#too many shows suck the life out of ships once made canon

[differentdancesfandom]

I want to interact with so much cool Voltron stuff on Tumblr, but the more I do, the more Klance appears in my feeds, and as much as I love my M/M ships, I never shipped any the guys together on VLD. If I squint I get why Klance and Sheith exist, but I never really found my M/M VLD OTP. (Closest I got was some musings on Alfor/Coran, or Alfor/Zarkon as brothers-in-arms sex friends. I shipped Ulaz/Shiro for the one episode Ulaz was alive o(TヘTo).)

Keith/Lotor could be fun based on their parallel shared heritage, but I can't write Lotor/Pidge AND Keith/Lotor at the same time, my brain can only fixate on one pairing per character when I'm in a creative mood.

And Lotidge has my heart more, so...plus, Lotidge has scarcely over 100 fics on Ao3, Keith/Lotor has 900; I tend to go where I can add something new.

Hell, there isn't really an MM VLD ship I actively read.

The closest I've got for a VLD MM ship is a Thace-centric side story to Lack of Scientific Consensus Concerns Me (I haven't abandoned this series entirely, folks), and the ship I have in mind was inspired by a comment someone left on LoSCCM; the relationship tag on Ao3 says it's even more of a rarepair hell than Lotidge, because of course my brain won't let me write ships people actually want to read.

[maxphilippa]

i'm genuinely just saying that the ii fandom should try to not put their ships on basic dynamics because when you watch the media itself you realize that they're wayyyy more complex than that, and that the content that gets made off it feels one dimensional and like people don't really get why their dynamic/friendship works at all, or simplify their attributes completely disregarding the other relationships the characters in said ship have.

nickloon works because of suitcase mattering so much to both of them. now this is something that most of the fandom doesn't get because they don't get nickel's character at all and often portray him as an gay asshole, but i've made a lot of analysis on his behaviour, so you can check my posts on him if you're interesed to learn why suitcase is so important to him too. however they're so much more than just "a weird gay thing", they're an story of growth and realizing that you were wrong, how much love they have and how you can learn and change for the better, as someone who went through that same thing and now i have a best friend thanks to that, seeing how people only put them on one dynamic disregarding completely the reason as to WHY they're like that is pretty boring. they work because had so many issues at hand and needed communication in order to work through it. their care towards one person (suitcase) is what made them be so angry at eachother and what ultimately made them become friends as well, but the way they genuinely ended up wanting to be friends and caring so deeply for eachother is what speaks the most. sure, nickel cared about baseball and all, but balloon was ultimately the reason as to why he lets go of the rough attitude, and decides that he does want to fix what he has done, that he wants to become a better person and friend.

lightbrush works as an POST canon ship, not as one that happens on s2, nor should people ignore the fact that paintbrush was often angered/stressed by lightbulb's behaviour for most of the show. it works because ultimately they're both struggling to come to terms with themselves, and lightbulb gets to finally understand why she was messing up so much and genuinely showed care for paintbrush, who was ultimately struggling with themselves, you know, coming out and all that. what people don't get by making their relationship just an "silly random fella x hot headed person" is that they're both so much more than that. lightbulb has depression and her terrible copying mechanisms are what made her suck so much as a team captain, and paintbrush wanted stability and for someone to actually listen to them for once. lightbulb gets to learn that life is much more complicated and that she has to be there for people if she wants genuine connections with others, and she helped paintbrush on such a complicated moment, showing that they can work on an actual friendship post show, and that they do care about eachotther after all.

fantube is so much more complicated and emotional from what the fandom usually portrays. downgrading them to just an "girlboss x malewife" feels like they're not getting their characters at all and also like it's missing the point of their arcs being entwined by still making them act like their s2 pre-ep 14 selfs. both fan and test tube had severe issues with social interaction and grasping on what's real and what not, emotional communication often being their biggest struggle, and constantly got on arguments with others thanks to the fact that they couldn't "fit in". test tube shows to generally struggle understanding people and their feelings, meanwhile fan is more so aware of those, he still struggles with understanding that the game is very real and that he can't keep running away from the fact that change IS very real. they both made eachother grow because fan made test tube aware of feelings, and test tube made fan aware of growing and learning. they're both pretty equal on their own terms and they had bad copying mechanisms through s2 as a whole, except for their elimination of course, where they make amends and start over. they trust eachother and are pretty much partners, whether romantic or not, they are a team. a duo. they're just trying their best after all, and still struggle a lot with feelings at times. but that's why they work it through talking: the thing that they couldn't do at all before.

i really like/enjoy these ships on their own and i kinda hope that the fandom starts to actually get the characters and understand them properly, i would've also talked about silvercandle, but that is a whole can of worms and after iii 18, i have an overall more negative/neutral stance on the fandom perception of them.

this is just a recollection of thoughts, too.

[rxttenfish]

What's your favorite thing about MirAvi or like top five favorite things about them as a couple/ship?

god i love love LOVE just the parallels with them..... like ive always been a "miranda is deeply traumatized and Not Fucking Okay" truther for YEARS but only after getting into aaravi's angle and her story did i realize theyre pretty much two sides to the same coin, two ways to respond to the same trauma and try to keep Going On from all of it. and for the two of them to be so marked by a profound loneliness and a lack of understanding on how to even begin filling that on top of a denial of BEING lonely or upset in the first place? mwah. mwah mwah mwah.

the character study aspect. like ive made my irritation known prior about the common fandom habit of mashing two characters together without truly considering their personalities, and i think to do that with either miranda or aaravi is a crime. they have such STRONG personalities and absolutely would have just SO MANY reactions to and feelings about the other that its like mixing volatile chemicals together just to see what happens. theyre going to bounce off of each other for sure but seeing HOW they bounce off of each other is so deeply delightful for me that you just KNOW theres not a boring moment for them. maybe moments where theres a lull in the energy, but in such a directed and specific way that even getting into the domestic with them is exciting.

hey so you know how aaravi is dedicated to managing to kill an outer god just to show everyone that it can be done, and how the slayers were originally set up to minimize eldritch influence and corruption, and how the merkingdom is now canonically dedicated to fighting and staving off the influence of the eldritch as much as possible? yeah. even just beyond this being weirdly relevant to my highly canon divergent lore i think its just Neat how this is a direct parallel between them in the mess that is roadtrip

i sincerely think aaravi needs someone to just, unironically, no catch, with her whole heart, absolutely meaning every word, praise her and compliment her. just... i need this for her. i love to see it crop up again and again in every little thing miri does for and with aaravi and how genuinely she loves aaravi because aaravi has had so LITTLE of this in her life. its always come with someone trying to push her further, trying to put her down, even the best compliments are halfhearted or still holding her up as failing an impossible standard. teasing her for being a failgirl is fun and all but i feel like it often goes far beyond teasing and instead sits at how most people actually view aaravi, and that SUCKS. having someone with whom that doesnt even come to mind would be so good for aaravi. no other references. nothing for her to be compared against. no hero trope that she is or isnt fulfilling. just a princess who is actually sincerely taking everything aaravi says to heart and listening to her and paying attention to her. so many times ive been writing them and have aaravi be DESTROYED by miranda saying she wants to protect HER like how aaravi protects miranda, or that she feels too safe around aaravi to even really consider that she might hurt her, or just genuinely trusting aaravi with her whole heart. its SO cathartic. absolutely fantastic.

this is self evident but being given an excuse to go whole ham fleshing miranda out and giving her weight as a character and history and complexity. i already talk so much about how fanon (and now canon....) gets miranda wrong and this is fully an excuse to talk about all of that. there is absolutely no way you could NOT talk about it, once you get into how they interact and bounce off of each other, and how the relationship forms, and what their expectations and wants are for that relationship. miranda is sincerely a very fun character to ship with because its never just ONLY about her. her kingdom is such a major player in all of her relationships that you HAVE to consider her standing in it, and what the merkingdom thinks of her partner, and what the merkingdom would demand of both of them, and how the other royals would react, and the culture clash, and just MWAH. PERFECTION. love love LOVE them both getting an "its complicated" for their life and family history and i just want to mash them both together into a horrible conflicting stew that they have to navigate and navigate together because it was already so hard on their own but at least now they have someone else in the same boat. love for them to make it work and see how they get out of it. together.

[chanbig]

For the character break down, Vegas please and thanks.

let's break his ass DOWNN!!!

VEGAS

How I feel about this character

I find him very very interesting, more than I show on this blog LMAO but he's one of my favs from the show. he is complex in a way that I really enjoy. he carries himself with obvious swagger but it's almost too obvious/too much, so it's a role he makes himself play, to various levels of success. i love a man who masks his tender feelings but kind of sucks at it. because then you see him inflicting pain and he so obviously enjoys it, there's no swagger there, this is perhaps one place where his true desires and the role he has to fulfill intersect, and he doesn't have to hide it anymore, he is made for this kind of work and it is soo interesting to see that come out. but alsooo crucially he wants to take care of someone/something, he wants that connection even if he isn't sure what to do with it, isn't sure how he can keep it, or if he's worthy of it. he wants his dad's approval so bad but his dad sucks so much, which is a dynamic I love to see - someone trying so hard to be terrible when their instinct is to be soft. I think he has a lot of interesting traits and Bible played him SO well, handling the vulnerability and facade of toughness very well. plus he and Pete made out after beating each other up which is always a good dynamic.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

i love vegaspete, there is so much going on there I'd love to see them post-canon, figuring things out. I love the power play between them, the s/m aspect, finding love or something like it in the worst place ever. I also love vegasporsche, their chemistry was amazing, Porsche isn't afraid to stand up to Vegas, Vegas wants to impress Porsche, they fight well together, I think they'd be good fuckbuddies tbh!!! or something more who knows. i think that he and ken hooked up. at least once. kinnvegas also for even more fucked up family dynamics, feat. vegasporsche proxyfucking perhaps. many terrible but interesting choices to be made with Vegas

My non-romantic OTP for this character

im not sure what this means like a brotp? 🤔 I'd say either porschevegas best friends who fuck occasionally, or Vegas and Macau as brothers, in the sense that any world where Vegas is, Macau needs to be there, because he's obviously one of the most important parts of vegas's life

My unpopular opinion about this character

tbh I am not sure what opinions are popular or unpopular about Vegas 🤔 I think he probably wouldn't be content to totally cut himself out of the mafia business post-canon, something tells me too much of his life has been spent trying and grasping and living in that world that to leave it entirely would leave him wanting and unbalanced. it's bad for him but I think he'd find it hard to let go.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

PORSCHEVEGAS KISS!!! I would like to see it

Give me a character to break down

[againstacecilia]

A Path Changed

Pairing: Din Djarin x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 1.9k

Rating: M, series is E so minors DNI

Warnings: Canon-typical violence, angst, this one gets emotional, gun use.

A/N: Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for getting to 300 followers! I know I've said this before, but I'm so thankful and grateful for all of you being here. I'm so excited to share this chapter with you! All I'll say is: enjoy the ride. 😉 @creatively-analytical is forever and always the best beta reader, thank you love. 💖 Asks are always open!!

You woke up as the shuddering of the ship knocked you from your seated position. Cursing the crick in your neck and sore back, you stood up and stretched. Suddenly, you realized you were taking off and you shot up the ladder to the cockpit. 

You clumsily scaled the ladder, sleep still ebbing from your veins, and found the door already open. “Where are we going?” you say as soon as you straighten up on the landing, “I thought we were staying here?”

“I got a tip from Tonis early this morning, the bounty your fiance is tracking was seen on Batuu last night. The planet isn’t too far from here.”

“And you were going to tell me this, when?” You snapped, strapping into your chair behind him. 

“Now,” he said, flipping a couple of switches.

“Anything else I should know?”

He answered with silence. A common occurrence, you’d found. You were left to simmer in your anger at being left out of the loop as the ship sped away from Jakku, leaving the oceans of sand behind you. 

After a night of poor sleep, the hum of the engines quickly lulled you into a doze and you let yourself drift. Vague dreams of Arlon floated through your mind, filling you with joy and sadness all at once. Even in your dreams, you missed him. 

Before you knew it, a light touch on your shoulder was waking you. 

“Hey,” Mando’s voice was soft, “We’re here.”

You dragged your eyes open, blinking the sleep away as soft light filtered in through the windows and reflected off Mando’s armor. “I didn’t realize I had fallen asleep, sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for,” he responded, straightening up and heading toward the ladder. 

You unbuckled and stood to follow. Climbing down, you noticed Mando strapping various weapons to his belt from a closet against the wall. Guns you’d never seen before slipped into holsters, while knives of all sizes were slipped into pockets and hiding places all over his body. 

“Wow. That’s a lot of weaponry…” You commented, uneasy about what his personal arsenal would mean for the day’s events. 

“You can never be too careful,” he said, strapping a rifle across his back.

“Why do you have so many?” You asked, crossing the small room to look in the cabinet, “How do you know what they all do?”

Mando reached into the cabinet over your shoulder before he answered, “Weapons are part of my religion. I’ve trained with them for most of my life.” He picked up a blaster and handed it to you.

“What are you doing?” you asked, staring at the weapon.

“You need something to protect yourself. This should work.”

“But,” you stuttered, still not taking the blaster from him, “I’ve never used one of these.” 

“I’ll give you a quick lesson before we head to the quarry’s last location. It won’t take long.”

You closed his fingers over the weapon and pushed his hand back towards him, shaking your head. “I’m more likely to hurt myself or someone innocent than actually use it to protect myself.”

His other hand reached up and gently nudged your chin up to look at him. “You’ll be fine.”

Something in his promise made you believe him, so you sucked in a breath and took the small blaster from him. Bright silver metal with beautiful filigree along the barrel shined in your hand. You went to put it in your waistband when Mando interrupted.

“Ah ah ah, let’s not do that,” he chuckled, handing you a leather strap with a holster. “This goes around your thigh and the blaster fits inside.”

He showed you how to clasp the holder around your hip and thigh, keeping a respectful distance and guiding you verbally. Once he was sure it was on correctly, you slipped the blaster into its place and you both headed down the ramp into the forests of Batuu. 

- - - - - - - -

“Alright, time for the basics,” Mando said once he had set up some empty ration containers to use as targets. You had found a clearing not far from the ship and Mando announced this was where you’d get your lesson. Mando ran through the parts of the gun; the grips and barrel, the sight and trigger. “Most importantly, always treat a blaster as if the safety is off. It’s better to assume the weapon is live than to make a mistake that could be costly.”

“Okay, I can do that. Um… Where’s the safety?”

A small sigh slipped through the modulator as Mando closed the distance between the two of you. He pointed at a small switch above the trigger.

“And the safety is on right now? Or, no, I’m supposed to assume it’s off…”

“Right now, it’s on. Let’s switch it off and see how your aim is, we don’t have much time,” Mando stepped away and gestured to the targets set up across the clearing. 

