#this was a real roundabout way for me to say that i think he chooses to look like lester post-toa

[weatheringandweary]

Apollo's perception of Lester changing over the course of the series drives me absolutely nuts because it's one of the most emotionally impactful arcs in his character.

He see's Lester as a prison sentence initially. He's the husk that Zeus made of Apollo when he stripped him of his immortality, his domains, and his memory. Not a single thing about the mortal body he's placed in was his choice and he resents it. Apollo even refers to Lester as a distinctly separate entity at times. There is a clear disconnect between what he views as himself and his punishment, and the only times he acknowledges it as his identity is to be self-deprecating or dismissive.

Then halfway through his arc, at the lowest points in the narrative where he's lost nearly all of his abilities, he spirals into self doubt. Maybe this was all he really was. Maybe without the support of his powers and domains, this was all there is to Phoebus Apollo. He's accepting Lester's negative traits as apart of himself, vocalizing his fear of being useless and unworthy of godhood to the readers. While the first portion of the series developed Apollo's character in terms of him accepting responsibility, The Burning Maze is when Apollo's most significant internal changes take place.

He stops lying constantly in his narration by this point, and we get to see how he actually feels about himself and others. What he was hiding from the readers - most notably, was his feelings of inadequacy.

But by the end of the series, once he's rightfully Apollo again, he admits to us that it doesn't feel right. He suddenly realizes that he does miss being Lester; that the godly form he's wearing doesn't fit like he once thought it did. Despite the trauma surrounding his trials, being Lester was the first time Apollo was able to be authentically himself without fear of needing to put on a mask. He was braver, kinder, and more beloved when he wasn't putting distance between himself and others.

Because that's the person he wants to be.

That's the real him, Lester Papadopoulos.

[nortsauce]

I’m gonna just copy and paste my “Miles Edgeworth Chooses Death” yap session from my broadcast channel on insta! Go join that if you want my Talk Show in real time LOL

BEGIN!

I wanna talk about my interpretation of the “Chooses death” sequence and what i think about Miles and Phoenix in it bc i feel like people get me wrong when i talk about it.

I often say that I would not have forgiven miles as quickly as phoenix did, and that i believe phoenix should have punched him for what he did. A lot of people say that phoenix was in the wrong for basically saying “You should have never come back from the dead!” and interpreting that as like phoenix basically telling miles to khs.

A lot of ppl wanna give miles more grace because they believe it WAS a “game over” note but he decided against it last minute, and i like that interpretation too!

Some believe phoenix knew what the note meant and still got pissed givibg phoenix less grace, because he was the one who told miles to “Kill the old prosecutor in him” or smth like that in the Skye case

And i’m not saying any of these interpretations are wrong! I like a lot of these interpretations!

But a lot of people miss my point when i say that i believe no matter what, phoenix had every right to be pissed and mad at miles.

1) This does NOT mean i hate miles as a character, no this flaw of his, constantly running away rather than facing problems or believing that he doesn’t leave much of an inpact on others Makes me like him MORE!!

I love when characters have an inherently unlikable flaw about them! Usually when people write character flaws they tend to be more sympathetic flaws, and i like those too! But when they have something about them that is just Ambiguous and unlikable like, they have a tendency to run away, they deflect and lash out at others, they have a problem with commitment, etc. I LOVE THAT. I love when a character has traits that are UNLIKABLE IT MAKES ME EXCITED TO SEE “Ooo how are they gonna grow from this!!!! :D”

2) this also does not mean that miles or phoenix are totally at fault here. Both of them are pretty messed up guys who are trying to communicate in the only ways they’ve ever learned how.

Phoenix is a very emotional person up until AA4, who is a representation of how a “normal” dude would react to absolutely batshit scenarios, but ultimately is really never talking about himself. He reacts to other people. He’s emotional about other people. He was sad and angry at miles, he’s silly and strong for the lil sisters/kids that he has, he’s exasperated and fond of his friends and he’s static with those he doesn’t know all that well. Phoenix is a very interesting character with his emotions which is why i find every interpretation of him so interesting!

Miles on the other hand:

Miles is a reserved person who is intimidating upon first glance and awkward at a closer look. Phoenix even says himself “A lot of people dont get edgeworth, do they.” and i believe the investigations games are a big indicator of this! Throughout the investigations games, so many people find the first one boring because Miles doesn’t react as much, because we are SEEING through his persona that he puts on in the courtroom!

We are finally seeing what got him the title of the prosecutor to call when there is a high profile case. We see him exasperated, we see him stressed, we see him angry, stoic, calculating and at certain times we see him show a little bit of a lack of empathy for others, including himself.

But we also see inside his mind, we see him fawning over steel samurai merch, we see him thinking of Phoenix when he’s lost which could factor in on why he kept calling phoenix over to europe during phoenix’s disbarment. We see him fondly looking after Kay and growing his friendship with Gumshoe.

He never says these feelings outloud, he shows them in roundabout ways that go over a lot of the characters heads until they start to understand him and know him more.

In an interview, the authors explain some things about miles and why he’s so less vulnerable in the investigations games, and they said “Its because we aren’t looking through the eyes of phoenix anymore” (paraphrasing. would you believe me if i told u my paraphrasing made it LESS gay?)

Phoenix seems to see miles in a way that no one else does, that is to say that miles shows more to phoenix than he shows other people.

But this also goes vice versa

In a scene in Hazakura temple (the famous bridge case) Miles says something about how phoenix is feeling. Miles then says something along the lines of “Not that i expect to get any clarification out of you” with a fond side smile. Phoenix then apologizes to miles about this. (this is slightly inspired by a tumblr post lol)

So it can be inferred that phoenix is NOTORIOUSLY dodgy with the details of his life. Mia points out that she thought phoenix had a twin because of how different he was from the “Feenie” she saw on the stand during the first dahlia trial where phoenix eats a necklace.

all this to say that miles KNOWS phoenix deflects topics when they are about himself, so for him to be so open about something personal means all the more of how dire it can get for him.

BACK TO THE NOTE! Because yes this all started with the note i go on tangents alot LOL

The note has a lot of significance for how miles was dealing with his whole life being flipped inside out, because he resigned himself to a tragedy when suddenly a side character from his past RIPPED THROUGH THE PAGES OF THE BOOK and changed the narrative to a redemption story. He wasn’t expecting anything of that. He looks at phoenix the way he remembers his father in a way, a shining light. He never realized that phoenix saw him the same way. So when Miles came back, he did everything in his power to try and live up to that. But once again, phoenix turned the pages of the book and scribbled all over it.

Miles understands phoenix because he is so blatant about how he’s feeling and why he feels that way. Despite being secretive about the facts of his life, He’s an emotional person, which is probably why we don’t see much of miles during apollo justice. It’s new territory, its unnerving. He’s so hidden and miles needs time to interpret that.

Also don’t think i’m skimping out on phoenix’s flaws. We have a whole ass game for that called AA4

In the trilogy he is so quick to floor the gas pedal on ANYTHING like yes i’ll change my entire life to see one dude bc he looked sad/stressed

Yes i’ll run across burning rope bridges, take the execution, tank an explosion, all for maya

yes i’ll break into a place (Gant’s office, Engerde’s house) and almosy get killed (50,000 volts, mafia, redd white, assassin, etc,) to prove you’re innocent!

He’s idealistic and sometimes gets upset when they dont match his ideals

he’s a master at deflection and many other condescending traits. and thats what i love about him.

Anyways yeah what miles did was a dick move but thats why i like him LOL

Phoenix had every right to be mad bc yeah. God forbid phoenix be a little upset and yell at the dude who tried to execute him and maya LMFAO

[barb-l]

As a desperate lesbian who has been wanting a sapphic Wednesday portrayed for AAAAGES now, I still can't believe these things that the show gave me:

THE Wednesday Addams being shown jealous of a character that barely has any lines MULTIPLE times just because Enid mayyybe wants to choose said minor character as a roomie/bestie over her

BFFs Thing and Enid ganging up on Wednesday over her fashion sense and her pouting about it

Wednesday, who takes pride in her independence and relishes in isolation, admitting to have missed anyone is unthinkable. But she did! In her own way. Even if she was roundabout with her admittance, the fact that she got called out by both Thing and the goddamn villain shows how down bad she was during that fallout with Enid

"Thing said he missed you" and the way she visibly struggles against her nature to say "Skip the tape" with the tape symbolizing her breaking down her walls for Enid

something about Thornhill, who is played by an actress who also used to play Wednesday, telling this new Wednesday that she has to admit someday how much Enid has come to mean to her is just... ugh. Will never get over how much it adds so many layers to Wednesday's self-denial.

she held off all the insults in her bottomless vocabulary so she wouldn't completely offend Enid over the snood she made for her. She sugarcoated her words for Enid, which Wednesday NEVER does. In fact, it's the opposite of what she always does!

