#this isn't as shippy as it could have been but

[danwhobrowses]

So Callowmoores am I alone in thinking it was cute that Fearne helped carry Ashton to the city? Like there's the parallel also with Ashton carrying her into the Bloody Bridge as well

[mx-myth]

Thinking about mlc because I just finished writing the modern au (the hanahaki au has been done for a few weeks, we'll see if I ever get around to posting them) and actually, I know exactly what the show tastes like. It's lotuses and blood and candy and sword oil and wood and tea. It smells like the sea and bitter medicinal herbs and also the terrible sweetness of death and sick. The texture is solid like chewing on a blade but also gritty like sand. It's a dish of love and confusion and hate and bloodlust and betrayal and tiredness and longing.

It's also a meal that, from the outside, seems completely normal. But when you take the first bite it's all off. None of the food is rotten, sure. And objectively it's not bad to eat. But none of the flavors match and the textures don't either and as a whole it's incredibly chaotic and jarring. When you try and wash it down with wine the wine is sour - again, not exactly in a bad way, but just odd enough to be off-putting.

But you eat all of it anyway, because someone you care about made it.

[minakoaiinos]

Lost my original post of this from the other day but I genuinely don't understand how Black Butler discourse ever shifted into the does Sebastian ~really~ like Ciel or is Ciel just dinner line of conversation that is pervasive as it is because Sebastian is the one that has absorbed his whole existence into Ciel's. Sebastian's face is what Ciel wants Sebastian's whole purpose is doing things for Ciel Sebastian's every hell of a butler yes my lord speech is about how he's Ciel's and Ciel is the one going around saying shit like whatever Sebastian is just my pawn 💅

[annafall]

thinking of vacuo and who all came over from Mantle&Atlas and I really wanna see the Happy Huntresses befriend Willow now

I'm imagining that they'd all have their preconceived notions of who Willow Schnee actually is and then in the weeks after the Fall of Atlas while working with Winter and also seeing Willow a lot, they all learn that she's really just a kind, sweet and timid woman who's finally learning to live

Robyn telling her fun stories about her time as a huntress, Fiona being a cheeky gossip whocs just so pleasant to be around, Joanna being a very physical person who finds it endearing how Willow yelps anytime bearhugs her, May who's the more refined more classy conversation partner who makes a point to hold a lil tea party with Willow and the rest of the Happy Huntresses and whoever else has time and energy for it

[longagoitwastuesday]

Kind of endearing that despite their obvious strained dynamic Utahime and Gojo trust each other

[shikai-the-storyteller]

Me: *starting to feel slightly anxious about my fic*

My brain immediately:

[olderthannetfic]

/olderthannetfic/769334704445997057/another-fandometrics-year-in-review-another-bevy

I am - genuinely - very sympathetic to the frustrations of solely f/f shippers and I DO think some people are a little too quick to shrug off the lack of f/f in fandom spaces with “lack of representation in media what can you do” when fandom is all about assigning personalities and backstories to one-line characters. HOWEVER. As someone who likes all kinds of ships, the experiences I have had across many MANY fandoms with solely f/f shippers treating people who also liked the main m/m ship as traitors and bad feminists, not to mention the number of people who have told me, a trans man, that I HAVE to write more f/f and less m/m For The Sisterhood, has made me LESS likely to engage in f/f, not more. Some of y’all are your own worst enemy when it comes to this stuff I swear. (Hashtag not all femslashers, hashtag some of my best friends are femslashers, etc)

--

Demands that people defend and explain perfectly commonplace things always end up generating dumber and dumber explanations.

I agree that that explanation by itself is kind of weak, but "Why are you asking only about AO3?" (as people often are) plus representation problems plus the other commonly cited reasons add up to a perfectly sufficient explanation. People just don't like what they're hearing.

--

The kind of f/f fandom people are often looking for—a by cis wlw, for cis wlw one—is not that different in size from the by cis mlm, for cis mlm one. They are both small.

Yes, I know they pretend that's not what they mean. They are lying. Possibly to themselves. Just look at the bawwwwing over the idea that cis men liking f/f could add to the amount of f/f art or the audience for the same.

Many AO3 slashers are better compared to transbian catgirls making lesbian furry porn or cis dudes horny for Buffy/Faith or something. There are plenty of people who care about f/f. They're just not necessarily the ~right~ people in the right spaces making the right art to count in some wanker's statistics.

Part of the reason our explanations and discussions always sound so bonkers is that we constantly compare apples to oranges.

--

And while we're at it, let's talk about that hoary old ~one-line character~ thing.

The reality is that we like to talk about how we elevate random walk-on characters, but the vast majority of shippy AO3 fanfic is about fairly major characters. Clint/Coulson was bizarrely popular in 2012. It has been twelve years. It is time to get over it.

On top of most things focusing on leads, the focus is often on characters who are given a lot of interiority. The audience is invited to be in their head and care about their feelings. People aren't usually good at analyzing film, so they use more familiar metrics involving text: how many lines do they have in the script? How many minutes does that translate to on screen? They don't know how to quantify a character being treated as an object to be looked at beyond "Booty shorts bad". But it's not general sex appeal or amount of skin on display that matters here.

As audiences, we respond to film grammar and "Just happen to like" or not like some character as a result of it, but we aren't aware of the mechanics, so we can't explain why beyond vague spluttering and "How dare you! Everyone should think this because it's the natural response!"

In general, media with multiple central women who have intense relationships with each other and who are conventionally attractive generate plenty of interest in f/f. Media with one hot girl who has the camera trained on her ass all the time while the men do everything interesting usually don't.

It's a no brainer and the harebrained explanations come from trying to look deeper to find the secret conspiracy where there is none.

--

The biggest mistake of most of this dumb discourse is "But I see all these queer women here. Why isn't there more f/f?"

This presupposes some default "normal" level of f/f without any actual justification for why that would be expected. You see the same nonsense from people going "Why is there so much m/m?"

What's the default? 10% because of the fake statistic that 10% of people are gay? 75% because action movies are sausagefests and all the important relationships are between men? What's the "normal" level of femslash? 25% because f/f, f/m, m/m, and gen are all equally valid? 80% because lots of fanfic writers are women?

Chasing one precise number is a fool's errand, but building a whole theory on the idea that there's an implicit number without even digging into that assumption is more foolish still.

When you look at the fanfic (or art!) spaces that are full of dudes, they often look like a bit of a mirror of AO3. Lots of het still. Lots of f/f. Lots of lady blorbos people are obsessed with. Limited m/m. Depending on the space, there might be a lot more gen. It's not perfectly 1:1, but then AO3 isn't precisely like other chick-heavy fanfic spaces anyway.

--

In my experience, the thing that makes a blorbo take off is that they're fairly major in canon, often driving the narrative even if they aren't the main protagonist, and they show up early.

In the cases where they weren't there at the very beginning, them showing up was the catalyst for fans who like this type of character to get into the canon at all. It's not just Castiel: you see it with Methos from Highlander and plenty of others. It's usually in a context where that fandom didn't have that much established for this type of fan. There wasn't a second dude to pair the lead with or the ship turned some people off or something. Highlander, for example, had fucktons of het shippers, both of canon het and of various OFCs and canon dudes. It was the slashers who stampeded over there when friends told them there was new ship potential for m/m. SPN... Sam/Dean was very popular on LJ, but I think it's obvious why a viable non-brother ship was of interest to people. I watched tons of people get pimped into Teen Wolf for Sterek. Of course they ended up liking it and not really caring about other ships: they were pre-selected to like that specific vibe. (And they are all wrong because Scott is the best and Derek has weird teeth.) The same thing happens with f/f. People get into media all the time because they're promised such-and-such a ship dynamic.

Wynonna Earp had plenty of people who were there for the women because the women are who matter for the most part. People were super into the canon f/f because it's hot and because it didn't seem like they were just going to get hit by a bus and shooed out of the narrative.