Cheeks burning with embarrassment, you flipped the safety and memorized the difference in the “off” and “on” positions. You lifted the blaster and closed one eye, aiming down the small sight on the top. 

“Stop,” Mando said before coming up to your side once again. He gestured to your hands, “May I?”

You nod and he repositioned your fingers along the grip, as well as shifted your arms and shoulders. “Relax, you’re too tense.”

You snorted, “Sure, I’ll just relax. As if anything about this situation is anything other than tense.”

“You can do it,” Mando said, stepping back. “Now, try and hit the targets.”

You spent the next 20 minutes firing at small tin boxes, hitting some, missing more, and generally learning the basics of the weapon. 

“That’s a good start,” Mando said after a time, “you should be able to at least hold someone off until I can get to you.”

You looked at him with an eyebrow cocked, “Is this a scenario you’re anticipating?”

“You can never be too careful,” he said again, echoing his statement from earlier. 

“Super reassuring,” you mumbled, flipping the safety on and holstering your blaster. “Come on, let’s get moving.” 

It took 20 minutes before the small outpost came into view through the trees. The path widened into a road leading straight into the makeshift town, small wooden buildings patched together lined the road. 

“This outpost was the most recent place the quarry was seen. We need to ask around.”

“Lead the way, Bounty Hunter,” you responded, scanning the buildings for people. “Although, it is really quiet… Do you think…”

Before you could finish the question, a shot rang through the air. Before you could react, Mando had thrown his body over yours. The impact of his body throwing you to the ground made your teeth rattle, but you didn’t have any time to worry about aches and pains as another blaster shot ricocheted off his beskar. 

“Back off, Mandalorian, the quarry is mine!” A voice echoed down the street from the direction of the gunshots. A familiar voice…

“Arlon,” you whispered as the ringing in your ears faded. “Mando, get off, that’s my fiance! Arlon!”

“You need to stay down…” Mando started, but you wiggled out from under him and stood up, already running toward the voice.

“Arlon, it’s me!” You shouted, legs and arms pumping and driving you closer to him. His eyes widened as recognition flitted across his face. He said your name in quiet surprise as you reached him, throwing your arms around his neck and holding him close. 

“I’m so happy you're alive, I’ve been so worried,” you buried your face in his neck and fought back the tears of joy threatening to fall. 

“What are you doing here?” Arlon asked, gently pulling you away from him. He looked hard into your eyes and scanned your face as if not totally believing you were standing in front of him.

“You didn’t come back and I was so worried,” your words started falling from your lips in a rush. “I asked Tonis what happened and he told me you had gone after some big bounty and then asked the Mandalorian to help me find you and we did it! We found you! And now you can work with Mando to get this quarry and come home!” Your breathing was heavy after you finished talking. You studied Arlon’s face for the happiness you were sure he’d feel but, instead, you saw… Anger. 

“Arlon… Say something,” you breathed. A pit formed in your stomach.

Arlon looked away from you, fist clenched at his side.“You weren’t supposed to follow me,” he said after a beat. He looked back at you, anger fully burning in his eyes now. “You were supposed to stay home and assume I died. I was banking on you being too scared to come after me; too weak to follow into the scary galaxy outside your little hole.”

Tears finally began to fall, but these weren’t tears of joy. Pain, searing and brutal, rushed through you as the meaning of his words began to set in. “Arlon… You don’t mean any of this…”

“I do mean it! Every word! You always kept me from being what I was capable of being, and the worst part is, I almost fell for it! And my parents, always so happy I had found such a good girl, always so ecstatic that I was going to be settling down and finally following the right path. Pathetic.” Then he pushed you, hands coming up to shove your shoulders quicker than you could react. 

You felt your body fall, but felt your heart fall faster. You could feel it shatter as it landed at the bottom of a pit deeper than you could fathom. Your world fractured around you as your body moved in slow motion toward the ground. 

Strong hands slipped under your arms and caught you before impact. Through the tears that flooded your eyes, you caught the swimming image of Beskar and a dark visor looking over you toward Arlon. Mando eased you to the ground, pulling you into a seated position against his chest. 

“Do we have a problem here?” Arlon asked, the sneer in his voice scraped through your ears. Mando ignored the question and looked down at you.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly, his voice as gentle as the hands holding you. 

You shook your head, words failing you. You tried, but the tears wouldn’t stop.

Mando squeezed your shoulders before helping you into a standing position. He shifted to stand in front of you and finally addressed Arlon. 

“Apologize.”

“Excuse me?” Arlon responded.

“Apologize to her.”

Arlon scoffed, “I have nothing to apologize for. She ruined my life for too long, and I needed to find my own path so I took my chance.”

In the blink of an eye, Mando had gone from standing in front of you to holding Arlon above his head by his collar. In the next blink, Arlon was on the ground.

“Arlon,” you started, reaching toward him.

“Don’t touch me!” Arlon shouted, scrambling to his feet. “If you didn’t get the hint the first time I’ll spell it out for you now: leave me alone and forget about me. I have no room in my life for boring, unimaginative, dreamless people with no ambition.” Without so much as looking at you or Mando again, he turned and ran down the road, disappearing down a side street. 

You watched him go, the echoes of your heart shattering still reverberating in your ears. The world lurched uncomfortably before tilting, and darkness swallowed you up.

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[multimetaverse]

HSMTMTS 2x09 Review

Spring Break was a bit of an odd ep but helped move some key plots forward. Let’s dig in!

Well people can no longer claim that Portwell is one sided. We finally got Gina’s pov and she starts off the ep uncertain whether the shift in their relationship means that EJ likes her but by the end of the ep she seems sure of herself and that EJ likes her back. I liked that she didn’t try to pretend that nothing had changed or that she hadn’t noticed potential signs that EJ might like her; it always sucks when tv characters act like idiots. 

Perhaps the most important reveal of this ep was that Gina has a much older estranged brother who left her and her mom many years ago. That certainly makes her backstory more tragic and is definite set up for her brother to eventually return.

The writers continue to give Portwell great tropes, capping this ep off with an airport rom-com trope that also calls back to EJ getting Gina the place ticket so she could come back in S1. Not only did Gina keep EJ’s Duke sweatshirt but she altered it to fit her better which is both sweet and bold in the assumption that it was hers to keep. Gina got her sign when not only did EJ show up to drive Gina home and take her luggage but he brought her the granola bar that she had wanted but forgot to pack. I wonder if her posting on her story that she was ubering home after her flight was cancelled was intended to see if EJ would show up since the camera focused on her posting it. Also sweet that she’s taken to calling EJ, ‘ Eej’. 

EJ’s opening was good, shows a lot of his character growth from the selfish guy he was in S1 and how he’s learned to value other people which of course leads into his feelings for Gina. We got another great use of the camera as character tonight when Gina was laughing after her facetime call with EJ until she realized that the camera was on her. 

Jack was a lot of fun. Though he didn’t really change Gina’s mind over anything like the ep description said he would.  Seemed like Gina was largely over Ricky and wondering about EJ at the beginning and the end solidified her feelings for EJ but Jack didn’t really play a role in that, it’s not like he encouraged Gina to reach out to EJ or anything. There’s a vague sense in which Jack being nomadic linked him to Ricky’s unreliability in Gina’s eyes with her craving stability but that’s a stretch. Jack mentioned that the second most dangerous part of a plane ride is when the plane takes off, a hint to the blossoming Portwell relationship where in order to take off one or both of them has to risk a confession even though they could be turned down.

This ep might seem a bit weird in hindsight. The zoom parts probably won’t age well and five years from now people might be wondering why they had Gina hang out with a manic pixie dream boy of sorts for an ep.

The path is clear for canon Portwell in the finale with EJ being Gina’s second chance at romance and her first kiss since they clearly telegraphed it out of nowhere. I’ve been impressed with the great work the writers have been doing since 2x05 to build up Portwell as a ship but also work on Gina and EJ as individual characters; they’ve been the highlight of the season so far. 

There was discourse this past week over how well or poorly Portwell has been set up. Objectively very few ships on this show get much in the way of set up or consistent writing. Redlyn and Kowie had barely any set up before getting together. Seblos had none (though in fairness that was due to Disney restrictions) and Miss Jenn and Mike Bowen didn’t have much set up either. Rini did get lots of development in S1 but that’s because they had already dated and were the main ship of the show. The show’s not really about slow burns, if Jenzzara canons in the finale they’ll count and if Rina ever got together they’d also count but neither of those ships have gotten consistent development with Mazzara not being in several eps and Gina and Ricky not even interacting for the past 3 eps. 

Is Portwell a slowburn? In a sense since they did feature quite a bit in each other’s S1 plot lines and even had a fake dating plot but it is true that they were platonic and not that close in S1 so it’s a wash. There was clear set up for romantic Portwell in 1x10 with team wonderstudies and Gina staring at EJ (which interestingly enough looked more like set up for Gina to pine over EJ). I think the main problem is that even though we saw Gina and EJ hanging out in the background we didn’t get any scenes of substance between them until 2x05. It was a mistake and there should have been some scene, like EJ and Gina commiserating in 2x03 over being single on Valentine’s Day or something like that. Hell there was even that still from 2x01 of EJ and Gina looking at each other at the piano while they were in the frame between Ricky and Nini singing and having a moment  which would have been good foreshadowing but that shot wasn’t in the ep.

Whether Tim just really wanted Portwell to be a surprise in 2x05 as a mid-season twist to throw the audience off of what looked like a Rini/Rina triangle or he was unsure as to whether he wanted to go with Portwell or if he just planned it out poorly we may never know. Regardless they’ve had great writing for 4 eps in a row now which puts them slightly ahead of the 3 eps in a row of development Rina got in S1. I’m sure if someone added up their screen time they’d find that Portwell has more screen time this season than Kowie and more screen time than Redlyn or Seblos  got in S1. 

Caswell cousins was fun and Ashlyn did in fact paint EJ’s nails. 

Set up for Seblos drama next week, it’s refreshing to see Seb being jealous over Carlos flirting with other boys that’s definitely not something you see on Disney shows.

Ricky got some healing done with his mom. Enough to cover their issues? No but this is probably the best this show is capable of. There was a brief mention of therapy sandwiched between other options which sounds more like checking off a box then setting up Ricky actually going to therapy. I noticed Lynne was smiling at odd times like when she told Ricky she knew about his breakup with Nini; whether that was poor directing or acting I don’t know. Who knows if we’ll see Lynne again. As an aside still so wild that Tim named Lynne who’s been a kinda shitty mom after his own mom who he seems to be fairly close with.

Really liked You ain’t seen nothin as a song but not a fan of the Tiktok style vid. I’ll level with you wildcats, I’m too old to really get Tiktok, it just seems like a crappy version of Vine to me. Let you go was good, seemed better fitted for Joshua Bassett’s voice than some of his previous songs. A big sign that they’re not circling back to Rini for a long time for sure. Though on that note we got a bit of a hint that Ricky was Nini’s muse which may one day come back as a way to help bring them back together. 

Looking Ahead:

If there’s only 3 weeks left till the Menkies, with only 2 weeks left for rehearsal due to spring break, it’s hard to see East High winning unless North High is disqualified or has to withdraw. 

Lily is in a promo photo so she’s likely the unexpected facetime Ricky gets which is what I had theorized. Also makes it much more likely that she’s the party crasher Ricky re-evaluates in the finale though what Tim actually wants to do with those two I do not know.

There’s little point in bringing back the Valentine’s chocolate since there’s no real stakes. Rini are already broken up, Gina hasn’t spoken to Ricky since 2x06, and it’s not like Nini and Gina were ever close so even if they stopped talking to each other it wouldn’t really affect the show in any way. 

Seems pretty likely that Second Chances refers to Gina realizing that her first try with Ricky failed but her second chance with EJ won’t and that leads to her sharing her truth and cue the Portwell confession and kiss, perhaps with an assist on EJ’s end from Mazzara. We’ve gone well past the point where Portwell can be brushed off as just a plot device to help Rina but Tim is playing with fire by getting the audience so on board with Portwell if he’s once again going to have EJ lose a girl he likes to Ricky in S3.

Gina certainly needs to talk with Ricky and I do think that happens in ep 11 or 12 and leaves them on better terms. As I mentioned last week, if Tim was smart he’d slam the door on Rina if he’s going with canon Portwell or vice versa. If he wants Rina to be a slow burn he’s really botched the writing this season, it’s been too one sided and too angsty to sustain any kind of momentum or audience interest. They haven’t even interacted for 3 eps now and not only has it not affected the show but it’s inarguably made Gina’s story line much better.  Again I don’t think he’s smart enough to not try and do Portwell and then later Rina but he’s accidentally set up the Rina story line to quite easily slam the door permanently on them by having their conversation be closure for Gina who’s moved on and an apology from Ricky who never liked her back as much as Gina liked him.

Not looking forward to seeing Nini basically live out Olivia Rodrigo’s life in future seasons

Curious to see Carlos’ apology song to Seb. Ricky helping him with it is a great way to help start redeeming Ricky’s character in the audiences eye’s. According to Matt there is a bit of a Ricky/EJ rivalry this season and if it’s really happening the sleepover would be a good place to do it though I hope it’s not about Gina. 

Until next week wildcats.

[wthtorke]

Can I get a human saving crucified predator and they escape together on the ship and live happily ever after?

You wouldn't die here. You refused to. Stuck with a group that would leave you behind as bait if the chance was there, no. You refused to.

As your group was chased yet again, everyone darting towards a general direction in hopes not to get murdered by the aliens, you took your chance. Running in the opposite direction, towards their camp, praying they were too busy with the others.

There was one of them in the camp. No, he was like them, but not one of them. You could tell the difference.

He was strapped to a pillar, arms painfully strained back as they held all his weight, breathing barely there. He looked sickly, skin too pale, muscles twitching, and face tiredly. You knew he wouldn't hurt you, not if you freed him.

Even then, being an alien, you couldn't help but feel for him. He looked ashamed, still enough fire in him to roar and snap at your group when you had approached, tusks flaring and tresses whipping in a way that told he wasn't dead, not only that but he was still dangerous.

Ignoring every instinct you had about this, you carefully made your way around the camp, spotting him in that same pillar, head jerking up when he heard your footsteps, growling as his tusks twitched. Warning.

You take a shaky breath and an even shakier step towards him, holding both of your hands up to show you meant no harm. -"Come on man, I mean-, well yeah, man? I think you're a dude, sorry if you're a lady," you said nervously approaching, "It must hurt a lot h-huh?" You stuttered as a particular louder growl made you jump a little bit, "B-Bet I could help" You gulped, staring at the fallen blade close to the pillar, "But let's agree on something first, y-yeah?", his growling took up at the mention of a bargain, spikey brows furrowing together in anger. -"I know, it sucks but we need each other, right? You're too...um...handsome to die here and I'm...well, I'm too fucking young," You said, picking up the blade, pointing it away from him.