Enid VS Tyler bearing so much resemblance to that classic trope where the Love Interest saves the girl from the other Love Interest, even being a parallel to the fight between Gomez and Garret over Morticia

Enid lamented how she would never find a mate because she's not a real werewolf and would hence die alone, to which Wednesday remarks that it's a good thing in episode one. To emphasize Wednesday's apparent indifference to isolation, she is told that her nature as a raven means that she is fated to be alone like Enid feared for herself. In the finale, after Wednesday accepts that she doesn't want to be alone in the wake of her fallout with Enid, Enid finally wolfs out to save Wednesday. Enid made Wednesday realize that she doesn't actually like being alone, at least not when it meant she wouldn't have Enid by her side. In turn, Wednesday's life being threatened gave Enid the push to finally wolf out and, supposedly, now be given an opportunity to be eligible for a mate. I mean... I don't have high hopes, but the narrative is making it too easy to make it look like they were meant for each other

The heavy implication that Wednesday joined the Poe Cup because Bianca specifically said she wanted to make Enid cry over losing. The fact that she always deflected whenever Enid tried to confirm that Wednesday is doing it for her, but she never outright denied it!

"The mark you have left on me is indelible" and "I'll think of you" about Enid aksnnzzinsosnsj she gets sooooo sappy for herrrr

THE HUG. For people she's very very soft for, like her family, she only ever let THEM touch her. She's never show to start or reciprocate. SHE pulls Enid back into her. She holds Enid just as tightly, despite the injuries and despite Enid's pink coat. Enid toughens up for her but Wednesday is so vulnerable for her my god im so ill for them 💀

[nothing-to-see-hi]

Ok… This will be long and probably ooc but this has also been in progress for like a year soooooo… Here is the Plague au.

It starts with the very concept of what would happen if Rhian got the plague and exploded from there. Essentially it became a choose-your-own adventure with the idea of giving this one dude the plague I kinda made up. There was a main timeline once that’s not this one, but this has become the more-ish coherent version of it.

General backstory: It’s around the time that Rafal and Rhian are called to be School Masters and take their oath, but it also happens to be the beginning of a plague time. It starts in some far-off kingdom and slowly inches its way toward them, and it comes in the form of a handsome man Rhian gives directions to. A week later that man is dead, but that hardly matters when everyone around them, and they themselves, are dying.

Rhian takes to his bed thinking it’s just a cold or something until he starts losing weight rapidly and coughing up blood and oh crap it’s not a cold now, is it? It’s now up to Rafal to fix the mess as he usually does, and he does. Kinda. In a roundabout way, he does fix the primary issue: Rhian dying, but gets them into a whole ‘nother mess.

Now you may be asking me, “Nothing, what did he do?” And I would tell you, “I don’t know, but here’s an idea that only half makes sense!” So we’re going with that. There’s this thing called soul binding that I may or may not have made up by myself. (It’s been so long that I can’t remember.) And it is exactly what it sounds like.

Used by Good and Evil alike in the days before even our boys were alive, it is used to tie one's soul to something else, usually another person since Death refuses to be cheated that easily. Good often used it in marriages to show the depths and power of True Love and Evil used it in their attempts to artificially extend their lives. (Think horcruxes that often get immediately destroyed.) It quickly fell out of fashion with both camps for various reasons and quickly became forbidden in most Ever kingdoms.

Back to them both dying. Rhian is mostly comatose and Rafal is starting to feel the plague take hold. It is only a matter of time before he is completely unable to do anything himself. He flips through spellbooks, history, blood, and arcane magic, and still finds nothing. With his brother taking his last breaths and his own coming far too soon, Fala gathers up his magic and-

And? Oh dear the page is blank! Who would have thought that a spell that could be used to circumvent the Storian’s power wouldn’t be mentioned in one of its tales? Certainly not I. Or did I not tell you? The Storian has been writing this whole time! How could it not take an interest in the boys who never showed up to take their vows? And it is such a passionate story, too. One of brotherly love where uh- Good? Evil? One of the two wins. I’m sure there will be no heavy academic debate that lasts multiple centuries over what side Fala was on. Why would there be? It’s not like the Woods will be so divided between the two sides that it will ever matter.

Fala does save his brother, though, on the next page. It’s as bright and as full of color as it ever could be for such an ending. Fala’s brother is in his arms, awful-looking but alive, and we never see Fala’s face. How peculiar. Not as interesting as the blank page right before the ending, but peculiar nonetheless. I’m sure it means nothing.

Moving along, in the real world, Rafal casts a spell that comes directly from his heart, his soul some might say, in a moment of desperation that he will never admit to. It works, whatever it was, and knocks him out for multiple days. When he comes to, Rhian is somewhat recovered, and while there is some strange feeling between them that surely has nothing to do with anything mentioned before, the world outside has been absolutely decimated. Half of their town/village/city is dead but more are on their way out. Rafal waits for Rhian to recover more before he tries to leave to investigate.

Only to find that he has to be in the same room as his brother unless he wants to feel like a piece of him is being ripped out the further away he goes. Hm. Fascinating. Anyway, he goes to get the mail with Rhian clinging onto him for dear life only to discover the invitation to become School Masters. But it is too late; a new one has already been chosen. One that hopefully will not indulge in powers he is not supposed to. Only time will tell. For now, all they can do is sit and stew on what to do next.

They settle on traveling. All over the Woods they go, finding places to settle down for a night or two before setting off again. Sherwood attracts them though it is not the information hub it will become. Slowly, they stretch that unknown tether keeping them together so that they can be in separate rooms, then houses, then on different sides of the same city.  That is as far as they go for the time being. Everything is going well until-

Until the plague comes back. Rhian is coughing up blood again, passing out, and losing weight at an alarming rate. Rafal gets what he would only call a “head cold” but takes to bed himself. It is perhaps one of his worst nightmares to watch this happen again. But happen again it does. Rhian gets to the brink of death once more and crosses over. His last breaths are taken. The tether between them pulls taught-tight enough to snap-until something bounces back. Rhian’s chest moves again in wheezing breaths when it had only been still before. The effort once again knocks both of them out.

They settle down in Foxwood and start putting their plans to paper, to blueprints. The plague keeps coming back but they keep surviving it anyway. Death is cheated over and over again in such an unnatural way. A school is built, a mansion the spitting image of the one that will soon be split into two schools. They will show those who rejected them, they will build that which left them for dead but outdo it by a thousandfold. Who truly needs to teach the next Snow White? Not when so few of those who pass become rulers in their own right. No, the true power is with the people, and those people need to be taught the same necessary lessons that those who think that they will rule do. (Isn’t this sounding somewhat familiar?) So few heirs really make it into the storybooks, so why not focus on those who didn’t make the cut instead? More influence and power anyway.

Everything goes according to plan. The first class comes and graduates. Rhian is forced to take week-long breaks during the more stressful times of the year, but who could blame him, really? No one after he had earned the reputation of being the more sickly twin. His newfound issues with something as simple as breathing don’t help his case at all. The proposals keep coming in the mail anyway.

In the summer, and on breaks, they go back to traveling. They’ve mainly been in Sherwood since Robin Hood took it over for general information-gathering purposes. Or at least, that’s why Rafal is there. Rhian just likes being with the people. They had already made an arrangement with the sheriff about Dot before she was (surprisingly to everyone involved) invited to Evil. They still keep in touch just because. *cough cough* Anadil and Hester *cough cough* Besides, it never hurts to have a contact that you’re friendly with for future enrollment purposes.

And if Rhian is too weak or sick to come along, they travel anyway. He’s just mogrified into a bird that sits on Rafal’s shoulder. He is often a bird on Rafal’s shoulder.

Onto Japeth and Rhian 2.0’s existence… I’ve put in some thoughts but I’m not quite sure about how well they’ll exactly work. Since their brothers seem to have no want or thought to continue the family line, their sisters decide to do it for them. As far as I can put that *waves hand at the entire parentage situation* thing that’s going on over there, it’s the same except they’ve got like four moms now instead of a mom and Rafal, and not Arthur. Don’t ask me how it worked I don’t know.

Did I include them in here just so I could have a situation where Rhian is dying of plague in the Camelot dungeons? Yes, yes I did. The walls are covered in his shade of red and I am beginning to understand what people mean when they talk about whumperflies.

Important bits (And not-so-important bits) that I don’t know where to put in:

Rhian and Rafal coast along by claiming to be descendants of Fala and that’s why they’re still like 18-19 after being alive as long as anyone can remember. They are distant from their sisters and often claim that they don’t know why they are stuck at the same age while their sisters are growing older.

Their school is very close, if not right next door, to Arbed House.

They might have had a hand in designing the Schools when they separated into two buildings.

They know the respective deans of said schools very well.

They are both banned from Pifflepaff Hills for their own reasons.

August uses them as a reference for his book(s?) and probably knows what’s up but never clarifies if he actually does know. Merlin knows something’s up but is too busy with the entire Arthur and Tedros shenanigans to really look into it.

The Great War may or may not have happened, but if it did, multiple towns were razed by a non-existent dragon. Take that how you will.

And I think that’s it? Maybe? I know it’s a lot but I have been working on this a while. I’m sure I’ve forgotten something but oh well. I might make another post of the various bits and bobs I forgot. If you made it this far, thank you for indulging me in my nonsense!