How many things that everybody and their sister saw have that many main women who matter? Some, definitely, but they're outnumbered by the sausagefests and by the things with very central het. Not everything with a huge audience gets a big fanfic fandom, but most things with big fanfic fandoms do have a big audience. You need critical mass to make a fandom happen.

Something like MCU has a variety of tasty shipping options, but the characters it spent all its time on first were the small selection of guys fandom cares the most about. When other characters were established very early, they also had an early spurt of fandom. I can't be the only one who remembers Pepperony fandom on LJ. It wasn't just people tagging canon ships in the background: Pepper/Tony shippers were a whole thing.

Yes, there are exceptions, but we make a big deal of them while ignoring the overall pattern.

Again, it is time to get over Clint/Coulson, Arthur/Eames, and people hallucinating that Hux had a personality in that first movie.

These are rare exceptions, and they're all snark-based at that. Darcy Lewis was also obnoxiously popular based solely on a few lines of snark, but that didn't count because she wasn't the correct and virtuous choice of favorite female character.

(Seriously, you should have seen the whining about all the people horny for Darcy who didn't give a fuck about boring Jane. Sorry, but your blorbo is a snooze and mine has amazing tits in addition to being funny.)

--

Let's go look at what's big on AO3 since it's easy and that's what other lazy statistics compilers do and then base their whining on:

Looking at the M/M tag, here's the sidebar:

Castiel/Dean Winchester (111856)

Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter (70823)

Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski (70134)

Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (67796)

James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers (61397)

Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens) (56548)

Minor or Background Relationship(s) (55109)

Sirius Black/Remus Lupin (49179)

Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku (46679)

Steve Rogers/Tony Stark (44754)

I'm seeing canons with huge audiences. Teen Wolf and SPN are way more popular in fanfic fandom, relatively speaking, but they're certainly not obscure media.

I'm seeing a lot of leads. Sirius/Remus does stand out a little: they aren't walk-ons, but fanon did elevate them. Same with Draco, but main protagonist/most obvious nemesis is hardly a surprising ship type.

Let's play with exclude filters and see what's next (numbers won't be exact since this is via excluding the previous batches):

Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson (43234)

Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian (40115)

Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V (38398)

Keith/Lance (Voltron) (32757)

Dazai Osamu/Nakahara Chuuya (Bungou Stray Dogs) (32744)

Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester (31834)

Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV) (31527)

Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin) (31011)

Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter (30819)

Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood (30133)

Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson (27403)

Original Male Character/Original Male Character (26854)

Bakugou Katsuki/Kirishima Eijirou (26854)

Jeon Jungkook/Park Jimin (26454)

Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov (26453)

Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF) (21154)

Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion (20946)

James T. Kirk/Spock (20716)

Min Yoongi | Suga/Park Jimin (20561)

Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet (20113)

Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru (20039)

Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio (18806)

Blaine Anderson/Kurt Hummel (18013)

Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier (17577)

Dan Howell/Phil Lester (17518)

Levi Ackerman/Eren Yeager (17404)

Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know (17390)

Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou (17141)

Tartaglia | Childe/Zhongli (Genshin Impact) (17041)

Harry Potter/Severus Snape (16773)

Oh look: more leads.

Sure, there are some little oddities, like the fact that taekook is obviously the worst BTS ship and it is a personal attack on me that it is that popular. But come the fuck on: this is a parade of some of the most famous musicians and most popular anime, shows that had huge audiences and particularly huge audiences of the type that like fanfic.

Let's have a look at f/m:

Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug (33773)

Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy (33031)

Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s) (29586)

Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (24192)

Minor or Background Relationship(s) (21606)

James Potter/Lily Evans Potter (21088)

Kylo Ren/Rey (16028)

James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader (15922)

Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley (15635)

Sirius Black/Remus Lupin (15335)

Pepper Potts/Tony Stark (14552)

Fox Mulder/Dana Scully (14214)

Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin (13616)

Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson (11471)

Oliver Queen/Felicity Smoak (11383)

Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan (11272)

Castiel/Dean Winchester (11187)

Other Relationship Tags to Be Added (10529)

Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov (9750)

Original Character(s)/Original Character(s) (9736)

Okay, it is AO3 after all, so some m/m ships have snuck in there, but the general trend is still leads, leads, leads, now with some readerfic. (For James/Lily, you can blame the insanity that is Marauders fandom on TikTok, or so I hear.)

And f/f:

Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor (21520)

Original Female Character(s)/Original Female Character(s) (17873)

Evil Queen | Regina Mills/Emma Swan (16168)

Minor or Background Relationship(s) (13681)

Clarke Griffin/Lexa (12876)

Adora/Catra (She-Ra) (11532)

Amity Blight/Luz Noceda (10880)

Sirius Black/Remus Lupin (10532)

Caitlyn/Vi (League of Legends) (8925)

Blake Belladonna/Yang Xiao Long (7766)

Robin Buckley/Nancy Wheeler (7369)

Korra/Asami Sato (7146)

Wednesday Addams/Enid Sinclair (6720)

Other Relationship Tags to Be Added (6684)

Waverly Earp/Nicole Haught (5764)

Original Character(s)/Original Character(s) (5529)

Chloe Beale/Beca Mitchell (5347)

Laura Hollis/Carmilla Karnstein (4895)

Jirou Kyouka/Yaoyorozu Momo (4662)

Charlie Magne | Morningstar/Vaggie (4402)

Thirteenth Doctor/Yasmin Khan (4284)

Alex Danvers/Maggie Sawyer (4223)

Rose Lalonde/Kanaya Maryam (3936)

Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova (3876)

Maya Bishop/Carina DeLuca (3700)

Sister Beatrice/Ava Silva (3689)

Castiel/Dean Winchester (3664)

Maxine "Max" Caulfield/Chloe Price (3471)

Miranda Priestly/Andrea Sachs (3394)

Ruby Rose/Weiss Schnee (3324)

Carmilla might be a little obscure compared to some media, and some other ships have snuck in here, but again, we're seeing some fairly prominent canons and the leads or at least main cast who have intense relationships in those canons. If most fantasy tv shows were Once Upon a Time, all of AO3 might be awash in nothing but swanqueen and captainswan.

The big thing that one sees is simply that f/f fandom often revolves around different media, while m/m and f/m are more likely to be into the same stuff that's full, full, full of main dudes getting to do things with one woman who matters.

We do not, in general, elevate anybody.

Not unless some very talented writer leads the way first with a juicy longfic that establishes all the fanon.

We repeat the myth that we do because it suits a certain narrative about how creative and transformative fandom is—and another equally popular narrative about how the lack of ship A/B is a ~conspiracy~ to rob one of one's rightful overflowing feed trough of fic.

It's bullshit.

We write about leads.

[rwbyrg]

So, we can all agree that when Oscar eventually gets his semblance, it's going to have something to do with Ruby, right? And I'm not even saying this from a shippy lens. Kid has an immortal wizard move into his brain at 14 that he can't kick out, immediately becomes a child soldier, lives through a train crash, countless grimm fights, crash lands a plane, gets shot in the chest, falls for - quite possibly - a few kilometres after blowing up a hole in the bottom of a military compound, gets beaten up and abducted by a goopy grimm super monster, magic blasted by his headmate's ex-wife, tortured and beaten up by a man six times his size, fights off Salem again to save his friends, and not ONE of those instances has been stressful enough to awaken it.

But both times he's talked about his semblance manifesting, it's been with Ruby. The first is in v5 after they spar and Ruby cheers him (and Jaune) on about getting there one day, while Ren makes a comment saying:

"One common philosophy is that a warrior's semblance is a part of who they are".

The second time is in v7 when Ruby does something new with her own semblance and Oscar asks if she's always been able to do that. Eventually leading to him lamenting again about how he's not unlocked his yet while everyone else's are evolving. And it's Ruby that responds with:

"Well, I'm sure we'll all be jealous when you do (figure it out)".