-"I'm gonna take you out and we um, we flee I guess, yes? Fuck, I hope you can understand me, I didn't pay attention at school so if you speak Spanish I'm so sorry but I suck," You cleared your throat, "So, you, me, and ship?" You said, pointing at him, yourself, and then making a flying away motion with your free hand, "Forever, far away, yeah?" You continued, hand going further and further away, his eyes following your hand briefly before his gaze burned back into you.

You nodded, lifting the blade, watching for his reaction. When he didn't growl or flinch, you landed a hit against the shackles, the alien falling stiff onto the ground, limbs numb and painfully set to stone from being like that for days. 

You gasped as in a blink he was up again, grabbing you by your shirt and bringing your face close to his, tusks flaring as he growled, analyzing your face closely, the bottom tusks scraping against your throat ever so slightly, making you shiver, eyes widening as you tried not to move. 

He must have found whatever he was looking for as he let you go. Not shoving you back or pushing you down but simply releasing you, walking away to retrieve his cracked mask from the ground. Snapping it in place, you jerked back as his whole armor shone bright with electricity before the lights vanished completely. "Whoa ma-," You didn't get to finish your sentence as he grabbed you again, just in time for distant screaming to reach your ears.

The group. The aliens.

Your legs barely touched the ground as he all but hauled you with him, running towards an open clearing. Only to have you cursing as he pressed a few buttons into his wrist gauntlet, the ship's cloaking device turning off much to your relief and worry at the same time.

Losing no time, Crucified opened the gate, grabbing your arm and running in, sealing it closed behind him. Rushing to the main panel, Crucified set to work on getting the ship ready to go, not that he knew where to. Just away from death was good for now. He growled and pointed at one of the three oversized thrones that were set by the panels. “You got it, chief! No need to ask twice!” You sat down, pulling on the straps around your form, adjusting them to secure your smaller body, trying not to think which of the three space Michael Myers sat there before.

Thoughts were cut short when a victorious roar left Crucified’s mask, the ship quickly acting on its commands, lifting off the ground, your heart hammering against your ribcage as hard as the ship shook with power as it took off. Your smile lasted for three seconds until the panels went blood red and sirens started blaring, Crucified roaring in anger as he pressed many buttons at once, fingers moving fast and with purpose as a blue blast of energy hit the front window, making you scream in surprise and cling to your chair. They were trying to take the ship down.

Panicked screaming died in your throat as you panted looking at Crucified, ‘hurry’ and ‘do something!’ wouldn’t help now, and if you did survive, you surely did not want to be stuck with an angry alien for a whoever knows how long ride in space. You did scream again, however, as another blast whacked against the glass, a light blue shield lifting seconds after. 

Crucified growled as he kept fighting for control of the ship, accessing the main server of the ship, putting up his defenses to make it recognize Berserker’s trials to blow up the ship as a threat and not just a command from the ship’s owner. 

While still having to pilot the ship away from the reserve.

Crucified forced the stiffness away from his fingers as he finally won the battle for control, activating the space rift control, which lit up another two buttons before the other two chairs. Crucified roared at you, tresses whipping as he pressed the button in front of him while holding the shield up manually with his other hand.

Eyes widening, you slammed both hands onto the panels from the chair you were on, the button in front of you and the one almost too far off to reach turning green along with Crucified’s, a beam blasting from the ship and out into the sky, opening up a rift that led to an obscure somewhere in the galaxy. Crucified let go of the button, speeding the ship towards the rift as yet another canon blast hit the back of the ship. You closed your eyes as the ship neared the rift. All the sirens and noises suddenly ceasing seconds later. 

Panting hard, you only opened your eyes as you heard Crucified dropped down on the chair at your side, head snapping to look at him, whose chest was rising and falling just as fast as yours. You looked around, noticing that you were not in the reserve anymore. That instead of jungle and death, you were now surrounded by stars and -possible- death. The panel still looked red but in a soft glow, as if things were fine now.

You looked back at Crucified to find him looking back at you. Realization caught up as you started chuckling in relief, hand coming up to your forehead to wipe off the sweat of dread and panic. Chuckling evolved to a soft laugh soon enough, “You’re fucking genius, partner,” You said as he huffed, straightening up to mess with the panel again. 

-“I don’t know about you but-, I have no idea what to do now” You laughed nervously, Crucified stilling his movements as he considered this. He shook his head slightly.

He also didn’t.

-“Humans suck,” You started, Crucified huffed. “Your kind also sucks, apparently,” Crucified....couldn’t deny that. “What I see is that you don’t suck and I, well...I try not to suck, so-, what do you say we just-, watch each other’s backs for now, yeah? Just-, y’know, as friends? Partners?” You said, hopefully.

Crucified slowly turned to face you, the passive expression of the broken mask not giving you any hints of his actual expression, even if you could see a bit of his left eye through the hole in it.

-“Partners.” 

You sighed in relief, smiling brightly, “Partners! We’re gonna be best mates, you’ll see!”

After a year of living together on the ship, not only watching each other’s backs as it was first agreed but taking care of each other, a bond was fully formed. And a year after that, your prediction proved to be right, only that it was a different kind of ‘mates’ that you and Crucified would come to be.

Not that any of you complained, living your best life as best mates could. Together forever.

[jadelotusflower]

It’s Cold in that Fridge: The Case of Nakari Kelen

Since The Case of Mara Jade has been doing the rounds again, I’ve finally gone back to this post that has been sitting in my drafts for literally years. So let’s honour this absolute badass who deserved better:

Once upon a time, the Star Wars universe was but six films (and a tv series) in the story of the Skywalker family. But beyond George Lucas’ story was an absolute boatload of books, comics, games, and other materials that made up the Expanded Universe. When Disney purchased Lucasfilm and the rights to the Star Wars saga, everything in this universe was decanonised and deemed “Legends” - some aspects of this universe were retained or re-purposed, others sit in Disney’s figurative vault and will likely never see the light of day (and seeing how the ST turned out, maybe that’s for the best).

But this transition between Legends canon and Disney canon was not so simple, because the nature of publishing meant that there were novels approved during the time of Legends canon that would be released in the time of Disney canon. In particular, there had been the planned trilogy “Empire and Rebellion”, set between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, with each novel from the perspective of one of The Big Three.  

Razor’s Edge (Leia) and Honor Among Thieves (Han) were released prior to the Great Canon Split of 2014.  But while the Luke-centric novel had been planned, it was not due to be released until well after the Split. So Heir to the Jedi (so called as an homage to the Legends progenitor Heir to the Empire) became one of the first books of the Disney canon.

What does this background have to do with Nakari Kelen?  Perhaps nothing, but I do wonder how the writing process was affected by the shift from Legends to Disney - was the novel a relic of the old EU with any reference the LFL storygroup didn’t like excised during editing, or was it a trendsetter for the new EU, a Sign of Things to Come?  

The most salient point being, of course, that Nakari Kelen - like so many love interests before her - was not allowed to go along her merry way at the conclusion of the novel, but was shoved into the fridge.

If there was one constant of the Legends EU, it was that Luke Skywalker’s love interests couldn’t catch a break. Mara Jade naturally lasted the longest relationship-wise, with almost twenty years of marriage to Luke before some bright spark decided she had to go (as per the aforementioned case study). But before Mara there was Jem, Shira Brie, and Gaeriel Captison (who came close to escaping the curse), and in the Legacy of the Force series they brought back sole survivors Akanah and Callista, only to kill them off for good too (and rather brutally, if I may add).

So perhaps when Kevin Hearne began writing HttJ within the confines of the Legends continuity, he was merely sticking to the status quo, or perhaps once subsumed by Disney they needed to make sure Luke's slate was clean (so to speak).  And I can’t put all the blame on Hearne since I don’t know whether it was his idea, or LFL mandated - but regardless it was a poor decision.

The root cause of fridging, imo, is limited imagination.  How best to cause your male protagonist pain if not kill off someone they love, or at least have strong feelings for? The answer is of course, easily. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The Luke Skywalker of HttJ is fresh from his victory in ANH, a lieutenant in the Rebellion: young, not dumb, and full of...

Nakari Kalen is an absolute Queen a civilian volunteer and crack-shot sniper who loans her ship Desert Jewel to the Alliance. Luke is immediately attracted to her, they bond over a mutual love of fast ships and leaving behind desert home planets, and engage in the inexpert flirting of two nineteen year olds while also risking their lives several times over.

I want to make it clear: I actually really like this book. It's a breezy read, almost serialised as The Early Adventures of Luke Skywalker, and is ofttimes genuinely funny. And credit where it’s due to Hearne, many of of the supporting roles in the novel are female. Other than Nakari, there's Soonta, the Rodian who gives Luke her uncle’s lightsaber, Sakhet the Kupohan spy, and the Givin cryptographer/math genius Drusil Bephorin. In a genre where male characters are often the default for these kind of roles, it was nice to see, but makes the regressive fridging of Nakari even more egregious.

Luke and Nakari make a good team fighting brain-sucking monsters and Imperials, but more importantly they have fun together - she encourages him to work on his Force skills, and he successfully moves objects with his mind for the first time (leading to Nakari adorably dub him "a little noddle scooter"). It's a very sweet, if brief, relationship, and a respite from the danger of the mission. They spend the night together (leaving the reader to decide exactly what happened behind closed doors), and share a kiss before splitting up to try and escape bounty hunters. No prizes for guessing what happens to Nakari immediately after she received the Skywalker Kiss of Death.

I assume there were two motivating factors for why Hearne and/or LFL couldn't let Nakari live:

1. If she survived, fans would wonder why she doesn't appear in ESB/subsequent material.

I recall this bandied about on forums back at the time of the book's release, and to that I say - so what? Fans are always going to wonder, and try to paper over the gaps in canon, to make up their own headcanons to explain any any perceived inconsistencies. It's certainly no reason to kill someone off.

It is in fact possible for two young people to have a romance that just fizzles, or doesn’t work out for whatever reason - it should not require great maneuvering or explanation. If Nakari doesn’t show up in the next book in the timeline, what about it? The reader is smart enough to assume she and Luke broke up, decided to just remain friends, whatever. But it seems that the only way for a female character to exit stage left is for her to die, which is bullshit.

And actually, there's no reason why she couldn't have shown up again. ESB and RoTJ cover a month and a few days, respectively, of Luke's life - just because there was no mention of Nakari doesn't mean she didn't exist at that time, whether or not she and Luke were an item. She could have made an appearance in a subsequent novel, or Rebels, or the comics - she could have become a recurring character, showing up when the Rebellion needed her, or - heaven forbid - even have her own comic/book/show! Her existence in Star Wars canon didn't need to begin and end with Luke Skywalker, merely to service his plotline and backstory and abandoning the richness of her own.

No, the only reason Nakari had to die was to facilitate this:

It was a blow to the gut, realizing what that sudden absence meant. I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, but I had felt Nakari's life snuffed out through the Force, and into that void where she had shone anger rushed in - anger, and a cold sense of raw power and invincibility...I took a step to join in the hunt but stopped, breathing heavily, unaccountably sweating even though I felt so cold inside and the power of the Force roiled within me... I shook with emotion and power, and none of it felt the way the Force had before...I saw what kind of space it was , a black hole that would always be hungry no matter how much I fed it. I might never feel warm again if I didn't get myself under control.

Luke feels the dark side and is tempted by the boost of power it offers him, but immediately identifies it as dangerous and unnatural. I can understand why Hearne wanted to include this - it is a book of firsts after all: Luke's first solo mission, his first time using telekenisis, and ending with story with his first experience of the dark side makes sense. But it wasn't necessary, which leads to:

2. How to push Luke to touch the dark side without killing someone he has romantic feelings for?

Also, obviously, shite of the bull (or nerf, if you prefer). Even if this brush with the dark side was absolutely necessary for the novel's climax, there's any number of ways it could be achieved. At this point, Luke is fresh from losing important people in his life - Owen and Beru, Ben, and Biggs - lumping another death on top of that a narrative trick for Luke to react not only to losing Nakari, but the others as well. But it's cheap, the first card in the deck, and why not show a bit of imagination? Luke is young and inexperienced enough at this point that any number of things could be the catalyst - the whole book he's struggling with his growing powers, why not try and reach too far in the firefight with the bounty hunters, his anger and frustration with himself in not doing enough trigger the dark side temptation? It would work thematically and doesn't involve a fridging that ultimately has very little payoff.

Because Nakari is killed less than ten pages from the end of the book - afterwards Luke grieves, but ultimately chooses to honour her memory and be grateful for what he learned with her, recommitting to becoming a Jedi. It's all very surface level, and once again a female character's death facilitates a male character's development. Was it so imperative that Luke lost someone he cared about as part of this story? Sure, this was a time of galactic civil war, and it's far from unrealistic that these stories have a high body count, but who to make collateral damage remains an authorial choice, and in this case Nakari Kelen was (a) a female character of color, (b) a love interest of the protagonist - not just of this book, but the entire Original Trilogy.

I don't know to what extent (if any) race had to play in the decision. I'm sure there was a segment of the fandom absolutely livid that Luke Skywalker kissed (and maybe had sex with) a black woman. Was her death LFL hedging its bets, or demonstrative of the general lack of attention/respect they show their characters of colour?

In any case this was a chance to stand out from the old EU and it's fridge full of Luke's dead girlfriends, but instead they chose to introduce and kill off Nakari for the sole purpose of Luke's manpain and character development, and that's gross.

And then there's this:

A grisly yet reliable fact about custom bounty hunter ships is that you can always count on them to have body bags stashed somewhere for the easy transport of their kills. They often have built-in refrigerated storage, too.

NAKARI IS KILLED AND LITERALLY STORED IN THE FUCKING FRIDGE I COULDN'T BELIEVE WHAT I WAS READING.

I really hope this was unintentional on Hearne's part, because yikes. He was halfway there, this book was full of interesting female characters who had agency - Drusil in particular was a delight with her super math and inability to understand human interaction. Nakari was full of life and fun - capable but relatable, showing a different side of the Rebellion and those that suffered under the Empire's rule. Fridging her in her first appearance is considerably more vile, because it reduces her to a footnote of Luke's story, a plot device to Help Him Grow, rather than a springboard to tell more of her own story.

Because Nakari was a compelling character ripe for spinoff potential. I would absolutely have read or watched her continued adventures, juggling missions for her father's Biolabs company and trying to aid the Rebellion, shooting her slug rifle and cracking wise, maybe even finding a way to amplify her mother's song Vader's Many Prosthetic Parts to really stick it to the Empire, or try and free the political prisoners on Kessel.

The old EU was made great by allies and enemies of Our Heroes showing up again to help or hinder them, and/or branching out into their own material. We fell in love with them, and followed their stories even as they diverged from the main saga, eager to read more about their lives.

Nakari Kelen never got that chance. In many ways, she exemplified what Disney Star Wars was to become: an exercise in wasted potential.

