I have seen some people suggest, because it’s actually a complaint I see way more often from queer aromantics and asexuals (who I emphasize with, being on the grey spectrum) than straight people, but that could also be the selection bias of my circles talking. When I actually was poking a nose around the web and getting through puberty in early 2010s America, ZaDR shipping was something I associated more with the same straight girls who were borderline obnoxiously obsessed with mlm relationships (anyone else remember the hayday of the Yaoi fangirl trope?) than actual LGBT+ people trying to find representation.

But yeah I just really don’t enjoy ZaDR myself and I do sometimes get annoyed at how it’s basically the most popular and well known ship within IZ as a community. But it’s also kind of fascinating as like, a phenomenon? The entire radioactive shitstorm surrounding and watching it gain over a decade of internet history (god I feel old now) and most of all I just find it very intimidating to be both so everywhere yet at the same time so freaking gd in range of some loud hornet nests.

So in the anyway, idk, I hope that was an honest, somewhat solid contribution to the conversation here, at risk of alienating some of you if my tone came across wrong 👉👈

Btw if there’s any false impression I really hope I did not send out above all, it is any ambiguity or hypocrisy around the pro-ship stance in my intro. Just because I find iterations of ZaDR disgustang and not aligned with my view of the canon doesn’t mean any terminally online antiship/pp nonsense claims me as an ally or promoter of it, capeesh?

i know its probably not my place to ask, but im genuinely curious why so many people absolutely hate zadr? like i got the message that people didnt like zadr but i never got the reason why, yknow?

[tittyblade]

tumblr etiquette 101

a list that is nowhere near exhaustive, from yours truly.

First off, welcome! Whether you’re a twitter veteran looking for anything but whatever twitter is, or a new user just done signing up, glad to see you in our ranks beloveds! Welcome home. Refer to this quick tour to make sure your fandom experience (or tumblr experience in general) is a positive one!

Disclaimer: I know it’s long, but please try to read or skim through til the end if you’re new here! This is by no means meant to be a rule book (for the most part lol), only a guide to help you get settled easier!

1) Your blog

This is where people will see and interact with you, so put some effort into it!

Try to choose a name (url) that’s simple. You can see it as your brand, it’s how people will perceive you and remember you. If you’d like to interact with other users here (and not use the site just for the content) it’s better to have something short and sweet, preferably without spaces. (Of course, these are only suggestions.) Rest assured, you can change it literally any time you want.

Have a theme. Utilize the tool that lets you edit your blog’s color or the font of your bio! You can make it match your profile picture, or your blog if it has a theme of its own. Make it feel homey :]

Fill in your bio. People will be checking out your profile probably more often than you think. Don’t leave it empty! Put in any information you’re comfortable with sharing and isn’t too personal (like your age if you’re a minor, or other TMI that can be found on other people’s carrds). It’s always better to add a name/nickname people can use to refer to you by, but feel free to use your blog description to shitpost still.

You can have an intro post. More often than not, you’ll see a blog have a pinned post, a post permanently appearing at the top of a blog until you pin another post or unpin it. You can make one of those, if you’d like to introduce yourself in more length, link any other socials or a carrd, and show others visiting your blog how you tag things so it’ll be easy for them to navigate. Not an obligation.

Keep your anonymity and your safety. It should go without saying, but there’s no harm in repeating it just in case. Your comfort, privacy and safety has the utmost importance. Don’t share any information you don’t want to. Don’t share your age if you’re a minor, or any other incredibly personal info. I’d encourage you to go by a nickname that’s not your real name, (blog name, your brand, remember?) since there’s safety in anonymity, and that’s lowkey one of the big deals of tumblr, but that’s up to you still.

Choose what you want to be visible. Your liked posts and who you follow are all things you can set to keep to yourself and hide from the publics eye, how handy! You should go through all the setting while you’re at it, set it to your comfort.

Side blogs are a thing. You can have multiple blogs that you can use for different things (see: different fandoms, art blog, etc) to keep them organized or away from your followers. Just remember that the replies and off-anon asks you send will be from your main blog, as well as where you follow other blogs from.

2) Interacting with others

You’ve set up your account, now comes the fun part!

Follow to your heart’s desire. If you care about others seeing who you follow, fear not! In tumblr, usually only two types of blogs keep their following visible to others: newbies, and big blogs using it to point people on other good blogs’ direction. Just turn it off, and go ham following people.

Customize your dashboard. Gonna mention just two things here: this is another reason why it’s really important that you follow blogs without sparing, your dash will collect dust otherwise; and you should turn off “best stuff first” in your dashboard settings, to have a better community here and all.

