#this is all to say that while i see and acknowledge the 'security' i describe in teredio

[newty]

anyway thinking abt homophobia in valisthea

which means thinking abt sex-related misogyny in valisthea. bc imo there is way too much sexual violence against women and focus on women as sexual figures w sexual drama in this game for it to not bleed over into how it feels abt two men kissing (not gonna go into a lesbian reading bc it exits my scope)

like. anabella only being a vessel for children, benedikta using sex to control titan/feel loved by barny but also being threatened w rape twice(?) by men, jill awakening shiva when she's almost raped by a man + other rosarian girls are raped, the constant winkwink sexy references w isabella, the offscreen women moaning in the oriflamme brothel, sylvester killing his wife n mistress after they outlived any sexual service to him, barny's mom referenced in an easily interpretable sexual manner, etc etc

simultaneously the narrative does its best to present the veil as a morally neutral institution w benefits to the function of northreach. the discussion between the male sex worker and the male guard was deliberately placed, too, and gives an interesting view into affection and money. theres a couple more men in veil garb that arent presented as out of place.

which is all failed by rest of the worldbuilding imo. only male customers visit the veil. sex is still regarded as a sneaky taboo subject. every country has a male monarch and occupations are firmly divided by gender. the primary hinge of benedikta's relationship w hugo is the fact that hugo feels in charge, which helps culturally ascribe dominance as a masculine trait.

if women are so widely regarded as unequal on sexual terms (and, relatedly, on societal terms), certain expectations must also exist on the male side.

we dont really see much tension in the male characters performing masculinity--other than the huge unnatural vibes sleipnir gives off by mincing around--but we do see barny kneel before ultima in a rly sexually charged scene. his subservience is presented as an unexpected weak facet of his character, where he's desperate and obliging and uncertain. it's a private scene that works off its own uncanniness, so it functions a little bit more as a narrative piece than a societal mirror. but I don't think that removes it from the discussion, and i think its odd character is a stark contrast to the clarity we're given in dion and terence's kiss scene.

a sort of clarity, i guess. dion and terence talk abt power dynamics in class instead of sexual role or gender. there's still the words 'master' and 'servant' pinned on the wall w like 3 different undertones, so its easy to unravel that into different understandings of their relationship to class, duty, and romantic/sexual identity. i dont think its productive to split hairs abt who tops, but i think its reasonable to interpret that they feel secure in w/e service they give to the other. this is in spite of the societal understanding that dominance is inherently masculine and correct, and that subservience is feminine and not as acceptable.

i know enough abt queer history to know that the security & fulfillment i interpret them as having is simultaneously as rare as it is common depending on where you look. no matter what one does in the private sphere, the public view will influence it, and it's determined by the case who will feel negatively or positively abt themselves bc of it.

ultimately i see valisthea in the respect of a society that views queerness as undesirable but not smth ur gonna be burned at the stake for. im also fully operating under my own preference for queer narratives that labor under external & internal homophobic conflicts. it's fully supportable to decide that valisthea lacks homophobia as well, and its not less like wish fulfillment to have it that way or the other.

[skzstannie]

"Did you know?"

SKZ-> ot8 x 9th member! reader

genre: angst, hurt/comfort wc: ~4,500 cw: slight violence, swearing, reader has to go to the hospital

summary: some online rumors cause turmoil within the group, and it seems the members’ concerns were certainly not without reason

A/N: Here's another angsty 9th member fic for you guys, hope you enjoy! My requests are still open, so if you have any ideas, feel free to send them in!

Likes/reblogs and feedback are greatly appreciated!

Part 2 | Happy Scrolling! | Masterlist

Today was the first date of your North American tour, landing you guys in the beautiful city of Los Angeles, California. Your managers allowed you the morning to explore the city, given you had constant security. They made you specifically promise to abide by these rules, as you had a habit of sneaking off to see fans on your own. What can you say? Security could be annoying, and your fans were always the sweetest.

This little habit of yours not only made management anxious, but also your members. They knew you could be innocent and credulous when it came to other people, always wanting to believe there was good in everyone. While this may be true, people's best intentions sometimes went out the window when confronted with their favorite Kpop idols.

"Ok, first the art museum for Hyunjin, then Griffith Park, and then the nice breakfast cafe down the street from the venue. Anything else?" Chan reads off your planned itinerary, glancing upwards at you guys.

"Yea, I said I wanted to go to the Santa Monica Pier. They have the cutest attractions there," you say, repeating yourself for what felt like the hundredth time that day. You were the only one wanting to go, all the other members not wanting to risk getting sick on fair food and carnival rides before the concert.

"Yes, and I already acknowledged the fact that we will not be going there today. And we, includes you, meaning you will also not be sneaking off to go by yourself," Chan pointedly looks to you, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

"What makes you think I'd ever do that?" you give him a cheeky smile, tilting your head ever so slightly.

"Don't look at me like that. You know exactly why I'd think that."

You drop your innocent act, giving him a bored look in return.

Chan gets notified that the vans have arrived, so you all pack up your things and head to the hotel elevator. The boys roughhouse in the hallway, Seungmin almost tackling Jeongin to the ground. This is quickly stopped by Minho, reminding them they can't get hurt before the concert tonight. They roll their eyes at him but oblige.

Leaving the hotel, you all jump in the cars, embarking on the short drive to the art museum. Your van consists of Seungmin and Felix sitting in the middle set of seats, while you're squished in the back between Chan and Minho. The air is weirdly tense and quiet, everyone seemingly too occupied with their phones. Besides Chan describing the itinerary this morning, everyone has been quiet all day.

You feel Chan's watchful gaze slide to your screen, and you pull away, leaning towards Minho. "Do you mind?" you sass.

"I do actually. What are you looking at on there, any cute boys?"

"Give me a break, we have a dating ban," you scoff, turning your phone back off and sliding it into your crossbody bag.

You continue to sit in silence until you arrive, not wanting to deal with Chan's wandering eyes on your Instagram feed.

Finally arriving at the art museum, everyone piles out of the vans. Fans line the sidewalk, and a grin spreads across your face. You step out of line quickly, wanting to go over to a particularly young fan. She looks around 8 or 9, and she has a poster of you in hand with a black Sharpie. What's the harm in giving this young girl a quick signature?

Within your first few steps, your arm is aggressively pulled backwards, and you stumble into Minho. He gives you a stern look, and you know, especially with this many people around, not to question him. You fall back in line, looking back to give the young girl a sympathetic smile as you're guided the rest of the way into the museum.

You guys walk through the entrance of the museum, officially out of sight from all the fans. Minho gives you another pointed look, finally releasing your arm from his grasp. "We told you, no funny business today. Tonight's important, and we need you in one piece for it."

Your eyes widen at his tone of voice, not appreciating the seriousness behind it. You know you tend to break some rules here and there, but it's always light-hearted. You'd never intentionally put yourself or anyone else in danger.

You guys explore the museum exhibits in peace, security doing an excellent job of keeping the fans outside. You, not having much of an interest in art, spend most of your time watching Hyunjin and the way he admires the artwork. He really is an artist at heart, and you love the way he can appreciate each individual piece.

While staring at Hyunjin, who's admiring an intensely beautiful painting of a riverbed with flowers, you suddenly feel eyes on you. You quickly spin around to be met with the stares of Felix, Jisung, and Jeongin. They quickly look away, busying themselves looking at the statues next to them.

You give them a squinted look, walking over to them. "What is wrong with you guys today? Why is everyone acting so funny?" you confront them, furrowing your brows.

Jisung stumbles over his words, opening and closing his mouth like a fish. Felix jumps in, giving Jisung a strange look, "We were just talking about how beautiful you look today." He comes over to you and wraps an arm around your shoulder, pulling you into his side.

You don't stay there long, removing his arm from around you and walking away. "Weird," you mutter to yourself.

You guys finish up in the museum shortly after. Piling back into the cars, you're once again stuck between Minho and Chan. This time, however, Chan keeps constant conversation with you. He rambles on about the concert that night, what he had for dinner last night, practically anything to keep his mouth moving. While this is still strange behavior, you prefer this to radio silence.

Arriving at Griffith Park, you guys make your way up the hill terrain. All the guys want to take pictures, planning to post them to Instagram later that week. You think the perfect spot for pictures would be the Hollywood sign, so you start to make your way towards it.

You don't think to alert anyone, as it's within eyesight, and you prefer to take your own pictures, anyway. You came prepared, bringing your tripod in your backpack.

Before you make it very far, only walking about 25 feet away from the group, you hear your name being yelled. You turn back around, seeing an angry Minho storming towards you.

"What'd we say about going off on your own? Why are you being so difficult today?" he asks, his voice rising with every word he spits at you.

You don't know what's gotten everyone's panties in a bunch today, but you've just about had enough. The atmosphere has been tense all day, and you're officially sick of it.

"Why is everyone being so tense today? Gosh, I'm only going up to the sign!" You throw your arm behind, motioning to the spot only about 50 feet away from where you and Minho stand.

"No, you will not be going up there, especially not by yourself. Stay with the rest of the group and stop being stubborn!" Minho's overly-critical eyes stare you down. He steps toward you, grabbing you by the elbow for the second time that day.

You wretch yourself away from him. "I've had enough with being man-handled today. I'm done! I'm going to wait in the van. Have fun without me!" you yell at him, stalking off towards the parking lot.

You see everyone had stopped what they were doing upon hearing the loud yells, and they're all watching you as you hurriedly make your way back to the vans. Your face flushes, embarrassment taking over your features.

You pull on the door to the van, realizing it's locked. You stomp your foot and whip around, finding everyone still staring at you with varying expressions. "Someone please unlock this door before I have a mental breakdown," you beg, feeling the beginnings of an anxiety attack taking over your body.

The driver, just feet away sitting on a bench, searches for the keys in his jacket, finally unlocking the door for you. You climb in, slamming the door behind you.

You stumble over the front row of seats, laying down in the back away from the concerned gazes of your members and the rest of the staff. Your chest feels constricted, the air in your lungs feeling limited in supply. Tears stream down your face at the unwanted advances of an anxiety attack.

The fight with Minho paired with the building tension all day, along with the nerves for tonight's concert mixed into a deadly concoction in your brain, all too much for you to handle.

You're not left alone with your thoughts for long, the door to the van opening only minutes later. Hyunjin crawls in, shutting the door behind him.

"Hey, hey, shhh. It's ok, everything will be ok," he coos, rubbing your back. He's squeezed himself down in between the middle row of seats, his elbows resting on the armrests beside him.

"I'm sick of today," tears slide down you cheeks, your voice audibly shaking. "Everyone is being so distant and mean. What'd I do?"

"No honey, you didn't do anything. Everyone's just a little stressed for tonight. There's been some stuff circulating around online putting everyone on edge, but it'll all be fine," he reassures you, trying to roll you onto your other side so he can see your face. Your mind is too pre-occupied to register his words, letting them travel in one ear and out the other.

You allow him to turn you around, uncomfortably shifting in the small space. Your glossy eyes meet his, and he's quick to wrap you up into a tight hug, your own arms squished against his chest.

"Everyone's finishing up out there, then we're going to head to the venue a little earlier than planned. Does that sound ok?" he asks, affectionately running his fingers through your hair.

"Yea," you sniffle, pressing your face firmly into his shoulder. "I don't want to sit by Minho. Please don't make me," you cry harder at the thought.

"Alright, alright, shhh. You're only working yourself up more. You know we have to stay in our assigned vehicles, but I'm sure Seungmin and Felix will switch spots with him and Chan."

After a few more minutes of consoling from Hyunjin, everyone else has finished their photoshoots. Hyunjin leaves, but not before giving you another firm squeeze. Seungmin and Felix pile into the van first, both of them coming to sit beside you. You telepathically thank Hyunjin for asking them in passing.

Felix rests a comforting hand on your knee throughout the ride to the venue. Chan and Minho are silent, completely engrossed in their phones once again.

Once at the venue, you stay far from Minho, not wanting to deal with his negativity. You notice the security is amped up a bit compared to last tour, guards standing at every door leading to your dressing rooms. You figure it's because your band has gotten so much bigger, the Stay Family always growing exponentially.

In your dressing room, Felix occupies the chair by the mirror, your stylists brushing shades of brown and pink across his eyelids. Changbin stands nearby, the hair stylist just finishing up with a couple extra spurts of hairspray. You lay on the couch while you wait, playing Among Us with Jeongin and Hyunjin who reside in the other dressing room.

Changbin and Felix offered to go with you to your dressing room, and you gladly accepted their offer. You explained to them you didn't necessarily want to be alone; you just didn't want to be by Minho.

The stylists start to work on you once they're done with the boys. They finish your hair and makeup just in time for soundcheck, applying some last minute powder to your nose before sending you off to the stage.

Rehearsals go by smoothly. You and Minho are able to put your issues behind you for now. Your fans are so important to you, and the last thing you want to do is ruin their night because of some petty argument.

Management sends you off to the dressing rooms once again, satisfied with the quality of the soundcheck. You follow your members off stage before departing down a separate hallway in search of the bathroom.

You walk for another few seconds, taking a few random turns before your met with the door to the ladies' restroom. You do your business and take your time getting back to the dressing room as you guys don't go on for another hour. The venue your playing is beautiful, so you take a slight detour, admiring all the nice architecture.

You're startled from your peaceful thoughts once again by a furious Minho. "I cannot believe you'd go off on your own again. After all we've told you today, how could you possibly think that's ok?" he throws his hands up in disbelief, his tone snarky.

"I had to use the restroom! You guys have never had a problem with me walking around the venues by myself, why now? You have been up my ass all day. Leave me the hell alone for awhile." You push him out of the way, ramming his shoulder with your own in the tight hallway.

"Do you think this is fun for me, huh? Yelling at you all day long? Did you ever stop to think for one second that there may be something bigger going on here?" His voice sounds exhausted, leaving you slightly concerned because you still have hours of performing to do. However, your anger gets the best of you, and your concern gets pushed deep below the surface.

"Well, I'm sorry that I can't read your damn mind. If there's something bigger going on, then why hasn't anyone told me? I'm a big girl, not some toddler. I am a part of this group the same as everyone else, so why are things being kept from me?"

Minho starts to speak, but you immediately cut him off, not wanting to hear the lame excuses you're sure he's come up with. "You know what, I don't even wanna hear it. My mental health has went to shit today because of you, and if I wanna be able to perform in 30 minutes, I need to be away from you. We can talk about this later," you finish, rushing off to your dressing room, leaving Minho standing alone in the hallway.

Everyone seems to have deemed your dressing room the hangout spot until the concert officially begins, as all the other boys have gathered around, making themselves comfortable amongst the laid out furniture in the room.

You all make conversation, laughing at Changbin's cringey jokes; you're happy for the distraction, allowing your mind to wander from the fight you had with Minho.

10 minutes before you go on, management comes to fetch you to get ready, providing you all with in-ears and microphones.

Your pre-performance jitters have made themselves known, but you've been doing this long enough that you can turn that nervous energy into excitement.

5 minutes before you go on, you and the boys gather in a circle. Chan leads, knowing exactly how to get everyone hype before going on.

You're all standing now just outside of view from the fans on the side of the stage, waiting for your cue from management. Once they give it, you all make your way out onto the stage, relishing in the sounds of the screaming Stay that form the crowd.

All is going smoothly as you finish your center part during the bridge of Lalala, and you make your way to the side of the stage, waiting for the part in the song where you re-enter the choreo. With all your attenton focused on the performance, you fail to notice the commotion coming from the crowd just a few feet from you.

Your attention is pulled away from the performance when you're tackled from behind. You scream in agony and fear, having landed painfully on your wrist. If the snap you felt is anything to go by, it's definitely broken. However, this isn't your main concern at the moment. You open your eyes, and they’re immediately drawn to the shiny pocket knife the man has in his hand. He's quick to slash a small cut into your forearm before he is aggressively pushed off of you. Your attacker is taken down by security; they immediately throw a pair of handcuffs on him, taking him off stage.

The crowd has broke out into panicked cries, all of Stay wondering what happened and if you're ok.

Your members are quick to rush over to you, abandoning the remainder of the Lalala choreo. While it's felt like an eternity since you were tackled, it really only took security a few seconds to get the situation under control, and only a few more seconds for your members to surround you.

"What hurts?" Chan panics, crouching down beside you.

"My wrist," you sob, totally overwhelmed from all the commotion. The crowd is still roaring and your wrist throbbing like crazy. The cut on your arm is no comparison to the pain radiating from your wrist.

"Alright, let's move her off stage," a paramedic pushes through the barricade your members have formed around you and helps you stand to your feet. You quickly move off stage, wanting to get out of the crowd's view as soon as possible.

Once off to the side, one paramedic inspects your wrist, gently grasping your forearm to hold you steady, while another wraps the cut on your other arm.