[ashdoesfandomarchieved]

lost in the citadel (this is how villains are made)

ao3

Two Morties and a Rick stand facing each other at the end of all things.

Morty, the ordinary one, the stolen Morty--because as it stands C-137 isn’t his Rick and the family he’s stealing time with isn’t his family-thinks that maybe this is a beginning.

The beginning.

The start of something that was always going to happen. The splinter in the timelines that they’ve been careening toward for years but have always been brushing off with offhand jokes about serialized adventures and canon adventures.

Or maybe, instead of a horrifying beginning, it is the merciless end after all. The thrilling conclusion in the clusterfuck that is Rick Sanchez’s life, featuring one Morty Smith.

Or maybe they’re all missing the point.

Maybe this story isn’t about a Rick at all.

Morty Smith, dressed in a black jumpsuit and rapidly keying in sequence codes to the terminal beside him, offers Rick a cold glance over his shoulder and it occurs to the other Morty that this story isn’t about C-137 and or even himself.

It’s about a Lost Morty.

Because the thing is the Stolen Morty remembers the other Morty, the Morty who was President but who is now evil, but also maybe a little bit right, and very very Lost.

He remembers him tagging along after Evil Rick- the Rick who may have not been a Rick at all - remembers the expression on his face when he dragged Morty away from his not his never his Rick and the furrow in his brow after everything, before all the Morties got herded away by Ricks.

Something intelligent has always been gleaming behind the surface of this Morty’s eyes, and the ordinary Morty has been a fool to ignore it. He remembers Rick’s warnings of cocky Morties and his own itching trigger finger and how far he’s willing to go when Rick isn’t around or, even worse, how far he’s willing to go when Rick is around, how far Rick pushes him, how far Ricks push their Morties to do things against the shaky moral code they all possess, how much everything hurts so much all the time and how scared and lonely and worried he is all the time-

The Smart Morty, or maybe distinguishing him from other Morties as smart is wrong-because they’re all smart, you can’t be in their family and not have at least a little bit of something upstairs, despite what Ricks say- maybe the word he’s looking for is free , or even tired or maybe calling him Lost Morty was the most correct-

The Morty who’s currently making every Ricks killcount look pathetic turns and calls them “an infinite fucking baby” and the Stolen Morty thinks fucking relatable .

This thought is quickly lost in a barrage of oh shit oh shit oh shit as the Citadel fills with screaming. The place is literally falling apart around them, Ricks and Morties screaming as they try to activate protocol Phoenix, when a piece of the ceiling crumbles and takes C-137 down with it.

The Stolen Morty takes a step toward him, despite his anger, despite the now you’re evil Morty too ringing in his ears, when the Lost Morty turns and says-

- you can come with me and everything comes to a standstill.

Because the stolen Morty understands what the lost Morty is saying.

Just like how every Rick knows each other’s moves and hates each other, because how could they like each other when they don’t even like themselves, and understands each other on a level that no one else ever can--and despises every other Rick for it, like any of them could help it--just like every Rick knows what the other Rick is about to do-

Morty understands what the other Morty is saying.

Infinite fucking baby.

Jackshit, I’m leaving.

That’s what makes me evil.

Now you’re evil Morty too.

Or even,

You guys can’t help it-

Maybe they’re all Lost Morties and this Morty is the only one who can see that.

Except now the Stolen Morty can see it too.

And that realization breaks every foundation the Stolen Morty has, because hasn’t he been lost too for as long as he can remember?

Isn’t he lost and exhausted and hitting rock bottom only to find that there’s another rock bottom waiting for him after that one? Doesn’t he look in the morning every day and see another part of himself chipping away as he becomes more and more compliant to what everyone else wants, to what Rick wants?

Doesn’t he lie on the roof every night, with the stolen cigarettes from under Summer’s mattress, bare heels digging into the rough shingles, hoping that if he inhales enough smoke everything will stay numb when the sun rises and it all starts over again?

Isn’t Morty so so lost?

Two lost Morties and a Rick face each other at the end of the universe, the beginning of something, and the diverging of paths.

The stolen Morty, ordinary Morty, the Morty who keeps fucking up, the Morty who once opened a book and read about abuse cycles and snapped it shut, but has never forgotten but watches his mom stop drinking only to start up again two weeks later, but watches Summer promise to do better but then fall for Rick’s manipulations without fall again and again, but he, himself also keeps crawling back to the people hurting him again and again and again…

This Morty hears the words you could come with me and for the first time in his life sees possibilities.

Every taste of freedom Rick has ever given has been tainted with the knowledge that one of them always comes crawling back to the other. It’s a universal constant, as long as there’s a Rick there must also be a Morty. And usually vice versa, although Morty’s met Rick’s without a Morty. He doesn’t like to think about them.

But now someone stands before him and offers a world where “Rick and�� doesn’t proceed a Morty’s existence.

He hears Rick say something about this being the better offer and something about him not having a plan, but there’s a high pitched whine ringing in his ears, breath squeezing tightly in his lungs, a burn like anxiety itching under his skin.

But there’s no time for that because everyone’s dying and Rick’s groaning with pain and the other Morty is about to leave.

Morty has only a split second to make a decision and he-he doesn’t-

He doesn’t know what to do.

There’s a burn in his lungs and a pulse in his ears and the only person in his life who’s even chosen him is in pain and Morty doesn’t even think , suddenly he’s across the room, helping Rick, the Rick that’s hurt him and forced him to hurt over people and won’t stop no matter how many self actualization moments he has or promises he makes to do better, but none of it matters to Morty because, because-

--Rick is dragging him out of bed, rambling loudly- loudly enough to wake the whole family, so Morty shushes him, makes panicked little noises begging him to just quiet down -but then they’re out in the garage and then in Rick’s ship and then they’re zipping through space and Rick won’t tell Morty where they’re going, why he’s dragged Morty out of bed this time, and on a school night again

but then Morty sees it, three orbiting stars going supernova and Rick is saying something about statistical anomalies and epic light shows , but Morty isn’t even listening because now he’s seeing colors he didn’t even know existed and he’s aware his nose is smooshed against the window and he’s fogging the glass, but he doesn’t even care-

-he fails another test and Rick tells him school is wasted on him anyway that not even he’s the kind of stupid that needs the American education system to mold him into a mindless citizen-

-the garage blows up and Morty has glass in his eye and he’s sobbing screeching yelling begging, but then warm, rough hands are on his face and everything goes numb for a second and then the pain is gone -

-Morty watches Rick fuck around the keyboard before sitting down next to him, exhausted because school sucked, school always sucks , but then Rick is guiding his hands toward the keys and saying shit like m-middle c, M-Morty, it’s not that hard , and then they’re pressing keys together and the sound soothes the itch under his skin-

-he’s no stranger to the smell of smoke, but the bar smell has him feeling a particular way, so he steps outside for a moment, just a moment to catch his breath, to quell the nausea in his stomach, but some humanoid creature follows him out and drags him into the ally and just before everything goes wrong , his assailant shrieks and crumbles to the ground and there’s Rick, streetlight silhouetting his furious face-

-he’s sitting in the Principal's office and they can’t get ahold of his mom because she’s at work and who knows where Jerry is and Summer ditched because that what she does now and Morty’s eyes hurt and he’s pretty sure he’s bleeding on top of everything and the sensory overload is just too much he can’t

there’s a hand on his shoulder and a familiar drawl interrupted by belching and suddenly Morty’s being whisked away, he’s in the parking lot, he’s in the ship, someone’s pushing a pair of earplugs into his hands and it’s suddenly, blissfully quiet-

-his knuckles are red and his lip is split and Rick hands him ice cream and says next time punch with y-your two front knuckles, du-dumbass, and then something buzzes in his ears and his skin is healing-

-Rick slings an arm over his shoulder and belches loudly-

-a hand ruffles his hair-

-a voice that is soft sometimes but also yells sometimes and calls him names but also says things like I’m so sorry and I’ll do better and god, M-Morty would you just shut up -

The president Morty does that thing with the curve thingy and the citadel explodes.

____

When the golden light fades away and the crack in the curve slams shut after the other Morty--the smartest Morty, or maybe just the tiredest Morty, the Morty who had finally said enough and used his brain for something other than defending Rick--the Rickest Rick and the Morty who threw his chance at freedom away stand in what’s left of the Citadel.

Morty--possibly the dumbest Morty, the Morty that belongs to Rick C-137, even though this Morty isn’t from dimension C-137, the Morty that keeps getting a shot at getting out , but throwing it all away because at this point he doesn’t know how to exist without a “Rick and” in front of his name--turns in a slow circle, blinking rapidly.

Mortyberg is a little worse for wear, but nowhere near as bad as the rest of the Citadel, which is miles away and crumbling fast. Morty seriously doubts there’s any survivors --not after the clusterfuck that had happened there.

Morty turns back to Rick--not his Rick, but also his Rick--and his eyes lock on what the man has been staring at in horror.

The portal gun is empty.

They are lightyears from any civilization--possibly universes away, because even though Morty can’t really comprehend what the Citadel really is, he’s also fairly certain that it doesn’t exist in any universe besides it’s own--and Rick’s portal gun is empty.

Rick turns and stares at the closing crevice in the stars. Morty follows his gaze.

The tiny sliver of black disappears and so does Morty’s freedom.

He chances a glance at Rick. The man’s eyes are glued to-to-

Morty looks at the other Morties, some of them normal, some of them those terrible, hideous things they saw beneath the citadel, and realizes that it’s just them, just whoever Rick managed to drag to this part of the citadel and anyone fortunate enough to already be here.

He thinks he sees a few Ricks too, their Morty’s clinging to them in terror or watching with mild disinterest--cynical, jaded Morty’s, one step ahead of this Morty and yet still ones step behind.

“Well, shit,” Morty hears himself say, lack of stutter almost startling. It’ll come back full force in a minute, he’s sure.

Rick doesn’t say anything, lips thinning with either irritation or panic. Morty can usually tell, but the past hour has shaken him. Possibly shaken both of them.

Another Rick suddenly appears in the terminal that they’re all standing in and Morty’s stolen Rick goes expressionless again. There’s a lot of shouting that goes on, between them, between the other Ricks, and a couple of scared Morties, but this Morty barely registers any of that.

Everything has narrowed down to the other Morty’s voice in his head and the sound of his stolen Rick’s voice in his ear. Angry. Irritated. Worried.

The other Rick smacks a hand to his forehead in exasperation and says something that Morty doesn’t quite catch, but suddenly both Rick’s are practically shrieking at each other and it’s too loud -

Morty flinches away, stumbling into his Rick, who catches him on impulse, not really paying attention. His hand grabs Morty’s upper arm and he rights him, while continuing to throw insults in the other Rick’s direction. Eventually they calm down-although Morty isn’t paying attention enough to know how they actually came to a resolution on...whatever they were fighting about (he should really start paying attention)-and the other Rick sulks off, herding Morties off the terminal and into the streets.

Another Rick comes running- cop Rick-and takes over, gently talking to the Morties and asking them if they needed anything, if they were okay and everything right now between that and the Evil Morty-the Lost Morty- blowing the place up and Rick-Rick-

Everything right now is so surreal Morty distantly entertains the scenario that he might, in fact, have died. Or never come out of those memories.

He lets out a shaky breath, squeezing his eyes so tightly shut that stars burst behind the lids. When he opens them, he’s still standing on the last functioning part of the Citadel, with several Ricks, even more Morties, and no way of getting home.

No way yet.

There is no doubt in Morty’s mind that Rick already has a plan with at least fifty contingencies and contingencies for the contingencies. He is still Rick Sanchez after all, even if eight percent of his personality is a product of trauma.

But when he turns to look at Rick, the man is still staring blankly at the sky, where they had last seen the other Morty disappear.

His grip on Morty’s shoulder tightens.

____

It takes all of three hours to figure out that every Rick here has a plan, and not every plan really gets along with the others.

Morty’s Rick clearly has the best idea-and he’s not just saying that because he’s biased, he’s not - but it’s going to take a hell of a lot to convince the other Ricks, so Morty takes his exit when the fighting starts and finds a back alley to hunker down in.

There are much nicer places in Mortyberg to hang out in, he’s sure, but there’s also less chance a Rick will stumble across him or, even worse, his Rick.

He really just needs a moment to himself.

There’s a dumpster lying in the middle of the path, upended onto its side in the chaos, so Morty hops on top of it and sits, with his feet dangling over the edge.

Despite being the master of compartmentalization, Morty’s hardly been able to focus.

He and Rick often liked to joke about twenty minute adventures and about how cramming so much action into so little time was jarring, but this was the first actual time Morty felt it . Between the memories of someone else’s life- Rick’s life-suddenly dumped into his skull and the President Morty killing eight percent of the Citadel and offering to take Morty with him -

(he’s still not sure if the other Morty was kidding about the toilet thing.)

(he thinks he wasn’t.)

(but what if he was?)

-Morty barely can scramble his own thoughts together, let alone hold a conversation with anyone.

Which is why, naturally his self imposed solitude is quickly interrupted.

Cop Rick pokes his head into the alley and frowns.

“Y-You look like shit, kid,” he says, arms crossed as he approaches.

Morty scowls.

“N-nobody asked you,” he snaps, mirroring Cop Rick in crossing his arms.

“No, I-I mean you-you really look like shit. Christ, does your Rick even feed you?”

When Morty glare deepens, Cop Rick winces reflexively, rubbing the back of his neck. “Sorry, di-did your Rick-was he on the Citadel or-”

Morty groans, already done with this conversation. “My Rick’s fine , he-he’s that asshole revving everyone else up.”

Cop Rick barks a surprised laugh. “Your-your Rick is C-137? Sh-shit, tough break, kid.”

“T-tell me about it,” Morty mumbles, drawing his knees up and looping his arms around them.

The Rick frowns at him for a second before hopping up beside him, letting his legs dangle over the edge next to his. “Wanna talk about it?”

This surprises Morty. This is still a Rick, still a complete asshole who smells like a liquor store and wouldn’t know what tactful was if it hit him in the face, but there’s also something surprisingly sensitive about him.

Morty doesn’t trust the guy--he doesn’t trust anyone , why would he trust a random Rick?--but something in his chest loosens ever so slightly at the almost kind voice.

“Not really,” Morty mumbles, just the same, not really up for getting into the highs and lows of the clusterfuck that was Rick C-137 and the Morty from-from-

Christ, what dimension was Morty even from?

“Wa-wanna grab a bite, then?”

A few moments later finds Morty seated in a diner.

The place is a mess- tables and chairs thrown about in the chaos, but there’s still food in the pantries and freezers, so Morty helps himself to the remaining ice cream in the ice box. It’s the first time he’s eaten since this morning and he’s suddenly ravenous .

“Th-thanks,” Morty says, a few hours later and overfull with gross junk food, as Cop Rick guides him back to where he saw his own Rick last.