And then, from both Ruby and Oscar's perspectives, we are shown their attachment to each other. Ruby throughout V9 with Neo's illusions, and Oscar with - many instances - but especially in the recently released epilogue where he speaks at her grave. And in this speech we're reminded of that attachment as well as his struggles with identity. Specifically how those two things are intrinsically linked together:

"You always believed in the best. Saw people for who they really were. Some of us... don't know anymore. "

Oscar can't grasp his own personal super power that's "a part of himself" when he doesn't know who he is. He's losing himself to the merge, the boundaries of where he ends and Oz begins are blurring by the day, and he's only 15 and still growing into the person he could become. And the one person that was always certain of who he was, always made him feel like he was his own person... isn't around anymore. So he feels even more detached from his identity and the parts that comprise it than ever before.

But she returns in Vacuo before their final fight, and his semblance has been teased too many times to never appear. So my current guesses are either:

he's going to unlock it under stress to save Ruby from certain danger, because he "lost her once and won't risk it a second time"; or

he's going to unlock it in a different, maybe even quieter moment, where - once again, thanks to Ruby's certainty - he starts feeling like himself again.

Only one way to find out.

[tigirl-and-co]

Specks of Dust in Hallowed Halls

Part 2; Linguistics

Part 1, the introductory chapter, is here!

Now we get into the shippy stuff! And bonus points for anybody who recognizes the book I've chosen here

"Howlsong, who had fallen asleep at the outer edge of the canyon while he waited, led them silently back through the forest. Fritti, full of vague resentment and doom, had no conversation to offer, either. After a long stretch of unspeaking travel, Pouncequick finally broke the stillness.

"Just think, Tailchaser," he said, "we've actually been to see the Queen of Cats!""

You were curled up in a nook that you had unofficially claimed as your own somewhere in the human residence. Made more comfortable by a few blankets and pillows, you had chosen it for its out-of-the-way location and because Metroplex could both see the spot with a camera and use a nearby speaker to talk with you.

In your lap was your phone, currently accessing his personal communication line, which let him hear your voice.

Metroplex loved your voice. It was his favourite sound, the most wonderful melody he'd heard in all his unfathomable eons of existence. Every syllable, every stutter and stumble was permanently caught in his memory circuits, and he wouldn't have it any other way.

And when he learned you had a collection of books back on earth, he had practically begged you to import some to read to him. Not only was he desperate to hear your voice, Metroplex was also curious about you. What you liked to read, what the human culture you hailed from was like, what you thought about things...

So, you found yourself contacting a friend on earth to bring a few books to the supply ship every so often, and spending a bit of extra cash to get them shipped here and back. You didn't mind. It felt nice to be heard. To have your interests acknowledged and considered important.

And, quite honestly, you simply enjoyed hearing him speak. The deep rumble was both soothing and impossible to ignore, and his contemplative nature gave every statement the gravitas of some ancient philosopher comprehending the universe.

"So, Metty, what'd you think of that chapter?" you asked, keeping your own opinions out of it. You were just as interested in his thoughts as he was in yours.

A few moments of pause. "Hm... are human noble courts typically like that?"

You chuckled. Of course that's what he picked out- he'd borne witness to much more sophisticated councils time and time again. In fact, some other part of his processor was probably preoccupied with one now.

"Honestly? Never been. But if I walked in to one and it went like that, I wouldn't be surprised in the least. Fancy people looooooove making overly complex routines and rules and then not actually doing anything to help." You looked up into his camera and beamed at him. "But I get the feeling that sort of behaviour isn't unique to my species."

You felt as much as heard his merriment at that one. "No, it truly is not. Although I've found Cybertronians prefer bureaucracy to bloodlines."

You snuggled back into your nook, still making eye contact with the camera as you got ready for what was certain to be the nerdiest bout of flirting any human had ever partaken in outside of a lab. "Ah, humans most definitely get up to red tape and government nonsense too, but I'm afraid that compared to millions of years of rule-writing, ours would pale in comparison."

You smirked. "Although I'd like to see what would happen if somebody addressed Prime as 'Your Regal Softness.'"

Metroplex desperately wished he had finer control over his internal mechanisms so that he could embrace you right now. But he would have to settle for watching you curl up against his walls. "Knowing that mech, he would assume it was an actual title and wear it with pride."

You burst out laughing at the image, and how it didn't seem all that far-fetched. You both respected Optimus, but that didn't mean you couldn't be irreverent about him in private.

And as you chatted with the titan, book now just conversational fuel, you were struck by how easy it all was. The meandering levity, the way you each made both space and time for each other...

And how easy he was to love.

[theprinceandthewitch]

See... part of me actually wants to know what Dana's thought process was with Luz's and Hunter's relationship.

Like... why did she decide to make Luz's type of boy "angsty warrior princes" even though Luz's type of boy could have been literally anything else?

Why was Luz's relationship with a prince highlighted as important since WBW? Even going to far as to make Luz write a romantic scene between her and a prince in Sense and Insensitivity. Hunter would not make his debut until season two, but they felt the need to bring him up in SAI.

Why wasn't there more of an effort to make sure Willow was there for all of Hunter's important moments?

Why did they keep hammering in the Lunter = Caleb/Evelyn parallels, even when Luz was dating Amity? If you want to argue Luz had to be there for all of Hunter's moments because she's the protagonist, it doesn't explain why they wrote these parallels. Especially the ones that came up in Hollow Mind and Thanks to Them.

Why is Luz honest with Hunter in Thanks to Them when she has never been honest with how she feels with any other character -- not even her girlfriend? What makes Hunter different from anyone else? She could have just kept how she actually feels to herself and it would have changed nothing. It's not like Hunter wouldn't have given his speech to Luz if she didn't tell him how she feels... cuz she literally tells everyone how she feels after Hunter comes back to life. This decision is strange and unbelievably haunting... because Thanks to Them brought up the Caleb/Evelyn lore in an episode where Luz's relationship with Hunter was the focus... oh okay... i guess this is nbd then. Like I'm just supposed to not make a big deal abt Luz being honest without having the truth forced out of her... okay. I guess i also shouldn't make a big deal about the other choice to have Hunter know Luz's secret in Hollow Mind.

You really just did that for reasons that are toooootally not shippy, huh? Mhm, okay! Sure, I believe you! [this is sarcasm, btw]

Why did WAD make Willow stand in front of Flapjack's grave with Hunter, even though the only other character with significant ties to Flapjack is Luz? WAD even made it clear Luz feels guilty about Flapjacks death... but she still isn't shown to pay respects to Flapjack post timeskip... WAD is gaslighting me into thinking Willow has significant thematic ties with Flapjack... as if she has a deeper relationship with that bird than Luz did. And just to make it even worse, they give EVERYONE Flapjack tattoos even though no other characters besides Luz and Hunter are tied to Flapjack. Especially Amity... like girlies first and last conversation with Hunter was when he made her feel bad about her relationship with Luz in Eclipse Lake... but the show is gaslighting me into thinking Amity and Hunter are friends or something. TOH LOVES tricking me into thinking certain character relationships exist...

I'm not going to ask why Hunter is unconcerned with Luz not coming through the portal right away in FTF because I already know the answer. This episode exists almost exclusively to make sure Hunter's arc ends with him holding pinkies with Willow. FTF is really funny for pulling this little stunt at the beginning because it's completely out of character for Hunter LMAO. Not sure why they've made such a big deal about Luz's and Hunter's relationship, just to pretend like it doesn't exist in FTF; only to then bring it up in WAD by having Hunter and Amity guide Luz out of the illusion... nightmare thing. They just cant stop bringing up Luz's relationship with Hunter even when both of them are dating someone else, it's so crazy.