"It definitely looks broken. We should get you to the hospital to get it X-rayed and possibly casted," he explains.

Minho steps up next to you, your earlier arguments swept from your mind. "I'll go with her. You guys finish up here. Probably should cut the setlist short anyway; we're already behind schedule."

You follow behind the paramedics, them leading you outside to the ambulance. Minho walks beside you, providing you familiarity in this uncomfortable situation.

The ride to the hospital is silent except for the beeping of the machines the paramedics have you connected to. Minho holds your unbroken hand the whole ride, your disagreements on the backburner for the moment.

The more time that passes, the sorer your body becomes. Your arms feel heavy, and your back feels like it was beaten with a hammer. You realize you've probably been in shock this whole time, and the attacker did more damage than you originally thought.

You finally find yourself in a hospital room, Minho pulling the chair up beside you.

"Well," the doctor says, pulling your X-ray up onto the screen, "This cut doesn't require stitches, just keep it bandaged and medicated. We'll give you a Tetanus shot for it, though, since it was done with a knife. As for your wrist, it's definitely broken. The good news, though, is that it doesn't look like it will require surgery. What color cast do you want?"

You're expression appears dazed to Minho and the doctor, your mind completely preoccupied. "Black," you mumble, just loud enough for him to hear you.

The doctor nods his head, disappearing from the room to retrieve the supplies to apply your cast and the shot.

You look to Minho, finally feeling like you have processed everything that's happened. "What the hell happened? How did that guy get past security, and with a knife especially?"

"Honestly, we're not sure. Management and security are reviewing the camera footage now. We were trying to be cautious; there was so much extra security tonight. It should've been impossible for anyone to get to you."

You process his words, a realization forming in your mind. "Did you guys know something about this beforehand?" Your eyebrows furrow. If they knew something, they for sure would have told you, too, right? "Is this what you were talking about in the hallway before the concert?"

"Y/N," he sighs, giving you a look full of remorse.

"No. I don't want any bullshit," you snap, "Did you or did you not know something was wrong before the concert? Is that why you have been giving me a hard time all day?" You start to put the puzzle pieces together, the day replaying in your head.

The overprotectiveness, the extra security, them not wanting you to go on your phone- they knew.

Minho looks to the ground, his shoulders slumping. "Look, we find out about some rumors going around online this morning, but-"

"Get out," you say, your voice tense.

His head snaps up, his remorseful eyes meeting your fiery ones. "What?"

"I said, Get. Out." Your unbroken hand aggressively points to the door.

"I'm not leaving you here alone. Let's just talk about this-"

"You had all day to talk to me about this, but now that I'm injured and traumatized you want to talk about it?" Your incredibly angry, and your words are filled with venom. "Get out, get out, get out!"

"Do you really think it's the best idea to be by yourself right now?" His eyes are filled with sorrow, his hands in dire need to reach out to you.

"If you don't leave right now, I will scream."

His watchful gaze rests on you for a couple seconds, before he finally gives in, rising to his feet. He walks toward the door. "We'll send a car to come get you when you're ready. There's security out here waiting, and your manager is out in the hall. I'll see you when you get back to the hotel."

He disappears out the door, once again leaving you alone with your thoughts. How dare they not tell you? There are threats going around online about you, and you're the last one they tell? In what world does that make any sense?

The doctor comes back in the room just a few minutes later. He's quick with putting your cast on, and he sends you on your way, requesting you stop by the front desk to sign a few documents before you go.

You follow him out the door, meeting up with your manager and security right outside the room.

After signing the paperwork, your manager leads you outside to the car that has been called for you.

Fans must've found out which hotel they took to you, and the outside of the hotel is flooded with Stay. Normally, you'd be ecstatic to see so many of them. However, you're exhausted and hurt, so you bring your hood over your head and stare at the ground, thankful for the security that surrounds you.

You climb in the back of the car, your manager following suit. "Why was I not informed about the threats online?" you question, your eyebrows furrowing in anger.

"The concert was going to go on no matter what, so we figured it'd be easier to get you out there if you didn't know about them."

Your jaw drops at her statement. "That is not fair, how can you just assume that? I had a right to know about this," you argue.

"This isn't really up for discussion. It's the way we chose to handle it, and that's that."

You're in disbelief at her careless attitude. "How did the guys find out about it then?"

"Nosy little shits," she laughs, but you're not sure how she's finding any humor in this situation. "They saw them online themselves. We practically had to threaten their contracts to get them not to tell you."

Your heart constricts at this new information. Emotions flood your system, and you're suddenly feeling incredibly guilty for your interaction with Minho in the hospital room. All the arguments between the two of you flood your mind, and remorse rushes your body.

They have just been trying to keep you safe all day. Trying to keep you off your phone, not letting you wander by yourself, the whispers behind your back. It all makes sense now. And you realize you've been a royal bitch all day to the wrong people.

You turn to look out the window for the remainder of the drive, knowing it's useless to argue with your manager. What she says goes. This doesn't mean you're not angry with her and the rest of management, though. This conversation needs to be had in a professional setting, not in the backseat of a car when you're by yourself.

Once you arrive at the hotel, your quick to jump out of the car, wanting to be away from your careless manager. However, you stand directly outside the door, patiently waiting for security to escort you to your room.

They walk you all the way up to your shared room with Seungmin, and you're not surprised to find all of them waiting for you when you open the door.

They're conversations halt, all eyes snapping to you. You walk in and set your bag down on the bed. Your eyes well up with tears for what feels like the hundredth time that day. "I'm so sorry," you cry, afraid to meet their concerned gazes. "Today has just been so overwhelming, and my manager sucks, and my back hurts, and I have been so rude to you guys all day-," your words are cut short by another sob wracking through your sore body. You sniffle some more, bringing your sleeve up to wipe at your face. "Min, I'm so sorry for kicking you out. I should've just listened to what you had to say. I'm such a horrible person."

All the guys are quick to stand, not wanting you to rile yourself up anymore. Hyunjin comes over to you first, gently guiding you to sit on the bed. Everyone else follows, all of you now gathered on the queen sized bed. "Listen," Minho starts, comforting you, "Absolutely none of this is your fault, you hear?" He pulls you down next to him, his arm coming up around your shoulders. "Today has been an awful day, and you don't need to work yourself up about how you treated us."

"Yea, but-"

"No buts, you need to rest. We are not mad at you."

"Not one bit. We love you so much, and we're so sorry you had to go through that. Are you ok? How's your wrist?" Chan asks from the edge of the bed, placing a comforting hand on your ankle.

"It hurts, but the doctor gave me some painkillers to take for the next few days. My cut didn't need stitches, but I have to keep it bandaged until it heals," you explain, your words coming out steadier than before.

Your cries eventually calm down, leaving you sniffling every now and again. Felix notices you've calmed down, and he nudges your leg, opening his arms for you. You crawl into them, relaxing into his calm and comforting embrace. The rest of them are quick to follow, creating one big group hug.

You know this situation is certainly not over. I'm sure you guys will press charges, and you'll probably have to release a statement of some kind. It seems that management and you guys have come to a silent agreement to deal with everything in the morning, and you couldn’t be more grateful for it.

~ ~ ~

Part 2

[sayruq]

For today's update, I'm splitting it into three - before Nasrallah's speech, the speech itself, and after the speech. If you don't know who he is, he is Hezbollah's Secretary General and he scheduled an important speech like a week ahead of time. The speech caused quite a stir to say the least to the point where there was a media blackout in Israel.

Before

The clip in the tweet above has gone viral. It shows why guerilla tactics are so effective and sheer bravery and discipline displayed by the Palestinian resistance (no gore).

People have noted that the IDF only announces the deaths of officers. You can imagine how many ordinary soldiers have died in the invasion in Gaza. Also, despite the fact that we know thousands of American soldiers have taken part, the Biden administration is keeping any news of casualties quiet. Eventually we will start to hear about those deaths, just like eventually the administration acknowledged the attacks on American bases in Iraq and Syria (while downplaying the severity of those attacks).

The speech itself

(I'm copying and pasting so I don't go above the max number of tweets embedded per post). Follow the link to see the whole thing. I'll be using OP's tweets for the next part

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: I salute the incomparable, legendary people of Gaza for their patience. Words fail to describe these people, their patience and their steadfastness.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Today, my speech will focus on what has happened, where our responsibilities lie, and where we are heading.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: I salute the Resistance of Yemen and Iraq who have joined this battle in its very heart.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Why are we here today? What ignited the Al-Aqsa Flood? There are several factors: the thousands of Palestinian prisoners in "israeli" prisoners, the besiegement of Gaza, the suffocation and oppression in the West Bank...things were bound to explode.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Al-Aqsa Flood put the righteous Palestinian cause back on the forefront of the causes of the world. It was carried out by the Ezzedine Al-Qassam (r) Brigades. This battle was 100% of Palestinian planning and 100% Palestinian execution.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The Resistance factions of Hamas completely hid their plans from everyone, even from the other factions of the Resistance Axis, who were very glad they did so. This secrecy is what guaranteed the legendary success of this operation.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: This is honest proof that the decisions of the factions of the Resistance Axis are own. The Islamic Republic of Iran does not control these factions or dictate upon them when to act or not.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: What was done on the 7th of October shuddered the ground under the occupation; it caused a security, political, and psychological quake whose repercussions will remain with this entity now, and in the future.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: This battle revealed the frailty and weakness of the Zionists; it proved that they really are weaker than a spider's web, that even they started to believe this!

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The Zionists have still not been able to take control, and the rapid involvement of the Americans is proof of the incapability of the Zionists.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: There is no other option to Al-Aqsa Flood. The other option would mean waiting for more death, more besiegement, more settlements. This operation was carried out in perfect timing and it is worth all the sacrifices made.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The gravest mistake committed by the Zionists is setting the bar of their goals very high. For example, today they set the goal of completely eradicating Hamas. Is this a goal made by a rational human?

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: They had set the same goal in 2006, complete eradication of Hezbollah and the unconditional return of the 2 soldiers. They had America, the West, and the Arabs on their side, and yet they failed to accomplish this goal.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: What is happening today is proof of the incapability and weakness of the "israelis." What are they doing today? They are killing innocent civilians. The Zionists have not been able to make any military wins.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The "israelis" resorted to the ground invasion when they saw that the Resistance was still capable of fighting despite the immense bombing on Gaza. They try to portray that they are carrying out a large operation, but in reality, they are terrified.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: How will they fight this Resistance? When a fighter walks toward a tank and plants a bomb on it. The scenes from Gaza, of the men, women, & children shouting in support of their Resistance as they are removed from under the rubble tell the Zionists a lot

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Today, the victims in Gaza, the martyrs, the injured, all expose the true nature of the barbarism of this entity, the complicity of the nations, America's responsibility in all the crimes committed, & the hypocrisy in applying international regulations

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The repercussions of the "israeli" attacks in 1948 were not only against the Palestinians. Every surrounding nation was affected. Today is the same; the effects of this war are not limited to Gaza or Palestine.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The first goal today is to put a stop to the war and aggression against Gaza, for humanitarian reasons, and the second goal is the victory of the Resistance in Gaza, specifically Hamas' victory.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Speeches today are not enough. Nations must cut ties and expell "israeli" ambassadors. You cannot give a speech [in support of Palestine] while you are exporting oil to "israel!"

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: There is an inability to transport the injured from Gaza. Are the Arabs this weak? Are they this unable to open the Rafah Crossing? We have reached a point where we are calling upon the nations to stop exporting oil to "israel" & open the Rafah Crossing!

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The Islamic Resistance in Iraq has taken responsibility and continues to carry out several operations. The honorable Yemenis are firing missiles and drones against Eilat. I salute them for their bravery.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Some were saying that the Sayyed will speak to announce Hezbollah's joining of the battle. The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon already joined the battle since October 8. What are they talking about?

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Some underestimate the operations of the Islamic Resistance conducted at the border, unaware of their significance and importance. These operations are very important, but anyway, they will not suffice alone.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: There is a real battle ongoing from the coast all the way to the Shebaa Farms along the border. This battle is unprecedented between the Resistance and the enemy, not before 2000 or even after.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The "israeli" army was meant to transport their specialty forces from the West Bank to Gaza, but were then forced to move them to the North. So yes, Lebanon has released some stress from the Gaza front.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: A third of the "israeli" army is now recruited at the Northern front, half their navy forces in the Mediterranean facing Lebanon and Haifa, a quarter of their airforce recruited in the north, half their air defense systems (iron dome etc) facing Lebanon,

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: A third of their logistic forces are recruited against Lebanon. Most of the troops recruited on the Northern front are specialty forces. These are real, accurate numbers.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Tens of thousands of settlers have evacuated from the northern settlements, which adds to the moral and economic stress. These operations have put the Americans and "israelis" in a state of fear and worry.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The possibility of matters escalating into an all-out war is very probable. We tell the "israelis" that if they are planning an attack against Lebanon that they are committing the gravest mistake in their history!

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: They told us that the US carriers came to target us, and the Americans threatened to not only bomb us if we continue, but to also bomb Iran. I tell the Americans: your fleets do not scare us, and we have prepared for them what is needed!

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: Escalation on the Lebanese fronts depends on 2 factors: the events in Gaza, and the acts of the enemy against Lebanon. We are a supporting front for Gaza.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: I tell the Americans to remember their defeats in Afghanistan and Iraq. And I tell them that the men who fought them in 1982 in Lebanon are still alive today, and have their sons and grandchildren along with them!

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: To the Americans: You are able to put an end to this aggression as it is yours. And if matters escalate to the a regional war, then your benefits and your soldiers will witness the greatest losses!

[Pause due to Tumblr's text per block limit]

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: The Resistance in Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, and the entire region is making victories through its patience, steadfastness, and perseverance, for this is a battle of patience and steadfastness to prevent the enemy from accomplishing their goals.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: We must work to end the aggression against Gaza and for the Resistance to emerge victorious. To the Palestinian people, this will take some time, but we are making one victory after the other, which will lead to the ultimate victory, just as in 2006.

Sayyed Hassan #Nasrallah: This is how the Resistance made its victories in 2006, in the West Bank, and in Gaza. Palestine will emerge victorious, and we will meet to celebrate this victory, which will come as a result of us handling our responsibilities with patience.

Turns out I was wrong about 2 things- that Iran and Hezbollah were involved from the very beginning and that Nasrallah would declare war. This was a Palestinian operation through and through and all the other parties were simply inspired to join by their actions on Oct 7th. As far as Hezbollah leadership is concerned, they have been part of the war from the beginning and they have been very effective, destroying an estimated $20 billion worth of equipment in Northern Israel (that number is a bit old).

That was a good speech. It highlights everything that happened since Oct 7th for those who have not been paying close attention, as well as showing that the Resistance will not be cowed by America and it does not plan on stopping any time soon. It's also a nice summary of everything Hezbollah has accomplished. I post updates a lot but that makes it hard to see the bigger picture.

After

Expect an increase in activity from the Resistance as it aims to force Netanyahu to halt the genocidal bombing of Gaza.

[daenysx]

Hi, would you write a modern aemond where he's a virgin and quite shy? ♡ First time with his girlfriend he's a bit ashamed of his inexperience/has performance anxiety and he doesn't last very long, but she's super kind about it and makes him feel comfortable

thanks love ♡

hii! thank you for this request, i've never written aemond as a shy character before but i tried my best, i hope you like it!!

i always think that aemond would love receiving praises and he deserves to know how good he is. in my stories mostly he is the one giving praises but this time i wanted him to be the praised one. ♡

title's from suki waterhouse' lovely song 'good looking'

my masterlist

my good looking boy

you are the first person modern!aemond has sex with. nsfw.

aemond has no idea how good he looks right now.

not good, perfect. such a gorgeous man and he is with you. you know he doesn't usually believe in your words about how good looking he is, how kind and gentle, how perfect for you. he's gotten used to receiving problematic words from his family, he's never felt appreciated enough and you always intend to change his mind.

he should know how perfect he is.

he is just sitting on the couch with wearing nothing but his sweatpants, his back is against the comfy pillows and he has this book he's recently obsessed with in his hands. his pretty hands. he looks concentrated, unaware of your presence as you stand by the door. you take your time, watch him a little bit more and enjoy the sight in front of you.

he lifts his hand to push his hair from his face then reaches for his cup on the coffee table. he takes a sip and you watch how the muscles of his throat move with the act. as he puts the coffee cup back, he looks at the door and sees you.

he smiles so beautifully when he sees you standing there. you approach him, he puts his book aside and opens his arms for you. he always welcomes you with open arms and helps you lay on top of him. he knows you love the comfort you feel with him after a long day, just listening to his heartbeat to acknowledge his presence, feeling he is there for you.

your relationship has started a little while ago, you were just friends before you both realized your feelings for each other. aemond always told you how bad he thinks he is with feelings and relationships but that was okay. you were willing to be the brave one, the one who confessed first, the one who gave the first kiss, the one who first started a hug.

you lift your head enough to kiss him, he parts his lips enough to let your tongue in his mouth. he holds the back of your head securely in his big hand and you keep kissing him until you decide to move further.

you feel him smiling on your lips and you smile back. you've never done anything more, only these intense kisses and touching each other. it felt a bit awkward at first, thinking you were friends before and now that he is your boyfriend. you took your time, waited enough to feel comfortable for something more.

and now, you feel like you're on the edge with how gorgeous your man looks.

he can turn you on without doing anything spesific. fuck, he turns you on just by sitting shirtless and reading a book. you try to settle on his lap more comfortably and he holds your hips while you do that.

you press yourself to his hardness which is inevitable to feel right now and he makes a sound, clearly indicating he was not expecting this.