He gets a pat on the shoulder in response. “Don’t-don’t worry about it, kid.”

____

Morty takes to wandering around Mortyberg at night.

He thinks it's night, at least. The Citadel didn’t operate in a proper universe, so weather and season were completely artificially generated. Even in this broken off piece of the city, a fake sun still sets, blanketing the place in darkness.

Rick and the few other Ricks who managed to survive are still trying to find a way to create portal fluid. Morty doesn’t think it will take them long. The smartest man in the universe plus twenty more of him means there’s more than enough brain power to go around.

Enough brain power that Morty can keep to himself.

He comes across other Ricks-mostly Cop Rick, which is a relief because he’s the nicest Rick and all the other one’s make him feel weirdly uncomfortable for reasons he can’t quite pinpoint-but mostly it’s just other Morties.

He meets mostly Morties like him-a few dimensions off, or a dimension where Jessica is a guy, or Summer is dating a girl, or Jerry is out of the picture-but there are a few oddities: a lizard Morty, a Morty that hit puberty faster than the rest of them, a Morty with curly curls than the rest of them, and even a Morticia.

He spends time talking to some of them, even realizes that a few are some he knew from before, whether it was from the few times Rick has reluctantly dragged him to the Citadel or the occasional Rick and Morty duo they ran into during adventures.

Most of them are Rickless which is both a terrifying and freeing concept to Morty.

He asks some of them what they’re going to do now.

“O-oh, y-you know. Go to school and j-just be normal now, I-I guess,” one Morty says.

The idea of going back to a regular life-a pre -Rick life, is inconceivable to Morty. Even during times Rick has taken off for weeks at a time to do his own thing or the more recent adventure breakout they had, Morty was still traipsing around the universe(s) getting into trouble.

Morticia squints at him when he asks her. “Wh-what kind of a question i-is that?” she asks, arms crossed.

He shrugs.

She scoffs. “O-obviously Summer and I will figure s-something out.” She shakes her head and walks off, muttering things about dumbass boys and what the fuck does normal even mean .

Morty wonders if it’s weird that out of all the Morties here, he and Morticia have the most in common.

____

Morty begins to have dreams on day three.

They aren’t really dreams. No, they’re memories , memories of that brainscan he’d dumped into his own mind. He doesn’t know how long he’d been out, but he guesses it had been somewhere between ten to twenty minutes, which was ridiculous considering the amount of information he’d taken in.

Most of it had barely registered due to, well, everything .

But now snippets are coming back.

When Rick finds him, sitting on a rooftop, a few nights after the dreams started, he only sighs with vague annoyance before joining him.

With all the Morties scattered across Mortyberg, this Morty is distantly surprised that Rick knows it’s him.

Or maybe he’s not.

“He broke the curve, di-didn’t he,” Morty says, eyes glued to a constellation of stars that might not even be real.

Rick flops onto his back, arms spread.

“So there’s a chance tha-that we can go to places wh-where you aren’t the smartest man in the universe?���

It’s barely a question.

Rick doesn’t respond and Morty doesn’t look at him.

“Wh-which means your chances of finding the Rick that-”

“ Jesus , Morty, I said w-we could stop talking about it.” He doesn’t even sound that mad, but Morty shuts up anyway.

He crosses his arms and lays down on his back too.

The roof he’d chosen to perch on belonged to some restaurant establishment Morty barely remembered the name of. It was mostly flat, but he’d found a section of it that reclined slightly enough that it felt like sitting on the roof at home.

If he closes his eyes, in fact, he can’t even feel the difference.

His fingers itch for a cigarette. He wonders if anyone here has any.

When he opens his eyes, Rick is staring at him. He looks irritated, but not in a M-Morty stop being a du-dumbass way. There’s something else behind it, something watchful and analyzing. He wants to know something, but is too proud to ask.

Whatever. It’s not as if Morty can read his mind.

“H-hey, do y-you think anyone here has any ciggs?”

Rick frowns. “W-what, you smoke now? Christ, I leave you for like-like three weeks and y-you’re developing-”

Morty groans and rolls onto his side, fed up with Rick’s hypocrisy for like. The zillionth time since the man steamrolled into his life and derailed it.

The silence echoes between them, only occasionally broken up by a Rick or sometimes even a Morty in the street shouting or saying things that Morty can’t quite catch. His mind is racing a million miles a minute, and, like usual, he can’t get it to calm the fuck down .

He likes to think of his own energy as a cup. When he’s around his family the cup is about half full. When his parents are fighting-are being loud , are talking about him like he can’t understand them, when they say things like “special” and “different’ and “needs”-it spills over the edges, little trickles down the side. When he’s at school it’s definitely overflowing, his patience and the amount of energy he needs to function around people fluctuate wildly.

When he’s around Rick it’s either empty or overflowing so quickly that he’s ready to throw up from the intensity of it.

Right now it feels like that.

His breath starts to come in sharp gasps, adrenaline shooting through his body for the first time since he and Rick escaped the exploding Citadel. His eyes are on fire and his lungs aren’t working and his skin feels wrong -

Rick lays a hand on his shoulder.

It doesn’t urge him to move over or do anything other than simply rest there.

Morty feels distantly-because anything other than feeling overwhelmed is distant right now-surprised. Usually when he gets like this Rick either yells at him or offers to sedate him.

Or just leaves him alone.

But it wasn’t always like that, was it?

Morty can remember a time, when he’d just turned 13- or was it 14? It’s hard to remember a time before Rick- and his grandpa had come literally crashing back into their lives and suddenly there was someone who understood who said things to his mom like jesus what are they teaching kids there, and ye-yeah Morty’s special, bu-but you don’t have to treat him different, wow, and sure it was all condescending, sure it was just another way for him to insult someone else-

But someone had understood .

This is abusive , Rick had said a few weeks ago.

It feels like forever.

Maybe he had actually understood this time.

Or maybe, one again, Morty has been duped into believing the great lie. That a Rick could change. That his Rick is different.

Jesus, this isn’t even his Rick.

But he’s one sitting next to him and absentmindedly rubbing his thumb into Morty’s shoulder.

It’s nice. Morty closes his eyes, skin soaking up the warmth.

“I don’t regret it,” Morty says softly. He feels Rick startle next to him, but doesn’t roll over. He keeps all of his limbs interlocked together, ankles crossed, arms folded, as if he can keep himself from falling apart.

He squeezes his eyes shut and whispers. “I don’t regret it.”

(Morty wakes up halfway a few hours later when Rick picks him up. He falls back asleep a few minutes later--soothed by the rocking of Rick’s gait and his annoyed g-go back to sleep --but something in his chest settles at it.

Maybe everything’s going to be fine.)

____

Morty doesn’t really know how they did it-he thinks some Rick’s salvaged some tech from the floating remains of the Citadel and did some sci-fi shit to it or whatever-but a week after the curve thingy explodes, Rick and Morty are in a ship, headed home.

“Aw j-jeez, what are we gonna tell Mom?” Morty says, face pressed into the window. His sleep schedule, which is normally fucked, is now completely nonexistent. The ride home was supposed to be for napping, but the ever prevalent anxiety is keeping him awake.

Rick shrugs. “T-tell her whatever you w-want, Morty, I seriously d-doubt she’s gonna care.”

It stings a bit, but it’s true.

Well, maybe not as true anymore. His mom has been much sterner with Rick over dragging Morty and Summer on dangerous adventures of late, but Morty thinks it has more to do with control than actual concern.

Still, it’s doubtful they’ll get more than passing irritation for being away for a week.

A couple of minutes before they reach earth, Rick stops the ship.

He lets the engine idle for a minute, fingers tapping against the steering wheel.

When the silence goes on long enough that Morty is distinctly uncomfortable , he groans and uncurls from his fetal position against the door and blinks bemusedly up at him.

“R-rick?”

“W-we should dial it back for a while,” Rick says. “Maybe go back to s-solo adventures.”

Morty clasps his hands together, twisting them into uncomfortable positions nervously. “I-I don’t know, Rick. It-it seems like wh-when we’re apart things get-they get worse.”

“Y-yeah and you almost di-died like sixty times this week, Morty, I-I don’t think you get a say in w-what’s worse,” Rick sneers.

Morty sighs and looks out the window.

“Rick,” he says, wearily and then cuts himself off.

The man in question glares down at the center console like it personally offended him. “L-look, Morty, you-you may have had a point about not-about not trusting me and-”

“Yeah, okay.”

“-and, wait what.”

“I s-said, okay ,” Morty presses the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I-I just-we keep doing this, Rick and I-I’m just-”

He sucks in a breath and pulls his hands away. Stares up at Rick with wide eyes and an expression that bleeds emotional vulnerability, but he doesn’t even care anymore because he just threw away every chance at freedom, at a life free from the bullshit that’s so deeply infected in everything he touches, for this man, this guy who can barely even look at him and he’s-he’s-

“I-I’m really tired, okay?” His voice is small. “Can we j-just go home?”

Rick stares at him for a minute before putting the ship back in drive.

The rest of the drive home is silent.

Beth is mad, surprise surprise, but not as mad as she could have been.

Morty lets Rick bare the brunt of it and seeks refuge in his room. It’s a mess, exactly like it was when he left, because Beth isn’t the type to come and clean up after her kids and she’s the only person who’d ever actually walk into his room, except Rick, who doesn’t give a shit.

Morty collapses in bed, intent on sleeping for the next couple of hours or days, when the door creaks open.

It’s Rick. Of course.

He scowls. “W-way to go on having m-my back, M-Moorty,” he says, rolling his eyes in irritation.

Morty rolls his eyes back. “Y-you said that s-she wouldn’t care !” he points an accusatory finger at him.

Rick glares back.

After a moment of prolonged, uncomfortable glaring, Morty looks away. Rick takes this to mean that he won or whatever, because the tension in his shoulder loosens a bit and he flops down on the end of the bed, facedown.

“J-jeez, are y-you having another crisis?” Morty mumbles, tugging the blanket up over his head.

Rick mutters something into the bedding unintelligible so Morty ignores him. Sleep is darkening the edges of his vision anyway.

Before he completely passes out, the door creaks open again.

Everything fades as Beth and Rick start talking.

____

Morty doesn’t think they’re ever going to talk about what happened.

Rick clearly doesn’t care about the other Morty- why would he?- but it’s very clear that he’s upset about....something.

If Morty was to garner a guess it’s because Morty could have left with him.

And he almost had.

He should have.

But no, he hadn’t in the end. He’d chosen to pull Rick up and follow him out of there, instead of taking a deal no other Morty had been offered. And Rick was either mad that he hadn’t or mad that he almost had , and Morty didn’t know how to apologize for either.

It was almost easier in that week when they were stuck on the Citadel because then Rick could take out his ire on other Ricks and Morties or throw all of his energy into solving their predicament.

Now there’s just Morty and the rest of his dysfunctional family.

A whole lot of not talking about it and arguing about other things goes around for a while, with Summer trying to break up the tension by forcing them to go on adventures with her or Beth demanding in hissed whispers that Rick figure it how or whatever because I’m not finding us another therapist.

Morty basically tries to ignore everyone.

Until one night, he’s lying in bed, staring up at the ceiling because insomnia’s a fucking bitch, when he realizes…

Why should he have to avoid Rick?

Why did they have to avoid each other in the first place?

“Y-you know wh-what? The other M-Morty was right, you’re a big fucking baby!” Morty says, bursting into the garage.

Rick looks over his shoulder, eyebrow cocked.

“First-first y-you leave and then you come back and s-suddenly everything’s m-my fault j-just because y-you’re mad that you were wrong about something! It-it isn’t my fault that you figured out y-you’re toxic and don’t know wh-what to do about it!”

Rick looks irritated. “Morty-” he begins, voice already a sneer.

“No, I’m talking right now!” Morty points at him.

Rick crosses his arms and waits.

“I-I don’t regret it, but I should, shouldn’t I? B-because you’re always gonna be a dick and I’m always gonna just be h-here.” Morty swallows, fight suddenly draining out of him. “It’s never gonna change, huh.”

Rick sighs and puts down whatever he was working on. “Look, M-Morty-”

Morty groans, running his hands through his hair. “This blows, can w-we-can we stop? Lets-lets just go watch some interdimensional cable or something.”

Rick drags a hand over his face and looks as tired as Morty feels. “S-so that’s it? We-we’re both fucked up and we’re just gonna go watch tv? Real-real healthy, Morty.”

“Y-yeah, you really can’t call me out on that.” He turns on his heel and makes for the door. Rick catches him before he reaches it.

There’s a pause. Morty doesn’t pull away and Rick doesn’t let go. He just frowns down at Morty for a moment, brow furrowed, that same look in his eyes as that night on the roof. Curious. Analytical.

Then,

“Your mom’s already pissed at us, I-I’m not gonna wake her up.”

Morty blinks. He had maybe forgotten that it was 4am on a Sunday night. “Oh y-yeah.”

Rick’s hand tightens on his shoulder. “But w-we could go out for ice cream.”

Getting ice cream at 4am on a Sunday night isn’t much better than staying up watching tv, but at least Beth wouldn’t lose her shit with them.

Morty smiles. It’s more real and less tired than it’s felt the past couple of months-years even, if he’s being honest.

“Okay,” he says, allowing himself to be herded toward the spaceship.

Once inside, he clicks his seatbelt on and lets his body relax to the sound of the terrible noises the engine makes when it turns over. Rick backs them out and takes off, looking far more at ease than Morty’s seen in a while.

He wishes this could last.

It’s not going to. Of course it’s not. Rick will do something fucked up and Morty will either walk away for a while or continue to be addicted to making the man happy. Their own fucked up little abuse cycle, fueled by shared and separate traumas that neither will admit to, let alone work on.

And still, even knowing-even knowing the shape of the rest of his life, he can’t bring himself to say he made the wrong choice.

He doesn’t regret it.

He can’t bring himself to, because he would go literally insane with it. How could he go on knowing that he threw away the best chance at happiness he’d ever been given?

Morty leans back in the passenger seat and lets Rick’s ramblings and the ambient sounds of the ship wash over him.

It’s the closest thing to peace he has.

____

[olderthannetfic]

It's really surprising that you're so well versed in older fandoms and yet participate in new popular ones (that cdrama, kpop) is this by design? Im in my twenties and my interest turnover is already way slower than it used to be

You know, that’s a really interesting question. I wouldn’t say it’s by design exactly in that I do tend to just follow what strikes my fancy, and I can’t force myself to want to write fic for just anything. (I find it easier to like reading fic without serious involuntary emotional investment, but writing takes more. Vidding I can do on command most of the time, but I don’t usually bother unless I have a lot of feels or I’m fulfilling someone’s prompt.)