Follow tags. You can set it in your settings that posts with your followed tags appear on your dashboard.

You can check the og post for edits and context. When you see a reblogged post you don’t understand the context of (or don’t recognize the character in case of fanarts), click on the profile so it will take you to the original post. From there you can check the original poster’s tags to get the context, or see if there have been any edits made to the post, since when you edit a post it doesn’t update any past reblogs.

Send people asks... This is how you make mutuals, people! Do it off-anon if you’d like them to know your blog, or anon if you’d rather not! (You can still end your messages with a signature to show you’re the same person, -[name] is one example.) Send them nice messages, ask their opinion on something, discuss things, or just straight up shitpost lol. Go wild. The sky’s your limit and it’s definitely more than 280 characters.

...and let them ask you! You can set your preference in the settings, do it on desktop tumblr to access more settings tho! What you can customize on mobile is limited (like letting people ask you things anonymously, that’s only on desktop settings). In my personal opinion, it’s always better to tag their username (or a nickname you give them, if they’re a friend) on that post, since you wouldn’t want your interactions with your friends to get buried in your blog forever.

Comment on posts. If you have something to say but don’t want the post to appear on your blog you can add a comment. The owner of the post will get a notif for it, but for anyone else you need to tag them.

For the love of god, reblog. People will only see your liked posts if you have it visible to public and they specifically go on your blog to look at them. You like something? You reblog. It’s already hard for posts to circulate properly, if you don’t reblog them literally no one will see them. If not for anything do it for the artists. Just hold and drag on mobile to fast rb.

3) Your Posts

Finally here! Don’t be a lurker, post and engage!

Make use of “read more”. If your post is long, add it. That’s what you clicked on earlier to expand this post. On desktop leave an empty line and you’ll see three dots appear, and on mobile type :readmore: on that empty line.

Draft a post to come back to it later. Pretty self explanatory.

Queue your post. Whether it’s your own post or you’re reblogging, make use of the queue feature to a) not spam reblog and fill up the dashboard of people following you and b) keep your blog active while you’re gone. Mess around in the settings, it’s fairly easy to set up.

Schedule your post. Same as queueing, the only difference is you get to choose the exact time your post will go up. Handy if you want to schedule a post for certain dates like april fools, or 5 years in the future for some reason. 

Format your texts. You can do all kinds of fancy stuff here (that’s a link, try pressing on it). Twitter doesn’t have this, make use of it. Changes depending on whether you’re on mobile or desktop. (Desktop has less features.)

Check your stats. If you’re trying to understand the algorithm better or want to look at some pretty graphs you can get your data on that on desktop tumblr.

@ people in comments. You’ll get all the notifs when people comment on your posts but they won’t see your reply unless you tag them in your message.

4) Tags, and tagging a post

This is where my earlier statement “this isn’t a rule book” stops being applicable. It’s not a war crime to go against these, I won’t come chasing you (don’t take my word for this) but you’ll work up a bad rep. Just saying lol.

Do NOT crosstag posts. It’s really tempting to add unrelated tags to increase your posts’ interaction, I know, but that’s not what tumblr is about. Don’t be a dick and make other communities’ experience worse for them.

Always tag your posts with “crit/critical/discourse/etc” if it calls for it. There’s no exceptions to it. This is the reason you see people migrating to tumblr. Let people enjoy things.

Don’t main tag a critical/negative post. If your crit post is about “Thing”, you add the “Thing critical” tag, but not the “Thing” tag. People block crit tags if they don’t want to see it, don’t shove it in their faces by main tagging it. 

If you don’t want to see something, just block it. Another reason why people are able to survive on tumblr. You don’t start discourse, you don’t make call-outs, you block. You can find something for every community you can think of if you go looking for it. The worst of the worst probably won’t ever appear on your dash, but if you’re worried or feel the need for it, you know where the block button is.

Feel free to shitpost or ramble. More often than not you’ll see people rb a post with a comment, and their elaboration will be in the tags. The tags are only visible on your profile and the notifications of the owner of the og blog. Just a thing people do.

Reblog artists’ posts with nice comments in the tags! Commenting on a drawing is usually done through the tags (Not an obligation, again, just a thing people do. Feel free to add your comment on the rb itself if you’d want other people to see it tho!) and leave nice messages for the artists! It’s a win-win for everyone involved. 

If you have more than a single follower, always use the common tw warning tags. You don’t need to tw everything, but tw’ing some common things is the bare minimum human decency. Keep it safe for others. 

Tag a post “long post” if it’s really long. Pretty self explanatory. Don’t make people scroll through all that please lol. 