"sorry." you say, laughing slightly.

he smiles, "that's okay."

"i know we didn't really talked about this but- if it feels weird we can always try later. i just-"

he cuts your rushed words with a simple kiss. "nothing feels weird with you sweetheart. it's- i want to do this with you. but, i think you should know that i've- i've never done that before."

you are a little bit surprised but you don't say it. "that's fine. we can take all the time you want. just-anything you're okay with."

you see his cheeks turn pink and you love the color on him. you can't even describe how lovely he looks, how pretty for you. you give him a comforting smile.

"do you want to go to bed?" he asks, almost whispering.

you nod, take his hand and lead him to the bedroom. he sits on the bed while you stand and looks at you, unsure of what he's supposed to do.

you lean closer to give him a little kiss as you move your hands to take off your clothes. your shirt goes first, then your skirt. he watches you with a starved look on his face. you take off your bra and your panties as he can look at your face only. your clothes make a little pool on the floor and you kneel in front of him.

"can i take this off?" you ask with a smile, your forefinger points his sweatpants. he nods and lifts his hips to help you.

he doesn't wear any underwear.

and he looks gorgeous. the tip of his cock is slightly red, he is hard for you and you can't help but pressing a little kiss to the tip of him. he winces, closes his eye.

"we can do anything you want, however you want. just tell me, my love." you say with a reassuring smile.

"i'd like to be inside you first, but i'm not sure i can last long." he says.

"that's fine. we have all the time in the world. would you like to be on top?"

he thinks for a small moment. "no, i want you on top of me. you'd look so good on top of me."

for a man who never had sex, aemond targaryen surely knows what to say to make you fall for him.

he lays down on bed, extends his hand for you to reach. you sit on his abs, slowly moving on top of him and his cock presses against your backside. your wetness stains his abs and he loves the feeling. he loves the way you kiss his chest when you move, the way you bite his nipple playfully, the way he can hold onto the soft flesh of your thighs.

you are everything he has ever longed for and he is glad that he waited enough to have his first time with you.

"that feels- fuck, that's perfect but i want you, i want to be inside-" he says with an impatient voice.

"do you have any idea how good you look right now? no, you don't. you don't have a little clue about what you do to me just by looking like that. my good looking boy." you say, finally moving closer to his cock.

he moans deeply when you hold him in your hands, adjust yourself on top of him and take him inside you. he loves the feeling of your warmth, your tight muscles clenching around him, and it's perfect. such a lovely feeling, it makes him feel safe, totally unaware of the outside world right now.

you start riding him, taking his hand to stroke your clit at the same time. you guide him first but he is a fast learner, he starts doing it with his own pace now. you arch your waist like a purring cat and he says your name with a desperate voice.

"i'm- too close, i can't stop!"

you nod feverently, "don't stop. never stop."

he rubs your clit harder and your little kiss on his chest makes the final for him. he lifts his hips and comes inside you with a grunt.

you are mesmerised by the way he looks when he comes.

he takes quick breaths, tries to calm himself. your warmth still surrounds him and he realizes you're still waiting for your own peak.

"fuck, i'm sorry. i'm sorry, my love, i should've-"

you shush him as he sits on bed with you on his lap, put a finger on his lips and stop him from talking nonsense.

"that was perfect, aemond. it was supposed to be good for you and you- you don't know how pretty you look when you come. for me it was enough."

he kisses you, he is still inside and you can feel him getting hard. "thank you for being so kind. i love you."

"i love you, too."

"can you let me make it up to you, right now?"

you laugh at his words. "of course."

he smiles too, you lay on your back now as he stays on top, he pulls himself back. "i need you to tell me what you like. i want to learn how you like it, how to make it good for you."

you nod attentively, hold his face and kiss him. you guide his long fingers on your clit. "i like how you touch me here. like this."

he nods, trying to understand the basics of it. you let his hand move and he finds your entrance with his fingers. you guide them inside you. "there's a spot that feels- oh!"

it appears your good looking boy is successful at everything he does. his fingers find your g-spot with the little help from your hips and he presses there.

he moves his fingers inside you, his thumb stays on your clit. "mm-hmm, there. that's so beautiful. you are so good for me."

aemond loves when you praise him, your words are sincere and so sweet. he wants to make you feel good, he wants his touches to make you lose it for him.

he sucks your nipple, and then the other one. you push your body to him, wanting him to keep going.

"like that, just like that!"

it only takes three more thrusts for you to reach to that lovely state. you moan his name, not caring about how loud you are. he feels the pride deep in his heart, smiles broadly and kisses you. you grab his cock when your orgasm hits you and you move your hand fastly to make him come once more.

he pushes his cock to your fist and he is gone after a few moments.

he feels so good, so relaxed. he lays on bed with you on his chest and pulls the covers on you.

you are trying to catch your breath as he rubs circles on your back, your nipples press on his skin and his softened cock rests on his thigh.

you enjoy a few minutes of comfortable silence.

you leave the bed afterwards, go to the bathroom to clean yourself. you grab a towel for him, hand it to him when you go back to his side and let him clean himself.

he looks calm and grounded, his eye closing slowly and you know he wants to sleep with you in bed. you kiss his forehead affectionally, mumbling how perfect he is. you take the used towel from him and put it in washing machine.

you go to kitchen with quick steps after wearing one of his shirts and clean panties. you bring him a cool glass of water and sit on the edge of the bed on his side.

"come on, drink some water my love."

he slowly sips his water, grateful for the care you show him. you hold his hand when he finishes the water in the glass and put the glass on the nightstand.

he opens the covers for you and takes you in his arms. you kiss his neck, wrap your arms around him.

"thank you." he says, and his voice sounds a little shy it makes your heart clench.

"i want you to feel good with me. i like taking care of you, i like making you smile. you deserve all the sweetness i could ever offer."

"i feel the best when i'm with you. i just- i'm not used to it but i love it. pretty words and someone taking care of me." he says.

"that's okay. we have time, remember? you'll get used to all of it, baby."

he kisses you good night then, and you watch him fall asleep, holding you closer and closer.

your good looking boy.

[kosher-salt]

Saw Naftali Bennett. No notes for the most part, I wanted to high five him (I don't think security would have allowed this).

The notes I do have:

-neutral: pessimistic but real. Has some hot takes on the future of a Palestinian state. Says it's unfortunately not feasible but then goes on to describe what is for all intents and purposes a Palestinian state. But kind of a protectorate too. He doesn't want to govern or police them and certainly doesn't want soldiers roaming Gaza. He does warn that there will have to be an allowance for the IDF to quietly and precisely intervene when hints of terrorism pop up. Doesn't have to feel good to be necessary and prevent the most suffering.

-negative: he has too much faith in the next US administration. That said, if he didn't have faith, I don't think he would have announced it on stage. He does seem to think there's viability in Musk and I really really need Israel to understand that Musk shouldn't be trusted with a cornchip much less security. I also doubt Musk's allegiance.

-positive: he explicitly called out Netanyahu while also acknowledging that the domestic issues were in danger of tearing Israel apart. These things can both be true and I haven't found many people brave enough to hold space for both. He demands Haredim to serve if they expect money from the government, and points out the religious precedent for working and fighting as our patriarchs kings and prophets did both - in other words, the religious argument against Haredim contributing to society he called out for being nonsensical and hypocritical. Hell yeah.

Food for thought: No Jewish state has made it past 60 years or so due to infighting (how Jewish of us). We have absolutely gotten an option to overcome this affliction with this war - that and the opportunity to put our foot down against terrorism is the tiny silver lining of all this atrocity, if it can be said.

Also, he's really funny. If you can see him talk, go just for the jokes.

[innermost-memoirs]

Something that has been said to me as a trans masc person is, "Well aren't you just a tomboy? Liking boyish stuff doesn't mean you have to be trans".

The foremost mistake people are making when they ask something like this is assuming that I don't know myself well enough to distinguish being a masculine woman from being an actual man. While it's true that liking boyish things doesn't make a woman a man, that isn't the point. Gender expression is different from gender identity (though sometimes it can be easy to confuse the two).

If you put a man in a dress, it does not make him a woman; it makes him a man wearing a dress. He knows he is a man, he feels it within himself regardless of any external factor. But if people keep insisting he is a woman, treat him as one, and he is not made aware that he has any other choice but to comply, then he will likely feel compelled to do so.

When I tell you that as a child I participated in boyish activities like playing in the mud and catching frogs, or felt left out when I wasn't included with the boys, I am giving you context that I have felt disconnected from being a girl ever since I began being aware that I was treated like one. I just didn't have the language to describe it until I was older, and even then I tried to suppress it.

Many trans masculine people have a hyper feminine phase in which we try extra hard to force ourselves to fit into the box that was originally prescribed to us, only to come out on the other side with confirmation of what we already had a deep suspicion of: we just aren't women, and there isn't anything we can do to change that.

I can relate to women and their experiences. I know what it's like to be treated as one by society, and I presented as one as I grew into adulthood. I have all the lived experience of being female, without the "soul" of one. When I am amongst a group of women, I notice that I am different. When I am called by "she" or "her", I feel the words grate on my nerves and I know that they do not belong to me.

However, when my friends call me "he", when my partner refers to me as his boyfriend, when a stranger accurately assumes that I am male, and I'm treated as such, I feel at home. It feels natural, the way one should feel when they are being referred to. I love being a man in a way that I never loved being a woman. I feel confident and secure with myself, like I finally fit into my own skin. I am belated when I see the way that my body hair has come in so handsomely, or how sharp my jawline has become. This is not even close to the same thing as being a "tomboy".

I can't speak for every trans person, but I'm not wrong in saying that the vast majority of trans people think very carefully and thoroughly about who they are and what they want. When we decide to transition, we are acknowledging that we will likely face additional hardships in exchange for being happier with ourselves and true to our identity as an individual.

The next time you feel compelled to question someone's identity, think about the fact that you do not know what it's like to live as them. You don't know the road they took to get to where they are today, how they really feel, or what they really want. You are imposing your own experiences and thoughts onto them. While some people, like me, write posts like this to help bring awareness and understanding, the truth is that you don't need to understand their identity in order to respect it. There are countless different human experiences that I will never live, but that does not make them any less real and valid than mine.

[hero-israel]

The "Left" has been braying about fascism for years and yet, and YET, I know none of them have even skimmed a single sentence of Ur-Fascism by Umberto Eco. If you've read it, you'll immediately start saying "Oh that's Hamas!" at basically every point he made.

Hamas has used some of the most conservative and harsh readings of Islamic theology to create a cult of tradition, they fundamentally reject modernity as an evil plague of the West, they call on Palestinians to "resist" and "struggle" and plan grandiose attacks like 10/7 with no real concrete long term tenable goals that can be gleaned- action for action's sake.

Disagreement is treason, that much is obvious. Children in preschool are taught to fear and hate Jews (fear of difference), and at the same time teach the "middle" classes that Jews are responsible for their economic hardship as if they aren't embezzling tens of millions of dollars from a global charity scam, that Jews are ever seeking to take more land and resources.

Hamas is obsessed with a Plot, that plot being every antisemitic conspiracy theory under the sun. They and their supporters believe all of them, or prime their own brains to stumble down those pipelines at a later date. My personal favorites include the Ben Gurion Canal Project, but they're all sub-plots of the Main Plot; Jews are seeking to supplant us.

Hamas frames themselves and Palestinian society as a whole as both too strong to consider humble negotiated peace, and to justify endless warfare, but also too weak to be responsible for their crimes, too pathetic for Israel to ever be justified in taking military action. It's a constant cycle of hyping themselves up as a group of badass radical warriors and then squealing "no fair" when Israel uses modern weaponry to swat them away.

I'm sure there's also contempt for the weak in Gazan society, but it doesn't immediately jump out at me from Hamas' propaganda machine (this is usually shunted onto Jews anyway, who are seen as effeminate and metropolitan, feeding into that simultaneous strength and weakness thing- Israel is weak and unworthy of life, but too powerful they're the bullies actually).

Hamas literally educates everyone to become a hero, they literally groom young boys into becoming radicalized child soldiers who do not have the frontal cortex development to resist such blatant brainwashing. It's literal child abuse. Palestinian women are pretty obviously seen as chattel who must breed the future army that will finally overwhelm Al-Yahood. There is no aspect of Gazan society that can exist for itself, it must all be part of the Struggle against Israel. And everyone, down to the tiniest baby, must play their part.

The Machismo is so blatant it should be comical. But you don't gang rape Jewish women and humiliate and torture kids if you're secure in your masculinity. I mean, there is something emasculating about being constantly beaten and seeming to have no hope for your political goals... while also constantly telling yourself that you're a proud virile warrior and you and the People have the strength of will to accomplish anything... but then these people you see as subhuman and like kind of queer if you think about it... well they utterly crush you every time. And that is all to say nothing about how Hamas relates to feminism and gay rights. And also how Eco describes the Macho Fascist as using weapons as an ersatz phallic symbol and we see so many teenage boys in Gaza being handed guns and it's like oh... this one section of the essay could take years to unpack when it comes to Hamas.

And Hamas definitely treats the people of Gaza (if not all of Palestine) as having one will and one voice, individuality is not considered. We've seen them and their spineless NGO simps refuse to acknowledge that many many Gazans criticize them, protest against them, hold them equally responsible for their current suffering as Israel. There is no One Singular Leader who claims to represent Gazans/Palestinians but that could change at any moment honestly.

And I don't see any evidence of Newspeak, but I don't know Arabic so I don't know. I do see the Western Leftist allies of Hamas engage in Newspeak like behaviors though. But that brings me to my ultimate point of this long ass ask. The Western Hamas girlies are literally, not only legitimizing a fascist organization even though they purport to hate fascism more than anything. They're starting to reproduce fascist talking points, fascist ways of thinking, in their own activism and their own lives! They're starting to think, talk, and act like fascists when it comes to Israel and Palestine, and to Jews more broadly. They're entirely unaware of this because to recognize Hamas as fascists would be to add a LOT of gray into their black and white worldview. When they appropriate the Palestinian national struggle for their own narcissistic delusions of popular revolution in the West, they're taking actual fascist propaganda produced by a fascist organization and applying it to their own lives.

tl;dr, by every metric laid out by Eco, Hamas are fascists, the people who support them and make apologetics for them are (maybe unknowingly) becoming more like fascists themselves, the next few years and decades are going to thoroughly suck but Am Yisrael Chai.

.

[fruitbowlsngoals]

Back at it again with the my brain full of the ghost doll au this time is Ashe's turn

Stitch. Pull. Stitch. Pull.

Over and over again. The rotary motion of sewing was tiring and near sickening. Every new stitch left this lingering pain she couldn't quite describe.

The Trickster bites the thread tying it off as they hold the doll up, a grin spreads across their face as they acknowledge the new patch they've made. Several different fabrics make up the doll, different colors, different textures, but none of the patches seem to be their own.

"There you do go dear all fixed! I think that Kathy girls blue looks wonderful on you! What do you think?.."

Ashe frowned, they hated it. Absolutely hated it, it felt like skin that wasn't theirs or clothing that was the wrong texture. It left them sick to their stomach, but the look on the Tricksters face urged them to say something positive, and if they hadn't gone through this before and they didn't know the consequences they would never say anything positive about it.

But they knew if the Trickster didn't get the answer they wanted it's more than likely they'll start over again, or maybe they'll keep their arms for a week or their legs even longer.

"Yeah- yeah.. it's a lovely blue"

"Where's the enthusiasm Ashe! I just fixed you, that horrible gash down your side would still be there if I didn't patch it up!"

They were right. Ashe had gotten snagged on some thorns, though really they don't remember it. They feel bad, the poor girl thought she was helping them..

The Trickster looks the doll over making sure the stitching and patch applying they've done is secure but pullable, just enough to keep the stuffing in.