[mayhemchicken-varneyposting]

Varney the Vampire, Chapter 23: That Satisfaction Due From One Gentleman To Another

[Previous chapter] [Next chapter]

Charles sits his uncle down and tells him his secret plan: he intends to duel Varney. The admiral thinks this is a fantastic plan, to the point of wanting to also duel Varney, but Charles asks him not to, and to instead look after Flora financially if anything should happen to him. The admiral agrees; he also agrees to be Charles' second in the duel, and Charles writes out a formal challenge for him to deliver to Varney. The admiral leaves, along with Jack Pringle, on his errand.

While he is gone, Charles works himself up thinking about dueling Varney, including making plans for how to keep him from coming back in case he really is a vampire. He reflects that, based on the appearance of the portrait, Varney must be around 150 years old, and marvels at the thought of what he must have witnessed in that time. Finally, he resolves that his duel with Varney must surely be life or death - either Varney dies, or he does.

Admiral Bell meets with Varney and delivers the challenge. Varney casually insinuates that he will kill Charles if they duel. The Admiral now reveals his own secret plan, which is to offer to duel Varney in his nephew's stead. Varney points out that this is highly unusual, but agrees. He continues to talk as though the death of his opponent is a foregone conclusion, and insists on using swords, which the admiral is peeved by. Varney winds the admiral up a bunch with his usual brand of mannerly insults before sending him on his way.

Oh baby, the DUELS are here. Let's fucking go.

Charles' written challenge to Varney is the most hilariously roundabout way of saying "I want to fight you" I think I've ever read.

"To SIR FRANCIS VARNEY. "Sir,—The expressions made use of towards me by you, as well as general circumstances, which I need not further allude to here, induce me to demand of you that satisfaction due from one gentleman to another. My uncle, Admiral Bell, is the bearer of this note, and will arrange preliminaries with any friend you may choose to appoint to act in your behalf. I am, sir, yours, &c. "CHARLES HOLLAND."

This is so vague. The first sentence of this could just as easily be asking Varney out. (Imagine.)

The admiral is acting slightly suspicious as he accepts the letter; secretly, he's plotting to challenge Varney in Charles' stead. Once he's gone, Charles is left to stew in the pre-duel anticipation, which I imagine is about the same feeling I get when I have to make a phone call.

Rymer seems, at times, almost resentful of the fact that there's a vampire in his vampire story about vampires. It's the way he talks about the characters like they're being silly for believing in vampires, in his story he's written about a world which contains real vampires.

It was strange to imagine that such was the force of many concurrent circumstances, that a young man like Charles Holland, of first-rate abilities and education, should find it necessary to give in so far to a belief which was repugnant to all his best feelings and habits of thought, as to be reasoning with himself upon the best means of preventing the resuscitation of the corpse of a vampyre.

Yeah of course he should find it necessary to believe in vampires in your fucking vampire novel, Rymer, what do you WANT from him.

I'm convinced, by now, that the author has no conception of how long a hundred years is. First there was all that business about rates of decay, in which he was convinced that a coffin sealed in a stone vault for a hundred years would decay away to nothing, and now, well...

"That portrait," he thought, "on the panel, is the portrait of a man in the prime of life. If it be the portrait of Sir Francis Varney, by the date which the family ascribe to it he must be nearly one hundred and fifty years of age now." This was a supposition which carried the imagination to a vast amount of strange conjectures. "What changes he must have witnessed about him in that time," thought Charles. "How he must have seen kingdoms totter and fall, and how many changes of habits, of manners, and of customs must he have become a spectator of."

150 years is only about two lifetimes, it's not like he witnessed the collapse of the Roman Empire. What kingdoms are you talking about? (This gets even sillier if we assume the story is set in the late 18th/early 19th century, as is insinuated at one point, because in that case Charles himself would have been alive for multiple revolutions.)

It would be aside from the object of these pages, which is to record facts as they occurred,

Oh, is it now, Rymer? Is it really? What important facts were being recorded when you went on a tangent about construction projects in Kent? Or when you paused the narrative to soapbox about religion for multiple paragraphs? Or the entirety of chapter 19?

The admiral knew well he could trust Jack with any secret, for long habits of discipline and deference to the orders of superiors takes off the propensity to blabbing which, among civilians who are not accustomed to discipline, is so very prevalent.

This is just...patently not true about Jack. Also further revealing of Rymer's shitty beliefs, which we've seen earlier in the form of the Bannerworth's servants gossiping about the vampire attack to the entire surrounding countryside. This "poor people be gossiping" idea keeps getting worse throughout the story, too.

"Confound the fellow!" muttered the old admiral, "he is well lodged at all events. I should say he was not one of those sort of vampyres who have nowhere to go to but their own coffins when the evening comes."

An interesting statement coming from the guy who keeps getting vampires mixed up with mermaids. Many of the vampire superstitions raised in the story are not true within its worldbuilding, but I like to imagine there are indeed vampires of the coffin-dwelling sort in the Varneyverse, and Varney simply isn't one of them. (Or he is, and that's why he can never get a peaceful night's sleep.)

Now we reach a real treat: Admiral Bell and Varney interacting. You will recall that Varney loves winding people up until they snap, and that Admiral Bell is already perpetually wound up. A conversation between them, therefore, ought to be incredibly entertaining, and it does not disappoint.

"Why, he is a young man just, as you say, entering into life, and I cannot help thinking it would be a pity to cut him off like a flower in the bud, so very soon." "Oh, you make quite sure, then, of settling him, do you?" "My dear sir, only consider; he might be very troublesome, indeed; you know young men are hot-headed and troublesome. Even if I were only to maim him, he might be a continual and never-ceasing annoyance to me. I think I should be absolutely, in a manner of speaking, compelled to cut him off." "The devil you do!" "As you say, sir."

(First speaker Varney, second Admiral Bell)

Varney remains pleasant and good-natured throughout the conversation, which only serves to wind up the admiral all the more. He's also being an annoying little shit, of course, which doesn't help. Behind it all, however, is a fairly serious threat. Varney isn't simply confident in his ability to kill any challenger, he takes it as an obvious fact.

"Ay, with swords; but I must have everything properly arranged, so that no blame can rest on me, you know. As you will be killed, you are safe from all consequences, but I shall be in a very different position; so, if you please, I must have this meeting got up in such a manner as shall enable me to prove, to whoever may question me on the subject, that you had fair play."

Speaking of swords, we get more witty vampire insinuations from Varney.

"I cling to the customs and the fashions of my youth," said Varney. "I have been, years ago, accustomed always to wear a sword, and to be without one now vexes me." "Pray, how many years ago?" "I am older than I look, but that is not the question."

I never get tired of him doing this.

And now...okay, I know the purpose of this series is to keep people from having to read Varney the Vampire, and pasting in huge chunks of text is antithetical to that purpose, but goddammit I just enjoy this next part too much. I'll break it up with commentary so it's not such a huge wall of text.

"Is that all?" "Not quite. I will have a surgeon on the ground, in case, when I pink you, there should be a chance of saving your life. It always looks humane." "When you pink me?" "Precisely."

I love the line "It always looks humane." It really highlights his skewed priorities, and the way he treats the death of his opponent as a foregone conclusion not even worth fretting over.

"Upon my word, you take these affairs easy. I suppose you have had a few of them?" "Oh, a good number. People like yourself worry me into them, I don't like the trouble, I assure you; it is no amusement to me. I would rather, by a great deal, make some concession than fight, because I will fight with swords, and the result is then so certain that there is no danger in the matter to me." "Hark you, Sir Francis Varney. You are either a very clever actor, or a man, as you say, of such skill with your sword, that you can make sure of the result of a duel. You know, therefore, that it is not fair play on your part to fight a duel with that weapon." "Oh, I beg your pardon there. I never challenge anybody, and when foolish people will call me out, contrary to my inclination, I think I am bound to take what care of myself I can."

He may sound flippant here, but Varney really is mostly averse to violence, finding duels annoying and tedious and preferring to run from a conflict whenever possible. I won't say this is a consistent character trait of his, because there are a number of later chapters which blatantly contradict this characterization, but it does come up fairly often, and several times is milked for angst. That's right, Varney is the original tragic tortured unwilling monster vampire, and every adaptor who's ever done that with Dracula owes me 20 bucks.

"D—n me, there's some reason in that, too," said the admiral; "but why do you insult people?" "People insult me first." "Oh, nonsense!" "How should you like to be called a vampyre, and stared at as if you were some hideous natural phenomenon?" "Well, but—" "I say, Admiral Bell, how should you like it? I am a harmless country gentleman, and because, in the heated imaginations of some member of a crack-brained family, some housebreaker has been converted into a vampyre, I am to be pitched upon as the man, and insulted and persecuted accordingly."

"People insult me first," he says, grinning while showing all of his big sharp vampire teeth and constantly making little verbal jabs at literally everyone he talks to.

Varney voice how dare you call me out for being rude when I'm literally neurodivergent and a vampire

"But you forget the proofs." "What proofs?" "The portrait, for one." "What! Because there is an accidental likeness between me and an old picture, am I to be set down as a vampyre? Why, when I was in Austria last, I saw an old portrait of a celebrated court fool, and you so strongly resemble it, that I was quite struck when I first saw you with the likeness; but I was not so unpolite as to tell you that I considered you were the court fool turned vampyre." "D—n your assurance!" "And d—n yours, if you come to that."