You can use them to organize your blog. This is more of a pro tip, if you’d like to not miss a post in your blog, cause they will start pilin’ up soon enough.

#Liveblogging is pretty fun. If you’d like to talk to people during streams, don’t forget to add the relevant tags still! Again, you won’t show up on people’s dash otherwise.

Whew! That got out of hand. Hopefully I didn’t bore you too much. Check out blogs like @heritageposts and @hellsite-hall-of-fame to honor our past o7. @mcytblr-hall-of-fame too maybe :eyes:. Anyways, don’t forget the most important rule of them all:

Enjoy your stay! You’re meant to have fun on here while also making friends (if that’s your thing). Just be kind and respectful of others, you’ll get the hang of the rest! <3

[poguesholland]

No pressure but if you have time do you think you could ever write something about waking up really early one day with gray? Like you’re chilly and snuggle into him and wake up slow and just lovey and go for a walk around the neighborhood with sledge and some coffee. Idk domestic boyfriend Grayson is just so cute to me 🥺🥰

Gets a bit steamy at one point but I hope you like it!

-

Your eyes flutter open to be faced with a window, covered in snow. Currently, you were in New Jersey with your boyfriend, Grayson, as he visited his family. You loved coming to New Jersey, it was just so different from where you lived. It was peaceful. And you loved visiting Lisa, Graysons Mom.

Graysons arm was draped over your waist, looser than how it was last night yet still making sure you stayed close to him. His face rested against your shoulder, feeling the small breaths he takes against your skin. You shuffle a bit in place to have a better look outside the window and admire the December weather.

You feel Grayson shift a bit behind you before the arm around your waist tightens it’s grip, pulling you closer to him. A smile finds its way to your face as Grayson hides his face in the crook of your neck, peppering kisses all over. You giggle at the ticklish sensation before turning around to face your handsome boy.

You move your leg to be across Graysons waist and lay down on top of him, sort of straddling him. His hands go to your waist, sliding up the fabric of his shirt which you wore to sleep, to rest against your bare stomach giving you goosebumps. A hand of yours goes to cup Graysons face as he sleepily looks at you with admiration.

“G’Morning baby” Grayson yawns leaning into your palm, closing his eyes to savor this feeling. Smiling softly at his sleepy state, you lean in to leave a deep kiss on his lips. “Good morning, my love” You whisper against his lips, making Grayson smile and lean in to kiss you once more. Your hand tangles in his soft curls as your head rests on his chest, looking up at him.

“It’s snowing” You say, raising your eyebrows as Grayson grins widely. His hands trace random shapes onto your bare skin, the feeling making you relaxed. “Maybe we could take a walk?” He suggests and you hum a quiet ‘okay’. Both of you peacefully take in this lovely moment, a moment where you and no responsibilities or worries. Just here with one another.

That didn’t last long as you heard scratching against the bottom of the bed, looking down to see none other than Sledge, Grayson and Ethan’s dog. But from how much he adores you and Kristina, anyone would think he’s your dog. You quickly sit up to straddle Grayson, reaching down to carry Sledge up onto the bed.

“Gooodd Morning, my perfect boyy, I missed you so much. Yes I did, yes I did!” You exclaim excitedly, as you kiss Sledge all over his face. He gets excited, licking you to give you a kiss. Grayson could not bring himself to understand how you could kiss the dog directly on the lips, he could barely let the furry animal lick him.

Sledge leans up to lick Graysons face, tail wagging with excitement as Grayson smiled widely. “Good morning to you too, was hoping to have a little alone time with my girlfriend but I can share if you want” He talks to the dog, making you giggle.

Sledge lays his head on Graysons thigh, closing his eyes in content as you pet him. “Look at how cute he is! Oh my god, I just wanna eat him up!” You ramble to Grayson at the sight of the dog, making him laugh. Little did you know he was looking at you with the same look of admiration you were giving Sledge, his heart warming at the sight of you bonding with his dog.

“Can Sledge come with us on our walk? Please, I promise I won’t let go of his leash and he won’t get lost again! I even got him that adorable winter outfit with an ice cap and everything, Gray please-” You whine and Grayson laughs, leaving a kiss on your head. “Of course baby, we just need to get dressed”.

You got up and took out your warmest pair of sweatpants and one of Graysons hoodies, taking out a scarf and ice cap for you and Grayson. You weren’t wearing anything under Graysons shirt which you had slept with, so once you took it off, Grayson whistled making you blush. “Stop, Gray!” You whine making him chuckle.