"You know the rules you're free in the work shop and living room, and for your acting today I'll get you in a cookie! It's been so long since I've fed you anything, hasn't it! "

The Trickster sets the doll down looking in ashes direction with a smile. They gestures around the workshop staring at the doll with a nod.

"At least you don't complain about being hungry, you hardly complained about me stitching you back this time! I should get you some wings, you are an angel after all!"

The Trickster left leaving the door open a crack. Cautiously Ashe picked up their doll, turning it over in their hands and observing it. So many pieces that didn't belong to them. It wasn't comfortable but the Trickster would do worse if then removed them.

The first time they ever did the trickster just about threw them in a wood chipper. So much begging was needed to convince them not to, even then the Trickster insisted on something, he took their left arm that day and sewed their shoulder shut. Their arm still never feels like it's been sewn on correctly.

Ashe glanced towards the door, moving the doll to a shelf , at the very least it looks like they've moved. So the Trickster won't be upset with them. Soon enough the trickster is back holding felt in their hands as well as a plate of cookies, Ashe can't tell if they're store bought or not.

"Ashe, come back to the desk."

Ashe looks over picking up her doll and making her way over as the Trickster makes a deliberate effort to look away. The Trickster gestures to the plate smiling. Ashe knows what they want, they want to see the cookie disappear into nothing as she eats it. The Trickster looks away and Ashe reaches for a cookie, the first time in a while they think.

But they take a bite, and the Trickster looks back, this giddy expression on their face as a portion of the cookie is simply gone , and the cookie floats mid air. They then look away focusing on the felt in front of them and cutting out a cute yet flimsy pair of wings.

[aihoshiino]

ive seen interpretations of both but do you think ayumi's abuse of ai only started once the stepdad starting to uh make eyes at her or if it already was a thing before but escalated due to it?

I'm pretty certain and always have been that Ayumi was abusive to Ai the entire time she was in her care - 131 just clarified the shape of it and its point of explosive escalation.

Even prior to that, I was pretty firm in my reading that Ai did not have anything resembling a normative upbringing in her mother's household. Even before we have any of the details about that relationship presented to us, Ai says herself in chapter 1 of the manga no less that she has 'always wanted' a family because she does not have one. As 131 tells us, Ai didn't leave her mother's house until she was nine or ten years old at the very least. She was raised by Ayumi for ten years and still considers herself to be a person who never had a family.

We see this clarified in chapter 8 where Ai more explicitly talks about her abuse: Ayumi abandoned her to the care system after her arrest, which Ai frames as preferable to "getting hit", making it more or less explicit that Ayumi was, in fact, physically violent towards her outside of the incident we hear about in 45510. However, the most damning part of this scene to me comes from elsewhere:

"I don't remember ever being loved."

Even by her own mother. Ai has no memory of ever being loved by Ayumi. We get a reiteration of this idea during Ryosuke's attack on her, as Ai says over and over: she doesn't understand love. She doesn't know how to love people, no matter how desperately she tries.

This by itself is all very alarming before you ever account for Ayumi's violence. Remember that Ai cannot be any older than 11 or 12 years old here and yet this is still how she chooses to describe herself: as a person with no memory of ever being loved. As an antisocial liar, a people-hating liar. A twelve year old child should not be able to even think of herself in these terms, let alone articulate them.

There's a lot of other small hints scattered around, too— Ai is implied to have some anxieties relating to food security and she is shown to be quite short and slight even by the standards of an average Japanese woman, which possibly implies a history of not being fed enough or not having access to food as and when she needed to eat. During her big Ai research session, Akane even directly says that, with the way Ai's personality turned out, there's no way she could have come from a good home environment.

Ai's personality isn't the only red flag here, though. Ayumi herself and the way she talks about both Ai and her abuse of Ai when Aqua finally speaks to her in person paints a very clear picture of the sort of mother she likely was, even in the short amount of time that we have page time with her. I did a much longer analysis of her in a previous post but to TL;DR it, Ayumi spends the entire conversation simultaneously backpedalling at breakneck speed from any claim of agency and responsibility in her abuse of Ai while also placing the blame of that abuse on Ai herself.

Not only that, but here's something I just caught on reviewing the chapter right now — Ayumi never even actually admits to abusing her daughter. Pay attention to how she describes the series of events: She became angry at her boyfriend, jealous of her daughter and then… their family just 'fell apart'. There is a glaring hole, a missing step in this process and that missing step is her violence towards Ai. The closest she ever gets to acknowledging any sort of mistreatment is her saying that she would just "wind up hurting" Ai if they were together again, which is about the most understated nothing sentiment imaginable. Of course Ayumi can never atone for what she did. She can't even fucking admit it.

The way Ayumi disavows herself of agency while centering Ai as holding responsibility for her own victimization and abuse combined with Ai's own personality pretty much makes it explicit to me that Ayumi was emotionally abusive to Ai for all her life. Specifically, I think Ayumi was probably the sort of mother that is colloquially referred to as a "narcissistic mother" - specifically, I think she falls under the umbrella of 'covert narcissist'. While discussing this type of behavior, psychologist Craig Malkin said "Covert narcissists feel special because they believe their pain is more important than others". Covert narcissism is defined by jealousy, difficulty maintaining meaningful relationships, projection of insecurities onto others (in this case, from mother to daughter) and an inability to handle criticism or cop to their own behavior. Sound like someone we know?

Another big tell is just… honestly, looking at any list of the long term effects of this kind of abuse on children. Growing up under this kind of parenting leads to a whole host of issues, but most relevant to my point here is as follows:

Hyper-vigilance towards other peoples' feelings

Poor emotional intelligence; specifically, a lack of comprehension of your own emotions

Unhealthy desires for validation from other people and tendencies towards codependency in relationships

Perfectionism and/or self destructive tendencies, either separately or in parallel

Low self esteem, poor self image, high levels of self doubt and self criticism.

If you're reading that list and going wow! this is basically just a Greatest Hits of everything wrong with Hoshino Ai! then congratulations because you successfully completed my thought experiment for me. I've described the effects of Ayumi's abuse as running through Ai like fault lines before and this is the sort of thing I mean.

I also don't want to leave it unspoken that like… violence the likes of which Ayumi subjected Ai to does not come from nowhere. A normal, loving parent does not escalate to putting fucking glass in her daughter's food no matter what the hell else is going on in their life. It's unclear whether Ayumi's physical abuse of Ai was something that only started after the incident with her stepfather or if it was an aspect of the ongoing abuse she subjected Ai to all her life, but I simply don't think it's possible with everything the manga has laid out, explicitly and implicitly, about their relationship that Ayumi was ever a loving mother to Ai or that the two of them ever had a remotely normal relationship. In a horrible way, Ayumi's abandonment of Ai was the kindest thing she ever did for her, because it means she finally got the fuck out of her life.

[light-yaers]

Maroon.

Masterlist | AO3 | Ko-Fi

Cassian wasn’t like the others. He was like the red clay beneath the white salt on Crait outpost. He was maroon, and he used to be yours. 

Or: the time you and Cassian met, up until the Battle of Scarif. 

Warnings: major character death [follows Rogue One: A Star Wars Story], grief, trauma, implied sexual content, masses of angst.

A/N: I will just say that I think this is the saddest thing I’ve ever written. Also-- I do attempt to say something in Kenari in this work. I got it by combining Portuguese and Spanish words. It’s not real Kenari. It’s just the best attempt I had. 

Word Count: 10k+

maroon.

Red. 

 That’s the only colour you can see now. Sketched upon every surface, splattered on every flight suit, hidden beneath every fingernail.

 You see it so often now that the entire world seems red. The sky had an ominous haze to it, foggy, with a sickly shade of pink that resembles evaporated blood; sucked up by the clouds; preparing to rain down upon all that you find holy.

 Cassian sees it too, but in different ways.

His red is made up of Ferrix bricks, and the clay that makes up Rix Road. The maroon tinge of grease on his palms, the luminescence of the whiskey that Maarva used to love, B2EMO’s distinctive paint job. 

 He described them all so well that you could imagine everything so vividly. Often times, you found yourself spacing out on perimeter searches and ground missions, mapping out the Ferrix roads and Bix’s section of scrapyard inside your head.

 He didn’t tell everyone about his life.

 You were special, in that sense.

 It had been a while, you knew that, since he’d left his home. For a few months, he worked closely with a higher-up— Luthen Rael— until his expertise was needed elsewhere.

 The more time passed, the more savvy the Empire got when it came to double agents. Luthen was under a constant watchful eye now, too far gone to try and bite back against the thumb that he so callously lived beneath.

 It just wasn’t worth it; for him; or for Cassian.

 You were there when they dropped him off on base; an outpost on Crait. There was nothing much there, bar the salty taste of the air and the vast wasteland.

 But, there was red. Red everywhere. The clay that lay beneath the thick, ice-like layer of salt that covered the planet, exposed by footsteps and tank wheels and X-wing take-offs. 

 So. Much. Red.

 And then, there was Cassian.

 He jumped off the lander hesitantly, strength lined his shoulders and jaw. All he held was a bag of personal belongings, and the eyes of someone who had seen too much, too far, for how old he was. 

 But, he still hadn’t seen salvation. None of you had.

 “Lieutenant,” your commander said, jumping off the ship behind Cassian. You nodded at him on approach, not yet acknowledging the unknown rebel. 

 “Commander. Glad you made it back safely,” you said respectfully.

 “Almost didn’t, but—,” he smacked his hand on Cassian’s shoulder, alerting you to each other. “Andor here got us out of an Imperial mess,” 

 You regarded him then, taking in the complexity of his gaze. “You’re a pilot?” you chided.

 “Anything that can run, I can fly,” 

 “You’ll fit right in,” you smiled, and Cassian’s shoulders instantly relaxed. You stuck your hand out to him in proper greeting. He smacked his palm against yours, shaking your hand softly in return.

 “Lieutenant,” Cassian said.

 “Andor,” you replied. 

 You were one step closer to friends.

 Being on a planet such as this left you with free time— the worst disease you could ever want when in the rebellion. Free time meant suffering souls. Free time meant overthinking. 

 Cassian was in briefings. Having not been on base before, he was subjected to different training. Security, what to do in the event of an attack or ambush, dormitory regulations and the like.

 A few hours after greeting him, you were in the landing bay, going over the mechanic rounds for the fifth time. You’d got so bored that you’d taken to memorising the mechanic teams shift rotations. You were in communications, a Lieutenant, but when things were stale it often left you lonely.

 “Lieutenant,” your commander called, but you were so zoned out you hardly heard. “C-26!” he boomed, prompting you to drop your data pad abruptly. It crashed to the floor, a few buttons pinging off and rolling in all directions.

 You internally cursed.

 “Commander,” you turned to him, noticing Cassian behind him as you did.

 “I know things are dry. Show the new recruit around, will you? The escape routes, the fire doors, the dormitory building,”

 You saluted him, gaining back some of your composure. “Yes, Sir,” 

 He left as soon as he’d arrived, leaving Cassian and you in the landing bay alone. As soon as he was gone, you instantly relaxed, letting out muttered curses beneath your breath as you dropped to the floor, looking for stray data pad parts.

 “He’s a real stick in the mud,” Cassian spoke first, peering down at you as you scrambled on the floor.

 “He’s a very good commander. You’ll learn that with more time here,” you snapped, annoyed more at yourself than at Cassian. He huffed behind you, amused.

 “Is it always this… quiet?” 

 “No. This is abnormal,” you admitted, standing up and assessing the data pad parts in your palm. “Luthen’s off the radar, you know?” 

 Cassian nodded gravely.

 “It was getting too hot,” 

 “What work did you do with him?” you asked, trying to be as unbothered as possible, but Cassian immediately stumbled.

 “Why do you want to know?” 

 You laughed, a belly chuckle. “This isn’t some random planet, Andor. Nor a back alley. This is the rebellion. We share here. We’re on the right side of the war,” 

 Maybe this was a test. Your own secret one to assess him. To work him out. To see what game he was playing. Everyone did it, even if you were all on the same team.

 Cassian regarded you quizzically, trying to work you out.

 “You already know,” he replied. You smiled. He’d caught on immediately. 

 “Aldhani. That’s a feat,” 

 “So I’m told,” 

 “You were there. No point in pushing away congratulations from the rebellion. You deserve it—,” 

 “No, I don’t,” he cut over you, stiff as a board, as hard as steel. His gaze had turned soured, his eyes stone cold. 

 Silence descended the landing bay. You reattached the buttons on your data pad quickly, the clicks of metal upon metal clanging throughout the empty bay.

 “Come on. There’s much to see,” you said finally. The two of you started the tour of the outpost. 

 He never mentioned home, never mentioned Maarva or Bix or Ferrix, in the first few months. Only after you’d been assigned a few dual missions, scouting patrols, being a pilot and comm unit, did he finally open up.

 You did, too.

 “My mother is from Sorgan,” you said gently, five hours into an eight-hour perimeter scout. 

 It was customary to split up tasks on the outpost. It wasn’t like other rebel bases. There weren’t masses of cadets around to borrow. 

 “She never liked grey. Only greens, and blues, and the oranges of the sunset. My father was from Yavin. Same greens, same trees, but completely different ways of living. She moved there for him, uprooted her small village life because she fell in love as soon as she saw him,” 

 You loved talking about your parents.

 You missed them. They were some of the first to join the Alliance, and some of the first to die. You were raised with rebellion in your blood, brought up by your godparents and moved from base to base with them.

 Crait outpost was their attempt at keeping you safe, but all it did was drive you insane. Why someone such as Cassian was here, you didn’t know— it was effectively a ghost town now, with no more than one hundred officials on base, and only acting as a secure link for meetings to take place, or for transport missions.

 “They were rebels?” Cassian asked, sat in front of you and piloting the ship. The space was small, compact, and your flight suits were stuffy, but this was the only time you felt free.

 Shoved in a tiny ship, scouting the outer atmosphere of a planet that you knew like the back of your hand— but you were in the sky, dotted amongst the stars. You craved this.

 “Yes. They died rebels, too,” you said it quickly, getting it out of the way. All rebels had lost someone; maybe everyone; who was close to them. It was customary. 

 “And now, you will finish what they started,” Cassian said, no hint of falseness in his voice.

 You glanced to your left, catching his reflection in the control console. It was the only way you could see each other sat like this. His reflection was wobbled, warped, but you still got to see his eyes. 

 You sort of loved them, really, over the months you’d got to know them with increasing intensity. 

 “That’s the plan,” you leaned back in your seat. 

 The urge to say what about you? was overwhelming, but you bit on your tongue. Getting personal was not obligatory. Being more than acquaintances was less normal than this, but you opened up because this felt different.

 Cassian felt different. 

 You swallowed through the silence, through the cogs whirring in Cassian’s brain. 

 Until they finally clicked.

 “I had a mother. She wasn’t my real mother, but she was as good as. She was all I ever knew,” he started, and you breathed out slowly as relief washed over you.

 This went two ways.

 Good.

 “Maarva was the bravest person in the galaxy. That’s not an exaggeration, it’s the truth. A daughter of Ferrix. Died with honour. She protected me through it all,” he listed off everything he wanted, recalling small details and going on tangents whenever he pleased. 

 You listened intently, laughing at his funny stories, envisioning the copper streets of Ferrix.

 “I was a pain in her ass, I knew it. From age fourteen I was scaling over the wall in the scrapyard to find Bix. We were just kids,” 

 “Was there something more?” this is the first time you properly interjected. He perked his eyebrow up at you in the console reflection.

 You squinted back at him, amused. 

 “Come on. A man like you has to have some broken hearts behind him,” you let out, smiling uncontrollably. He does the same. 

 “For a little while, yes,” he admitted. 

 “Knew it,” you muttered, and Cassian leaned forward slightly. Maybe he was embarrassed. Maybe he was shocked, because you read him so easily. 

 A silence descended across the tiny cockpit, encasing you both in a feeling of knowing. Knowing each other, knowing the stars in the sky, maybe even knowing that all of this was temporary; probably. 

 “When I left Ferrix for the last time, I put her on a ship with Brasso, Bee, some others,” Cassian continued slowly, leaning back in his chair and letting out a sigh. “I promised I’d find her,”

 He hadn’t. 

 “There’s still time,” you said strongly, meaning every word. 

 You knew Cassian well enough by now to know that, when he put his mind to something, more often than not he ended up succeeding. It’d been a long time since he’d left Ferrix; many moons had passed and grown and disappeared in that time; but not Cassian’s love for Bix. 

 Not his allegiance to justice, or the rebellion. Not his skill and brash nature and overly annoying attempts at getting you to laugh during meetings with General Mon Mothma or other higher-ups. 

 You meant every word, every breath. If he tried to, now, he would find his family again. 