Damn, roast him Varney.

After Admiral Bell leaves, so frothing mad that he kicks Varney's servant on the way out the door (uncalled for), he starts to worry about what he's going to tell Charles, now that he's arranged the particulars for his own duel instead of for Charles' like he was supposed to. Yeah, dude, maybe you should have thought about that beforehand.

Next: Varney asks Charles out arranges a not-at-all-suspicious meeting

[trying-to-get-somewhere-real]

okay so something i read today has me thinking once again about the significance of carm telling syd that she makes him better at this, and what a huge fucking deal it is. the extremely talented @bartonbones just updated their incredible fic, my hand was tied to yours, and it includes this bit (spoiler warning) where carmy struggles (but ultimately succeeds to a degree) to tell ebra that what he's doing at the sandwich window is important and he's doing a good job:

Ebrahem’s joy is real and present and wonderful, but it’s still kind of hard to look at, even with how much he leaned on it. That’s what a lot of this old shit felt like—the Beef, Mikey, even Chicago itself. He lived inside of it but he couldn’t look at it, he loved it and he hated it, he needed it and he could barely stand it. But that was his shit. Ebrahem was good, here. Everyone else was good. He needs to start fucking saying it before no one expects him to anymore—as hard as it is sometimes, as against his nature as it feels, he never wants anyone to have to look into his silence for answers. He wants to tell them. He really does. “Look, what you do here is really important, okay? It’s just as important as all the other shit, you know. It’s not, like, a bit part, or a plebe job, alright? This shit, it really matters. To me, and to Richie, and—and to fuckin’ Darius, right?”

and that example in the fic of carmy's struggle to praise his team— when i know he absolutely feels those feelings and knows they're deserving of it—made me think back on s2 and try to recall whether he was ever able to express praise/gratitude/pride in anyone verbally other than when he told syd she makes him better at this. his struggle to express himself here in the fic felt very true to canon for me because carm did all of these things all season to show he had faith in people: sending Tina and Marcus and Richie to places where they could grow, giving Tina the knife, giving Syd the jacket, etc.—but rarely (ever?) was able to tell anyone to their face that he was proud of them. we get claire telling richie that carm loves him very much, but it's not carm telling richie and we didn't even get to see carm tell claire! when marcus presents his new dishes to carm and syd, you can tell carm is impressed and pleased, but he doesn't really go all the way to saying that in so many words. you can see it and feel it but he doesn't quite say it.

i haven't done a close rewatch so i am probably missing something (please let me know), but i kind of think what he said to syd may have been the only time he told someone involved with the bear that they were good this season (even in the roundabout way of "your goodness makes me better"). that moment has always been incredibly powerful for me because the specific words he chooses feel so weighty and vulnerable and kind of unlike him, but i didn't really consider until this very minute that carm maybe goes the entire season without giving any kind of verbal affirmation to anyone else period? am i crazy?

[mimzywhimsy]

What You Think lyrics & annotations

What you think

Will I make it? TBA

It's the dude you really hate

The way I'm passing people you should say that I facilitate (1)

Wait/ you were probably caught in traffic like you Andrew Tate (2)

I was probably in the Delta Lounge during flight delays

I just want the mic to blaze/ battle with my ideas

Doxxing my yard only way I'll call you my peers

A Mill River (3) I make a mill quicker/I make em real bitter

Like some collard greens/The rap acquired taste

From the empire state

Imma make my escape/but there better be amenities

I'm bringing levity/allegedly/ I levitate

Best Wrestler Alive but I need some better dates

Like my fig tree's rotten(4) / my haters need reconnaissance

I shout the quiet parts in the face of the Anonymous (5)

Ball like Bogdanovic(6)/ drive's autonomous

I don't have the Reigns but I'm taking the acknowledgement(7)

Yo/ so what you think of me?

I don't think of you/it's not a thing we do

But I wrote this thing for you (8)

What'd you think of it?

Don't mention it

Yo/what you think of me?

I don't think of you/it's not a thing we do

Ay/ but I wrote this thing for you

What'd you think of it?

Don't mention it

Caster has been facing a lot of hate on IWC/Wrestling twitter, with many claims that he is dragging down other wrestlers he is working with. Jay White and Anthony Bowens are two in particular who are brought up a lot

Reference to Tate human trafficking; a roundabout pun as well, comparing his brokeass fans driving to him being able to fly as a Special Rich Boy Delta Club Member

The Mill River runs through Rockville Center, Long Island, NY, which is Caster's place of residence. He's literally doxxing himself lol

4. Possible reference to an excerpt from The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath:

"I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet […] and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”

The use of "use some better dates" in the line before (to use as a pun with fig) more explicitly links these two lines together. He therefore probably means that

a) He could use better TIME dates, for wrestling, and he sees his life's paths closing due to being held back professionally

or

b) He could use better ROMANTIC dates. Since his previous rap "Fancy Clown" was about a breakup, this may speak to the anxieties he feels about running out of time to find a good partner, as more and more prospects "rot away"

5. It has long been rumored that Caster frequents 4chan's prowrestling board, and this seems to confirm it. I wonder if he's really that guy who posts the Casterpepe?

6. Caster-eque topical sports news reference. NY Knicks player Bojan Bogdanovic was recently reported to be of questionable health for the game against the Milawukee Bucks (👀) due to a wrist sprain

7. Reference to Roman Reigns, "acknowledge me"

8. Caster brings it back around to addressing his Haters, with a blunt reminder about the parasocial nature of the relationship between himself and wrestling fans. It is somewhat ironic considering he made this effort to create this very song to address them

[coiled-dragon]

Hi! I’m working on my Dracfield weeks fics now (i know…why start early when you can wait for the last minute! 😂) but I really struggle with writing Dracula, because he is suppose to be nasty, over the top, cruel and yet still care somewhat for Renfield. Do you have any tips for writing Dracula? Like, how to balance his personality, things to keep in mind, that sort of thing? Thanks for all your help!!!

Hi there!

Man I wish I had advice to help because honestly it is something that I occasionally still struggle with myself and Im at the point with writing these two where it sort of just comes naturally to me. Part of what helped me was absolutely watching the movie a lot, but also talking with some friends and breaking down why Dracula acts the way he does, and how that influences what he may do.

Like he is a creature that we would call narcissistic (note: I am not saying that narcissism is inherently bad or evil, I am saying that Dracula as a vampire who views himself above all other forms of life, has narcissistic traits and exemplifies them in all the worst possible ways). He thinks of himself first and foremost, and constructs how he cares for things around him based on how it will serve him in the end. If Renfield getting off is of some benefit to him, then he'll ensure he does. If not, then he'll focus on his own pleasure and drop Ren to take care of himself. This extends to things beyond sex too.

His cruelty is a mix of keeping Renfield in his place, knowing that Renfield has grown to enjoy it (if you like masochistic Renfield but cmon he's a beacon of 'please hurt and degrade me'), and not entirely aware of - or choosing not to be aware of - the way it can break a person over time. He can mend physical wounds, he can beat Renfield into behaving somewhat acceptably, and the negative ways it affects Renfield often serve him all the better. Again it loops back to serving himself really.

Another important personality point to keep in mind is that... As a vampire, a life of isolation was how he kept himself safe. He wont admit to his weakness or faults, but he's aware that having someone - Renfield - that close, and given as much trust as he is puts him at great risk. Which is why he goes to such lengths to ensure Renfield is completely under his control. To show too much affection, to let this human who he has given way more trust than he has given anything know the power he has, can be a fatal risk. He will, in his own roundabout ways, show affection, but to the average human its not going to look like affection. Or at least, it wont look like enough to deal with his heaps of bullshit. But its enough for Renfield.

This is less advice and more a small crash course in points of his personality that I keep in mind, but I hope it can help?? Also, worth noting this is my personal take on it inspired by discussions with my friends as we obsess over this movie. Its not necessarily canon or the only way to write these two, but its what I keep in mind when I write.

Self Serving, even when he seems to be doing things for another

Cruel, but as a tactic to keep the other in their place and sometimes to get the other off (or let off steam lets be real)

Very Little Affection, otherwise risking letting the other know how important they actually are to him

[vacantgodling]

author tag

thank you mj ( @mjjune ) beloved <3

i’ll do these for paramoiiiiii (which is pronounced para-MWAH bc i’m kissing it)

1) What is the main lesson of your story (e.g. kindness, diversity, anti-war), and why did you choose it?

oof. paramour has a lot of things going on in it, a lot of which are unintentional but evolved as i began to piece together the characters and the narrative. i don’t think paramour can be boiled down to a singular “main lesson” because i don’t think there’s really a lesson to be HAD. you can definitively read paramour for all of the deep thoughts i have about religion, masculinity, sex, gender presentation, and societal expectations, as well as like the horrors and suffering that greed can bring… or you can just read it as two guys who take the most stupid roundabout way to realize maybe the sex does have feelings. maybe the porn in fact has a little plot.

a lot of the messages woven into paramour have been marinating and maturing in me since 2020 tbh when i really started to allow me to be yknow. MYSELF. and so because i love them they got the projection beam as ya do.