However, me getting into BTS was 100% due to me wanting to understand BTS enough to explain to people who weren’t very interested but wanted to know what was going on in fandom lately. Under normal circumstances, I run the dance party at Escapade, the oldest extant slash con. We borrowed vividcon’s thing of playing fanvids on the wall--all of them set to dance music--as the soundtrack for the dance party. This means I’m creating a 3-hour mixtape of fannishness, which has amazing potential to make people feel in the know about Fandom Today... and equal potential to make them feel alienated if nothing they care about shows up. Only about 100-150 people attend the con, so it really is possible to make a playlist that feels inclusive yet informative--it just takes a huge amount of work.

Every year, I do a lot of research on which fandoms are getting big and look for vids from vidders people won’t have heard of, so there is an element of consciously trying to keep up with things. Generally, I only get into these fandoms myself if I had no idea what they were and then suddenly, oops, they’re my kryptonite, like the buddy cop android plot in Detroit: Become Human, which sucked me in hard for like 6 months on the basis of a vid.

(So if you’re into cross-fandom meta and associated stuff as one of your fannish interests, you tend to have broader knowledge of different fandoms, old and new, than if you’re just looking for the next place you’ll read fic. It’s also easier to love vids for unfamiliar things than fic.)

But though I was only looking for a basic primer on BTS, BTS has 7 members with multiple names and no clear juggernaut pairing, not to mention that AU that runs through the music videos and lots of other context to explain. The barrier to understanding WTF was going on at all was high enough that to know enough to explain, I had to be thoroughly exposed... And once I was over that hurdle, oops, I had a fandom.

--

In terms of old vs. new, here’s the thing: kpop fandoms in English and c-drama fandoms in English right now feel a lot like anime fandom in English did in the early 00s. I had a Buddy Cops of the 70s phase in the middle, but my current fannishness is actually a return to my older fannishness in many ways.

What do I mean about them being similar?

Yes, I know some wanker will show up to say I think China, Korea, and Japan are indistinguishable, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the way that I used to routinely meet Italian and French and German fans, Argentinian and Mexican, Malaysian and Indonesian and Filipino too. English-language fandom of SPN or MCU may have all those fans from all those countries, but it feels very American most of the time. English-language fandom of a non-English-language canon is more overtly about using English as a lingua franca.

It also tends to attract people who as a sideline to their fannishness are getting into language learning and translation, which are my other passion in life after fanworks fandom. (I speak only English and Spanish and a bit of Japanese, but I’ve studied German, French, Russian, Mandarin, Old English, and now Korean.)

Nerds arguing about methods of language learning and which textbooks are good and why is my jam. This is all over the place in English-language fandoms of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean media. Those fandoms also tend to be full of speakers coming from a Germanic or Romance languages background who face similar hurdles in learning these languages. (In other words, if you’re a native Japanese speaker trying to learn Korean, the parts that will be hard for you are different than if you’re an English speaker, but you’re also usually not doing fandom in English.)

There’s also an element of scarcity and difficulty of access and a communal attempt to construct a canon (in the other sense) of stuff from that country that pertains to one’s fannishness. So, for example, a primer explaining the genre of xianxia is highly relevant to being a n00b Untamed fan, but just any old thing about China is not. A c-drama adapted from a danmei webnovel is perhaps part of the new pantheon of Chinese shit we’re all getting into, but just any old drama from decades ago is probably not... unless it’s a genre precursor to something else we care about. Another aspect here is that while Stuff I Can Access As A N00b Who Doesn’t Speak The Language may be relatively scarce, there’s a vast, vast wealth of stuff that exists.

This is what it felt like to be an anime fan in the US in 2000. As translation got more commercial and more crappy series were licensed and dumped onto an already glutted market, the vibe changed. No longer were fans desperately trying to learn enough of the language to translate or spending their time cataloguing what existed or making fanworks about a show they stuck with for a bit: the overall community focus turned to an endless race of consumption to keep up with all of the latest releases. That’s a perfectly valid way of being fannish, but if I wanted that, I’d binge US television 24/7.

Anime fandom got bigger, but what I liked about anime fandom in English died, and I moved on. (Okay, I first moved on to Onmyouji, which is a live action Japanese thing, but still.)

Hardcore weeaboos and now fans of Chinese and Korean stuff don’t stop at language: people get excited about cooking, my other other great passion. Times a thousand if the canon is something like The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty, which is full of loving shots of food preparation. People get excited about history! Mandarin and Japanese may share almost nothing in terms of grammar or phonology, but all of East Asia has influence from specific Chinese power centers historically, and there are commonalities to historical architecture and clothing that I love.

I fell out of love with the popular anime art styles as they changed, and I’m not that into animation in general these days. (I still own a shitton of manga in art styles I like, like Okano Reiko’s Onmyouji series.) I’ve become a filmmaker over the last decade, and I’m very excited about beautiful cinematography and editing. With one thing and another, I’m probably not going to get back into anime fandom, but it’s lovely to revisit the cultural aspects I enjoyed about it via live-action media.

BTS surprised me too, to be honest. I really dislike that early 90s R&B ballad style that infests idol music (not just Korean--believe me, I resisted many rounds of “But Johnny’s Entertainment though!” back in the day). While I like some of the dance pop, I just don’t care. But OH NO, BTS turn out to be massive conscious hip hop fanboys, and their music sounds different. I have some tl;dr about my reactions in the meta I wrote about one of my fanvids, which you can find on Dreamwidth here.

--

But back to your comment about turnover: I know fans from the 70s who’ve had one great fannish love and that’s it and more who were like that but eventually moved on to a second or third. They’re... really fannishly monogamous in a way I find hard to comprehend. It was the norm long ago, but even by the 90s when far more people were getting into fandom, it was seen as a little weird. By now, with exponentially more people in fandom, it’s almost unheard of. I think those fans still exist, even as new people joining, but we don’t notice them. They were always rare, but in the past, only people like that had the stamina to get over the barriers to entry and actually become the people who made zines or were willing to be visibly into fanfic in eras when that was seen as really weird. On top of that, there’s an element of me, us, judging the past by what’s left: only people with an intense and often single passion are visible because other people either drifted away or have seamlessly disappeared into some modern fandom. They don’t say they’re 80 or 60 or 40 instead of 20, so nobody knows.

In general, I’m a small fandoms and rare ships person. My brain will do its best to thwart me by liking whatever has no fic even in a big fic fandom... (Except BTS because there is literally fic for any combination of them, like even more than for the likes of MCU. Wow. Best fandom evar!) So I have an incentive to not get complacent and just stick with one fandom because I would very soon have no ability to be in fandom at all.

My appetite for Consuming All The Things has slowed way down, but it also goes in waves, and a lot of what I’m consuming is what I did back in 2000: journal articles and the limited range of English-language books on the history of m/m sex and romance in East Asia. It’s not so much that I have a million fandoms as that I’m watching a few shows as an expression of my interest in East Asian costume dramas and East Asian history generally.

I do like to sit with one thing and experience it deeply rather than moving on quickly, but the surface expression of this has changed depending on whether I’m more into writing fic or more into doing research or something else.

But yes, I do do a certain amount of trying to stay current, often as a part of research for fandom meta or to help other people know what’s going on. Having a sense of what’s big doesn’t automatically mean getting into all those things, but I think some fans who are older-in-fandom and/or older-in-years stop being open to even hearing what’s new. And if you’ve never heard of it, you’ll never know if you might have liked it.

[fromtheplanethexagon]

the robot problem: a critical look at tobecky, 5 years late

hello wordgirl fandom i am back :) and i have a lot of thoughts that i never got around to expressing before i moved on from the show. so be aware that everything i'm saying is based on my experiences during the 2012-2016 era of the fandom & state of tumblr in general, and i am not familiar with more recent fan content.

it's been over five years since the show ended, and @ifbrd​ reminded me (along with some great analysis) that while tobecky was super popular since before the show technically started (thanks to the play date shorts), it's pretty unhealthy in a lot of ways that tend to be excused or flat out ignored in fanworks. i'd like to reflect on that a bit (a lot); specifically, how both the show and the fandom approached this enemies-to-lovers ship, and how easily this ship can slip into uncomfortable territory if we're careless about how we interpret the ship and create fan content of it.

i will admit, i'm mostly writing this as a response to past me and my old creations - though i moved on from the show as a whole years ago, i do like taking the time to reflect on old interests once in a while, and reevaluating my thoughts on them. and this ship is probably the biggest one that still lurks in the corners of my mind once in a while, so let's go.

cherish is the word: a short positive note before a much longer negative one

i wanted to start this essay off with some positivity, because i am going to be very negative after this. tobecky was, in some ways, cute. it's obvious from the very beginning that these two characters are on pretty equal ground, even if one of them isn't aware of it. and that's part of the fun - the irony of how unaware tobey is that his nemesis/crush/person that pretty much always wins against him is someone that he completely dismisses as incompetent. i want to point this out because honestly, in general i don't like enemies-to-lovers because a lot of them use a power imbalance within the dynamic, and i hate power imbalances, especially when it comes to actual life-or-death scenarios (at least, as much as cartoons can do that). in most episodes, becky is never actually forced to go along with his wishes. she's not held in a 'date' against her will, nor is she ever really outwitted by him. i bring this up because there is one huge, uncomfortable exception, which i will get to later.

another big plus to the ship is the fact that they just... get along? even when fighting? of course we get brief moments where they just hang out and talk about paintings or whatever, but i'm talking about how much they get each other, even if they don't realize it. like the word banter, for example. been there since day one. becky loves words, and while most other people in her life don't really care (ranging from 'eh, that's cool i guess' to her brother calling it annoying), tobey gives her a chance to show off and thus treats her as a worthy adversary as herself, not because of her more generic superpowers - something that we've seen in canon that she feels self-conscious about (see: her motivation in patch game). one of the less noticed examples, to me, is "it's your party and i'll cry if I want to", because it's just - okay. they both are excluded from a social event, and while it's obvious that tobey deals with it by destroying the city, it's also pretty obvious that becky also deals with her frustration by fighting in that battle. like, yes, realistically it's just objectively bad that he's destroying buildings. but they're also providing each other with a way to work through their frustrations, first by fighting and then by talking things out, and finally by hanging out together instead of dwelling on being excluded from the party.

so it makes a lot of sense to me that many tobecky fans gravitated towards writing far-in-the-future fic, usually by implying that some growth had taken place before starting to write the ship. (there are, as far as i'm aware, 2... maybe 3 exceptions, that take the time to attempt a real redemption for him, at least when i left the fandom.) because if you take away his worst moments, either by reasoning out that he was 10 years old and a mess, or that he was a cartoon character in a cartoon world where everyone's actions are over-the-top, or by just flat-out pretending that certain episodes never happened, there's some pretty solid ground to start a ship on.

go gadget go: we all do not see it, we simply close our eyes (review of canon)

when the show began, i was the same age as the characters. a lot of other people were, too - at least in my cohort of the fandom. i think it's pretty safe to say that many of us have fond memories of the show's earlier seasons, and held on to that interest as we got older, for whatever reasons. so like, not to be all 'as an OG fan...', but i remember seeing the shorts air for the first time in 2006. i have a diary entry in july of 2009 about how i, a 12yo with no concept of the idea of 'shipping', was disappointed in the new tobey episode because i wanted more tobecky interactions. (that was robo-camping, btw, lol.) and so i remember how exciting their rivalry felt, watching them as someone literally their exact same age, and then watching that again as a nostalgic 17yo, and then uh... growing up, to put it frankly, and realizing just how unhealthy most of their interactions were.

okay what i meant to say was, this section is an overview of the relationship's canon portrayal throughout the years.

first, we have early tobecky: this includes the shorts and the first few seasons. this is their classic relationship: he likes her and takes robots on rampages to get her attention, she majorly disapproves and has fun taking him down. we've all seen the show, you know what i'm talking about. his backhanded ways of trying to find out her identity often feature prominently in the episodes, which - sigh, i've mentioned this whole issue before, but it's kind of a grey area in the whole uncomfortable-factor thing, because while trying to find out her identity is VERY invasive, it's something that like... everyone in the show tries to do, even her canon crush (scoops). on the one hand, it's really not a great look, but on the other hand, this is a cartoon meant to parody a genre in which this trope is extremely common. so i just wanna say that i have Issues and Thoughts on this aspect of their relationship, but there are other things i find more important to discuss here.

second, we have late tobecky: this is seasons 7-8. this is... a very strange and huge shift from the previous dynamic, though it's not necessarily obvious. what i mean by that is that for some reason, the show writers made it so that half of tobey’s rampages have nothing to do with his crush on wordgirl, even though that used to be the sole reason for his villainy. seriously. we have the birthday episode, where he's upset because he feels left out; wg vs tobey vs the dentist, where he's mad that he has a cavity; and trustworthy tobey, where his robot goes on a rampage... after becky accidentally makes it malfunction. the two outliers are ‘guess who’s coming to thanksgiving dinner’ and ‘patch game’, but they still differ from previous seasons because 1) his destruction is isolated to a forest far away from the city, and 2) his motive is still to impress wordgirl, but his methods are relatively tame. also he completely gives up on the secret identity thing??? i may have missed some things but i think he straight up tells her 'yeah there's no way you're wordgirl, lol' and the subject is just dropped for the rest of the show.

i also want to include 'the robot problem' here, because it's one of two season 6 tobey episodes, and follows the 'doesn't destroy buildings to get her attention' pattern: in fact, he teams up with her to try and stop someone else from going on a rampage (even if his reasons are selfish, lol).

and finally. the other season 6 episode. we have go gadget go, the bane of my time spent in the fandom. because GGG is the single episode where tobey truly manages to take away her autonomy, and proceeds to abuse that power for an extended period of time, for his own amusement. it's bad. it's Very Bad. put in the context that it's a white boy doing this to an (ambiguously) brown girl, it's REALLY REALLY BAD. and the more i look back on it, tbh, the more weirded out i am that the show not only made it seem like she wasn't affected at all within the episode, it just... forgot about it (which is not unusual for shows and especially children’s shows, but WG does make some efforts to either retain continuity or create canon reasons for why things are forgotten about). it's the kind of thing that you can't excuse and honestly you can't redeem (like at this point, you gotta ask yourself why you're spending so much effort trying to redeem this guy when becky has several other possible ships that are nowhere near this unhealthy - violet, scoops, honestly even victoria if you want another hero/villain ship, my absolute fave rarepair rose, etc).

so if you want to still ship it you have to just pretend that it never happened. (i remember trying for weeks to write something exploring the aftermath of this episode, to try and make myself feel better about it, but the more i wrote the more i realized just how traumatic this event should've been, so i eventually just dropped it.) and i brought up my own timeline of experiences earlier to point out that this episode aired eight whole years after the show started. which means that when i saw it, even though i was a huge stickler for canon at the time, i'd built up my own idea of the show and characters strongly enough to go 'yeah, no, this episode sucks and i am going to pretend that it doesn't exist'. and i think a lot of other people did too, because i really saw like... no one mention it, ever, except for some rogue fanfics over on ff dot net that already liked dynamics like that.