 “My time is for the rebellion, now,” he replied finally, sending you a soft smile into the console reflection. “Wherever they are, they’re safer without me,”

 There was nothing you could say to make it better, nothing you could offer to give him even a shred of hope when you knew it was pointless. He was here, and they were elsewhere; that was the way he wanted it, as much as it pained him. 

 You remembered that perimeter search well. You dwelled on it often, mostly when Cassian was off world for missions and you weren’t in contact; or when he was pissing you off to oblivion that you wanted to blast him between the eyes. 

 But, upon every landing; every return to Crait that he graced you with; his hugs got even tighter. 

 When the Death Star hit Alderaan, he was away. You fretted, you cried in private, worried for his safety and whether the Empire would hit his planet next. But, when he returned, you were the first to sprint out to his ship. 

 He dropped himself from the cockpit, skipping over the last two ladder rungs, and almost tripping upon landing, as he scrambled to you— sprinting, full pelt, directly towards each other. 

 He dropped his helmet to the ground, unbothered, before you embraced with an unceremonious smack into each other. 

 “Thank the stars,” you whispered, only loud enough for him to hear. He laughed, but it wasn’t full of comedy; it was relief filled. 

 “Did you miss me?” He squeezed you harder. 

 “Shut up, Cassian.” You squeezed him harder right back, until you were just two rebels, standing in an almost empty landing bay, clutching onto the other like he was the very air that you needed to breathe. 

 On base, you would work around each other in the way giggling school kids would. He would come to the comms rooms just to ask you one question, before hitting you with a joke on his way out. You’d head to the Admiral’s quarters with a message to deliver, only to be hit by Cassian’s gleaming gaze as you entered the room. 

 He was higher-up than you, a Captain, hot shit. But he never looked down on you; not ever. 

 “Captain Andor,” you announced. He stood up straight from his position, leaned down, next to the Admiral.

 “Lieutenant, how can I help?” He smiled at you jokingly. When formalities came into play, he loved chalking it up, making it worse. Purely because neither of you were like it behind closed doors. 

 “I’ve intercepted a relay from a close-by Destroyer. I think it’ll interest you to listen, considering we had a tip from someone on a planet close by about the defector,”

 The Defector. An Imperial pilot that randomly decided to join the side of the rebellion. He’d been the talk of the Alliance since Alderaan had been hit. 

 “Good work, Lieutenant,” Cassian started rounding the circular table that separated you. “Tell me everything you’ve heard,” he stopped to peer down at you, smile on his face, before the two of you left for communications.

 It wasn’t long after that when he left again. On another mission, out amongst the stars while you played the housewife, fixing the same coolant compartments over, and over again, and trying not to go crazy. You could count on one hand the months that you and Cassian had known each other, but that didn’t stop either of you from falling into the trap—

 The trap of care and concern. In the rebellion, it was the worst trap of them all. 

 Against protocol, Cassian sent you message relays this time. Maybe it was due to everything feeling less stable, everything going to shit. The Death Star was in full flight; citizens were at war with their own minds, worrying about whether they’d be the next planet to be destroyed by the power of a dying star. 

 Jedha City, that’s where we’re going. Saw Gerrara is close, as is the defector. I’m with someone who’s very valuable to the cause, someone who can get us close to Gerrara. I’m safe. I miss you. 

 You read them at night, over, and over again. Every crumb and speck of communication that he could muster or even allow. 

 Jedha City, that’s where he, K-2SO, and this mystery helper were. His written words allowed you to imagine him, surrounded by sand, by the wind, by the ruins of old temples and all that sandstone that made up the planet, and the city itself— alone, yes— but also being him. 

 Cassian was brave, Cassian was fearless. He was born to be a rebel, and, despite his troubled upbringing, he was still kind. That was a good sign of his character. 

 “C-26,” your commander approached you one morning. You were alone in comms, choosing to stay during breakfast to get more done. The quiet was the only place where you weren’t reminded of Cassian. “A word?”

 “Of course, Sir,” you swivelled on your chair to peer up at him. 

 “We just received news,” he started, but the tone of his voice shifted immediately. Your heart dropped. “Jedha City has been hit by the Death Star,”

 Words couldn’t describe the jolt that slashed its way through your entire body. 

 “We haven’t received word from Andor or Kay-Two, but due to their mission parameters, their location was on world—,”

 “Stop,” you let out harshly, trying to come to terms with the words he was saying. He stopped when you asked, standing up straight as he waited for you to reply. “You think they didn’t make it out, is that what you’re saying?”

 “I just want you to prepare for the worst,” he replied sullenly. “That’s what I’m saying, C-26. I know you and Andor are close,”

 “That’s irrelevant—,”

 “No, it’s not,” he said strongly, taking you by surprise. “I’ve been at this outpost with you for close to two years, seen you when you’re bored stiff and wondering what the hell your purpose is,” you listened to his every word. “As soon as Cassian showed up, that all changed, don’t deny it,”

 “I’m not,” you said defensively, standing up abruptly to face him, but there was part of you that had completely shut down. 

 This wasn’t the time where you needed someone else to confirm just how close you and Cassian were. This wasn’t the time where you needed someone to drill into you about the extent of your lonely, prior life on this outpost— only gleaming brighter after his very arrival. 

 You needed to raise your guard and focus on your breathing and not spill your guts all over the floor by your commander’s feet. 

 “We’ll find out in a few hours,” he added, finally. “Feel free to take some time.”

 “With all due respect, Commander, I’d rather be so busy that my fingers go numb than sit in the silence of the landing bay and wait for him to come home.”

 He nodded at you, taken aback by the power laced between your words. 

 “As you wish,” he said, softer this time. “Back to work, then, C-26,” he gulped after speaking, like he didn’t want to have the formality of it all right now. Not while you were tensing every muscle in your body to stop yourself from screaming, and he could see that pain written all over your face.

 “Yes, Sir,” you breathed out as you sat back down, swivelling yourself back towards your screens. Your fingers got to work, and your commander disappeared once more. 

 You stayed at your desk for eighteen hours straight. You looked up images of the Death Star hitting Jedha City. You reached out to other bases to see if they had any updates themselves. You scanned the skies with radar until the clockwise motion of the visuals had fucked up your eyes for the night. 

 When you dozed, dreams finally took you. 

 You and Cassian are on a forest planet, somewhere that looks like Yavin and Sorgan combined. He looks younger, almost, less stressed by his years as a rebel. His clothes are clean. Gently, he turns to you as you both stroll through the lush greenery, sticking out his hand for you to take. 

 “Come,” he urges, as you slip your hand into his grasp. When he smiles, it’s like nothing can ever be wrong with the world. “I have to show you something,”

 You follow him as he leads you to a clearing; large and built from limestone. It’s moss covered, dazzling in the sun rays as the vibrant green lights up the entire clearing. It’s soft, it’s warm, and you have Cassian’s hand in your own— there is nothing that could have made you happier. 

 “Here,” he says, tugging you forward with more excitement. You squeal as you stumble into him, but he simply repositions himself and holds you to his chest warmly. 

 You both look out over the horizon. You’re at the top of a cliff; steep and deadly should you fall; but quiet and beautiful where you’re stood. You see mountains on the horizon, snow-capped and covered by a subtle fog. The sun is setting as you breathe in sync, as Cassian gently drops his cheek onto the top of your head. 

 “This view,” he says. “This view reminds me of you,” you watch in silence, a warmth cascading through your gut, as the sky changes to a glowing red. “The colour red reminds me of you. Maroon, burgundy, whatever shade, it doesn’t matter. When I see something red, I think of you, wherever I am in the galaxy,”

 You peer up at him, eyes glassy with emotion. “Red reminds me of you, too,” you admit. “The red of Ferrix bricks. The clay that makes up Rix Road. The maroon tinge of grease on your palms,” you pick up his hand softly, but it is spotless. “The luminescence of the whiskey that Maarva used to love. Bee’s paint job,” you list everything one by one, certain that you’re thinking on the spot, but there is an odd sense of Deja vu that falls over you. 

 Gently, smiling, he takes your chin into his hand, resting his thumb just below your bottom lip. His eyes skim every feature on your desperate face, every wrinkle and bump and scar and bruise. The sign of a rebel is etched on your skin, while he is completely perfect. The small scar above his eyebrow is gone. The collection of dirt stains from clay don’t litter his face. 

 He is perfect, but not his usual perfect. He is perfect in aesthetic ways, not in the ways that make Cassian; Cassian. 

 You suck in a breath as he starts to lean forward, softly, gently, your gut lurching within your body with the desire to absolutely crumble against the feel of his lips on your own. 

 “The red of the Death Star ray,” he whispers, just an inch from your face. 

 “What?” you gasp suddenly, tugging away ever so slightly. 

 “You remind me of that red, too,” he smiles at you so genuinely that you feel sick. “The red of the Death Star. The red of the Death Star that killed me,”

 “Cassian—,” you stutter, pulling away from him. He’s still smiling, and you feel like you might vomit your guts upon the forest floor at any moment. “No,” you find your words. “You’re not my Cassian,”

 “Here it is, now,” he says, turning back to the horizon. The sunset that once faced the sky has now been replaced— by an explosion the size of a small moon. Debris already litters the crater, as the impact of the ray heads in every direction on the planet. 

 You look at him, distraught, but he’s in some kind of trance. 

 “Look at that,” he breathes out, before turning back to you. “What a beautiful way to die.”

 You woke up to beeping. Incessant and shrill, you shot up in your chair as you realised what had happened. You’d fallen asleep at your desk, drifted into dreams that were unable to replicate Cassian in person. Quickly, you shut off your systems. When the beeping stopped, you leaned back in your chair and tried not to think about how your fingers were shaking, how your heart was beating out of your chest. 

 Inhale. Shake. Exhale. Shake. Inhale. Shake. Exhale. Cry. 

 You wiped away a stray tear, not wanting your own subconscious to be your downfall. You wouldn’t let it, wouldn’t let it show. He had to be alive, somewhere out there, he had to still be completing this mission. 

 What a beautiful way to die. 

 You switched off the light by your desk, knowing it was time to call it a day. You wouldn’t be of help if you were sleep deprived. Hoisting yourself from your chair, you left communications glumly. Your back clicked when you stretched yourself out. 

 The bays were empty. You had no idea what time it was, but from the quiet of the outpost, you guessed everyone was in their dorms. Gently, you placed your hand on one of the X-wings in the bay. It was customary for pilots to swipe the noses of their ships before take-off, just for good luck, just for the hell of it. 

 You always oddly loved the way Cassian did it. Before every perimeter search or recon mission, the methodical way he so delicately placed his hand and dragged it against the smooth metal of his ship reminded you of the soft way he draped his arm around others; around you. 

 Oh, Maker, please let him be alive. 

 Back in your dorm, you didn’t sleep— but you still dreamt. You dreamt of him, of the real Cassian, not the one that had infiltrated your mind beforehand.

 In the morning, a knock woke you from your dozing. As the door wooshed up, you were hit with the face of your commander. You saluted him immediately, standing to attention. 

 “Sir,”

 “At ease,” he said breathlessly. He’d run all the way here. “There’s a call for you,”

 “Sir?” you let out, but he was already smiling. 

 “It’s Cassian.”

 The two of you sprinted to the control room, hearts in your throats. Your commander was older, but not by much. Your godparents had placed you under his command for a reason, and you knew this was one of those times. His softness was needed, as too was his formality and allegiance to the rebellion as a whole. 

 He cared; and that’s what mattered in the long run. 

 You rounded the corner to the control room and almost stumbled, but he grabbed your waist before you could trip. “Come on. He’s on the General’s frequency,”

 The General’s frequency? This was a line solely reserved for Alliance Generals to talk to one another undisturbed. This was unheard of; Cassian was a Captain; you were a Lieutenant. 

 As you passed the control table, you slowed your breathing. A comm headset sat atop a desk, just waiting for you. Your commander stayed behind you, filling the room with a calmer energy. “Go on, C-26,” he urged, and you almost burst out laughing; from relief. 

 You peered back at him, sending him the softest smile you had within you. He reciprocated in full. 

 “I’ll leave you be,” he decided, before stepping back slowly. When the thud of his boots disappeared down the corridor, you finally allowed yourself to pick up the headset. 

 You slipped it on, feeling the pump of blood in your ears and the incessant beat of your heart as you prayed to the Maker. Then, you clicked the relay button. 

 “Cassian?” You whispered pathetically, but there was no other way around how you felt. 

 “Meu korazon,” his voice trickled over you like honey, in some language that you couldn’t identify. He’d called you it many times before—it was a long time joke that he never told you what it meant, but you still felt warm whenever the name cascaded over you. The relief in his tone is what got to you the most. 

 “What does that mean?” you asked, on the brink of tears. Cassian chuckled; it was a sound you loved. 

 “Nothing,” he let out, changing his tone. “I’m just happy to hear your voice. Meu korazon,” he repeated. You shut your eyes, trying not to utterly explode into tears. You’d never felt more relieved in your life, never been happier to hear someone’s voice.

 “Where are you?”

 “Yavin 4. We got off Jedha in time, just before the planet was destroyed,”

 “We?”

 “Me, Kay, and some stragglers we’ve picked up. The defector is with us, and two protectors of the temple from Jedha. And—,” he stopped, sucking in a deep breath. “Jyn Erso,”

 “Erso?” You let out instinctually. Everyone knew of Galen Erso, Imperial weapons designer, the man responsible for the fucking Death Star. 

 “It’s complicated, not something that I can explain over a comm relay,” he admitted, and your heart sank. You knew things were escalating, knew missions were in place. You waited for orders to rally every single day, knowing that it was only a matter of time before a strike occurred on the Death Star.

 “Are you coming back?” You whispered. “To Crait,”

 He went silent for a moment, and you knew what his answer would be. 

 “No, I’m not,” he let out. Your heart broke, the blood rushed to your head. “You’re coming to Yavin 4 instead.”

 The shuttle came for you as soon as possible. Your commander had set it up without question, knowing that it was time for you to get involved elsewhere. This wasn’t just about Cassian; it was about you. You packed in record speed, bringing the limited items that you owned and fitting them in one bag alone. 

 Before you left your dorm, you etched your name on the underside of the small desk in the corner. Others had done it too, names like Lynx 2BBY. You added yours, scribbling 0BBY next to it, knowing that you wouldn’t be coming back again. You had more purpose than this, more than working behind the scenes when you knew you were capable.

 Cassian knew it too. Knew that you could do more; wanted to do more; to end this war once and for all. 

 You jumped on the shuttle before your commander, but he stopped by the hull door. You turned back, rucksack on your shoulder, and peered down at him. “You’re not coming, are you?” You knew. He shook his head with a small smile. 

 From this position, you were closer to his height now, basically the same. It felt odd, being able to look him in the eye fully; it also felt needed. 

 “There’s still work for me to do here,” he said finally. 

 It sunk in then that this might be the last time you saw him for a long time. Depending on how things went, depending on the mission at hand with Jyn Erso. 

 “Thank you,” you said. “For being the best commander to work beneath, and for being my friend,” you meant it. 

 “It’s been a pleasure,” he smiled, before saluting you once more. You saluted back strongly, before the hull door slowly rose, cutting you off from each other.

 He waved as you took off, flying high above the outpost until you left the atmosphere. 

 You arrived at the hight of the meeting. Mon Mothma and Bail Organa were present, amongst others. The room was packed to the brim as you entered at the back, rising onto tiptoes to see better.

 “There’s no choice but to retreat! The Empire will stop at nothing to ensure every base, every planet that we inhabit, is dead and gone—,”

 “There’s a flaw!” A young woman spoke up, someone that you knew to be Jyn Erso. You stepped through two others, looking out into the light. The breath hitched in your throat when you saw Cassian next to her. “There’s a flaw planted specifically for this use. We need to gather a team and strike it while the iron is hot,”

 “With all due respect, Gerrara and your father are dead, Erso,” Tynnra Pamlo spoke up softly, but with purpose. “How can we believe these claims? When there is so much at stake and our resources are already running so thin,”

 “I can vouch for her,” Cassian stepped forward abruptly. You flinched as he did, his eyes skimming the crowd of higher-ups and rebels— until his gaze finally hit yours. 

 He stopped, going silent for a moment as a few sets of eyes hit yours from following his own. Jyn followed his gaze, too, and when her stare hit yours, her expression softened. Perhaps, Cassian had told her about you. He’d gone to all this trouble just to get you here; had called you over the General’s frequency to ensure that you knew he was alive and well. Had called you meu korazon, whatever that may mean. 

 My heart. My heart. 

 You smiled at her, before glancing back to Cassian. 

 “Go on, Captain,” Mon Mothma urged him, and the moment ended. “Continue.”