He gets up from the bed to stand behind you as you looked through your closet for gloves, arms wrapping around your bare waist. He buried his head in the crook of your neck, leaving slow kisses from your jaw to your shoulder, his scruff tickling you. “On second thought, maybe we could stay in instead?” Grayson mumbles. You let out a sigh of content as you leaned back into Graysons bare chest, indulging in the feeling of his mouth on your skin.

Graysons hands trail up to your breasts, as he cups them lightly making your breath hitch in your throat. “Gray” You whimpered as you turned your head to face him, leaning in to connect your lips. You hum into the kiss as his fingers brush over your hardening buds, making your head spin.

Suddenly, Sledge barks loudly from the bed, interrupting the two of you. “Do you have to be such a cockblock all the time Sledge?” Grayson groans into the kiss, earning a giggle from you. You run your hands through his hair and pull away from him, “C’mon, get dressed so we can go”.

And both of you get dressed ten minutes later, now having finished dressing Sledge up. You went downstairs to pour some cereal into two bowls for Grayson and you, filling up two glasses of water as well.

Grayson and you quickly finish the breakfast and put on your shoes, along with your winter coats. You put Sledge’s leash on, with some difficulty due to his excitement. As you walk out, Grayson shuts the door behind you. He lightly jogs to reach you, his hand wrapping around your waist to keep you close to him.

He leans down to kiss your cheek, “Coffee?”, knowing you already want coffee. “Coffee”. You head to a small coffee stand and order, Grayson pays for your drinks which you thank him for. You wait for your drink as Sledge tries to run around to escape the leash he had on. “You love walks that much, huh buddy?” Grayson chuckles as he leans down to pet the dog. A smile finds its way onto your face before you take the coffee, thanking the barista and handing Grayson his coffee.

Snuggling up to Grayson, you walk around the snowed out streets of Jersey. “God, I forget how much I miss living in Jersey” Grayson let’s out, eyes scanning the fairytale like scene in front of the both of you. “One day, maybe you will” You hum and he squeezes your waist. “We will” He corrects you as you blush, resting your head on his shoulder.

“That’s very confident of you to say about the future” You joke and he shrugs. “You are my future” Grayson replies softly as you both stop walking. “You think about stuff like that?” You almost whisper, feeling your heart warming by the second. “Yeah, ‘Course I do” Grayson mumbles, his hands resting on your hips to bring you closer to him.

He notices your blush, smiling lightly. “When we get married, we’ll move to Jersey. We’ll get three dogs, that I’ll hopefully not be allergic to, we’ll have kids — have a huge family, if y’want to it’s your body of course — take walks every day and grow old together with Sledge” Grayson continues, and you look at him in awe. “I really won the jackpot with you, didn’t I?” You laugh lightly, a hand of yours going to Graysons neck to lightly pull him towards you and kiss him softly.

He leans his head down, deepening your kiss. “I love you so much” Grayson mumbles into the kiss and you connect your lips once more. “I love you so much more” You let out, your eyes staring into his captivating hazel orbs. He smiles lightly, before turning his attention back to Sledge who had began to get a bit bored.

Sledge begins to get a bit tired, which you take notice of, so you pick him up and try to cheer him up. “Look, Sledge! Everything’s so pretty here!” You point out to him, not even noticing that you were using your baby voice. Grayson takes his phone out to take a picture of you as you were totally unaware, setting it as his lock screen.

He really had everything he needed at this very moment. And he hoped that in the future, he could still be able to say the exact same sentence with you by his side, always.

[lipstickstainz]

touches - s.r.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Reader Summary: Spencer doesn’t like to be touched. But what happens, when he gets comfortable around you? Warnings: fluff, Spencer being cute, getting shot but nothing too explicit and oh, and a bucket full of angst Word Count: 4,4k  A/N: hello friends. I have a part two of this in my drafts if you like! I hope you enjoy. gif not mine.

You had heard a lot about the BAU team before joining them.

About the cases, the trust, the bond. It had always been something that had fascinated you. You had experienced some things with your previous team as well, but the BAU was in a whole different league.

Before you had been moved there, you had already familiarized yourself with the teammates. You didn't want to come unprepared to a team that knew each other inside and out. Also, you were a person who put your foot in your mouth quickly.

You were most impressed by Doctor Spencer Reid. You had heard the most about him. He was a genius, with an IQ of 187 and he could read 20,000 words a minute. Not to mention his eidetic memory. You had even read his doctoral dissertations. While you didn't understand everything, they were incredibly interesting and gave you a little insight into the mind of the spectacular Doctor Spencer Reid.

When you first met, you concentrated on not reaching out to him. You merely raised your hand to greet him, which he returned with a smile, and although he tried to hide it, you knew that this small gesture meant a lot to him.