because here's the thing, and i don't know if people nowadays are aware of it? but i'm 80% sure (cannot find a source, so the other 20% is that it was just a rumor) that the show was originally supposed to end after season 6. and even if it's a rumor, it makes a ton of sense, because we get 1) an 'ending' to tobecky, which is a bad one, 2) a permanent wordgirl identity reveal that significantly changes one of the major dynamics in the show, 3) an episode where TJ gets to work with wordgirl and get a nice potential ending for their sibling dynamic, 4) an episode where we see Two-Brains explore life without his henchmen... the list goes on, and idk how many of these are just major stretches. but the point is. if the show had ended there, that would've been a pretty solid ending for many things, including their relationship: aka, it would prove that it was only ever heading somewhere bad, and when tobey finally has his moment of triumph, he is truly evil about it. and this provides us fans who HATE go gadget go with an easy reason to dismiss it - we can say that it was an attempt to conclude things in a way that wouldn't have happened if the writers had known they'd get more time. but despite that... it is still a canon episode.

it is odd to me how dramatically the dynamic shifts after that, though, because we seriously go from 'worst case ever, tobecky is toxic, your ship is dead' to 'no actually they get along and hang out and get ice cream together and tobey isn't even pressuring her into it, she's happy to go along with it :)' like, immediately. i never knew much about the show writers, so i don't know if the writers changed in between these seasons, but i would absolutely not be surprised if they did.

the earlier episodes are definitely problematic as well (though they pale in comparison to GGG) but i think everyone who ships it is aware considering that tobey is, yknow, a villain. from memory, he destroys buildings to get her attention, lies to her about the level of danger that people are in to trick her into spending more time with him, blackmails her into reading his poetry, and he creates a robot based on her that’s supposed to be devoted to him (but of course, all of these things backfire). not great stuff of course, but like... he’s a villain, that’s the point of his character. and considering that he’s a child these are things that can be redeemed, if done thoughtfully.

anyway, to sum up this section, the show starts off with a pretty standard 'enemies with an unrequited crush' setup, takes a really dark turn for a single episode, and then for the rest of the show takes their dynamic in a direction that makes it much, much easier to ship. as long as you ignore a lot of previous content.

wordbot: where's becky's autonomy in all of this? (misogyny)

we've finally gotten to the fandom. i recognize that a lot of this is going to come across as hypocritical considering how active i used to be re: this ship, but like... i'm a very different person now. anyway. disclaimer i guess - i don't write this to accuse all tobecky shippers of being like this - i know a lot of us aren't/weren't! but boy do i have things to point out, so without further ado:

it is very hard to ship this without allowing some bit of misogyny to slip into it. very, very hard. the entire premise of the ship involves a girl falling in love with a boy that repeatedly pressures her to date him via threats to the safety of herself and people she cares about, which... it's 2020, i shouldn't have to explain why that's terrible & a terrible example to set for children (which is why i am glad they never made it canon, tbh). best-case fan content has tobey stop pressuring her and start working to redeem himself out of an actual change of heart, which leads to becky seeing him in a new light. worst-case fan content treats his incessant pressuring and sometimes outright threats as something romantic - and even worse, romantic to the point where he deserves her attention and love as a reward for not giving up or whatever. i did see this pretty frequently for a while, especially in the earlier 2010s (didn't read much, Not My Thing At All), but i don't feel like going into detail here because of how obviously problematic it is. one medium (but still bad) case is where the fan content makes him start his redemption, but treats her liking him back as a reward for not knocking buildings over anymore. another not great case is where she tries to fix him with her love, which is a very common and very dangerous romantic trope. both are just... so incredibly unfair to her.

in content where she tries to 'fix him'... yeah i feel like it's really obvious how misogynistic that is. girls and women should not feel responsible for the evil actions of men, plain and simple. idk what else to say here i just really hate that trope and hated it back then and it just sucks! so can we not do that anymore, thanks.

in content that treats her like a reward for good behavior, there really isn't much of an explanation for what she sees in him. if she just goes 'oh wow, you're good now, i am going to fall in love with you for it' the whole thing falls flat because it makes NO sense whatsoever. we get to hear so much about tobey and his feelings and why he likes her and how he feels about it, but where is that energy for becky? why does she choose to trust him, to spend time around him, what does she enjoy about his presence? where is her getting over scoops in the process of falling for tobey? where is her telling her friends about this, confiding in them, asking them for advice? where is her choice in the matter?

win a day with wordgirl: do you guys even like becky or do you just like the idea of her (misogyny... 2!)

it was pretty standard for all fandoms the early-mid 2010s, but that's still not a good excuse for why so many tobecky fanfictions centered specifically around tobey's feelings while refusing to give becky the same level of empathy and nuance. it is true that to ship them comfortably you have to redeem him to some degree, which means spending time figuring him out and trying to find ways to pull him to the light without feeling super OOC. but ships take two people??? and there was so much potential for fanfics to explore becky's complex feelings on the matter - because she is! complex! she's heroic and kind but she's petty and has a competitive streak, she easily befriends villains but also doesn't trust them and doesn't believe they can ever really change, she's the savior of an entire planet but has feelings of inadequacy as her civilian identity and struggles with feeling like she can be successful without superpowers, she's great at the straightforward meanings and uses of words and loves reading but struggles to write passages that aren't dry as hell, it can be easily headcannoned that she's neurodivergent (special interests, issues with fitting in with her peers, taking things very literally, etc)... seriously there is SO MUCH to explore about her character, and a lot of it comes into play when you add tobey into the mix (literally ALL of the things i mentioned are explored at some point using tobey as a parallel or foil), but i rarely saw fanfiction that explored her thoughts on things further than 'he's evil but... maybe good?' or 'he's evil but... i kind of like him anyway?'.

if you want her to fall for him while being a villain, explore it!! why does she go against her morals? does she lie to herself about it to feel better? does she feel like she has to 'fix him' as part of her superhero duties to the city, and if so, how does that affect her as she tries and fails to help him? does she fall for him when she believes that he's turning good, only to feel betrayed when he starts acting worse because he feels like he can get away with it? it's such a shame that fanworks spend so little time even considering these questions, and it is absolutely a product of how deeply misogyny is/was baked into how we approach media (especially back then).

tobey goes good: but wait, i thought this show was progressive (a conclusion, i guess)

ifbrd wrote a great meta recently about how the show is a bit misogynist, despite being progressive in several ways. honestly i don't have much to add, but i'd really recommend reading through this; it makes a lot of great observations about the ways that male and female characters are presented differently through the show

i have little to add, so i'd just like to conclude with a reflection on the ship from my current viewpoint. i do think part of the reason so many of us latched onto the ship, despite how obviously problematic it was, is that the show treats a lot of things that would be serious in real life as normal or even comedic - which is fine lol, i'm not going to pretend that it's not a show for little kids, so they have to keep the tone light.

but if we, as teens/adults, decide to engage with this content in a more realistic manner, we have to be prepared to confront how messed up so many of the things going on really are. and if you still want to ship it, there's nothing inherently wrong with that! there's a lot of interesting things to explore in this ship, no matter what stage of enemies-to-friends-to-lovers you write them at, and it can be really helpful to have a space where you can explore a dynamic such as this in fiction. (speaking from experience here tbh, writing some fic for them helped me deal with complicated feelings about some ex-longtime friends.)

so to write this ship at all means that there are canon issues that you need to deal with if you want to have them end up in a healthy relationship in any manner that makes sense (unless you create an AU where none of that is applicable, which, power to you then). and i’m not saying ‘write them with a healthy endgame or you’re Bad’, not at all lol. but at least please, please take a step back once in a while to examine the dynamic that you’re writing, and please be careful about whether you mean to be romanticizing whatever behaviors you end up portraying as good.

[broken-heart20x]

Sorry for any spelling and grammar errors. English is not my first language. Als,o I suck at writing but please enjoy!

Wanna say something really quick because this has been on my mind for DAYS!! Ok so I was thinking of ways of Gou and Satoshi possibly confessing to one another in the series, I know that the chance of that actually happening in canon is slim to none but let me have this okay also I mostly made this for fun. Anyways, let's continue.

Ok! Hear me out, what if instead of Gou being the one to confess, Satoshi does the confessing first? Here are my reasonings:

Satoshi has had multiple people in his past journeys have feelings for him (be it companions or characters that were there for a couple of episodes) yet he's too dense to even notice it. *coughcoughSerenacoughcough* So him actually fully recognizing his feeling romantic feelings by himself for someone rather than pure platonic feelings, will show that this person is more meaningful to him as in more than just a friend

As I explain a bit in the last point, it would be more impactful for the relationship and ship too because it would be shown that this isn't just another one-sided relationship. Because as much as I love shipping ships where there aren't canonical feelings present, it would be nice to have mutual feelings in this relationship. Satoshi hasn't shown much interest in many characters in a romantic way because he is a kid what do you expect? Sure he cares about them because they are his friends and that's the thing. It's just a simple friendship. (Not to invalidate friends because friends are great but not the point I'm trying to make)

I just to see a flustered Satoshi and not be a dense baby boy for once in his life.

Although I wrote this specifically for Satogou, I wrote this in a more broad way because shipping Satoshi with anyone comes with its fair share of conflicts and honestly I feel this is a more realistic approach for a stable relationship for Satoshi. Not over fantasizing about an immediate relationship between the two because both Gou and Satoshi are young. I feel like building their relationship over time would be more impactful. Honestly, I feel like Gou would have himself more figured out than Satoshi would granted Gou would still be a mess. So Satoshi being the one to pull himself together and figure himself out show that he has grown from that young trainer who didn't understand what crushes were to a person who knows what it's like to have someone that you love and care for because they are important and precious to you.

Without further ado:

Satoshi begins to be more self-aware of his feelings toward Gou but doesn't come to full terms with them yet because it's the first time he's felt this way and his actually aware of his feelings and not misinterpreting those feelings as friendship. Maybe a couple episodes before this series ends, he has fully embraced those feelings and tries to tell Gou what he is feeling, but can't be because he's busy with the World Championships. Meanwhile, Gou has been deciding what he wants to do next now that he's more fully capable of catching stronger Pokémon. Although Gou likes traveling with Satoshi, he feels like it's time for him to start his own journey. (Note: regarding their jobs as research fellows, Professor Sakuragi doesn't mind them leaving as he is very thankful for all the information they have given him. Besides Koharu had decided to help her father out. Although she doesn't want to be a professor like her father, she still wanted help out because to her, seeing the bond between Pokémon��and human is something beautiful and special) Gou tells Satoshi that after the World Championships, he will be leaving but wants to continue to support his friend, Satoshi, from afar. Satoshi, although hurt at first, understands because he has done the same thing before and this wasn't the first time he and a friend split ways. However, this was the first time where he didn't want to leave his friend.

Their friendship has become a bit shaky after that but nonetheless, they support each other. Ok, so the World Championships end (depending on what the anime chooses of Satoshi either lost or won) and Gou and Satoshi are preparing to say goodbye and pack their stuff to go separate ways.

The night before Gou has to leave for his journey, he decides to sneak out and get some air because he couldn't sleep. Satoshi (also not being able to sleep) follows Gou (mind you that they both left their Pokémon to sleep) and finds him at the docs, the same place where he met Lugia when he first came to Vermillion City. Satoshi sits next to Gou and Gou was startled that he found him, but didn't mind having some company.

They end up talking about the journeys they'd had together as friends and research fellows while having a nice time overall. Eventually, Gou brings up that, at first, his impression of Satoshi was that he was cool ("is" Satoshi corrects) and how the next day when they had their fight, he thought that Satoshi was one of those guys, who pretend to be nice but end up being jerks. But when he saw him protecting those Ivysaur and Bulbasaur, he realized that Satoshi isn't that type of person and as they continued to travel together, his admiration for Satoshi has grown so much that now Satoshi is someone Gou considers to be special to him. Satoshi is speechless and Gou decides he's said enough and gets up to leave but Satoshi stops Gou from leaving. He confesses to Gou that he feels something toward him and for the first time in his life and actually wants to continue traveling with someone other than Pikachu. Before Gou could respond, Lugia appears in front of them and take them out for another joy ride where they talk about the future and come up with a plan. After their ride was over Lugia, this time didn't drop them off a mile away and they go back to the Laboratory and sleep peacefully together in separate beds.

When they wake up, it's time to say goodbye. Professor Sakuragi and Professor Oak shake his hand and tells Gou that they look forward to learning about what he discovered out in the world (Professor Sakugari promises to take care of Gou's Pokémon until he returns and those Pokémon that Gou sends back to the lab). His parents would be an emotional mess and worried if this was the correct decision, only to be assured by Gou that he'll be fine while his parent tightly embrace him. His Pokémon all give a huge group hug and Gou is trying to get oxygen into his lungs. Koharu tells Gou that she'll take care of his Pokémon and that he should stay safe out there then gives him a hug. What surprised everyone was when Satoshi doesn't give Gou a hug rather he gives him a....

A KISS!!!

no, I'm kidding haha

He and Gou simply fist bump and say that they'll be the first to reach their goal. As Gou boards, his ride (doesn't matter what mode of transportation) Satoshi goes to him and pulls off his cap from the top of his head and uses it to cover his and Gou’s face as he gives him a kiss on the cheek. Then he placed the hat on Gou's head and wished him safe travels. Gou nodded with determination on his face and got on board Satoshi goes back to the main group where he is bombarded with questions. He answered as best and simply as he could without giving too much away. As they go home, Koharu asks him, as they are away from the adult, why he kissed Gou's cheek rather than his lips and why he gave his hat away. Which Satoshi replied that he simply expects those two things to be returned in better quality and use than when he had them.

Gou and Satoshi part ways promising to be stronger people for themselves rather than for each other, so that when they reunite they can be stronger than ever before. First separately and then together. Like Pokémon and humans, separately they can be incredibly strong individuals but when they come together, it forges into something new, stronger, and special.

They wanted to see how far they can go individually and then how far they can go together once they have seen their own limitations. As much as I adore this ship I want what's best for Gou and Satoshi characters because I know neither will abandon their dream for the other and sometimes life takes us on separate roads but that doesn't mean that they won't cross again. Besides destiny and fate have a funny way of uniting people together. Be it with Pokémon with Pokémon, Pokémon with human, or human with human. Meetings like those, fateful meetings, aren't easy to forget and those meetings hold a special place in our hearts.

I believe Gou and Satoshi are fated partners (take that in a romantic or platonic sense) and regardless of what lies ahead in the Pokémon world, they will face it together until the day they part of ways. Regardless, where, when, why or how it happens (the separation), their relationship is truly something special ♡

Thanks for reading this stupid post that I had zero impulse control in making.

HAPPY SATOGOU WEEK EVERYONE!!! ♡♡♡♡♡♡

[zutaralesbian]

zutara and bamon!