 “I can vouch for Jyn,” Cassian repeated. “I was there, both on Jedha and on Eadu. I saw the hologram with my own eyes,”

 “That’s all well and good, Captain, but there is no evidence. It’s been destroyed. We simply have no choice,” Vasp Vaspar chimed in, but he looked almost apologetic. 

 “You’re asking us to invade an Imperial installation based on nothing but hope,” Pamlo spoke up again, looking directly at Jyn. Jyn smiled sadly, strongly. 

 “Rebellions are built on hope.”

 It wasn’t enough.

 “So, it is decided,” Pamlo spoke again. “We will scatter our fleet, retreat to safer planets, hide away— until we are strong enough to fight back against their weapon,”

 “No— please, Senator—,” Jyn persisted, but Pamlo held up her hand. 

 “All those in favour of retreating?” 

 The majority put their hands up. The room fell silent. 

 “It is done.” Pamlo left first, followed by the scattering of cadets and rebels. 

 You fought against the dissipating sea of people to get to him. Cassian caught your eye, pointing to the door, so you followed the rest of the gaggle back to the landing bays. Your heart was in your throat when you made it out, glancing and scanning over all the pilots, mechs, and techs that left the meeting with upset frowns on their faces. 

 When Cassian emerged, he pushed himself through the crowd and broke into a run immediately. 

 “Cassian—,” you breathed out, but the air was ripped from your lungs when he bombarded you into an embrace. He held you for a long moment, so hard that you could feel his heart as it pumped in his body, syncing up with your own. “Thank the stars,” you let out from relief; a saying that you’d said to him so many times before, on missions where he almost hadn’t made it home. 

 “Did you miss me, meu korazon?” He whispered, only loud enough for you to hear. 

 “I always miss you,” gently, he brought his hand to the back of your head, stroking your hair softly. You nuzzled your cheek into the nook between his shoulder and neck, breathing him in. 

 This felt different. They said that distance made the heart grow fonder, but you and Cassian weren’t like normal people. Perhaps it was the threat of death that kept you so close, the worry that one of you might never return when they left. Either way, it had come to this. You thanked the Maker for him. 

 When he pulled away, he raised his hand to your cheek. You smiled; before punching him in the stomach swiftly. 

 “Hey!” He yelped. 

 “How many times do I have to tell you to not die?” You exclaimed. 

 “I didn’t!”

 “You almost did!” You pointed at him threateningly. 

 “But— I didn’t,” he said, straightening himself out as his surprised tone mellowed. He smirked at you, but you shot him with a look of fire.

 “Don’t you dare make that face at me,” 

 “What face? This is just my face,”

 “You know exactly what face I mean, hot shot. That little smirk,” you imitated the smirk. “Like you know everything, like you’ve just thrown an insult at me and are proud of yourself,”

 “Have I ever told you that you look beautiful when you’re angry?” 

 You almost swallowed your tongue, stepping back and immediately feeling your ears go boiling hot at his comment. You crossed your arms, trying to ignore the way his gaze was eating you up inside. It skimmed down your body and all the way up again, divulging all your secrets within seconds. 

 “No, you haven’t,” you almost spat it out, knowing that the heat was growing onto your cheeks as well. “You should more often, you piece of Bantha shit,”

 His smirk turned into a full grin, which then prompted chuckles to burst from his lips. You rolled your eyes at him, pissed off and flattered and wanting him all at the same time.

 “I hate you, I swear,” you said through clenched teeth. A lie. 

 “Don’t swear it. You know you don’t hate me, meu korazon,”

 “Tell me what that means,” you uncrossed your arms, stepping closer to him again. “Tell me, Cassian.”

 He sucked in a deep breath, and suddenly the roles had shifted. His ears got warm; his cheeks went rouge. He kissed his teeth as he accepted this; he had to tell you the truth after so many months.

 “It means—,” 

 “It means cooler than him,” Jyn spoke up suddenly, approaching you both gently. “Because you are definitely cooler than him,” she said, and you couldn’t help but smile. She stuck her hand out to you gently, which you took happily. “Everything he’s told me about you has been good,”

 “I should hope so,” you joked, as the two of you looked back at Cassian. He looked awkward, or caught out, or both. 

 “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” his voice trailed off, as he placed his hands on his hips and looked uncomfortably around the bay. 

 Eventually, others gathered. You were introduced to Bodhi, the defector, a scrawny pilot with a big heart; Chirrut and Baze, the temple protectors; a few others who wanted Jyn’s plan to be set in motion. It was clear that they’d all been through a lot— Jedha, Eadu—and now their want to do something good had been denied. 

 Throughout the solemn chat, you stuck by Cassian’s side. At one point, he placed his hand on the small of your back, peering down at you like you were pure gold. This was the Cassian that you adored— tired, but still fighting. There was dirt on his forehead and some dark circles under his eyes, but he still looked perfect. 

 “I knew they wouldn’t believe you,” he said to Jyn, peering down at the floor with his hand on his hip, the other on you. Gently, you wrapped your arm around his back, too, just so he knew you were there. 

 Jyn stepped forward, a look like fire on her face. “Thanks for the support,” she said stubbornly. Cassian met her eye. 

 “But I do,” he said strongly. “We do,”

 Men and women gathered, over thirty of them, all ready to stand up and fight for the cause that they believed in. When Cassian spoke, you held onto his every word. He was impossible not to listen to, impossible not to go utterly silent whenever a speech erupted itself from his mouth.

 Jyn approached you and Cassian after it was decided; they would all fight.

 “I’m not used to people sticking around,” Jyn smiled, a smile that you knew to be genuine. She turned to you gently. 

 “Welcome home,” you let out. 

 What ensued was a heist of epic proportions. You helped Bodhi locate a stray passenger lander, watched as he powered it up, checked the fuel gage and coolant compartment. You sat in the co-pilot seat, going through checks. 

 “I thought you were in communications?” Bodhi asked somewhat frantically. He had a rapid way of talking, but he was sweet. 

 “I am,”

 “Then how do you know so much about ships? Do you pilot as well?” you scoffed at his question. 

 “In the Alliance, we’re all all-rounders, truthfully. But—after my parents died—I wasn’t allowed to fly anymore,” you admitted. 

 “Why?” you shrugged, sad whenever you remembered your godparents taking that away from you. 

 “My guardians when I was growing up, they just want to protect me. I just wish—I wish that they’d realise I’m good for more than this,” 

 “This is legendary,” Bodhi said suddenly. “Hijacking an Alliance lander, going to Scarif for the Death Star plans. This is what someone like you was made for,” you knew you’d only just met him, but your heart reached out to him. 

 You placed your hand on his forearm, nodding at him in appreciation. 

 “Thanks, Bodhi.” You smiled at him, eyes glassy. 

 “This is what I’ve been saying for almost a year,” Cassian’s arrival made you flinch. You swivelled around to meet his gaze, looking at him knowingly as he peered down at you proudly. “You’ve always been capable of so much more, but you’ve been held back your entire life,”

 “Who are your guardians? Are they here?” Bodhi asked. You sucked in a sharp breath. 

 “They’re both Admirals,” you confessed. “They’re not posted in this system, they’re elsewhere, but,” you glanced back at Cassian, shooting his own smirk back at him. “What they don’t know, won’t hurt them,”

 Cassian pointed at you, leaning down affectionately, and bringing his fingers to hold you by the chin. His thumb rested just below your bottom lip; just like the dream; but this was real. 

 “This is why I love you,” he said lowly. Bodhi turned away with an awkward smile on his face. 

 “Tell me what meu korazon means, you coward,” 

 “Not until you ask nicely,” Cassian joked, shifting his thumb ever so slightly upwards, so it was swiping against your lip. You fought the urge to smash your face onto his; he was so close, it would be easy, and he’d definitely expect it. “You’re looking at my lips, meu korazon,” he whispered, and you all too late realised that you had been staring at his mouth.

 It was hard not to. 

 “Because I’m waiting for you to tell me what it means,” you lied. 

 “I’ll go find Jyn—the ship is ready to fly,” Bodhi said quickly, removing himself from the cockpit as soon as possible. Cassian laughed to himself, a knowing laugh that radiated through every pore in your body. 

 “I forgot he was still there, truthfully,” Cassian let out. You held your breath with embarrassment, falling into him ever so slightly.

 “We’re awful people,”

 “We’re only human, you can’t blame us,” 

 “I can, and I will blame us,” you chuckled out, bobbing your shoulders softly with built up laugher. You had to bring a hand over your mouth to stop yourself from giggling to oblivion. 

 “Hey,” Cassian said, annoyed suddenly. “Don’t do that,” he grabbed your hand gently and pulled it away from your mouth, holding it in his own. “I was about to kiss you, that’s just not fair,”

 He swiped his thumb over your bottom lip. Your heart jolted beneath your ribcage, lurching forward so quickly that you’re surprised you didn’t kiss him as soon as his words had stopped being spoken. He was looking at you like you were gold, like you were the red of the sunset that both of you loved, the maroon clay that laid beneath the salt on Crait, where you’d both met all those months before. 

 “Tell me what meu korazon means, and you can kiss me all you like,” you whispered, giving him an ultimatum. He let out a soft huff, peering down at the floor as an excuse to lay his forehead on yours. 

 His hand wound its way onto your cheek, his thumb swiping there instead. 

 “You’re impossible,” he let out. You shut your eyes, feeling the strength in his arms as you laid your hands on his biceps, just to hold him as he squatted on the floor by the co-pilot chair. 

 “That’s why you love me,” 

 “I do,” you opened your eyes. “I really do,” he admitted. “My heart. It means—you’re my heart, meu korazon.”

 My heart, my heart. How many times had he called you it? He’d started after a trip where his cover had been blown. He’d come home, beaten and bruised to within an inch of his life. You cared for him for days, fussing over him in the med-bay, reading him books as he lay in bed.

 That’s when he’d called you it for the first time, all those months ago. Since then, you’d asked around about it. What language it could be, if anyone knew what it meant, since Cassian had been so against telling you every time you’d asked. 

 Now you knew why. He’d been waiting for to realise it, waiting for you to understand that you were his heart, his body, his love. 

 You kissed him before you lost your nerve. It felt like coming home. It was everything you’d ever wanted and more. He was soft, but you felt the fire within him. One that started in both of your guts and grew outwards, overtaking every sense and controlling your every move. 

 When you pulled away, you took the time to indulge in the way he looked. A deer in headlights, flushed, breathing heavily. 

 “If you’d told me that sooner, I would have kissed you sooner,” you let out, a few chuckles escaping alongside the words. 

 “We’ll just have to make up for lost time,” he smiled, holding you close. 

 You both stayed like that for a while, laughing subtly at the fact you’d finally done it—you and Cassian had finally told each other the truth, spilled your guts upon the floor for each other, felt the other in a way that you’d both so desperately wanted behind closed doors. 

 When the shuttle engine started, all of you held your breath. 

 “Cargo shuttle, read back, please. What’s going on out there?” the control tower spoke through the pilot comms. Jyn approached Bodhi, squatting by his side to hear better. “That ship’s off limits, no one’s supposed to be on board until further instructions,”

 Bodhi clicked the relay. “Uh—yes, yes, we are. Affirmative,”

 “That’s an impounded Imperial ship. What’s your call-sign, pilot?”

 Bodhi looked to Jyn, stuttering over his words. You watched her mouth we have to go, while Bodhi continued to struggle with what to answer.

 “Say something,” Jyn whispered, fierce. “Come on,”

 Bodhi exhaled shakily. “Rogue,” he glanced around for approval. “Rogue One,”

 “Rogue One? There is no Rogue one,”

 K-2SO switched on the radar scanner, evidently running out of patience. “Well, there is now,”

 The shuttle took off abruptly, rising into the sky as fast as Bodhi and K2 could get it off the rebel base. As soon as you left the atmosphere, you were punched into hyperspace. You stood with Cassian by the cockpit, watching the blue lights of lightspeed cover the ship windshield. 

 You were going into the belly of the beast, right into the enemy’s hands, but you’d never felt more part of something. 

 Flying through Scarif’s shield was up there as the scariest moment of your life, but still you all persisted. Cadets in the back got on their gear and checked their blasters, dusting off their helmets and preparing themselves both mentally and physically for what was about to come.

 Upon landing, Cassian took you aside gently. 

 “I need you to stay here,” he explained. “We need someone on the ground with Bodhi while Jyn and I find the data inside. It’s too risky having more of us inside the building,”

 “Okay,” you said, just so he knew you understood. Gently, he placed a communicator into your hand, wrapping your fingers around it slowly. 

 “For you and me. You need me, you call me,” he whispered. Once again, this was not allowed, but he was doing it for you. 

 All of a sudden, everything hit you all at once. He was leaving, the same way he did every time he took off from Crait outpost and went off world. He was leaving, and he may not come back this time. Really not come back this time.

 You peered up at him with all your strength, widening your eyes to get across every fibre of your love for him, everything. 

 “Come back to me, Cassian.”

 “I’m not going anywhere,” he laid his hand on your cheek. “I promise,”

 “Because, I swear, I’ll kill you otherwise. I really will,” you let out, stuttering over your word and trying not to crumble completely. 

 Cassian leant forward and kissed you simply—as if it was the most normal thing he could ever do. When he pulled away, that fucking smirk was on his face again. The one you loved to hate, but dreamt about when he wasn’t around. 

 “What a beautiful way to die, meu korazon.” he said. 

 And then, he was gone. 

 And all hell broke loose.

 First, it was the troopers. There were so many of them, all with their blasters firing. You stayed with Bodhi in the ship while cadets fought them outside, knowing that you needed to be here for the transmission of the plans. It was essential. 

 Then, it was the walkers. They bombarded over the landing bays and destroyed ships and people alike. Smashing their bulking feet down upon the ground without so much as a second glance. 

 Chirrut and Baze were dead. You struggled to breathe. 

 Come on, Cassian. 

 Bodhi had sent distress signals to all branches of the galaxy, praying for rebels to arrive. It was a call to action, a cry for help. You needed all the help you could get, as the war raged outside and you focused on not losing your cool. 

 “Bodhi!” you screamed, just so he could hear you. You were sat at the secondary comms, heart in your throat at what you were hearing. The tears came faster than you could have imagined. “They’re here! They heard us!”

 Above Scarif’s shield entrance, two dozen rebel ships had arrived. They were there to help, there to answer your call. Bodhi grabbed his comm immediately, knowing what to do. 

 “Rogue One to the Rebellion!” he yelled. 

 “This is Admiral Raddus to Rogue One!”

 “Raddus, they have the plans. They found the Death Star plans. They have to transmit them from the communications tower! You have to take down the shield gate, it’s the only way we’re gonna get them through!” he spoke quickly, efficiently, and for a moment you allowed yourself to feel relieved. 

 “Pull up a hammerhead corvette—I have an idea. Stand by Rogue One, we’re on it!” Raddus replied. Bodhi bowed his head in thanks. 

 After the battle for the past hour, the fear of death from every trooper and walker and higher up on this godforsaken planet, you were hopeful—you were hopeful. 

 “This is for you, Galen,” Bodhi whispered to himself. It was go time. 

 “Bodhi, we need to tell Cassian—,”

 “Grenade!” he yelled over you, as the tinker of metal upon the hull of the ship alerted you both to the danger. 

 You had seconds to live. 

 You did the first thing you could think of; you clipped a blaster to you hip and jumped out of the shuttle; right before it exploded and blasted into a thousand pieces. You fell onto the sand of the landing pad, covering your head and ignoring the agonising sting of burns on your back. 

 All around you, troopers and cadets lay dead on the floor. Debris littered the sand. The once beautiful seclusion of the bay, surrounded by swinging palm trees, had been obliterated. 

 And Bodhi. Bodhi lay, burning, on the hull of the destroyed and on fire wreckage of Rogue One. 

 It was hard to hope for the best when all you wanted to do was join him. You felt the guilt first, then the grief, then the excruciating pain of all the losses you’d endured. You knew what you’d signed up to, knew this was always inevitable, but that didn’t stop you from feeling broken.

 When you moved, your skin burned. But still, you moved. You moved into the tree line, into the last of the greenery that surrounded you. You think your mother would have done the same, and your father; hidden in the foliage; made friends with the leaves as you focused on not dying. 

 You gulped down the pain, knowing that you needed medical attention; badly. It would have to wait. 

 You grabbed the communicator Cassian gave you and turned it on. You clicked the relay. 

 “Cassian,” you croaked. “Cassian—everyone’s dead,” you said, not even knowing if he was listening on the other end. 

 Static was all you were met with, until he finally replied. 

 “I know,” was all he said. “So is Kay-Two. But, you are alive,”

 “And you,” you said bluntly, struggling to be emotive when your energy was all but gone. “I’m trapped, at the landing pads. There are walkers, and—there were troopers—Bodhi. He’s—,” you stuttered through the words, trying to hold it together.