[cafecitoeddie]

I think the salient point about Tommy calling Buck "Evan" is that Buck has not corrected him. Just like Eddie never corrected Ana. In no way an indication that he loves or even likes it. It's an indication of a pattern we've witnessed Buck fall into time and time again. It's very easy to imagine Buck thinking it makes him seem more mature or whatever and just going along with it. I don't think it makes Tommy evil or even a bad guy, just like Ana wasn't evil (to Eddie. her out of pocket ableism about chris is another story) . It's just another indicator of the romantic partner of the moment not being a right fit. There to teach the boys a lesson about themselves and then be gone. This one just also happened to bring along a genuinely revelatory self discovery, for Buck. A good thing! And still...

We — the omnipotent "we" of the audience — know that Buck does not like being called "Evan," for complicated reasons of childhood trauma. And, we know that Maddie and Eddie have used it in very specific contexts, with full awareness of its weight. (Also Chim, purposely to make fun of him/in front of Buck's parents, which proves my point.)

I think Tommy calling Buck "Evan" is a clever shorthand by the writers: telling us both that this is temporary because this person doesn't really understand Buck and that Buck is going to work something out here in his relationship to himself (again, like all the romantic partners, every single one). "Evan" as a callback to his childhood trauma, the origin of his hamster wheel, why he keeps finding himself repeating these patterns, why he feels like he's not enough and needs other people to name and validate his own feelings, how he could have been so oblivious to his own queerness for so long, etc. etc.

My 2 cents (that ended up being more like a dollar sorry!)

NO NO BECAUSE YOU'RE RIGHT. that's my train of thought too. i always end up in the same conclusion.

evan stands for something he is always willing to walk away from ONCE HE GETS THROUGH THE HURDLE OF ACTUALLY KNOWING WHAT THAT SOMETHING ACTUALLY IS. we've seen him time and time again repeating patterns in his relationships.

to me, tommy calling buck evan isn't the cutesy shippy thing it's being made out to be. to me, tommy calling buck evan is a direct result of a love interest coming in and thinking they know who buck is and trying to set themselves apart when in reality nobody knows who evan is and the closest we've come to knowing is when he decides that no, he isn't evan, he's buck.

anyway, YES THANK YOU TO ALL OF THIS! 💖

[brigdh]

Okay. My thoughts on the Our Flag Means Death finale. Obviously I'm not very happy with the ending, though I'm also not as upset as some people are. I would say I'm discontent. Unsatisfied. Too aware of how it could have been improved, and a bit bitter that we didn't get a better version, but I also don't hate what we did get.

I know a lot of meta has attributed the problems to a shorter season, and absolutely I would have loved to get 10 episodes instead. I would have loved 22 episodes! Why don't we do that anymore? But I don't think the 8 episode length was the ultimate problem. A) The showrunner and writers knew they had only 8 episodes, so they needed to choose a story that fit into that length, but even more importantly, B) my problem is not that they had too much story for too little time, but actually that they had plenty of time and chose to fill it with too little story.

As I've sat with it over the last few days and thought more about the season's arc, it feels to me like we got eight episodes of filler. Filler episodes can be great! Filler episodes can have some of the funniest lines, the greatest scenes, the most intriguing ideas. But filler episodes do not progress character arcs or major themes, and that's exactly the problem this season had.

The only characters who got arcs this season are Izzy, and to a lesser and more rushed extent, Lucius. Which sure is a choice.

Ed and Stede and their relationship did not meaningfully change from S1. (Okay, yes, they had sex, they said I Love You – but these are external changes, not internal. They don't represent character growth. Stede realized he loved Ed and was telling everyone back in 1x10. Ed clearly would have slept with him in S1 if they'd had a little more time.) Ed and Stede in 2x08 are not different from who they are in 2x01. If Ed had asked Stede to be innkeepers in 2x01, does anyone think Stede wouldn't have immediately agreed? One of the big moments in 2x08 is Ed reading a letter that Stede wrote in 2x01! Stede's exact words from the very beginning of the season! What better way to underline that none of the subsequent seven episodes had important growth or changes?

Another one of 2x08's big shippy moments is Ed and Stede running to each other across a beach – deliberately paralleling the dream Stede had in 2x01. What are we supposed to take from this parallel? My original thought was that we're supposed to see how different the real version is from the dream, but there's honestly not many differences. Neither one has a beard, now? The dream mocked how Stede knew they needed to have a conversation about their relationship that he wanted to avoid, but they don't have a conversation in the "real" version either. They exchange about two sentences (which includes Ed's I Love You, yes, which is a big deal but still isn't a conversation) and then they charge right back into the fight, without discussing anything like Ed abruptly dumping Stede to go be a fisherman, Stede killing Ned Low when Ed asked him not to, their differences of opinion on being pirates, if having sex was a mistake or if that's only a thing Ed said because he was panicking, etc etc. They have just as many issues to address as they did in the dream, but just like the dream they act like everything is magically okay without talking about it!

So I think we're meant to take the beach-run parallels as "here's what Stede's been wanting, and after waiting for so long he finally gets it". Which is fine, a very sweet take-away for a finale. But it underlines what I'm saying is the problem of the season: Stede has just been waiting for eight episodes for his dream to come true. Not changing. Not growing. Not doing anything to bring the dream about, other than trying to get himself and Ed into the same physical location. Just... waiting.

This is an extra surprising development, because the show was really good at giving Ed and Stede character arcs in S1! Ed and Stede in 1x10 are significantly different than they were in their first introductions. Also, just to preempt some criticism, by 'progressing' I do not mean 'wrap up literally every loose end and make a firm final ending' – S1's finale is an excellent example of both moving the characters forward and leaving a ton of room for future stories. I wasn't expecting for 2x08 to show us a Stede and Ed who were perfectly on the same page and would never again have a problem. I was expecting them to be somewhat different than they were in 2x01, and I just don't see that.

Instead of arcs, we got little pieces of single-episode growth here and there that never added up to an overall whole. The season brought up a ton of potential arcs for Ed – violence, piracy, guilt, suicide, daddy issues, self-loathing, apologies, redemption, his tendency to idealize escaping into a different life – but didn't do anything with any of these options. Stede had nothing resembling a season arc at all.

Stede works to improve as a captain! Stede kills someone and has regrets! Stede confronts Ed's dark side! <- All potential arcs, but none of which lasted for more than an episode or had consequences. We don't even know what the ending means for Stede: does he want to be an innkeeper because he failed as a pirate in 2x07? Because piracy was always just a displaced search for love, and now that he has love, he doesn't need piracy? What does the crew of the Revenge leaving mean to him? Stede's understanding of their new arrangement literally happens off-screen and we're left to fumble at guesses for its significance to him as an individual.

Ed and Stede's last big conversation in the season is their break-up fight in 2x07, which is a shocking way to send off your main couple in a rom-com. Yes, there's the I Love You on the beach (again: two sentences) and the brief 'let's try to be innkeepers' conversation at the very end, but that's it for them in 2x08, except for their inclusion in some brief large group conversations about their fighting skills and the plan for escaping the British. How can you end your rom-com with the main couple exchanging only a paragraph's worth of dialogue in the finale? None of the stuff was brought up in the fishing fight in 2x07 is ever addressed at all!

Again, I don't think this is solely a matter of time crunch. Instead of using the eight episodes to progress the two main characters, we got a bunch of filler episodes that used the time in amusing side tangents instead of forward progress. I don't think that's the inevitable result of having to work with eight episodes.

Look, I can come up with a better Ed/Stede relationship arc without needing more episodes, and despite only thinking about this for a couple days and not having an entire writing room to work with:

(Note: this only addresses the Ed/Stede relationship. It doesn't fix Stede completely lacking an independent character arc and Ed having about ten thousand of them, none of which went anywhere.)

In 2x05 to 2x07, I would make Ed's motivations in their relationship very clearly that he's pushing Stede away so he doesn't get hurt again. Basically play up Ed's comment about "I was all in" in 2x04, and make him determined not to get 'all in' this time around. This aligns the "let's take it slow" conversation in 2x05, the "sex was a mistake" in 2x06, and Ed running away to be a fisherman in 2x07 into a single arc. He wants Stede, but he's afraid of what that wanting will do to him. He's trying to find a way to have a relationship without making himself vulnerable. He keeps pushing off commitment and openness.