2) What did you use as inspiration for your worldbuilding (like real-life cultures, animals, famous media, websites, etc.)?

paramour is inspired chiefly by steampunk, rococo fashion, and france. lmao. the entire universe that paramour is in (which includes wips like alizath, teardrops, and that one wip that is new and budding but doesn’t have a name yet) is inspired by me bastardizing and colorizing (aka making every mc and all the characters black) europe bc i’m tired of fantasy, mythology, and history and all the things that i enjoy as a person being dictated and delegated to white people. so a lot of it is also “writing the story that i want to see” etc etc.

paramour specifically was also inspired by (but has moved away from QUITE a bit): hamlet, crimson peak, beauty & the beast, gothic literature (that aspect has heavily stayed) and stuff like that. it’s original name was beauty and the crimson hamlet and it was more of a haunted house thing vs what it’s evolved into now lol.

3) What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, help readers grow as a person?

hya is honestly trying to achieve being left the fuck alone and he doesn’t succeed LMAO. i’m not really trying to achieve anything with hya particularly (again you can read into all the things that i put into him and the narrative or he can be just some guy and both are correct tbh) — other than extreme wish fulfillment. though it may not seem this way because hya is a raging dick, he’s ideally what type of person i want to be like in Extreme fantasy land. i wish i was joking but i ain’t. and as such, he gets forgiven of a lot of the things that he does by the narrative or gets his own little happy ending and reasonings why he’s like this which i know some or many people will take issue with. him leaving a corpse in the foyer for example—many will describe him as cruel and callous and “problematic” and they’re right! love that for him 💛 i’m not trying to inspire anyone but myself like when i tell you that paramour is a wip written by me and for me i mean it LOOOOOL like idgaf about what anyone thinks of it 💀 (though i am so happy so many people love paramour as much as i do i didn’t think anyone would care about these assholes but many of my dear friends and other followers have proved me wrong and it’s validating tbh lol)

4) How many chapters is your story going to have?

current outline says 27 but i’m thinking it’s gonna lean closer to 30 just because as i write i realize i need to add in a filler chapter or two. so i’ll say it’ll probably end up being 30–at MAX 35 chapters probably.

5) Is it fanfiction or original content? Where do you plan to post it?

original 💛 and i still don’t particularly know where i want to publish it meaning idk if i want to go for indie which makes more sense or tryyyy to get trad published but. with the content paramour is and the way the publishing industry is i somehow highly doubt i can get it trad pub. so nothing but snippets online (tumblr) for now. maybe if i go indie i’ll make it readable on a website or whatever cuz i’m not really keen on putting it on amazon. but i may just for the reach. idk! i’m just trying to finish it first.

6) When and why did you start writing?

if we’re talking generally speaking i’ve been making stories since i was like 3 years old. paramour in itself however i made juneteenth (6/19) of 2021. i can’t remember WHY i started it so much as i remember just wanting a wip inspired by crimson peak perhaps? and we have gone WAAAAY off from that but yknow. we move lol.

7) Do you have any words of engagement for fellow writers of Writeblr? What other writers of Tumblr do you follow?

honestly just write for you. take all advice with a grain of salt and don’t worry about what others think of your writing/your ideas/whatever. there’s something for everyone and you’ll find your people.

other writeblrs/artists/creators whatever i follow and would recommend (and tag to do this if ya want no pressure) are: @kudzucataclysm @henrike-does-writing-sometimes @kazenokaori @magic-is-something-we-create @void-botanist @outpost51 @isherwoodj & consider this an open tag if you would also like to do this :)

[dragonlordazuroth]

I am LOSING my goddamned MIND! What do you mean!? What do you MEAN my father just said that as Christians "we" (I'm a closet atheist) are supposed to WILLING GIVE OURSELVES AS SLAVES to God!?!?! GOD WANTS US TO BE SLAVES!?!?! AND THAT'S A **GOOD** THING!?!?!?!?!

Now don't get me wrong. I've known for a while now that the version of Christianity I was raised in (Independant Fundamentalist Baptist) demands giving up autonomy, but I always ever heard it said in a very roundabout way, where they try their best to make it SOUND like you still have free will. But I was still shocked to HEAR SOMEONE OUTRIGHT SAY IT AND BELIEVE THAT IT WAS NORMAL.

HOW does he not realize how *depraved* that is to say?!?! HOW does someone sit there and tell their OWN KIDS with a straight face that God is the embodiment of love, and in the same breath say that we need to make ourselves SLAVES to him!?!?!?

I feel crazy for acting so shocked, because the doctrine I was taught always ever encouraged stripping away autonomy. But I just. MY OWN FATHER. TOLD HIS OWN CHILDREN. TO BE SLAVES (TO A DEBATABLY REAL OR NOT GOD). BECAUSE MY FATHER BELIEVES THAT'S WHAT LOVE IS.

PLEASE tell me I'm not crazy. PLEASE tell me that's an insane way to think. I can't leave. I have to live my father. I am forced to go to a church of HIS choosing. I cannot speak up or argue or go to another family member for assistance. All I can do is spend week after week hearing my father and his pastor preach increasingly depraved things, and EVERYONE I'M AROUND JUST GOES ALONG WITH IT. BECAUSE THEY ALL EITHER AGREE WITH IT, THINK IT'S NOT THAT SERIOUS, OR HAVE NO POWER TO STAND UP AGAINST THE OTHER TWO GROUPS.

I'M LOSING MY MIND!!! I'M TOO SCARED TO TELL MY DAD I DON'T WANT TO ENGAGE WITH HIS RELIGION ANYMORE. I DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HE'S WILLING TO DO TO KEEP ME UNDER HIS CONTROL. AM I INSANE? IS HE INSANE? WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING!?

[rosieuv]

College started

I had to wake up at 6:30 for the first time in like 2 months and dug up my blazer jacket that I bought for prom and paired it with a white summer shirt, a yellow hoodie, light grey jeans and a tie I nicked from my dad and had to watch a youtube video just to figure out how to tie it. I don't know why the blazer looks grey and crumpled in the photo, in real life it's turquoise and has less noticeable creases in it. Mum now sees what I mean when I say that hoodies, ties and blazers go well together. God it got hot while walking though but it was worth it in the name of style.

I also had a packed lunch for the first time as keyboard lessons were more expensive due to them being twice as long so buying hot lunches was chucked out of the budget. I made a cheese bagel sandwich with mozzarella slices and packed it in a bag with a little pancake, 4 crackers, a little brownie and a banana that I didn't eat because it had been waiting for so long that it was going brown. I didn't think about how all the food would sit so everything that wasn't in the sandwich bag (the sandwich) had a faint taste of banana. I also bought a packet of crisps at the college's cafe as I was still a bit hungry afterwards so maybe I should figure that out.

I walked 20 minutes and across a roundabout to reach my new bus stop and a new bus came every 15 minutes so I didn't bother mesmerising the timetable. Luckily I live quite close so the journey only took like 35 minutes and I was an hour early and didn't know what to do. Very few students were there and I was mostly looking for the library so I could vibe until I had A-Level Music. After a google search I found the building but turns out it's being moved to some other building (there's like 8 buildings across 2 sides of a road and it resembles a uni campus) so I just drew in the study centre by myself for about half an hour. Someone I knew (kinda) from my old school came up to me to say hello. I walked over to the building with music in but ended up a couple minutes late as I was washing my hands when the bell went off and I though "oh it's the warning bell" when no, no it wasn't. The teacher didn't seem to care considering it's the first day.

The lessons are so much longer here. So long that in the middle there was a 15 minute break. I didn't really have anywhere better to be so I remained in the classroom drawing. There seems to be a lot of emphasis on performance but I kinda suck at preforming. At least A-Level also has composition. I had to leave in the last half hour though to go to an orthodontist appointment and I left when they were talking about intervals and intervals are cool and now I have to do catch up work just because my teeth jewellery needed tightening.

I ate my lunch at a table all by myself in the student commons room and I don't know if all the groups already knew each other or if this was a case of extroverts having good social skills, but almost everyone was sitting in a group. One of the teachers talked to me when I was eating my bagel. Nothing deep just general new school small talk. He said I'll find new friends due to the way classes are structured around A-levels, which you choose yourself so there's a common interest, but tbh I'm probably just going to be known as that weird quiet kid that knows way too much on video game consoles. I don't mind not having any friends my entire time there, but when you've been stuck in an all girls private school since you were a toddler to now, it shelters you and I want to not be that as I'll have one hell of a shock once I enter the real world and/or act like a snob unintentionally. Eh, whatever. I bought the aforementioned crisps in beef flavoured and it was mostly air dammit. I then did my music homework in one of the practice rooms so I could test the musical dictation on the piano. I then just started playing whatever and some girl hovered around my door so I let her in and apparently she could hear me blasting my music because I have no dynamic control on a piano and she said that she really liked it. Then my music teacher appeared and I said I was doing my homework, and then they both left. Someone was playing some ballad piano song (I assume it's the girl as it sounds like it's coming from the other room) which would occasionally change to fur elise. Then I still had some time left but I was bored so after asking a history teacher for directions on where the mac lab is, I went into Music Technology like 10 minutes early and was just fiddling with the mac until everyone else came in. (Music tech is a BTEC which is a different exam board and is more DAW stuff while Music A-Level is performance and theory. I was supposed to be doing Computer Science but I fucked up my exam because OCR sucks the devil's ass while marking so I didn't have the qualifications so the careers people suggested music tech as the 3rd subject and oh god I'm so thankful as I'm certain my college uses OCR for it's A Levels and I would rip my wrists open and develop a caffeine addiction if I had to deal with OCR again).