While the other team members put their hand on his shoulder or ruffled his hair, you were almost tensely careful not to touch him. If he should want to, he would make the first move.

It happened some time later, as you stood side by side in the office kitchen. While Spencer poured himself a coffee, you poured hot water into your teacup. You asked him for the sugar that was next to him, and instead of sliding it over to you as you had been doing, he held the dispenser out to you. You reached for it and when your fingers brushed his, it went through you like an electric shock. You suddenly felt warm and your heart beat faster, but Spencer didn't seem to notice. He smiled at you before walking back to his seat. You looked after him.

After that incident, you were both a little more relaxed. While you didn't push it, Spencer didn't seem to mind you handing him files or touching each other briefly when you sat next to each other. After an incident on the plane, even the team noticed.

Spencer was on his way to the trash can when you got up to sit with Emily and Hotch to discuss the current case. You squeezed past each other as the plane made an unexpected swerve. You tried to grab onto the seat next to you, but the sway was too sudden. Before you could fall, Spencer grabbed your arm with one hand and your hip with the other and held you tight. He pulled you straight toward him so you wouldn't land face down on the ground. Even when the plane was back on course, he didn't let go. As you tried to regain control of your irregular breathing from the shock, Spencer looked at you closely. You felt his gaze on you, almost burning into your forehead, but neither said a word. As you broke away from each other and each sat down in your seat, you noticed his gaze still on you. When you looked up, he looked away.

Next came your birthday. Even though you didn't want to celebrate and your real plan was to have food delivered and watch your favorite movie for the hundredth time, the team dragged you to a bar. "Pathetic," Derek had called the plan, and you had punched him affectionately in the shoulder, but by the time he put the first drink in your hand, you had all but forgotten his comment. While some of you sat at a table and the rest enjoyed themselves on the dance floor, you sat at the bar. You did love your team, but on your birthday you didn't want to hear about any cases outside of work. Which couldn't be avoided when you were around each other 24/7.

You sipped your drink, secretly cursing Derek for having so much alcohol in it. You scrunched your nose.

"Did you know that alcohol tastes different when you drink it with a straw?" Spencer asked, sitting down in the empty chair next to you. You turned to him and raised an eyebrow questioningly. "When we ingest something, the aroma molecules go up our nose and we can tell from the start whether it's going to taste good or not. Also, the nose detects different flavors than the tongue. So if you drink the drink with the straw so the glass is farther away from your nose, you'll perceive the taste of the drink differently than it is." Even in the dim light of the bar, you could see how red he was getting. When you didn't answer, he laughed nervously and ran a hand through his hair. "Sorry, I was rambling again."

You took another sip of your drink. "Don't apologize, Spencer. I like that you're so smart. And I like that you're comfortable enough to want to share your knowledge with me," you smiled gently at him. He returned your smile.

"I appreciate you not reaching out to me then, by the way," he confessed, nibbling on the label of his beer bottle. "I don't like shaking hands with strangers, and it makes me uncomfortable when I'm expected to but I don't. So, thanks for that."

"It's okay," you said, but he let go of his bottle and turned to you completely.

"You never pushed me to do this. You waited for me to make the first move on this because it means more to me than it does to you. There aren't many who are that respectful and understanding." He got up from his chair, but left the beer bottle on the counter. He held out his arms. "I haven't wished you a happy birthday yet because I didn't want to do it in front of the team. They'd make a big deal out of it." He gestured for you to give him a hug. He actually wanted to hug you.

"Spencer, you don't have to do this," you said, but before you knew it, he had grabbed your hand and pulled you off the chair, right into his arms.

You had often imagined what a hug from Spencer would be like, especially when you saw him hug JJ or Emily after a hard case. But you had imagined it differently.

He had his arms wrapped around your waist and held you so close that you almost couldn't breathe. You felt his long fingers on your skin, despite your T-shirt and you felt his warm breath on your neck and his curls on your temple. Goosebumps spread over your body and you prayed he didn't notice. "Happy birthday," he whispered in your ear and before you knew it, he placed his lips on your cheek before pulling away from you. Smiling, he reached for his beer and sauntered back over to the table, leaving you standing at the bar. With a pounding heart and fire in your veins. And in that moment, you just thought that work colleagues, or even maybe friends, shouldn't feel that way about each other.

After your birthday, it was no longer an issue for Spencer. Under the table, he'd nudge you with his knee if you weren't paying attention for a second, or he'd put his hand on your shoulder when he looked over you at the computer screen. He also didn't mind if you were so exhausted from a case that you fell asleep by his side on the plane, with your head on his shoulder. You didn't realize it, but JJ had pointed out that Spencer always pulled you a little closer then, resting his cheek against the top of your head. For him, the constant touching was no longer an issue.