Then, in 2x08, I'd make it more explicit that Ed thinks/fears Stede is dead when he sees the pirate ships burning. I think it's subtext in the episode as-is, but give him a line or two to make it really clear. Ed and Stede still see each other on the beach, have their dramatic run to each other, and Ed says, "I love you". Now this moment is Ed acknowledging his love, exactly what he's been avoiding for the last three episodes.

Near the end of the episode, Ed and Stede have a conversation where Ed says something like, "I didn't want to get hurt again, I was afraid of the risk of falling in love and you leaving again, but thinking you were dead made me realize that never loving you would be worse" (but better written, ha, this is a tumblr post that's already too long). (Also possibly you could tie in Izzy's death here to underline both Ed and Stede not wanting to lose another person they care about, if we must have that plot point for some reason.) We actually get to see Ed asking Stede to come be innkeepers with him, paralleling asking him to run away to China (and paralleling NOT asking Stede to a fisherman), Stede voices some of his worries (paralleling him keeping them inside in 1x09, but also giving him a chance to explain what piracy and love mean to him and why he'd give up one for the other), but ultimately they agree that they at least want to try.

This both puts them into a much clearer place for a happy ending, has clear growth from S1 and the beginning of this season, but also leaves open a ton of room for S3, because welp, it turns out trying to have a relationship entails all sorts of problems! Especially with these two. It also would make me feel like they'd at least addressed some of the issues between them.

Right now I feel like S3 will have to spend at least the first few episodes running through exactly the same "don't talk – break up – get back together dramatically" arc that Stede and Ed have already done twice but have never discussed and never learned from. I liked it, but I don't need to see it yet again. That will – ironically – feel like yet more wasted time, more episodes that are just churning through beats without moving the characters forward. I wanted them to have new, different fights in S3, but now I don't even feel like they've made enough progress to have a fresh set of problems.

[yuukei-yikes]

Long as hell text post under the cut my guys

me when i wake up and talk every day about the same shit. heart <3 i could talk for days abt jin and the misogyny he writes with. it's everywhere of course lol but out of the female characters takane's like…. the most tragic, in my opinion, because she's the only female character to have absolutely 0 backstory. yes, there's Some stuff, such as her illness, but truly takane does not have that much angst surrounding her illness. everything about her is rather about haruka. takane's moment is yuukei yesterday, but yuukei yesterday is entirely about both haruka and takane and their relationship. yes it's takane's pov, but it's ultimately still about… haruka, and how she feels about him.

back then in the fandom, pre over the dimension specifically, there was a take going around i remember pretty well. "people write haruka and takane like there's nothing more to them than being in love with each other" like the only time we'd see haruka and takane specifically (in fan content), they'd just be there to be shippy. i TOTALLY agreed with this sentiment and i always have, especially because i've always been obsessed with them as characters and i was overanalyzing every little thing (when otd came out i was over the moon bc i got so much stuff right btw. if u even care)

HOWEVER. if u think about it. pre over the dimension, with the manga having covered yuukei yesterday already and the next time takane (and haruka) appear as themselves in the manga is A LOT later in volume 10 (by that time, otd was already out) (also i'll get to takane in 2nd manga route in a second), so what we had at the time, for haruka and takane's backstory, was manga&novel yuukei yesterday and what we got from the anime. if you consider this… truly, at first the only thing to go off really was. just their relationship. that was all there was to both of them, because haruka was described from takane's pov, and everything we got from takane was how she felt for haruka. that was IT. for everything else u had to read between the lines like i was doing bc 10 years later i'd still be here talking about it teehee

of course there are also the songs. takane's songs set in time before she's ene are yuukei yesterday and of course headphone actor, one of the Best kagepro songs dont even come AT ME anyways headphone actor as a song touches THE OTHER BIG THING we were offered about takane at the time. okay, she isn't JUST in love with haruka. the other thing about takane is… she wants to SURVIVE!!!

i've talked about this LOADS of times i know (about this entire thing actually but i just like talking about also it's my blog) takane gets opening eyes because she's so determined to live. ratio + this from novel 2 headphone actor

which brings me to. ugh. second manga route. takane….would not…. KILL HERSELF…. second manga route WHY. we finally get to see Takane again in the manga and she's just so spectacularly NOT HERSELF it's crazy. takane since her INTRODUCTION is presented as "selfish" and how her want for attention from haruka or in general gets the best of her. that's ene. THAT'S ene!!! that's also why ENE stays with shintaro!!! it is FUNDAMENTAL to her character. we were given miserably little about her and in the most simplified way to put it, those things are: takane 1. is an attention whore<3 2. doesn't want to die. so tell me. how do you manage to get these 2 very simple things so incredibly WRONG in second manga route.

where in the world would takane get mad haruka got another friend. it makes NO sense!?!? bro haruka and shintaro ARE ALSO BEST FRIENDS IN THE MAIN ROUTE, where takane ACTUALLY HAS REASONS TO ACTIVELY REALLY DISLIKE SHINTARO, and she doesn't give a fuck that they're friends, why would she randomly care so much now when she has no reason to even dislike shintaro? so basically because she doesn't have ayano she gets jealous and wants haruka all to herself?? erm ok?? let's say that's true (it's not), even if she was jealous of shintaro her desire to be by haruka's side WILL be stronger, she would NEVER just turn around and leave. absolutely NOT. one of the stupidest things takane does is want haruka to look her way so bad she doesn't realize HE'S DYING ON HER. this bitch is so insanely self centered she would never in her life walk out on haruka just for having another friend. REAL takane walks in there with that stupid basket and be like Everyone look at me NOW<3

ok. first trait: attention whore: second manga route FAILS. second trait: doesn't want to die. wonder what second manga route will do. (looks into the camera) takane kills herself in second manga route.

dude you're crazy. you literally get EVERYTHING WRONG. it pisses me off. and not only does she kill herself but she does it because haruka DIED!?!?!?!?!? OH MY GOD. i hate it it's so fucking fake it's not HER THAT'S NOT TAKANE ENOMOTO THAT'S A SHIT CHARACTER JIN AND MAHIRO SATO DECIDED TO SUDDENLY WRITE INTO THE STORY i already put it in this post but let me attach it again

dear lord. anyways i've talked about that loads of times but i needed to include it in this talk cuz. yeah. i dont even HATE the rest of second manga route i just hate how takane is written specifically but since she's everything 2 me erm. you get my thumbs down!!! anyways having acknowledged second manga route we can move on.

back to main route discussion. so takane's backstory. not super deep, especially compared to other characters. yes her backstory is basically that she's sad because her boyfriend dies. but as ene there's so much more to unpack, right?! a character who will 100% accept a HALF DEATH because she's so determined not to die, but she's also mentioned to be tirelessly looking for her body because despite everything she's got HOPE? that's SUPER interesting, i love her!! what will she- *is obsessed with shintaro* ene's obsession with shintaro again ties in with everything else, desperate for attention, finds kinship with shintaro because she (or rather, ayano) decided he's compatible with her, but most importantly, he's doing badly and she wants to help him. takane isn't a person anymore, she's alive only as a technicality, so… she spends time with shintaro! but we ignore, it's TWO YEARS. and only in one of those she is with shintaro. we tend to overlook she spends the WHOLE TIME looking for her body in that other year. of course ene talks a lot about how much she loves her power, how much she loves being ene and not having to take care of her sick body but it's a REALITY that she wants to get it back. if she really didn't want it, why would she look for it and later get back into it when she does find it? but that's in between the lines. ene's obsession with shintaro is super interesting and you KNOW i love everything we know about takane be it her obsession with shintaro or her crush on haruka. i just wish there was....more.... like everyone else gets more! like HARUKA, a damn side character, gets more!!