The actual lesson was interesting but I was the only one putting my hand up most of the time and also I've already used a DAW before (LMMS) so I picked up on how to use Logic Pro quicker than the others (I think, idk I was sitting by myself on an empty row) but Logic Pro has cool sounds that I want in a soundfont, but is full of little things that makes it a bit annoying. And mac. Mac OS is annoying. I wasn't really following the instructions and was mostly doing my own thing in Logic Pro. Use this plugin to automatically augment a bassline? Nah I'm going to keep pressing keys with this acoustic bass sound until I get a cool bassline. I stayed for half an hour afterwards to finish the song as it was cool and this is what I did:

There was also theory stuff too. In groups we had to type out a list of places you find music and I just ignored the people in my group and wrote my own list. Also music kept randomly playing and the teacher couldn't figure out where it was coming from so I listed "the poltergeist from the mac lab" as one place music comes from. After that I took the bus home and now I'm going to watch the 2nd Deadpool film because I'm tired and don't feel like doing anything but sit in my chair and morph into it.

[videodrxme]

fuck this putting my ultimate dirk fic here. Meta, 4th wall break, degradation.

Honestly, this asshole is pretty fucking pathetic. 

I could go on about this but instead I will graciously choose to preface this with a warning that there is a non-zero, if not completely unavoidable, chance I will be abso-fuckin'-lutely butchered in this little rant. For all intents and purposes, consider me kind of like a Dirk-shaped hand-puppet Jack is using to 'jack' himself off here in a roundabout manner, or don't. Maybe the idea of a random author on Cohost, or I guess Hentai foundry in this case or TUMBLR NOW, channelling me like some kind of paranormal phenomenon gets you off, and who am I to deny you that?

Not that I can blame him, or you, for finding me attractive. I mean, look at me. I'm virtually a paragon of masculinity when people depict me artistically. Did you *see* my Pesterquest sprites? I was fuckin' toned, not to mention my sweet tattoo. Christ, he's salivating over that. Fuckin' weirdo. He's actually going back and adding to this because he saw my Pesterquest sprite again and is staring and wanted you to know. 

 Here's where it gets tricky. See, my erudition is far beyond this random smut peddler on the internet, so he has to look shit up in the Thesaurus, and use me to gleefully inform you of his cluelessness when it comes to literature. This is a new low for anyone, honestly. Using a fictional man to drag yourself through the mud, really? The worst part is that as he's writing me saying that, he's leaking through his underwear like a faucet. Honestly, if I was real, and I said near anything to this dude, he would trip all over himself like a clumsy high heel model in a tripwire factory. But I'm not, so this asshole has to make do with jacking off to the idea of me domming him using the narrative.

There isn't even anything in canon suggesting I might like guys like him, but he still gushes over me like a malfunctioning river dam. He even thinks about, get this, my *splinters* and *alternate selves* fucking him in different and novel ways. I would be flattered if it wasn't so disturbing. Really now, Jack, you pick the most scumbaggy versions of me to imagine fucking, probably because you know that they might not find your sexual proclivities as abhorrent. 

That's not even his real name. He chose another alias specifically to run this blog, or I guess porn account now, so he can jack off in peace. He knows exactly how much of a psychosexual deviant he is and continues to do it anyway, because he just can't fucking control himself, can he? It's why he gets someone like me to do it for him. What do I mean, you ask? Someone he sees as superordinate. Better than him, for those of you who can't read. He thinks my leaderly qualities and faux-stoicism make me better than him, and I'd be inclined to disagree if I wasn't also getting a sick kick out of it.

Yes, I am getting something out of this, if it wasn't already painfully obvious. I already told you to see me as the handpuppet he's using to masochistically smack himself upside the ass, and it's like that for a reason. I'm not real. Well, as not-real as I can get while still being Dirk, that is. He likes to think that in-character Dirk might get a kick out of this, which is something of a stretch, but I'll entertain it. Who knows, maybe the canon Ultimate Dirk really would humiliate and dominate him, and it would be entirely in-character the whole time, no flanderization needed? That would be a fucking sight to see. Imagine that happening for the rest of the time you read this whole thing. And humiliating you, too.

 Why are you still here, anyways? Do you get off on fictional characters degrading their authors in a glorious display of self-vitriol and allusions to moistened genitals, or are you waiting for me to take you down a notch like the sexually depraved individual you are? I don't know who's more loathesome, you by the virtue of putting up with this fascimile of a character you know and love so you can rub one out, or him for making me do this whole masturbatory rant in the first place. You're welcome for the amazing self-coitus, by the way. 

 You realize this was made on the seat of this dude's pants at 2 am, right? I'm unsurprised that you would spend this much damn time on this, knowing how sexual misfits are, but still disappointed. That's right, I'm disappointed in YOU, the one reading this, and I bet you're getting off on it. No need to lie to yourself. If you got this far, you take a frankly unnatural joy in degradation and being told off on your sexual habits. You're like the fuckin' Frankenstein's Monster of sex, and you definitely enjoyed me saying that to you, or rather the author saying that to you using my deliciously tang-coated text. Well, not orange anymore, this site doesn't let me color my text orange, but it's what fucking ever Oh, look, Tumblr lets me color my text orange. Great job..

 Speaking of the author, we should run down a list of his lecherous fantasies involving yours truly. What else are you even here for, more of me insulting you? You definitely clicked through a read more to see this, you fucking horndog. I bet you're humping your bed, or chair, or other lounging apparatus you're using. Let's take it from the top with a new paragraph, shall we?

 By the way, this bit was made after he slept. It's 9 am for him now. That's right, he worked on this shitty little sexual diatribe for multiple days, or hours, at the very least. Whichever idea gets you off more, really. But enough suspense. 

Let's see. We can do this from least to most bizarre. Only three, though, I got places to be and this terrible rant is taking up too much of everyone's time.

First, normal PIV sex. About a 3/10. Not novel or new in any way but I can see how it's an unmatched classic. A little breeding here, a little impreg there, definitely pretty vanilla. 

 For the next strangest sexual fantasy about me this dude's cooked up, we have me flexing my muscles and various assets at him. 6/10. Seriously, muscular dudes are hot, but come on, there's only so large those muscles can get before looking grotesque in new and horrible ways. Yes, it gets weird, and yes, it gets kind of gross. It will only get worse from here, so please do buckle your seat-belts and keep your hands inside the ride at all times, and by the ride I mean your pants.

The third time's the charm, but this one isn't even charming. Seriously, an older version of me in an age gap relationship? This is so played out that it isn't even funny. In fact, the way Jack goes about it is honestly mentally concerning. Who knows, maybe that's your thing, but I'm uncomfortable elaborating on it. 

Looking back on everything written here, this dude makes me look super full of myself and obnoxious in ways that I'm not. Thank whatever whims he's having that he's letting me tack on that this would all be out of character and at least 90% made up for some kind of awful BDSM routine. Later, you filthy degenerates.

[worthington-iii]

Hey! Just wanted to respond to some stuff and clarify since I think we're actually just saying a lot of the same stuff in different roundabout ways lol.

"He knew he couldn't afford to show them - not because he was ashamed."

I never said he's ashamed of the mutation itself, just that he struggled to reconcile with being a mutant at first. It takes time for him to go from being a teenage boy denying himself pleasures because of his identity and visible mutation (in the aforementioned Season One) to a loud and proud mutant leading a team. I think by the time we hit Champions, he's gone through that character growth. So I agree that he's got something to be insecure about, and a lot of it is societal! (Screencap from X-Men: Season One.)

(FWIW I also don't consider First Class to be a part of mainline canon because it directly contradicts other established works i.e. Warren's parents being aware of his mutation.)

"But they have him cheer and celebrate because he inherited money?"

I may be misremembering, but I never really got the impression he was celebrating any of it. In Hidden Years and the original Ka-Zar issues, it feels like he does carry resentment toward his uncle for that murder, and he continues to fight in his dad's name (Marvel Comic #335 below) despite having a tense relationship prior to that . I think he has good reason for that relationship to feel strained and nuanced (Revelations #3) so maybe his mourning process doesn't look the same as someone with a healthy dynamic.

In response to any of the Apocalypse stuff, I feel that it manifests more in the sense of Warren being afraid of what Archangel is capable of even if he has renounced Apocalypse himself. He didn't fully get comfortable with Archangel until way after X-Factor, if ever at all. I agree with Betsy's analysis below (Uncanny X-Force #2) and looking at the word choice to support him, it does feel like she's been feeling his discomfort with Archangel and everyone's reactions to it.