For you, it was. Every time his skin brushed yours, you felt warm and your heart skipped a beat. Whether it was at dinner, at a briefing, or just walking by. But it was bearable.

It got bad when he touched you longer. On particularly hard cases, he had taken to looking under the table for your hand and squeezing it twice. It was a gesture of friendship and care. If you held each other, nothing could happen to you. On the plane, you always sat next to each other, playing cards or absorbed in your own thoughts. Spencer, however, got into the habit of putting your legs over one of his if you had to fly for a particularly long time. At first, the team gave you strange looks, which made you uncomfortable, but didn't bother Spencer in the least. So you tried not to let on, which was pretty difficult when you were surrounded by profilers. Flames blazed in your veins at those touches, heat tingled under your skin where he touched you, and when he pulled you into his arms on certain occasions, you almost felt dizzy.

This is not how you should feel about your best friend.

"Thales, Miletus, here's your key," Hotch said, tossing Spencer the room key as the team checked into the hotel. He'd resisted at first the nickname Garcia had picked out for you - classically, after the discoverer of magnetism - but since everyone was using it, even the earnest Hotch had given up on it. "Prentiss, JJ, your room is right next to ours." The two women nodded and the four of them walked down the corridor while Derek was kind enough to take the girls' bags.

You couldn't look after them for long, because Spencer had already grabbed your hand and intertwined his fingers. "Come on. Our room is waiting."

You had never shared a room. You'd either always had your own, or shared one with Emily or JJ, but never with Spencer. You wouldn't mind so much if you weren't into him. Hopefully there were two beds. On opposite walls. Far away from each other.

When Spencer unlocked the door and you entered, you wanted to sink into the floor. Double bed. One blanket. You tried to mentally prepare yourself for the stay by setting your bag down on a chair and stopping in the middle of the room while your best friend inspected it. He didn't seem to notice that you had only one bed and, more importantly, only one blanket. At least, it didn't bother him.

When you returned to the room that evening, you went straight to the bathroom and took a shower. The water was as cold as you could stand it. It was supposed to cool you down and prepare you for the night. It wasn't every day that you shared a bed with your crush. After combing your hair and changing, you slipped under the covers and tried to fall asleep as quickly as possible so you wouldn't notice Spencer's presence next to you when he came out of the bathroom.

Your thoughts cheated on you. What if you snuggled up to each other in your sleep at night? Or you would unconsciously snuggle up to him, but he didn't want you to? Then you'd have to get another room tomorrow. And it would get so awkward that you wouldn't be able to look him in the eyes.

"What are you thinking about?" asked Spencer finally as he climbed into bed next to you. Immediately, you felt his warmth. He hadn't taken a cold shower, apparently.

"It's always hard when kids are involved," you answered truthfully. It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't what was floating around in your mind either.

"Come here," he said, opening his arms. Hesitantly, you slid closer to him so there was still space between you, but it didn't seem close enough for Spencer. After he turned out the light, he pulled you close enough for you to rest your head on his shoulder and with his free hand, he reached for yours and intertwined your fingers again. Your heart stopped. "We can do this, Y/N. We've done it all so far." You heard his heartbeat beneath you, felt his breath on your hair, and the warmth of his body burned into your skin. "Try to get some sleep. We'll know more tomorrow," he whispered, pressing a kiss to your forehead before you fell asleep.

When you woke up in the morning, you felt Spencer behind you. His chest was pressed against your back, his arm was wrapped tightly around your middle, and he had his face buried in your neck. Immediately goosebumps spread all over your body. You tried to pull away from him a little, but he pulled you even closer. Spencer was still asleep, so he didn't notice how he carefully slid his hand under your shirt and how his long fingers danced over your soft skin. You held your breath, afraid to move or give away your racing heartbeat. At one point he pulled his arm back and turned onto his back before lifting his hand and rubbing his eyes. His hair stood out in all directions and he smiled sleepily. You were getting hot.

"Good morning, Y/N." Good morning indeed.

The case took longer than planned, though of course you can't plan a case. After the third night, you had gotten used to sleeping next to Spencer, but the cuddling worried you. The longer you shared that room, the more complicated your feelings became. It was almost unbearable.

Derek, Emily, Spencer and you found the unsub in a remote car yard. While the latter surveyed the building, Derek and you looked around the yard.

"What's going on between you and Reid, anyway?" he asked curiously. You gave him a meaningful look, but he didn't care. "It's come to all of our attention. You guys are inseparable, he has to touch you all the time, and those looks."