haruka gets so SO much, he even bonds with SETO!! he gets a really well developed friendship with shintaro, he gets a very long detailed introduction scene with ayano with funny younger mekatrio shenanigans, he gets yuukei quartet hangout moments, he gets a GOOD RELATIONSHIP WITH KENJIROU (fundamental imo as he's very important both in general and haruka and takane's social circle back then) and not just all that, but super thoughtfully written feelings about his illness, views on life, wishes... and all takane's story gets is…. she's sick, but it's ok it's not deadly, HARUKA HOWEVER…. oh, HE'S the real delicate one….especially since she's in love with him ofcourse!! dont forget!! btw she's grumpy cuz of her illness. she wishes she just didn't need sleep. aaanywaaays did we mention it's not as important as haruka's illness and btw she's in love with him?

unlike haruka, takane gets no relationship with ayano, and all their interactions are talking about how in LOVE they are with haruka and shintaro. no relationship with kenjirou beyond comic relief of ugh useless ass teacher, even revealed later on she stays in the dark about kenjirou forcing them to participate in the festival ON PURPOSE and playing her like that so she would be determined and make haruka join. her dynamic to shintaro pre being ene is just pitiful, and if it wasn't for his behavior towards her shintaro would be…. erm normal?? yea he's cold to ayano but that vs the way he randomly treats takane without even knowing her. god. imagine kagepro where shintaro DIDN'T do that. he'd still be flawed and stuff like what was the need😭 like HUUHH. takane gets nothing!!!!! and if we're still on the shintaro subject, why she's the asshole for being a menace as ene? whatever. i support women's wrongs. bully him harder.

alright. later she's ene, bonds with the dan. wait!! look!! it's KANO!!! she has so much in common with him, to the point he chooses her to open up to and helps her get her body back!!! this is a GREAT character choice to pair her with and to develop a dynamic with!! uh. oh wait….. kano's just totally awful to her and then later leaves her to get her body back offscreen and on her own? (looks into the camera again)

to continue comparing haruka and takane. takane mentions grandma makes her lunch, grandpa is dead, and they're both SUPER worried about her illness. there's…. nothing about their personalities or their relationship to her. meanwhile, haruka mentions everything! he's all like my illness… when it killed my mother it was exactly when the doctors said it would. my dad is cold and a little strange and doesnt spend time at home. we have a live in helper who does chores. like that's already so much deeper!

u find out through another mention later on that takane's parents work overseas but you dont know ANYTHING else despite it being so specific. while haruka goes on about his relationship with his dad or rather lack of relationship, and there's even some stranger at home doing chores for him. and again HE GETS TO HAVE A CLOSE RELATIONSHIP WITH KENJIROU, heavily written as a father/son dynamic. man.

anyways…. this is kinda all over the place and it's something i talk about very often but teehee. wanted to do it again. i was thinking about it again because i realized i don't tend to draw haruka in a context outside being takane's boytoy. which i don't particularly care about because i know that's not all i see him as and i do see him as a deep character of his own and i like analyzing him just as much… it's just in art specifically he's just always there to be in love with her and nothing else. and i was like damn does that suck of me?? but you know what. i dont care<3 thanks for coming to my ted talk.

[thecottagecorebisexuals]

Can we talk about how the manga somehow made the marikata moments in the end of their first year even cuter?

The manga decided to depict "Catarina sticking even closer to Maria, more than she normally would" as Catarina gripping Maria's arm, it isn't the same in the anime and the book doesn't say exactly how close Catarina was.

Look at those two!!

Since it's canon that Catarina sees Maria dating someone else as being taken away I'm interpreting it as Catarina subconsciously getting her snuggles while she's still can.

The marikata moment in Chapter 22 of the manga is more shippy than the already shippy moment in Chapter 5 in vol. 2 or ep 12 of the anime but aside from interpreting "sticking close" as walking arm in arm there's also Catarina kind of sneaking out with Maria just like the FL1 endgame couple!

The book leaves it to open to interpretation if they were with the others/within earshot or sight at all times after giving Nicol his veggie bouquet, which is the route the anime took while the manga adds a panel of Mary and Sophia looking for Catarina while those two are together without the group.

Since they don't sneak out together, in the anime the only part of the confession that was like the original were the words "Let me continue being with you from here on out".

Catarina asking Maria who she liked in the anime played out with Maria being within sight (and earshot apparently) of Catarina and the group but not with them when Catarina started to wonder why nobody was sneaking out with Maria, after which Catarina just heads to where she is, in plain sight, to ask.

While I can't confirm that Mary and Sophia (and presumably the rest) lost Catarina because she and Maria hid on purpose...as if Mary would lose Catarina that easily...they were laughing together, away from their friend group before the confession happens (and gets hijacked).

With what's described in the book you could do either scenario, sneaking out or not being really alone* together ever (book just contradicts Catarina straying from Maria's side), they're kind of both extremes in interpretation though, being the anime more out there with the "she knowingly asked her with the capture targets in plain view and possibly (certainly) within earshot" than the manga's "they were alone after congratulating Nicol and people were searching for Catarina at some point". It doesn't suggest either one, there's undescribed windows of time before and after giving Nicol his bouquets (in which they might not have been with the group or always been with them) and then it's question time where apparently it's only Maria and Catarina there and then there's the canonical event of the confession being heard. Was Catarina thinking they were alone or just that there was enough space between them and the group that they wouldn't be heard? Both but each in a different universe.

*Alone not counting the party NPCs, those are everywhere.

[neverpathia]

you, my good sir, are a gem 💞💞💞 love all your stuff 🩷 any thoughts on how a smittunist meeting/conversation would go if they meet on or after happily ever after?

WAHOO and i know this probably isn't exactly a writing request but here's a funny thing, i actually kind of had a scenario like this in mind, and i was kind of thinking about writing it out and posting it when this ask came in! so i might as well just kill two birds with one stone (heh) and answer this request while writing out that excerpt here mwahah

sigh. have i said that romance wasn't really my thing? perhaps fortunately for you all, I may have lied.

so this came out a little more shippy than intended, and it's a bit long so I'm sorry if it gets boring, and it's kinda ooc but it is what it is I guess

===== ===== ===== =====

What had he done wrong?

What had he done wrong? What had he done wrong?

What had he done wrong, what had he done wrong, what had he done wrong what-had-he-done-wrong what-had-he-done-wrong? The finest garments a Princess could ever have been clad in. The most lavish settings a Princess could ever have stepped into. The best meals, the best games, the best of everything that she could ever have asked for. It was perfect. All of it ought to be perfect.

The Smitten had given her everything, but for that, he had been reduced to nothing.

Less than nothing.

Because 'nothing' at least required a 'something' to define it, and she was supposed to be his 'something'. Once upon a time, she had been his 'everything', and she would have remained so for all of eternity. It was their happily ever after. Everything would have been bliss. Perfection. The last chapter of their story; the closure they had been offered once and for all.

But there was the Princess, and there was the rest of them—the rest of him—dancing under the starlit sky he had shunned so. Dirt beneath their feet, grass-blades scraping the skin of their legs.

And here he was, trapped in the cabin. The torches no longer burned and only the dark was left. He, too, was the dark now. He was one with the bleak nothingness inside, left to rot away as they pranced and laughed.

They all no longer required him. Perhaps they never had in the first place.

So he watched them dance as he faded, because it was the only thing left to do. Their movements were graceful, elegant, and so natural. There was something about it that his 'grand paradise' had so plainly lacked. He couldn't comprehend it. It lay beyond raw passion, beyond what he thought was-

"May I have this dance?"

Something, someone had entered the cabin. Someone familiar. Like that other heroic voice, or like the Smitten himself; he was a semi-corporeal shadowy echo floating just as he did. He seemed to know him, though he didn't recall meeting him. This one was wily and devious. He shouldn't have liked him.

Yet he felt inexplicably drawn to him, like they were meant to be one. He could tell that he had been a piece of the Decider, the Hero. They both had. And the Smitten had felt the same pull at the banquets and games, but it had been resisted for all their sakes. How had it not been enough? How had it not been enough?