 “Use that big brain of yours,” he urged you forward. “I know you can get out, meu korazon. Through the shield gate, back to the Rebellion,”

 “Not without you,” the tears came thick and fast as you realised what was happening. “Where are you, my love?” you struggled to get it out.

 “We’re at the communication tower. Krennic—he got me with his blaster,” you stifled a sob. “We’re waiting now, for the shield to go down. We’re so close,”

 You allowed yourself to picture the perfect outcome: Raddus manages to open the shield gate, allowing the Rebellion into the atmosphere. They blast away the last of the enemy, kill Krennic where he stands, destroy their ships and leave them marooned on the planet to rot. 

 You find a ship and pick up Jyn and Cassian from atop the tower. They crawl into your ship and fall to the ground, hugging, safe, while you fly them far away from this god-awful place—back home; back to Yavin 4.

 You kiss Cassian a thousand times; you kiss him until your lips go numb and your belly hurts from all the laughter that he causes to burst from within you. He touches you softly and warmly, keeping you safe while also letting you roam free; the way you’ve always wanted to live. 

 You destroy the Death Star. You destroy the Empire, together. Alive. 

 “Okay,” you said, shutting your eyes and dispelling the last of your cold tears. You sucked in a shaking breath, forcing yourself to stand. “I’m finding a ship and getting off this fucking planet. And then—I’m coming back for you, Cassian. I will always come back,”

 “Meu korazon, I know,” 

 His comms cut off. You forced yourself to move.

 You blasted your way through the last trooper stragglers, going from landing pad to landing pad, looking for a ship. When you found one, you thanked the Maker within your heart. Somewhere deep down, you let yourself rejoice. 

 Just this once. Only for a second. 

 You’re working on autopilot when you entered the beat-up lander, praying that the engine is still usable. It stopped and stuttered to life, while you worked on powering up the comms systems. The static pinged abruptly, and you fiddled with the frequency knob until you could hear Admiral Raddus. 

 “Admiral, this is—,” you stopped. You didn’t know what to say. “I’m on landing pad four. How is the shield gate plan going?”

 “Tell me your call-sign, Lieutenant,” he pushed you, replying over the static. You sat in the pilot seat, looking out the dirtied windshield. 

 “Rogue Two,” you made it up on the spot. It was fitting.

 “Rogue Two, copy. Look at the sky,” he said knowingly. 

 You leaned forward, looking at the sky above. The blue haze of the shield gate had all but disappeared, after a Star Destroyer had crashed directly through it. It was still falling—in that slow motion sort of way that is both menacing and beautiful. 

 “They did it,” you whispered, but your comms were still on. 

 “The plans are being transmitted and uploaded as we speak, Rogue Two,” he announced. You thanked him, before clicking off your relay and got to piloting. 

 Before you could think, you took off in you ship. Quickly, you headed to the tower. If they were still up there, there was a chance that you’d be able to pick them up. You prayed, you hoped, you dreamed. 

 Cassian. 

 “Cassian,” you said over yours and his comm. “I’m in an Imperial lander, circling the tower. Where are you?”

 Only static came from the communicator. 

 “Cassian, come in,” you urged, as tears fell from your distressed eyes. 

 Nothing. 

 “Cassian!” you shouted, you screamed, you raged. 

 “Rogue Two—get out of there!” Admiral Raddus exclaimed over your ship comm. “They’re here. The Death Star is here,”

 You ceased to breathe. On the horizon, you saw it. Hulking, large, a sickly shade of grey and the size of a fucking planet as it loomed over everything. It covered the sun, casting a shadow over the entire planet. 

 “Rogue Two, that’s an order!” another voice came over your comms, but it wasn’t Raddus. “Don’t you dare disobey your commander,”

 “Commander?” you replied, eyes still glued to the horizon as you circled the tower for a third time. 

 “The shield gate is down. Leave the atmosphere, Rogue Two. Now,” he pleaded, and you wanted to rip the control console before you. You wanted to destroy every scrap of metal, every bolt, every button, and scanner that resided in this grim ship. 

 You only wanted him. You needed him. 

 “I can’t, Sir,” you croaked. 

 “Yes, you can,” he urged. You could picture his face, concerned and worried and on the brink of a meltdown in his X-wing, up in the stars. “Yes, you can!” he exclaimed again, shouting at you full pelt. 

 With every wasted second, the Death Star was gaining power and would soon blow. It would destroy the planet in minutes, seconds. Immediately. 

 “Please,” he let out. “You have so much more to do in this life.”

 You grimaced when you left the tower, heading for the upper atmosphere. You could see the collection of rebel ships, above the destroyed shield gate. Admiral Raddus, Bail Organa, your commander. They were all here—they’d all responded and helped. 

 You didn’t say a word as you entered space, letting the darkness encase you. You ignored the stars; the stars weren’t the same without him here. They would never be. 

 You blocked out the frantic comm relays from your ears. Something about Vader himself, something about the plans still uploading—nothing about Cassian. You turned off your comms altogether; you would follow the rebels back to base when you saw them jump into hyperspace; but this time was for you and Cassian. 

 Picking up your communicator, you looked down at the planet beneath you. Somewhere, Cassian was still down there. Jyn was still down there. 

 “Cassian,” you tried again, hating the sound of the static after each word. “Cassian,” your voice wobbled, your tears started to fall again. “My love, I need you. You said, if I needed you, to call you. I’m calling you, Cassian. I need you,”

 The air shifted when the Death Star fired on Scarif.

 You watched in horror as the initial blast slowly erupted, crumbling the crust of the planet as if it were nothing but a piece of paper that had been stabbed by a sharp lead pencil. 

 “Do you see it, meu korazon?” Cassian’s voice croaked over the comm. You almost vomited up your heart. “The colour of the sky. It’s red, but still soft. It reminds me of you,”

 You bit away the want to scream. 

 “Describe it to me,”

 “The skies used to look like this when I was a boy—on Kenari. They were so soft, so red, casting a glow over our forests and reflecting off the waxy leaves that we used to build our homes,” his voice was beautiful. You memorised every syllable and note and croak that he could muster. “My sister would clap at the sunset, every night. It happened so fast. One minute, the sky was still blue, the next a pale pink, and then—you,”

 “Me?” you sniffed through your tears. You couldn’t see properly. 

 “You. That shade of maroon, the deep kind. The kind that warms you. The kind that I see whenever I close my eyes. You,”

 The explosion was spreading fast, forcing the water from the vast ocean of the planet in all directions. 

 “Where are you, my love?” you asked. You wished you hadn’t.

 “On the beach, meu korazon. It’s beautiful. I’m with Jyn,”

 “Good,” your voice shook. 

 The first of the rebel ships flew into hyperspace around you. Time was up. 

 “Cassian,” you wobbled. “I love you,”

 “I know,” he said, huffing slightly. “I’ve loved you since you dropped that data pad and scrambled on the floor to pick up the buttons,”

 “Meu korazon,” you stuttered out. 

 “Meu koraz—,” the communicator went dead. 

 All you could hear was static, the ugly kind, the kind that made you want to vomit up your heart and use it to drive the ship home. 

 “Cassian?” you shut your eyes, feeling every muscle in your body give up. The air was ripped from your lungs. “Cassian!” you let out a scream so shrill it could’ve curdled cream. 

 Below you, the last of the planet was being destroyed. The crust crumbled like breadcrumbs, scattering out into the stars, while the core lay slowly dying. The light of a dying planet—it was maroon.

 Just like him. 

 Admiral Raddus’ ship blasted into hyperspace quickly, so you had no choice but to follow. There were only a few ships left now, including the looming Star Destroyer on the horizon that you knew wasn’t the ally. 

 You blinked away your tears, punching your ship into hyperspace as you collapsed onto the console. You wept, you cried so badly that your throat went red raw. The communicator was flush in your palm, cutting off the blood circulation and turning your knuckles white all the while. 

 You could no longer dream.

 When you returned to base, you didn’t speak for four days. You went back to work, helping Mon Mothma with a statement and planning the first stages of the attack on the Death Star. Despite doing it without words, Mon Mothma still chose to rank you up. 

 Captain. You were a Captain now, just like he was. 

 “Congratulations, Captain,” your commander approached you in the comms room. You were alone, but you preferred it that way. He was staying on Yavin 4 until rebels were needed at Crait once again. 

 He saluted you, and you silently laughed, allowing yourself a small smile. 

 “How does it feel, hm?” he sat next to you, smiling at you sullenly. 

 You said nothing, still not comfortable with the sound of your voice after you listened to it for so long—screaming, wailing—a few days prior. It made you feel sick. 

 When you didn’t reply, your commander shuffled to find something in his pocket. “I thought I’d bring these for you. He was always leaving his stuff around, you know? His dorm was next to mine, and it was gross,”

 Gently, he dangled Cassian’s dog tags before you. He never wore them, there was no point when he was always on recon missions. It would be a dead giveaway. You sucked in a deep breath as he slowly lowered them into your palms. They were cold, freezing cold, like they’d been left in the snow for days. You instinctually warmed them with your fingers. Turning them over, you read his name. 

 Captain Cassian Andor. 

 You were speechless, and not just because you’d decided not to talk for days on end. There were no words that would be thanks enough for what your commander had just given you. You had nothing of Cassian’s, nothing to remember him by, until now. 

 Gently, you skimmed your fingers over the metal over and over again, furrowing your brows when the tears started to well behind your eyes. 

 You looked up at your commander. “Thank you,” it burst from your lips, a coarse whisper, but words, nonetheless. He smiled. 

 “There she is. I was starting to miss her,” he said fondly.

 He left you to have some time, smiling as he exited the communication bay. You exhaled shakily as you finally put them around your neck. They were cold when you shoved them beneath your shirt, resting them over your heart. 

 This was the Alliance. The Rebellion. And Cassian had fought valiantly for what he believed in. An excellent pilot, a stellar fighter, the man you loved and who loved you back. It seemed only fitting that he would return to the sky, where he came from. 

 Scattered amongst the stars forevermore. 

 Meu korazon.  

[thealiveshadow]

Looking at all of the takes this chapter, and I thought about this Tokyo Ghoul quote that Eto Yoshimura wrote in her book “Dear Kafka”

"That time, so that no one (not even Father) would notice, I secretly rewrote the summary.

What cannot change can only be broken. 

This is so to me, who left behind everything necessary inside the womb."

(There’s also this translation, which I think fits better into what AFO’s character, even if there are only a few words that were changed: “Then I, hidden from everyone (particularly father), stealthily rewrote the outline. Things that cannot be changed, can only be broken. From the view of I, who left all needed things in the womb.”)

And how this quote in a way truly summarizes, especially the last line, the way All for One thinks of himself and a way we, the audience, can view the way he thinks of himself. For example, the first line can be used in reference to how he changed the summary of the comic books him and Yoichi read together, in order to better fit his own wishes and desires. He doesn't accept the fact that Hero had defeated the Villain in the end, and decides to simply stop reading when the villain had won and become the Demon King, hereby rewriting the summary of the book to fit his own needs and desires. (So in that context, it should be "(not even Brother) would notice", but we'll let it slide this time for the sake of coherence) He then tries to LARP that twisted idea and that's how you end up with the current AFO, a man who thinks of himself to be the Demon King of comic books, and does what ever he possibly can to bring that reality of the summary of the comic books he rewrote.

I think the second line of the quote also is an indication of the way AFO thinks. To the core he doesn't believe that people cannot change, evidenced by the way he reacts when Lady Nagant is now fighting on the side of the heroes and when he starts losing to what he defines as a ''bunch of extras". He does not anticipate people to step outside of the lines that he drew around them and when they do go outside of those ideas and change (you know how people do) he throws tantrums and and refuses to acknowledge the fact that each person has their own autonomy and character, far beyond any neat little box he has put them into. And what he cannot change he wants to break. He wanted to break Yoichi by forcefully bestowing a quirk onto him, he wanted to break Tomura by grooming and manipulating him for the majority of his life into believing that he was simply born evil, and he wants to break all of the "extras" such as Stain, Jiro, Hawks, and Bakugou who go against the stereotypes he has placed them into, because to him these people can not change their so called "true nature", and therefore can only be broken.

Lastly, the third line, which I have been waiting impatiently to get to. I think this last line, truly shows the way AFO thinks of himself. In the chapter, All For One is shown to have cannibalized his mother as soon as he was born, and has been described as someone who simply took from others, without any regard, because he thought that anyone who could not give him *something* was useless. One could say that this is an indication of how All For One was evil from his birth, and therefore has no redeeming qualities. BUT this is My Hero Academia, good sir, where everyone is human. While framed in a horror like and grim way, it important to look past that and see the AFO/Yoichi backstory through the lens of BNHA's themes, which are all about humanizing villains and are against dehumanization in general. Imagine being newborn with a dead mother with no source of nutrition, and you have to eat her. You grow up with no one to protect your child self, no name, no sense of identity, no social security net, no one to help you differentiate between right and wrong, you are constantly being hunted for simply existing, and you are responsible for someone who is far weaker than you and have to find ways to protect yourself and him as well. So, of course you are going to grow up twisted, with disturbing ideals and cruel habits. But AFO and a lot of the MHA fandom doesn't see those factors, or refuse to acknowledge them. That's why I think this third line really displays AFO's mindset how he thinks he was evil from the womb. All things necessary to interact and engage with the world in a healthy way, such as the ability to show affection, to be caring, to be understanding, to have the methods of socialization, and have a acceptance of the autonomy of other individuals, and to be able to face and understand you own feelings in general, are abilities that have to be learned, they don't simply come to you in dream at night. But All for One does not think that, rather he refuses to humanize himself, and continues to play the role of the Demon King in the story he is trying to write, forever convinced that he was born like that from his mother's womb.

In summary, I think this quote from Eto Yoshimura really provides insight into the character AFO is and what he thinks of himself. He rewrote the summary of the comic books him and Yoichi read together, he doesn't believe that people can be changed, only be broken into what he wants them to be, and that he truly believes he has been evil from the very beginning, and any kind of "humanlike" trait he could have, was all left behind in his mother's womb.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: LGBT Courage Coalition/Eva Kurilova

Published: Aug 29, 2023

As a participant in the gender debate over the past several years, something that has stuck out to me is the desire for truth and the palatable relief when it is admitted. Simply put, people like it when trans people are honest about their biological sex instead of claiming to be the opposite sex in a literal sense.

More and more people are starting to think that the transgender movement has gone too far. But what do they mean by that? By and large, most people wouldn’t say it has gone too far in securing actual rights like housing, education, and employment. Yes, there are actual bigots out there who want to push people who don’t fit the norm to the margins but, for the most part, people like to think they have a “live and let live” attitude. This attitude is tested, however, when activists push them to accept lies.

This is why I prefer to frame the problem in terms of gender ideology which, if I had to define succinctly, I would say is the idea that biological sex either isn’t real or that male and female sex differences don’t actually matter.

The problem is that these are lies, and these lies have led to what people view as the excesses of the trans movement, namely violent male rapists in women’s prisons, men in women’s sports, and the transitioning of children.

Many people describe their “peak trans” moment (the moment they simply had enough of gender ideology) as a time when they were forced to accept an obvious lie. Some common examples include asking us to believe that a man’s human rights had been violated because female estheticians would not perform services offered for women on his male genitals or that it was fair for “Lia” Thomas to compete in swimming against women and win while barely kicking.

The flip side of this is how relieved people are when they see a trans-identified person who acknowledges their sex and doesn’t ask others to lie. I am lucky enough to know many such people, including my good friend Lois Cardinal. No, I am not trying to say such people receive universal acceptance and praise, but many, myself included, who would be considered “TERFs” or “transphobic” have no personal issues with them. It is refreshing to see people who don’t want or need everyone else to lie, and it makes it feel like dialogue is possible.

Does this mean we always see eye-to-eye? Of course not. I am also not naïve enough to believe truth and honesty will solve all of the problems of the gender wars. For example, some trans-identified men might admit that they are biologically male but still believe they should use women’s spaces because they pass. Obviously, this does not go over well with many gender critical factions. Problems and arguments remain.

But this is the way the world goes. People are going to butt heads over issues in all areas of life, and we are going to have to debate those issues and come up with rules and boundaries around them. But we can’t even have the discussion if we don’t start from a place of truth.

When gender ideology demands that people accept lies, it becomes authoritarian, and people don’t like to be controlled. Many are happy to get on board with the idea that some individuals prefer to look like the opposite sex and consider it no business of theirs. People generally want to worry about their own lives. But it becomes their business when they are asked to take part in a lie, and people will act when push comes to shove, especially when it involves children.

It heartens me that despite the fair share of these little authoritarians out there, not everyone is willing to paint all trans people with the same brush. Maybe I am naïve and a bit too much of an optimist, but even some of the staunchest gender ideology critics I know are willing to see trans people as individuals as long as they are not being asked to lie or to accept a lie.