"What looks?" you probed, trying to sound as unsuspecting as possible. This time Derek was looking at you. So he had noticed. And if Derek knew, so did the others. Fucking profilers.

"Y/N," he started, and stopped. When you turned to him, he twisted his mouth into a weak smile. It was a very different Derek who stood before you. Not the go-getter who sometimes made fun of Spencer. He seemed genuinely worried, and that made you nervous. "Friends don't look at friends that way."

A loud bang rang through the air and the conversation was all but forgotten. You took cover and communicated via hand signals. Quietly, you moved forward. It wasn't long before you saw a figure running away behind the cars. "We got him," Derek said into the mic, and together you dashed toward the unsub. He ran toward the woods and disappeared. Derek looked at you and nodded. You split up.

Gun drawn, you ran forward. Leaves crunched beneath you, but you tuned that out. You focused on the birds above you, the shadows of the trees, and the gun in your hand. He had to be here somewhere.

You didn't even startle when you felt cold metal against the back of your head. "Don‘t. Move." You took your fingers off the trigger and raised your arms. "Put the gun down. Vest off." Slowly, you bent down and placed both on the ground. The only thing you could think about was that you would hopefully find them later. "Walk.“ With your hands clasped behind your head, you took one step at a time. Derek was nowhere to be seen. You wished you hadn't split up.

He led you to a rundown cabin in the woods that wasn't marked on any map, which is why you couldn't have known about it. He pushed you inside and closed the door behind him, his gun still pointed at you. "If you had wanted to kill me, you would have done it long ago," you gave out, but he didn't go for it. It was a game of fire. You knew the file and what he was capable of.

It was only a few moments before someone kicked open the door and Derek stormed into the cabin, closely followed by Spencer. "Put the gun down and keep your hands off," Derek yelled. Up until then, you hadn't realized that the he had pulled you close and was holding the barrel of his gun right to your temple You only had eyes for Spencer, who was deliberately not looking at you.

You tried to get his attention, but he wouldn't budge. You raised a hand and moved it toward your shoulder, hoping Spencer understood your message. But he wasn't looking at you.

Look at me, Spencer. Come on. Look. At. Me.

His eyes moved from the unsub to your fingers, tapping a spot in your shoulder. You repeated this until he finally looked you in the eye. Then he shook his head, barely perceptibly. Again you tapped the spot. If Spencer shot through your shoulder, he would hit the perpetrator in the torso, and even if the bullet slowed down through you, it would still do enough damage. And you were willing to take the risk.

But Spencer didn't shoot. And time was running out for you. "I trust you," you said, no sound escaping your lips. He gritted his teeth. "I trust you, Spencer. Do it."

And then he shot.

-

"Welcome back, sunshine," Derek grinned, wrapping you in his muscular arms as you entered the office. "We've all missed you."

It had been three months since you had been shot in the field. Spencer had shot you through the shoulder as planned, and you were right. The perpetrator was shot and the rest of the victims were found. So it was almost a happy ending.

Almost. Of course, you had to listen to a few more things from Hotch on the way to the hospital. You were tired of living and he was disappointed and angry, but incredibly relieved that nothing else had happened to you. You could have been the next victim, too.

"All of you?" you prodded, and Emily, who had joined you, screwed up her face.

"He's not back yet. He extended his vacation," she said, putting a hand on your shoulder. "He's not really over it yet."

You hadn't heard from Spencer since the incident. He hadn't visited you at the hospital, called you or been to your home after you were discharged. You were best friends and the fact that you hadn't seen him in three months hurt more than the gunshot wound. The only person Spencer talked to was JJ, but even she couldn't give you any information.

He probably blamed himself, but why? You had wanted him to shoot. It had been your plan. Besides, he had shot so well that you didn't suffer any permanent damage. He shouldn't worry about it.

It was strange to work a case without him. Not having him near you. Not being able to feel his warmth. You tried to reach him, by phone, by letter, but you got no answer. Even though you hadn't spoken in months, he was your best friend and you were starting to get really worried. He had cut off contact with JJ himself.

When you walked into the office one morning, you were almost breathless. Spencer was standing at his desk, leaning against it, and the others were standing around him. But you had no eyes for them. Spencer was back. Your Spencer was back. As you walked toward them, you got a sinking feeling. He looked good. Changed, but good. His hair was a little shorter and he didn't look as pale as usual. He also seemed more confident and self-assured, which unfortunately made him even more attractive.

He didn't see you until you were almost in front of him. He smiled weakly at you before standing up straight. "Y/N," he said, and it felt so good to hear your name come out of his mouth. Immediately, goosebumps spread across your body. You expected him to give you a hug or insist on talking to you in person, because a lot had happened in the time without him, but he didn't. He turned around briefly and pulled something off his office chair. Not something. Someone. "This is my girlfriend, Vicky."