"Why have you come?" The Smitten's voice, once reserved only for the Princess's ears, came out far too hoarse. "Leave me be. Allow me to decay in solitude."

The other one, the Opportunist, cocked his head. "Hm, no, I don't think so."

Before the Smitten could respond, the Opportunist grabbed his hand and yanked him back onto the grand carpets. He pushed him—pulled him—twirled him around—

"Begone." The Smitten, weakened as he was, could only manage a low angry murmur. "I did this. It was I who failed to cover every eventuality. And she is unhappy. I made her unhappy. I...made...her...unhappy."

"Yes, that's true," said the Opportunist, but he continued with the dance.

Here they were, cavorting about a hollow mimicry of a palace, when at least one of them should have been dancing with the Princess instead. Outside. Where the Smitten had failed to take her; where he could have saved everything.

"So?" Resignation sat heavy, thick and bitter beneath Smitten's tone. He tried to wrench his hands away from his new partner's, but for some reason, he couldn't. "Isn't that what I deserve? Harken, am I not the true villain of this new story? Go forth. Enjoy your happy ending while it lasts."

Opportunist stepped to the side, his fingers still splayed across Smitten's palm as he shrugged with one shoulder. "Well, this ending looks like the Princess and the Decider's. Doesn't have to just be theirs, though. It could be ours too."

"I do not remain one of you any longer," Smitten spat. "For how should I?"

The Opportunist smirked, a horrible mirror of the Smitten's own smile at them from across the table earlier. "But you were! At least I remember you. Besides, this can still be a happy ending for everyone! Including you."

He brought his mouth closer to the Smitten's ear. "Or, forget about you, I'm the one who wants this dance."

Smitten was too tired for rage. "Why?"

"Well, I can't quite put my finger on it myself," Opportunist mused. "But it's like, the Decider and that other one and you and me and the Princess, we're all fragments of the same thing, you know? Except there's two major parts, us and the Princess."

Opportunist paused for a bit, silent in contemplation, but he and Smitten continued to move in tacit harmony.

"There it is," said Opportunist. "Of course I'm drawn to the Princess, we all are. But I feel more drawn to you. Because the Princess and the rest of us, well, the crack between us is too wide and we're too separate. And even if I'd joined their dance, there's still a missing piece somewhere, and I suppose it must be you. But you're a closer thing to me than she is. We fit tighter, better perhaps."

Opportunist bowed forward and Smitten leaned back in response. Their bodies pressed close together: chest against chest, hand clasped in hand, fingers gently intertwining.

"So that's how it is." The Smitten stared into the Opportunist's eyes, but he didn't know how to read them. It all felt so right and it all felt so wrong; it felt so impossible; it felt like something that he should never have been able to feel.

And he couldn't understand it at all.

"How dare you?" Smitten rose, forcing the Opportunist backwards. "How dare you utter such...balderdash?"

"It's just how I felt, since I know you like feelings so much."

"No. This is nonsense! The Princess is the only absolute right. We must be with her, you must be one with her. How could you forgo such a chance? How could you forsake her, how could you choose to stay behind in this wreck and deny your true happy ending, how could you? Do you go against her? Are you mad, are you impertinent? For we have wronged and I may not make right, but you...you. How dare you?"

"How dare me?" This angered the Opportunist. "As if you did anything right! As if you're not the one responsible for her suffering in the first place! We ate and we ate and we ate then we played and we played—do you know how boring it got? How stale? And then it all lost its meaning and everything was just so empty! And you caused it, and you forced her to sit through everything! She was so scared! So before you even think about going all 'oh, how dare you, how dare you,' think about that first."

For a few beats, no one spoke. And still they danced, two shadows, graceful blank silhouettes amidst the vast unlit chambers.

"Alright, I take everything back," said Opportunist. "In the end, you've lost. Look at you. You were so powerful that reality itself bent according to you and your simpy little desires. And now, what are you? An exhausted little thing."

The Opportunist led the dance, steering him this way and that, with but a few flicks of his wrists and turns of his heels. He grinned. "So I'm still a winner, and you're still the loser here."

Smitten glared at him. "Have you no shame?"

"Not one bit, no."

"You have come to gloat, then? To laugh at my fall?"

"Why, yes I have! Can't say I don't enjoy it. See? I've come up on top. Just as I've always wanted."

And the Opportunist did laugh, throwing his head back as he cackled and shook. Amused, he veered aside, dragging the Smitten with him in a circle.

"So that was you," Smitten seethed. "The one who said we could stay in the cabin, she and I. The one who started everything. You caused it. You. You!"

"Yes." Opportunist sighed. "Fine, I admit it. I did something wrong there."

He violently jerked Smitten's arm backwards with his own, as if he wanted to wrench it from its socket.

"But who was the one who ripped our heart out?" demanded Opportunist. "And who made this whole place like this, and did everything he could to keep her unhappy? That definitely wasn't me. No, I think it was—"

"No more, I beseech you." Smitten interrupted. "I..."

He hesitated.

"I did make her unhappy. And right now, she's happier. Without me."

"Of course she is. You brought this loss upon yourself, lover-boy. Now isn't that satisfying."

Smitten didn't speak.

"I do agree with you, to be honest," said Opportunist. "You do deserve this. To fade away alone and unloved."

Smitten looked up at him. "Then why do you still take my hand in yours?"

Opportunist didn't respond either.

And there was another moment of silence. They quietly dared each other to pry apart their hands, to cease this dance, to stop these motions altogether.

But they didn't.

"Something about this still feels whole," said Opportunist. "I'm more complete here. Don't you feel it?"

"I don't know." The Smitten averted his gaze. "Truth be told, I don't know how it's meant to feel. But I think I do."

A few more steps. A few more turns. Pulling together, falling apart, pulling close again.

"This feels more complete," whispered Smitten.

"It does," said Opportunist. "But I still don't like what you did."

"And nor do I," said Smitten. "You vile, scheming wretch."

"You delusional lovesick psycho."

"..."

"...Are you scared to let go too?"

Something grey threatens the edges of their sight. Yet they dance still.

"I am."

Something ancient pulls at them, passes over the walls and floors. Yet they dance still.

"But you know I still can't forgive you, right?"

Something feathered reaches out and away, consuming, morphing, becoming. Yet they dance still.

"I know what I've done. I'm sorry, I truly am."

Something taloned stretches into the long quiet, and a mirror is touched. And the dance ends; still they stand hand in hand.

"I hate you." The Opportunist reaches out and pulls the Smitten into an embrace.

"I hate you." The Smitten reciprocates, resting his head against his shoulder, pulling him in, ever closer.

Shards of broken glass dissipate into oblivion.

[whimsicalish]

Sienna finds comfort in the strangest place.  

around 2k words

Cw for suicidal thoughts and ideation, implied death. There are references to the previous movies and Art is his own warning. Sienna isn't having a good time. 

- 

Fair warning- I do not consider myself to be a writer. I just couldn't get this idea out of my head and i thought i could try. So here is my attempt. This fic isn't meant to be shippy and it'd be appreciated if it wasn't viewed that way.

On that note: English isn't my native language so i apologize for any possible errors and mistakes.

-

Sienna's life was left in shambles after that Christmas night. Her uncle was gutted and nailed to their kitchen wall, her aunt was dead in the living room and Gabbie was gone. And Jonathan- she didn't want to think about him. She doesn't think she could handle it right now.  

Her wounds slowly stitched themselves together. Sienna felt numb. She was covered in blood; she was shaking both from the shock of the events that just unfolded, and from the cold. 

The cold breeze from the opened window reminded her that he was still out there, that he got away. The sadistic fuck who ruined her life was still alive and he was who knows where. Sienna wanted to scream. She wanted to scream and cry and tear her hair out- but she felt too exhausted to move. She felt too exhausted to do anything. 

She sat on the floor, staring ahead at nothing. She doesn't know how long she sat there, but it felt like she had been there for years. 