There is a backlash brewing because of all the lies that have been pushed up to this point, and the only way to stop it from crashing back way too far in the opposite direction is to have a message grounded in truth and reality.

[andydrysdalerogers]

Undercover ~ Two ~ Sam

Pairings: Jake Jensen and OFC Samantha Matthews

The Losers have made it back to their families and are out. Well, almost. A threat against the British crown needs to be handled and the CIA has tapped the Losers for one final mission. And they are sending in Jensen.

Jake Jensen hasn't been a civilian in years but now he's undercover to find out why his target is where he is and who he's after.

Enter Sam, someone who Jake doesn't expect and well, he didn't know he was looking for.

Can Jake handle his mission and falling in love? Especially when the truth leads to a bigger mission than expected?

*~* A Jake Jensen Story *~*

Author's note: this story continues after the events of the Losers. I may weave other characters into it but they are all minor. THE TAGLIST IS OPEN.

The playlist is available on Spotify.

cover photo by me! Dividers by @firefly-graphics

Warnings: angst, death, smut, and a bunch of stuff a can’t say because it gives away the plot!

Previous - One - Jake

Story Masterlist // Main Masterlist

Predictable.  

That’s how Sam Matthews would describe her life.  Eat sleep work repeat. Her job as secretary to the head of IT at ADR gave her an income but not joy. The only woman on a floor full of mouth breathing men was cringey. The ogle, the attempts to flirt (badly), the propositions got old and fast. 

When did my life become this, she thought to herself.  She had been on track to get married, become an executive within ADR.  But when Terry left (with his secretary) Sam’s life stalled.  She shuffled around until she landed with Mike, Terry’s best friend.  Mike was just as angry as Sam was, being that said secretary was his girlfriend.  

The beauty of men. A year after and Mike was able to move on.  Not “hey let’s have a beer with the ex-best friend” move on but still.  Sam barely functioned, only really doing the minimum to go to work, not really having anyone else in her life except her mother, her father and brother (who was quite distant), her best friend Stephanie and her cat, Bowie.  

While Sam was getting ready for the day, Mike messaged her about a new member of the security IT team. Jake Jensen. She replied, confirming that she would get it done. She headed out of her cottage and drove into work. Her cottage.  The one thing that her father had set her up with and she managed to hang on to during the break up.  

Heading into ADR, Sam checks herself in the mirror of the elevator.  Ponytail neat, makeup soft, clothes straight, she doesn’t look like a mess and that at least will keep Michael off her ass.  She greets everyone as she enters and tries to avoid the accounting floor where her most unwanted admirer had an office.  

John Fitzpatrick was not an unattractive man; Sam could acknowledge that a bit, but she just wasn’t interested.  John was cocky.  He knew he was good looking, and he had already ran through almost all of the woman at ADR with the exception of Sam.  

After setting up the new security IT manager with his email and logins, Sam sets off on her normal routine, delivering reports from Michael, gathering up the reports needed.  From the corner of her eye, she saw the new guy look at her and quickly duck his head.  She giggled but ignored him as he seemed shy.  But that distraction would cost her. She moved back to her area and went into the break room, not realizing who else was in the room with her.  

“Miss Matthews!” 

“Shit,” she mumbled to herself. She looked up to see John smiling down at her.  He had crowded her near the coffee maker, kitty corner from the door.  

“I was wondering when you would finally let me take you to dinner.” 

“That’s a nice offer, but as I explained before I’m really not interested.” She tried to move away but John stopped her with a hand on her hip. “Please don’t touch me.”  

“Why? Does it get you all hot and bothered?” 

“No, because its sexual harassment.” Sam pushed him away and walked out the door quickly. She barely missed another body in her retreat. “Excuse me, sorry.”  She moved to a corner that made it look like she was heading to the elevator. She crouched in the corner but could still hear from the break room.  

“Pardon me…” she heard John try to follow and stopped by the guy she almost ran into.  “You’re new.”  

“Yeah, hi. I’m Jake, IT.”  

“John, accounting.  Sorry, did you see a brunette pass by?” 

“Uh, yeah, she went into the elevator.” Sam breathed a sigh of relief.  

“Sly minx, she is.  You must know how that is.” Ew, really, she thought.  “Well, I’ll see you around Jake.”  

“Likewise.”  

Sam watched as John walked right by her and waited a moment before going back to the breakroom to retrieve her mug.  She found the new manager in the room, sipping his coffee. 

“Is he gone?” She must have startled him as he choked on his coffee.  

Sam finally had a good look at the man. Blonde spiky hair, memorizing blue eyes behind a set of wire rimmed glasses, pink lips with scruff on his chin.  He was gorgeous.  She could tell he was also slim but well built. He took a moment to respond to her. “Uh, yeah.  I told him that you went up the elevator.”  

Sam sighed in relief. “Thank you.  God, he just won’t take no for an answer.”  

He was still a little slow in responding but he seemed to snap out of it. “Sorry for my species.” He wrinkled his nose, assuming he made a stupid comment. He turned to walk away but Sam found his comment amusing.  

She giggled.  “Thank you for apologizing.  I’m Sam, by the way. Sam Matthews. Sorry Samantha.”  She extended her hand to him.  

“I like Sam.” He flinched again. “I’m Jake Jensen.” He took her hand. It was a warm hand, strong but yet gentle in hers.  

“Oh, you’re the new manger! Welcome to ADR!” She beamed him a smile and he flashed on back, showing off his pearly whites. Sam nearly swooned.  This was the first time since Terry that she found someone she was attracted to.  

“Are you going to have trouble getting back to your office?” he asked. He pointed his thumb over his shoulder.  “I could walk you back.”  

“I would like that,” she replied with a soft smile. “Let me just,” she reached for her mug and poured herself a cup.  

“Princess, huh?” 

She wrinkled her forehead. “Excuse me?” 

He pointed to her hands. “Your mug. Princess.”  

“Oh,” she lifted the mug to look at it.  “Yeah, my father gave it to me.” She blushed and quickly took a sip.  

“Makes sense.  Dad’s princess.  I get it.” Jake quirked a half smile.  “Sooo, I email you every day.” 

Sam giggled, “yep, all your reports. And other things.”  

“How long have you been with ADR?” 

“About four years.  I came in with… a friend and they left, and I stayed.” Sam shrugged. “What made you come to ADR?” 

“A job,” he quirked a smile.  “I’m ex-military and they offered me a position. It’s close to my family so it was a no-brainer.”  

“That must be nice. My mom is in New York so I can only see her every once in a while.”  

“And your dad?” Jake looked like he was sincerely interested and that gave Sam a flutter.  

“Uh, he’s in England with my brother.  We don’t talk a lot. He was quite busy, but he just retired.”  

“Cool.  Maybe he’ll get a chance to visit you.” Jake stopped, missing the look of apprehension on Sam’s face and Sam noticed that she was outside of Mike’s office where she sat. “Well, I better get back.  The boss won’t want me to slack off. Or his assistant.”  A half smile graces his face.  

“No, she wouldn’t.  But she wouldn’t mind if you came by to say hello more often.”  

“I think that can be arranged.”  Jake took a step back and hit a cubicle wall.  “Umm… so… yeah ok.”  He turned and walked back to his area as Sam watched.  He turned back once and raised a hand to wave but hesitated and just rubbed the back of his head as he walked into his area.  

Sam watched with a smile until she heard someone clearing his throat. She turned to see Mike smiling at her.  “I haven’t seen that smile in a while.”  

“Mike, sorry,” she ducked back to her desk.  

“Don’t be sorry Samantha. You haven’t smiled in a long time.” Mike leaned against the doorway. “He’s… interesting.”  

Sam smiled. Interesting doesn’t even begin to cover it.  She went to her computer and set up an appointment.  

Coffee ~ 10AM ~ Daily  Invitees:  J. Jensen and S. Matthews 

She sent it off as Mike went back to work.  She watched as Jake’s head popped up and looked over towards her.  He smiled and sat down.  Her computer pinged. She looked down to see the invitation was accepted.  

Then her instant message popped.  

JJ: I would have asked you to coffee  SM: Really?  JJ: No…  SM: Why?  JJ: Too Beautiful  JJ: Shit  JJ: I mean… 

Sam smiled. His adorable, dorky nature is refreshing compared to all the other men in the office.   SM: I think you’re cute.   SM: Just want to get to know my new team mate  JJ: Me too 

Sam bit her lip, feeling her cheeks flush.  Only Jake Jensen could really bring this out in her.  Because he wasn’t like everyone else. She went on with her day, staying close to Mike’s office as John wouldn’t come around.  As she packed up to leave, a shadow fell over her and she looked up to see Jake in the doorway. “Hi?” 

“I just wanted to make sure you made it to your car uninterrupted.  Consider me your bodyguard,” Jake said with an overexaggerated bow.  

“Thank you, kind sir,” Sam replied. She turned off her lamp and grabbed her bag.  They walked side by side to the garage.  

“So, you feel safe now?” 

“Very.” Sam smiled up at him.  He was so much taller than she was, even in her heels.  

“Good.  My pop taught me to always be a gentleman.  Even if my mouth gets me into trouble.”  

“No filter?” 

“Sometimes. My CO, sorry, commanding officer, would tell me I could talk my way out of a lot of things but it’s usually because I put myself there.” Jake chuckled. They stopped at Sam’s car.  “I guess you made it safe and sound.”  

“Well, couldn’t have done it without my personal bodyguard.”  Sam smiled. “See you tomorrow Jake.”  

“Have a good night Sam.”  He waited until she drove out before heading to his own vehicle.  

* 

* 

* 

In the dark corner of the lot, John Fitzgerald gripped his steering wheel.  This was not an obstacle that he had anticipated.  No matter.  When John Fitzgerald is on a mission, he stops at nothing to get what he wants.   

NEXT

Taglist:

@patzammit

@texmexdarling

@slutforchrisjamalevans

@firephotogrl74

@tinkerbelle67

@before-we-get-started

@bunnyforhim

@alexakeyloveloki

@sunnyhummingbee

@whiskeytangofoxtrot555

@peaceinourtime82

@saucy-sassy-sparkly

@kmc1989

@kandis-mom

@lokislady82

[bisluthq]

The other thing with The Black Dog is not just that Matty loves that song and covered it but that he specifically only ever covered it twice in April last year. I haven’t seen him perform that song any other time outside of those two in April. So obviously it’s not just a matter of Matty loving Best of Me by the starting line but that he was very intentionally performing it for Taylor. Otherwise it would’ve been something that happened outside of that time frame. So are we supposed to believe it’s just a coincidence that it was clearly Matty and Taylor’s song and Joe also is a fan of the starting line. At most I could agree that the black dog is a composite sketch and there are details about both of the guys in it (which I don’t really think but I can acknowledge it is possible) but it is straight up illogical to think the only two times matty played that song was during the one month him and Taylor were dating while he was touring and it was not meant to be a reference to their relationship. And that is not even getting into the fact that basically every other detail in the song fits Matty more than Joe based on how she describes him throughout the entire album.

this is also what I think. I can roll with an “it’s a composite sketch” interpretation but there are too many specifics in it for it to be purely fantasy imo and the many details she does give do not, to me, line up with how she describes Joe at all elsewhere. I get that sharing your location with your affair partner and boyfriend for one or so month is crazy but everything they did was crazy lmao like that was a hallmark of Tatty 2.0. I actually find it less bizarre to think Tatty shared locations than that Joe and Taylor did and specifically because of the affair aspect and him saying he’s not like Joe. She worried about Joe cheating a LOT - surely they could’ve just shared locations and that could’ve dealt with a lot of that? And most of the time she’d have known where the fuck he is because he would’ve told her? They lived together? I know some people share locations as a safety precaution but in Taylor and Joe’s case, given they have/had a security team like that seems useless af lol like wouldn’t Joe have been better off sharing his location with his ex-Mossad bodyguard than with Taylor lmao? So it’d have to be a romantic gesture rather than a practical one for them and seeing as how she was always worrying and that never went away idk man that they did that…

[darlinggeorgiedear]

Was George V a jealous husband?

No he wasn't! When George and Mary went on their first tour of the Empire, Mary was a hit, especially in Australia and New Zealand. George wrote to his mother about the success of the tour, describing how everyone fell in love with his wife and thought of her as pretty and charming, which made him proud. He also wrote to Mary saying that she was responsible for the tour's success and how thankful he was for her.

I think us royal fans are a little twisted in our thinking about what happens when a royal shines too much (ex. Diana and Meghan), and believe it always results in jealousy. The usual explanation is that the palace or Royal Family turns on whoever gets too much attention.

I think the real problem is the Palace or Royal Family feel that royals, like Diana or Meghan, were working against the royal family for their own popularity, instead of trying to represent the Queen. When the Duke of Windsor was Prince of Wales he was dragged all over the Empire to spread his Royal glamour with full support of the Palace.

I acknowledge that there are holes in my way of thinking because the Duke of Windsor, as Prince of Wales, did experience some sort of jealousy from family members at times (royal family are humans and you can't always help feeling insecure at times). But my point is that the Palace definitely supported him as Prince of Wales, since they felt like he was benefiting the Crown, unlike Diana and Meghan. (Also, I am not trying to make the argument that Diana and Meghan were out for themselves, I'm just saying that the Palace (and possibly Royal Family) seemed to see them that way).

I think even when Mary out did George (in stature, knowledge, etc), he didn't mind because he knew she was only trying to help him. Of course, this doesn't mean George let Mary walk all over him. There are a few reports about how, especially when he first became King, he tried to seem very formal with Mary in front of people, to ward off gossip that the consort is in control. He was valid in his response, since when you think about his son George Vi, many like to credit his success with his wife, in result of her seemly dominance over him.

I hope this is what you meant by asking if he was jealous! If you meant it more like if he was jealous of other men, I would say no to that too! George and Mary definitely had a very secure marriage. This is easier to see from her side because she befriended and didn't mind Julie Stoner still being good friends with George.

There is also a photograph from when they did that photoshoot in their London home, York House, where they are both posed while he is reading the paper. If you look closer, in between them, there is a photo of Missy of Edinburgh. There is also a photo of her in Mary's boudoir or sitting room on the mantle at York Cottage. These pictures were probably gifts, but similar to her acceptance of Julia Stoner, shows how both past romantic interest of George's, were past news. I'd imagine George would have looked at Mary's past romantic interest similarly.

[quandaryitem]

what the fuck do you think gonzo journalism is

so somebody mentioned The Bostonians which has been on my notional to-read list (that doesn't rly exist until i see the books in 2nd hand shops and then i buy them and they go on my shelf, which is used to impress women) for a long time. mostly this is due to a single person harping on about it, in a way that makes me think there really really really is some deep wisdom/insight hidden in it that we need to uncover. i do think books can be like this, like if you read any book before book X, then it's sort of a waste of time because book X will produce such a deep meaning-shift that you'll have to go back over all those other books to discover their new transformed meanings. like replaying super mario 64 with luigi i guess. nobody likes him but you gotta do it

anyway so The Bostonians - this is all hearsay but it's about a guy in 19th century boston who writes about these various society figures, i assume that there is drama, there are interactions, there are descriptions of various types of guy. i don't think anything is unique about this by the way, but the author was apparently quite famous so this particular novel has gained some amount of historical significance. i don't think it's anywhere close to being his most famous novel (i didn't see it in the (Top) section for him on wikipedia) but it's by him, so there

i think something interesting about this is that while i'm sure the writer was trying to entertain (aren't artists so pure of heart, they just want to give us a thing to enjoy, bless them) and also record some historical moment (i love how people say this nowadays, history is made up of moments, it's like a moment when you are with a girl and the sun goes down and you kiss. that's history) but ALSO devilishly, to use the collected charisma and notoriety of the figures as feedstock for his own process, to produce his novel and publish it and secure his own fame. it goes both ways too though, the people depicted in the novel (i don't think it matters if they are real or fictional characters, they're obviously based on real people they always are and no doubt they made sure others knew it) get more fame if the novel is a hit

so there's this symbiotic relationship, the author and the people he is writing about. they let him into their life and he writes about them, hell it doesn't even need to be true as i have mentioned, it's about setting the personalities in amber. i think something that bugs me about this is how this is always being sold as a new idea. i remembered the phrase gonzo journalism and just how mad it makes me, like as if hunter s thompson was the first person to acknowledge that the writer is subjective. of course he didn't invent that phrase, it was invented by a journalist. who was trying to make their own name, right? they thought of this pithy original phrase to describe a thing that's so old and so obvious to anyone, to make their own name. i was gonna write something like "maybe that's what writing is all about" but that adds a wistful curious incomplete note to something i am so, so sure of