And even after Xavier helps him gain more control, he still understands the power that the image of Archangel has alone, both threatening and negative to others (X-Corp #2 below). He chooses to hide it publicly until he reaches a breaking point and invites Monet to provoke him.

As far as Giant Size 2024, it was never really my personal cup of tea, but it still has merit for analysis' sake. I do think it has some interesting takes that I'd say reinforce that Warren is insecure at heart, wary of change, and doesn't always have the healthiest mechanisms to cope with it. I hate to side with Maze, but I do think she's right about him in some aspects lol.

"...how Warren longs for stability and a family."

Pulled from my original post: "I'd propose that [his confidence] is a big influence of having Candy in his life - some form of stability and care for him that he couldn't find within the X-Men. Part of his reason for leaving (at least seemingly as he agreed with Jean) was wanting to seek out meaning away from the X-Men, potentially with love and a family in the future. I'd say this is probably the peak of his mental health."

He definitely has always felt to me like he wants more to life than just being an X-Man. While being a hero brings satisfaction, he thought he needed a relationship for self-fulfillment. He's always thrived on other people's attention. I'd contest, though, that Warren broke things off with Betsy completely of his own accord. The first time they split, Betsy was beginning to drift and found interest in someone else (X-Men Vol. 2 #109) so I'd say the breakup feels mutual. As for their second breakup - it was never majorly addressed outside of Warren losing his memories and Betsy having planted her roots elsewhere while the "real" Warren was gone. I'd love to see them back together someday, even for a brief fling, but I don't expect it to happen with the way they've taken Betsy lately, and that's ok! Since the last time he lost Betsy, he hasn't really had any genuine romantic connections while earlier on, he's flirting with nearly everyone and having all sorts of short term relationships (i.e. Dazzler).

And yeah, I am a Candy truther. She's a total baddie, ready to go toe to toe with supervillains in Hidden Years or Defenders. Warren really seems to be the happiest out of all his stories when he's with Candy and things are going well between them. He didn't have to worry about the Archangel thing souring the relationship, and she was one of the humans who could see past his mutation or his status as an X-Man, likely because she knew him before all that happened. I see her as a grounding point for Warren between his old life and his new life.

To wrap this up, I still believe the core thread of Warren's character is a story about accepting and adapting to change. He has to revoke his "golden boy" status to present publicly as a mutant, and once things finally look perfect, he gets torn back down again and has to work his way back up. Rinse and repeat. Heirs of Apocalypse and Giant Size 2024 felt like a satisfying punch in that narrative, where he finally acknowledges the cycle he's kept himself in and seems determined to break it. The writing and plot has been wildly inconsistent for him over the years, but I still like to find what meaning and through-lines I can. I hope the writers going forward will follow an arc of "You Beat The Scary Thing....What Now?" That would be the most personally satisfying to me!

Some scary Archangel badassery for the road:

SOMEBODY GIVE ME YOUR CHARACTER BREAK DOWNS

I NEED TO LEARNNNN

SOMEONE GIVE ME THEIR ANALYSIS ON THE PSYCHOLOGY OF WARREN PLEASE

I WANNA LEARN HOW DEEP CHARACTERS GO

If you’ve been desperate to tell someone about a character you’ve dug into

TELL ME

as long as it’s a Marvel Character I’ll listen

And I’ll even take select DC characters but don’t push it.

[spanishskulduggery]

Hi can you help me figure out the different between present perfect subjunctive (e.g. haya reconocido) and imperfect subjunctive (e.g. reconociera)? Not those verbs exactly but when to use them? Thank you!

They're very similar, depending on how you use them.

Note: I promise this will come into play later but I just want to make something very clear. In Spanish, there are tenses and there are moods. It may be easier to understand them in Spanish - a tense is tiempo [meaning "time"] while a mood is modo [meaning "mode"]

There are 3 moods, indicative, subjunctive, and imperative [imperative are commands; not useful for this particular discussion]

The moods encompass the different tenses... so think of it like columns; indicative includes present tense, preterite, imperfect, future, conditional etc. And subjunctive includes present subjunctive and imperfect subjunctive.

The layman's explanation is that the mood says how the language works according to the "conditions" of the sentence/thought, and the tense says at what time it happens.

A very simple layman's explanation: the mood is the "conditions" of language. The tenses say whether it was past, present, or future in some capacity.

And there's usually a version of the indicative that corresponds to the subjunctive... present tense indicative happens at the same "time" as present tense subjunctive, for example

And perfect tenses [the ones that use haber] are a bit of a rogue time traveler; they can exist in any tense and can be either indicative or subjunctive, thus he reconocido happens at the same "time" as haya reconocido... just the conditions are different

No hemos reconocido... = We haven't recognized...

Es increídible que no hayamos reconocido... = It's unbelieveable that we haven't recognized...

So while they seem to express the same thought or idea, and though they happen at the same time [tense] the conditions of the second sentence necessitate subjunctive mood.

Keep that in mind going forward and it will make a lot more sense.

-

Present perfect just in general is used for placing something a little bit in the past, but since it's present it's still affecting the present:

Escribí. = I wrote. He escrito. = I have written.

Comí. = I ate. He comido. = I have eaten.

Pagué. = I paid. He pagado. = I have paid.

In the contexts of grammar, the simple past [preterite] in the first examples is just the actions "I wrote" or "I ate" etc. The action is done and completed and over.

Note: There are many people who will use the present perfect in place of the preterite tense because they do equate to largely the same thing in function. Though technically different, it's a colloquial thing.

But in a more grammatical roundabout way, present perfect brings that past action into the present, meaning it still has some bearing on the present in some way. Saying "I have written" is a way of just talking about past actions, but possibly bringing them into the present still.

I realize that doesn't make much sense but consider something like: "I've written a lot of essays, but I don't know how to write a poem"; or "I've read a lot of books but I've never read that author".

In those contexts, your past actions now have some bearing on the present situation. That's the basis of the perfect tenses.

With the haya here, that's the subjunctive form of haber.

In grammatical terms, it's the same idea as the present perfect... just with subjunctive phrasing:

No te has roto el brazo. = You didn't break your arm. Dudo que te hayas roto el brazo. = I doubt you broke your arm.

Lo has terminado. = You finished it. / You've finished it. Dime en cuanto lo hayas terminado. = Tell me as soon as you're done. / Tell me once you've finished it.

No se han equivocado. = They weren't wrong. No creo que se hayan equivocado. = I don't believe/think they were wrong.

Me han llamado idiota. = They've called me an idiot. Aunque me llamen idiota... = Even if they call me an idiot... [present subjunctive] Aunque me hayan llamado... = Even though they have called me an idiot...

In Spanish there are certain subjunctive phrases that activate, and they exist across multiple tenses.

Certain phrases necessitate subjunctive, so it can be the same information sort of, but they'll determine whether it's indicative or subjunctive.

-

Imperfect subjunctive is the equivalent of past tense subjunctive.

So just as an example real quick:

1. Quiero que pongas la mesa. = I want you to set the table.

2. Quería que pusieras la mesa. = I wanted you to set the table.

1. Sugieren que lo hagamos. = They suggest that we do it.

2. Sugieron que lo hiciéramos. = They suggested that we do it.

1. Es importante que tenga tiempo libre. = It's important that I have free time.

2. Era importante que tuviera tiempo libre. = It was important that I had free time.

1. Aunque me hayan llamado cobarde... = Even though they have called a coward...

2. Aunque me hubieran llamado cobarde... = Even though they had called me a coward...

Still subjunctive mood, just 1 is present, 2 is "past" so it's imperfect.

Imperfect subjunctive today also encompasses future subjunctive which can be confusing. This is normally done with contrary to fact states, hypothetical situations, and your basic if/then constructions with the conditional tense.

Si tuviera el dinero... = If I had the money... Si tuviera el dinero, estudiaría en el extranjero. = If I had the money, I would study abroad.

Si pudiera... = If I could... Lo haría si pudiera. = I would do it if I could.

Si me permitiera, señor... = If you allow me, sir... Si me permitiera, señor, podría ayudar. = If you allow me, sir, I can/could help.

Si hubiera otra opción... = If there was/were another option... Si hubiera otra opción, lo elegiríamos. = If there was/were another option, we would choose it.

Como si fuera la última vez... = As if it were the last time...

Me habló como si fuera idiota. = He talked to me like I was an idiot.

No puedo creer que nuestro jefe nos regañe como si fuéramos niños traviesos. = I can't believe our boss would scold us as if we were naughty children. [technically could be niñas traviesas if it the nosotros here were nosotras referring to all women]

You will occasionally see the future subjunctive forms, but really only in literature and contracts. It's not used commonly today; it'll look like imperfect subjunctive just with -e endings; tuviere, hubiere, hablare, llamare, quisiere etc.

For example: si fuere menester is a common thing in contracts and means "in the event of". Literally it's "if it were to be needed"

-

Important historical / regional note!

Once upon a time, the -iera/-ara forms were used as pluperfect, "had done", "had seen" etc.