- 

Life moved on, but Sienna couldn’t. She got the house and all their belongings. She was the only surviving relative. She felt like her life was slipping past her, she felt like everything was moving and she was stuck in place.  

She was on a treadmill but she couldn’t get up, she couldn’t get her legs under her and stand up and run.  

Sienna felt... defeated. What did she have left? What did she have left to live for? 

Her therapist told her she needed to get out and start a new life. She told her she needed to find people to talk to- to find new friends, but Sienna couldn’t. She didn't know how to talk to people. She was paranoid and she was terrified still. Art was still out there, he was still alive, and Sienna knew it was just a matter of time before he came after her again. She wouldn't get anyone else involved. She couldn't bear the thought of being responsible for another death.  

Her therapist was nice. She was nice but Sienna didn't know how to open up. She didn't know how she could talk about the things that happened. She didn't know what she would even say. She didn't know why she decided to even go to therapy. She knew no one would be able to help her. She knew she couldn't talk about the things that actually happened- she knew she could never talk about the whole “demon” thing nor the immortal thing. 

She thought maybe if she had someone there to just talk to her it would help. Maybe she thought that she would be able to talk about it with someone at least a little bit- maybe she hoped she would be able to open up to someone- but she didn’t see herself making any progress.  

She was wasting the therapists time.  

It was almost a year.  

Siennas life was taken from her, and she didn't know how to get back on her feet. She missed her brother. She missed Jonathan. She wanted him back. 

Christmas was coming again, and Sienna didn’t know if she would be able to handle it. Both Halloween and Christmas were ruined for her. Now all she could think about when she saw cute or creepy decorations was Art. Whenever she heard a Christmas song or any sort of Christmas carol, she felt like she couldn't breathe. She felt like she was back in the terrifier, she felt like she was back in her aunt's living room, tied to a chair, forced to watch those two murder her remaining family. 

It was suffocating. Everything reminded her of the clown, everything around her reminded her of her dead family. She couldn’t stop thinking about the face of her auntie just before she got murdered, she couldn’t stop thinking about Gabbies terrified expression when Art dragged her into the room, she couldn’t stop thinking about seeing her slip with the sword deep into the pit-  

She couldn’t stop imagining all the horrendous details, she couldn’t stop thinking about all the blood and the gore around her- the thick smell of all the blood making her sick to her stomach. She couldn’t get the smell out of her nose for weeks, still feeling like her nose was stuffed with all the blood of her now dead family. She would never forget the stench of blood and gore- she would never forget the smell of her family's blood. 

Everything felt so overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time and she didn’t know what to do, how to function. 

Most of her days were spent sitting at home, stuck in her own mind. She was struggling the five years after the first time she encountered Art, and she was finally starting get better, but now- now she went through the same thing again and she felt like she couldn't do anything. She lost everything and everyone again and she didn't know if it was even possible to move on from something like that. How do you move past that amount of trauma? How do you deal with something like that?  

Sienna wanted nothing more than to just go back to her old life. 

Getting groceries at the mall used to be a normal, casual and an easy task. Now, however, it felt overwhelming. She was scared, constantly looking over her shoulders and checking around to make sure he wasn’t there- that he wasn’t watching her, that he wasn’t waiting for her somewhere. Sienna knew for sure that he was out there, and it was just a matter of time before he got her. 

She couldn’t help the anxiety creeping up on her every time she left the house, every time someone passed by her that she couldn’t see, every time she felt someone brush against her. Sienna hated feeling so scared and being so skittish. She felt like a wild animal sometimes.  

- 

Sienna stood frozen. He was there. He was right there, in her kitchen, making hot chocolate out of all things. The man who ruined her life, the man who killed everyone she ever cared about- the man who traumatized her- standing in her kitchen, making hot chocolate. The sweet smell of the warm liquid almost made her want to throw up.

She thought back to last year when he was standing there, nailing her uncles dead and decapitated body to the wall.  

She felt like crying. She wanted to scream and yell, she wanted to get angry, she wanted to dash for a knife and stab him, she wanted to run it through his heart and gut him herself, she wanted to skin him alive and ask him how it felt. She wanted to make him scream and she wanted to hear his voice. She wanted to hear him be in pain. (She wasn’t sure if he even could talk, but the thought of making him scream in pain filled her with warmth.) 

She couldn’t move. All that anger, all that want to get her revenge- all those overwhelming feelings disappeared as soon as they appeared, and all she could feel in that moment was resignation. All the fight left her. All the anger, the terror- it was all just gone. She felt exhausted and desperate and resigned. 

She felt tears slipping down her cheeks.  

She wanted to fight- but she knew there was no point. She wanted to run and scream and hide away to never be seen again- but she knew there was no point. He would always come back to haunt her, he would always come back to finish the job. There was nothing Sienna could do.  

He was here to have his fun, he was here to end her, and Sienna had no fight left in her to even try and fight back if he tried. 

Her breath hitched in her throat as she felt her knees give out. She reached for the chair in front of her to support her weight. She knew running away wouldn't help her. He would come for her if she didn't end him first. And she didn't know how to. She didn't have the will to try. She lost everything and everyone in her life- what does she have to lose? Her life doesn't feel like hers anymore. It feels like it's his.  

Sienna stumbling and catching the chair to support herself was what got the clowns attention.  

He turned around from his place at the stove and he smiled when he saw her. He was excited to see her.

Sienna didn’t know how to feel. She almost felt relieved. The clowns presence brought along with it such raw fear and anxiety- it felt familiar. Comforting almost. She closed her eyes as tears slipped down her face. 

When she opened her eyes again she saw Art has turned away from her again and he was now pouring his hot chocolate from the pot into a mug.  

Sienna felt like laughing at the absurdity.  

The clown wasn’t paying attention. She could try and end him right now. She could cut off his head again, she could choke him from behind, she could stab him over and over again- but what would it matter? It wouldn’t do anything. He was seemingly immortal. And Sienna was tired of fighting. 

She slipped into the chair and sat down. 

The man turned around and put the mug in front of her and proudly presented it to her with a wicked smile that made her stomach turn. She looked at the mug before looking back at him. 

He appeared to be unarmed. Sienna didn’t feel relieved by that fact at all. She knew she was going to meet her demise soon. She knew he was going to have his way with her, with, or without weapons. He was going to torture her and kill her anyway.  

Sienna looked up at him. He was still smiling, looking at her. There was nothing in his eyes. They were scarily empty.  

“Why?” She asked, her voice weak and shaky. She wanted to be angry at him, she wanted to be furious, but she couldn’t find it in herself to get mad. She had no more to give. She just wanted to know why he did what he did.

Art just shrugged in an exaggerated manner, looking all innocent- well, as innocent as a killer clown can look. 

Sienna felt more tears welling up in her eyes. This man killed all her friends, her whole family, just because he was bored and felt like it. He did it just because he could, and Sienna was sure it was fun to him. 

She slumped forward, her head resting on her hands as a sob escaped her. She started crying silently. She was sure the clown was enjoying her pain. 

She heard him pull up a chair and sit down in it, right next to her. 

She felt a hand touch her shoulder in what she thought was a comforting gesture. 

Looking to the side at the clown, he had mock pity on his face. He was mocking her, laughing at her pain- and Sienna just broke. She sobbed and unwillingly leaned into the hand still on her shoulder. She felt the man tug her towards him and she let her body fall forwards into him.  

Art slowly enveloped her in a hug and Sienna could feel him shaking. He was laughing.  

He was laughing, he was comforting her to mock her- the killer, the monster who ruined her entire life- he was holding her close and comforting her just to remind her that she had no one else but him. She had no one and nothing left. All she had was her trauma and the painful memories. 

Sienna sobbed into his chest and despite her conflicting emotions- his tight embrace felt comforting, and the realization made Sienna sob harder as one of his hands started petting her hair.  

She felt safe in his arms, knowing he was going to be the one to kill her soon. 

The promise of death felt like heaven to her broken and tortured mind.