You didn't know what had happened in the last few months. Did you even want to know? Spencer hadn't contacted you in a long time, only to reappear with a girlfriend? You didn't understand the world anymore. The rest of the team must have felt the same way, because as you stood at your regular table in the bar, the couple was the only topic of conversation. In fact, you would have preferred all the murder cases.

"I'll be honest," Penelope said, taking a big gulp of her drink, which took quite a while since she always drank with a straw, "I was hoping you two would get together." She pointed her finger at you and then toward Spencer, who was standing at the bar with Vicky. You saw her run her finger through his hair and had to look away. Didn't she know he didn't like that?

"Hotch and I even bet money on it," Emily confessed, turning back towards the table. Apparently she didn't want to watch them either. "We would have gotten you a nice wedding present from that."

"He looks happy," you said, but you guessed that's not what the others wanted to hear from you. You sat at a table made up mostly of profilers. They knew exactly how you felt about the whole thing.

"Give it a rest," Derek said, putting his arm around your shoulder. Even the overly positive music in the background couldn't lighten your mood. "We all know how you feel about Spencer. And honestly, we thought he would feel the same way about you."

"But he doesn't, so please let it go," you shot back, instantly regretting it. Your friends weren't to blame for the whole situation. It was you. As you dared another look, Vicky pulled Spencer onto the dance floor, which you knew he didn't like either. Didn't she know him at all?

"I don't know what got into him," JJ confessed, sipping her Coke. "Those two don't even fit together." They didn't, but maybe that's why it worked. There was this theory that opposites attract, but you could never have imagined it with Spencer.

When Vicky grabbed Spencer by the tie and pulled him down so she could kiss him, your heart broke. It was different when you just knew two people were doing something. But when you saw it, all hope was lost. Even from a distance, you could see their tongues and you almost threw up.

"That's my sign," you said, pressing a kiss to Penelope's cheek. "See you." They all said goodbye to you and even over that awful music, you could still hear "It must hurt terribly to see him like that" and "I couldn't do that" as you walked.

Outside, the cold night air surprised you. It hit you in the face like a slap, but nothing hurt as much as knowing Spencer was happy without you. He didn’t need you and he didn't want you. That was fine, but that didn't mean you had to go along with it. Since he'd been back, he'd barely spoken to you. On the plane, he had sat at the other end of the room, and he had actually switched rooms at the hotel just so he wouldn't have to be near you. He'd even started shoving files back at you instead of handing them to you, like he'd burn if he touched you.

The lights in Hotch's office were still on when you came into the office. It was just after midnight and you knew he would still be there. When you knocked on his door, he invited you in. "What can I do for you?" He hadn't even had to ask. He knew why you were there. It was written on your forehead. "Are you sure about this? I'll write a recommendation, but only if you really want me to." You nodded silently. "It's because of him, isn't it?" he asked, his usually hard expression softening.

"Yes," you answered curtly. There was nothing to add.

"I'll make some calls. You get a week to pack. I'll call you tomorrow," he said, getting up from his desk. Surprisingly, he pulled you into his arms. "We're all going to miss you terribly, Y/N. And you're welcome here anytime."

It didn't take long for your things to be packed, and it didn't take long for the others to notice the following day. Your desk was empty, the files had been processed, the pictures of you and the team were gone, and your mug with a picture of Spencer and you on it that he had once given you was gone, too.

"Where is she?" asked Emily Derek, who didn't have an answer ready either. They looked around uncertainly and as the rest entered the bullpen, Hotch came out of his office. He looked like he hadn't slept. He walked down the steps and stood in the circle of confused team members. Even Spencer was puzzled.

"Agent Y/L/N left us last night," he began, sounding very composed. The others didn't know how to respond, so they just gave each other confused looks. "She has asked for a transfer and will start there next week. Please refrain from trying to talk her out of it. The transfer has gone through."

It took everyone by great surprise when Spencer dropped his bag and stormed out of the office. He didn't need to explain where he was going. It was obvious. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and tried to call you, but it went straight to voicemail. It wasn't long before he arrived at your complex and shot up the steps to your apartment. He took two steps at a time. He stopped in front of your door and pounded his fist against the wood, hoping you would open the door for him and explain what you were doing. When nothing happened, he dialed the number again. Again and again, until the voice in the phone said to him, this number was no longer in service.

He ran his hand through his hair before sliding down with his back to the door. He put his head between his knees and cursed himself.

You weren't there anymore.

part two