You see it mostly in literature, particularly literature before a certain time period or things set in the middle ages or that have an old-timey feel (like Lord of the Rings has this)

So if you had come across llamara you might assume it's imperfect subjunctive, but it may read as "had called" which is pluperfect.

In other words for some historical contexts (and only for historical contexts, not for modern day Spanish):

me hablaran = me habían hablado = they had talked to me

les escribieran = les habían escrito = they had written to them

nos dijeras = nos habías dicho = you had told us

viera = había visto = he/she/You had seen

-

I'm not a historical linguist but I believe this is because haber in older contexts was not an auxiliary verb like this. In its original form, haber worked the way Italian did as "to have". You would see el hombre ha dos hijos "the man has two children".

haber didn't get used as an auxiliary verb until later on, and tener which now means "to have", was often used in the context of "to obtain" or "to grasp"

So in these older contexts, pluperfect [now done with haber in imperfect + past participle] was done with one verb.

Imperfect subjunctive would have been done with the -iese/-ase forms. So llamase read as "would call"; si me llamasen "if they should call me" for example

Just be careful when you're reading things like that! It's usually not too bad if you can recognize the verb because at least you get the overall meaning, but if it's not quite translating how you think it might be one of those more "antiquated" usages of a tense

...

Spain still keeps this distinction more so than Latin America. You will see -ara/-iera forms used for imperfect subjunctive [past subjunctive].

But in Spain you're more likely to see those contrary to fact statements or hypotheticals with the -ase/-iese forms:

Si lo hubiese sabido... = If I had known...

Si tuviésemos más tiempo... = If we had more time...

Como si fuésemos niños... = As if we were children...

My own Spanish leans towards Latin American usages, so I tend to use -ara/-iera forms for everything.

Spain makes more of a distinction between them, and that's why in most dictionaries or conjugation charts you'll see two different forms... like "fuera O fuese" for example

-

Importante Note: You will see the -ara/-iera forms used as pluperfect in some contexts, even in Latin America - above all in journalism, biographies, and publications

This is why you may see nació "was born" written as naciera "was born"...

But you will NEVER see it as naciese for "was born"

[crollalanzaa]

There’s a reason Martha Jones is my favourite Dr Who companion and it’s her parting scene where she talks about her friend being in love with a guy who doesn’t love her back and will never love her back, and Martha is talking about her friend in reference to the Doctor because she loves him and finds him extraordinary but he’s never going to feel like that about her. So, she has a choice to stay or leave and she chooses to leave saying something like ‘This is me saying goodbye’. She gives up her exciting TARDIS adventures and life with the doctor because as wonderful as it is, she needs to move forward with her life and avoid the ghastly crash of reality when the adrenaline leaves.

This is a roundabout way of saying that I believe I’ve written my last fic. I started writing fic around fourteen years ago and for a time it was the absolute pinnacle of my existence. Obsessive but also fulfilling, I’d finally found an outlet for my creativity and the frustration I felt with everything around me. It served me well and I honestly think it gave me a sense of worth not much else has (acting perhaps?)

But the fic crash after I post hasn’t changed and although I was able to push through that with more writing or the influx of kudos/comments etc, that has become so much harder in recent times.

(Behold the wangsty pity party starts below)

From first thought to actual posting, I spent two years on one fic. (Not the last one) Two years. Not that I thought about it every day, or spent as long writing but there was a process rumbling away and the fic was as near to the vision in my head as I could have got it. And it barely scraped double figures in kudos and hits. I did receive some lovely comments and I truly appreciate that, but I look at the two years and think, ‘wow, so not worth it!’

And there’s what I call my Hirugami moment where the realisation that no one will die if I give up, makes so much sense and the relief is immeasurable. But then again, Hirugami was an amazing middle blocker and I’m not in that league.

And other thoughts rumble in my head, because a few years ago, while I wasn’t a BNF by any means, there was a thrill of anticipation when I posted. Cake or Break was a wild ride, and Icarus was wilder. (I will absolutely never forget the Christmas Day when I posted a chapter which led to IwaOi reuniting - ahhhhh good times)

However most of that has gone, and even though the comments I can get are glorious, there’s a very real feeling at the back of my head and a thousand whispers telling me not that I’m a bad writer, but that I’m an unpopular. Not necessarily an unpopular writer - I’m probably too boring for that - but an unpopular person ��� and I’m finding that incredibly hard to face up to. Like, there are issues with friends in rl and issues with some ppl online and there comes a point where I’m either overthinking and that’s unhealthy or I accept that actually it’s a me problem and I’m the issue. Ah well, my dog loves me. (Ends pity party. Sorry for the wank but need to get off chest.)

My problem now is I have nothing to move onto. There is the possibility of more plays, but I’m one of many auditioning for a dearth of parts. So I think about going back to my old job, but have some health issues which mean my wrists are truly fucked and you have no idea how many times you need to use scissors, or paper knives, or pick up books in a school. They’d drop off after a week.

In the end, Martha Jones was a doctor, who then worked at UNIT and Torchwood.

In the end, Martha Jones is a fictional character and I’m not.

But I’m off the TARDIS for a while because as much as I love writing, it ain’t never loving me back but moves on without me.

Here’s my dog. I love her.

[see-arcane]

So like, THANK YOU for siding with Jon and his whole "I don't want to condemn several realities to the Fears" and his friends going "But then it's US who will have to deal with them!!" and... I may be overthinking this but with everything, it feels like a very abusive dynamic? Idk if you know about the Golden Child/Parent/Escapegoat dynamic, but it's common in disfunctional families to have a favorite for the parent to project on, and a escapegoat to put blame

You know what? We’re at the end of the series and I’ve been trying to be placid about this for a long time. But screw it.

I honestly do not enjoy 75% of Team Archive. At all. 

Because every last one of them is a hypocrite and a half.

The thing is, much as we as a fandom have been trying really reeeeally hard to project a familial/jagged friendship dynamic on Team Archive, the actual interactions we get paint a picture of just...coworkers muscling through a job they hate while grudgingly working together. I know, Jon and Martin call them their friends and they’ve had lighter moments once in a while, but really? I think they just don’t have enough options to be choosy about the term.

Georgie’s cool most of the time, and at least she brought up that, hey, yeah, she really shouldn’t have plugged her ears and slammed the door when Jon was in crisis mode back in s4. Only for her to join the Let’s Cross Our Fingers and Hope We Aren’t Dooming a Whole Multiverse For Our Convenience crew. 

Basira has at least graduated from ‘If you have any more Scary Meals I’ll put you down >:(’ to ‘Thanks for not dropping me while I was living up to the ACAB vibes :).’ While also conveniently forgetting her High Moral Stance on Protecting Innocent Strangers when she gets put in Jon’s shoes, suddenly turning around and snapping at Jon when he suggests the euthanasia move. YoU cAn’T kIlL tHe WoRlD jUsT bEcAuSe SoMeOnE eLsE [READ: ENTIRE MULTIVERSE] MiGhT sUfFeR!!!1!

Melanie is a dick. Dickish characters can be fun! I love a lot of dickish characters! But Melanie is a dick who refuses to grow out of her shit-on-Jon-athon setting well after the excuse of the Slaughter bullet got taken away. Yes, she’s gone through traumatic experiences. Exactly one (1) billionth of a fraction of what Jon’s gone through and is still going through. I laughed out loud when she dropped that ‘high horse’ line at him. Pot meet fucking kettle. 

And Martin? Martin I love. I really do. But they covered his issue pretty clearly in that chat between Jon and Helen. Hell, in 199 itself. Martin is very much an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ character. He wants a version of things where everyone is safe and happy, but the closest substitute he can see is just dumping the problem on their unseen neighbors--a potential infinity of victims he’ll feel distantly guilty about, but will never have to interact with. Which makes it as close to okay as he thinks they can get. 

This whole episode was a microcosm of why I feel most for Jon out of any of them, regardless of what reasons the narrative might come up with to excuse the others’ do-as-I-say-not-as-I-doisms. Jon is the only one who’s given the decision any real thought beyond ‘At least it won’t be our problem anymore.’ Not because he’s the Archivist with a bottomless well of painful knowledge, but because he knows this is morally the wrong thing to do. 

Every choice is a wrong choice, but this poor empathetic chew toy of a man knows Team Archive is choosing the option that’s most convenient for their world, not because the logic is sound, but because they’re desperate enough to throw away all those scruples they were so eager to bludgeon him with when he made the mistake of not dying in the Unknowing. 

Which is all a roundabout way of saying, yes, Jon is absolutely the unfavorite in their merry band. And after 5 seasons’ worth of hell this man has gone through for the sake of these same people who shat on him, deemed him a monster, alternately cut him out of their lives or used him as a tool, all topped with shouting him down when he dares to point out that the move they’ve decided on is a selfish one--the same choice they shamed him for in s4 when the choice was ‘be a good boy and starve or be a monster and eat’--I am amazed at how Jon hasn’t gotten one single moment in which he gets to chew them all right the fuck out for it.

So I will instead.

Fuck ‘em. They’re well-written, they’re believable people, they aren’t cookie cutter characters, all that good stuff.

But fuck ‘em. You deserved a lot of better things in your miserable life, Jonathan Sims. Friends who were actually friends being chief among them.