Zutara:

Why I ship them (or why I do not): Ooooh Zutara. They're one of my oldest ships and one that I ALWAYS drift back to eventually when it comes to phases lol. I started shipping them back when I was about thirteen and they were one of my first major introductions to online fan works. The first time I watched ATLA it was when it was first airing and I was only a young kid, so I naturally just 'shipped' the canon pairings. But when I found out that Zutara was a thing I was intrigued by it and a bunch of meta and fics later, I was hooked. I just love the fire and water symbolism of them and the way they parallel each other. Their relationship development and the mutual understanding and respect they have for each other by the end of the show. There's just....so much interesting storytelling material for Zutara. And I think that's one of the biggest reasons they're so popular.

My favorite moment between them: I feel like this changes all the time but I think right now it would be the cave scene in Ba Sing Se. Despite Zuko's betrayal afterwards I just loved how these two people who were enemies for the entire time they've known each other bonded and found some understanding between each other. Also Katara offering to use the water from the oasis to heal Zuko's scar and Zuko letting her touch the scar???? Kill me. I feel like a lot of what I love about Zutara is represented in that scene alone.

My least favorite moment between them: I don't think there is a ZK scene that I hate. I mean, I don't like the infamous pirate scene in book 1 but I also think people make it out to be a lot worse than it actually was. (I've seen people compare it to the R*ylo scene where Kylo captures and tortures Rey and that is so undeserved and extra.)

The character I prefer: Zuko is my socially awkward son and I have a special love for him so he's definitely my personal fave. There aren't many character arcs that make me as emotional as his. BUT at the same time I know Katara is queen and she's definitely my second fave.

A fanfic idea for them that I would love to read or write: The post-war idea I have where Mai leaves Zuko for Ty Lee, Katara and Aang breakup amicably, and then Zuko and Katara fall for each other on a trip together to visit a healing Azula lives in my mind rent free.

What I would have changed about how canon handled them if I could: As amazing as canon Zutara done right would have been, I'm kind of okay with them not being canon? Mostly because with the exception of Sukka I think Bryke sucks at writing romance lmao. And I have more than enough ZK fanwork to keep me satisfied. BUT in a perfect world I would have had Zutara been implied as a future romance in the end and erased the K*taang and Ma*ko stuff. (The gaang are all literal children. I think it would have been more than fine if they ended the series all single.)

Bamon:

Why I ship them (or why I do not): They had great chemistry and were just a fun dynamic with a lot of potential (especially in the later seasons after they became friends.) I think their development from begrudging allies (and occasional enemies) to friends was fun to see and always an underrated dynamic in TVD and I would have loved to have seen it go all the way to lovers.

My favorite moment between them: Damon reciting the letter he wrote to Bonnie before he put himself in the coffin that she never read always gets me in the feels.

My least favorite moment between them: For some reason I can't really remember a specific scene but I know there were plenty in the early seasons that made me angry lol

The character I prefer: Oh definitely Bonnie. She was a queen that always deserved better than the way that shitty ass show treated her. She's the only reason I stuck with TVD as long as I did. I do admittedly have some kind of soft spot for Damon too though and I prefer him as a character over Stefan. But I completely understand why people hate him lmao 🥴

A fanfic idea for them that I would love to read or write: It's been soooo long since I've even thought about Bamon fic. But back in the day S6 canon divergents were my shit and I'd be down to reading one again if there are new ones out.

What I would have changed about how canon handled them if I could: Here's how I think I would have made them canon starting in S6: Damon and Bonnie would have had a frenemies with benefits kind of arrangement while they were stuck in the prison world together. (Honestly it's ridiculous to me that they didn't on the show. Two people with chemistry stuck in a prison world together with only each other for company, not expecting to escape and they never once fucked? Fffs). Once they're both free from the prison world there's this lingering Tension between them even though they obviously decided to stop having sex now that they were both free. Bonnie now feels off seeing Damon and Elena together and she eventually realizes it's because she's developed feelings for him. But she keeps it to herself out of loyalty to Elena and Damon has been obsessed with Elena for almost as long as Bonnie's known him so there's no way he'd feel the same anyway.

This would continue on for a while until we got to S7, where Damon decides to put himself in a coffin until Elena wakes up. I would have had part of his decision to do this be because he realized he has feelings for Bonnie and felt like he was betraying Elena by having them, so he ran.

Cut to Damon returning and Bonnie suddenly being in a relationship with Enzo. Damon would have been insanely jealous and this would have kicked off a Damon/Bonnie/Enzo triangle. Maybe Damon has some kind of talk with Stefan that makes him realize it's okay for him to want to be with Bonnie, that Elena wouldn't have wanted him to be miserable while she was gone. The triangle would have eventually ended with Bonnie/Enzo breaking up and Damon/Bonnie getting together. (And the 'Dear Bonnie' scene would have been re-written to be a reveal that Damon confessed to being in love with Bonnie and not knowing what to do about it in the letter). We would have then seen Damon and Bonnie as a couple throughout the entirety of S8, with the finale having the implication that Damon was going to stay with Bonnie throughout her whole human life and then one day in the far future reconcile with Elena. (Basically the same way the Will/Tessa/Jem situation was in The Infernal Devices.) What really sucks is that the TVD writers could have EASILY done something like this if they weren't cowards.

Thanks! :)

[stitch1830]

🎩

I'm fine and dandy,

Mind i ask your opinion on what became of the Gaang in LOK? I know the Toph being a cop thing ruffles some feathers and some don't accept Aang was a bad father.

HAT ANON HI glad to hear you are fine and dandy on this exquisite day of the week. And OOF this is a loaded question, but I'll do my best! :)

So I feel like there are a couple ways to answer this question based on your shipping preferences, but for the sake of this I'll try and answer everything based on what is considered canon. So ATLA, comics, and LOK.

I'll also preface by saying that I get why there are some controversial takes in LOK... I think they were trying to make the characters have more depth and show that even our favorite characters have flaws, even when they're adults. I just think that in some situations it was OOC and it leaves a bad taste in your mouth when you see where the Gaang went from the start to the end of ATLA, and then to see glimpses of their adult life and only seeing the trashiest parts.

Aang: If he's with Katara, it's not surprising to me that he's not a great father. Like, he has very strong opinions about his culture and while Katara is just as passionate about her upbringing, there isn't a ton of evidence of Aang accommodating the children's upbringing to also integrate SWT traditions in their lifestyle. I don't think he was outwardly trying to be a bad dad or anything, but his desperation to pass down Air Nomad traditions to an airbender overshadowed his primary need to be a father to all three of his kids. It's also really hard to see him as still this happy, lovable nice guy who treats everyone with kindness and respect when we know that he practically ignored 2 of his kids... But basically, his 'bad takes' as a dad were left unchecked, and his actions were probably defended by his wife as opposed to having to face them.

Katara: This one hurt lol. Again, it's not surprising that when she's with Aang that she chooses to settle down and be a wife and mother and healer. Aang's the Avatar, he's busy, their two oldest children are really rambunctious and are craving attention, so it's gonna be Katara to give them the love and care they need. But based on what we see in ATLA, it's just sad that we don't get to see or hear about any changes she made in the world or fighting. She really does seem to be ushered off to the side, left to retire in SWT after Aang dies. It's also sad/crazy that her strength and ability to stand up to disrespectful or ignorant people goes away when she's an adult. And I feel like this is glaring in her relationship with Aang and then also when Korra is finishing up training in the SWT. The other masters are whining that Korra isn't ready and Katara says she is and then the men keep complaining and whining. Like, no way would ATLA Katara let that go without her giving her two cents. Yes, she does help Korra leave, but she definitely would've said something to those old hoots. It's also weird that her strong resolve doesn't show up when she's raising her children with Aang. Why didn't she confront him? And if she did, how come nothing changed? Maybe it was too late, but idk. Katara doesn't seem like the person to let things go after she stood up to the problem once. Essentially, I'm upset that Katara was this strong and powerful female protagonist in ATLA, but not really hear about her amazing strides in the world in LOK (because if she did change the world, they didn't mention it... sad).

Sokka: Hmmm, he's not really ever shown in the show except in one flashback (because he's dead tears), but from what it sounds like, he didn't have any children, didn't sound like he ever really settled down, nothing like that. I think it would be sad if Aunt Wu's fortune was true and he never really ended up happy because of things he did. Would that be considered OOC? I don't think so... He was the goofy guy and the brains of the operations, but he seems like the guy that is afraid of being happy or ruins things when he is happy. My only reasoning for this is when he lost Yue, it changed him on some level, and at first he tried to push away Suki when she was initiating a kiss. Pretty light and lame reasons, but it's something....

Suki: MY GIRL SUKI NOT MENTIONED THAT'S SO OOC. Lol. Like, why didn't she randomly pop up from time to time? Are the Kyoshi Warriors just not around? I don't like that she wasn't in LOK, not even in a small flashback or anything. She was friends with the Gaang and it seems odd that no one mentioned their dear friend that helped save the world with them even if she passed away or anything. And also I don't think a casual statement about her settling in the suburbs counts as canon lol.

Toph: Okay. I don't hate that she's a cop. It's not really in character, but I don't hate it. If all of her friends settled in Republic City, and they all had their own responsibilities to deal with and asked Toph to run the RCPD, I think she would say yes out of loyalty to her friends, maybe out of boredom. I'm surprised she was in the role as long as she was, though... She was starting to get bored of her metalbending academy after a year or two once things were running smoothly, so she seems like the kind of woman that would search for the next adventure. But if she had to be a cop, I think she'd much rather be the one enforcing the rules at the top as opposed to following the rules, but... yeah. In a canon universe I struggle to come up with a long-term career for her, so I made my peace with the cop thing. Many of my friends haven't though lol, which is okay! Another thing I didn't like was how she was portrayed as a bad mother. Not that she was a bad mother (as much as it would suck, I can kind of see her being a bad mom), but they way she was a bad mom didn't really fit her character. She was neglected as a kid, doesn't seem right that she in turn would neglect her kids by giving them too much freedom. Also! My least favorite thing was how she had a 20/30 year rift with her girls, and then it was suddenly resolved. Like... No we need some more context to the conflict, and we need to see work being put into the resolution if we're going to bring this up. If Lin held a grudge against her family for 30 years, a short "sorry I wasn't a great mom, hope you don't hate me" comment isn't going to make her forgive them lol. I do like how she was portrayed as a single mother to two girls. She doesn't really seem like the type to settle down, and it was a nice surprise to see her have daughters from different men. Families come in all shapes and sizes, and it would've been the perfect opportunity to show those differences and show that there's more than one way to have a positive upbringing (Like, let's see the cloudbabies and the Beifongs both happy even though they had two very different parental upbringings? Just... there was an opportunity is all). And yeah, she seems like the one that would never settle down or have a family, so it would've been interesting to see her handle motherhood and her job! So I'm okay with that bit.

Zuko: Okay Zuko seems chill in canon, but who's his wife? Where she at? He got a partner or anything? We may never know... But it's nice that he appeared to have a happy life with good kids and grandkids... And yet I'm confused as to why Korra preferred to go to Zuko instead of the Avatar's wife for advice on what Aang would have done when choosing between saving the Air Nomads and turning herself in to the Red Lotus?? Like, I know Katara was in the SWT, but they have phones now, you're telling me they couldn't have called Katara? Why wasn't Katara the first person they thought to ask about the situation? I know the logistics would've been difficult considering Katara is holed up in the SWT, but why did everyone say that Zuko knew Aang the best? Why didn't his wife know him the best? Thoughts to ponder.

Okay. I wrote a lot and there's probably more that I do and don't like about how the characters were portrayed... But I think what it all boils down to is that there was an opportunity to still get depth in these beloved characters without us being frustrated with situations that are OOC. Then again, that would make it less about the Krew and more about the Gaang... It just seems like a bit of a slap to the face when we see glaring problems with the Gaang's characterization, and yet, we get no explanation. It does allow for canon writers to play with the 70 years in between, but idk. I much prefer AU's where there's time and opportunity to explore the characters as their best selves I suppose. Honestly, with my disinterest and disliking of canon ships, I don't see the bad takes in LOK as OOC, but it makes me wonder how different things could have been if other ships were made canon (thank goodness they weren't, we're not pigeonholed into one type of story, but still).

Does this kind of answer your question? Lol, sorry if not. My thoughts are all over the place with this one! Thank you for the ask, though, Hatty. Hope you have a great day! :)

[mashi-sims]

My 5x10 Thoughts (I have many).

I’m going to start with the non-Cooliver material, because for once, an episode has made me feel like there’s actual stuff to talk about (other than Cooper and Oliver, of course). So, here we go:

1.       Franklin and Anna-Kat must be protected at all costs. I love these two characters and the fact that they are very openly calling each other “boyfriend” and “girlfriend” in this season is amazing. I really enjoy Anna Kat this season; of course, it’s different, but it’s still good. It honestly disgusts me how so many people keep commenting “Where’s the real Anna-Kat?” on AHW’s ig posts. Julia made the decision to leave, it isn’t the show’s fault, and it definitely isn’t Giselle’s fault. I love how Giselle is trying her best to portray a character that people already loved for her kooky-wicked personality, which already gave her dramatically high expectations to meet, and you can clearly see her progress EVERY EPISODE, she’s amazing. If anything, we should be praising this young girl for taking the challenge and carrying it on!

 2.       Taylor and Trip’s relationship is going down the drain? I’m honestly not a 100% certain. If anything, I believe it’s more of a 50/50 chance. There are many ways this could be headed. I like Taylor and Trip’s relationship because they’re both very sweet and they fit together in a nice way, but honestly, and hate me if you want, there’s nothing about it that makes me crazy. I think it’s very clever how they introduced Taylor’s doubts about Trip, which are completely valid. Leaving someone who is holding you back in any way is always okay if your personal growth is your main focus. If she wants to explore new parts of herself and to be able to do it, means she has the leave Trip behind, so be it! However, what I don’t like, is that this happened because of Andre. Again, don’t get me wrong, I really like Andre, and after last night’s episode, I think he’s very sweet and would be a good match for Taylor. What I mean is, I don’t like the idea that she only figured out she had bigger dreams because she met someone else. It’s okay when you look at a person who makes you rethink stuff and opens up new thought opportunities so you can get to exploring them yourself, but the show clearly made it known since the beginning that he was a potential new love interest, and (at least to me) it kind of feels like she’s replacing Trip. I have no predictions and no hopes for Taylor/Trip/Andre because they’re not really the reason why I watch the show (we all know why I watch the show), but I’m interested in seeing what happens.

 3.       I have no feelings about Greg running for city council. I also have no feelings for his competition. Yes, those are my thoughts.

 4.       Katie and Kathryn’s storyline here was pretty minor in my head, but it honestly sparked up one of my biggest fears in life, which is becoming my mother, you know? lol. It was still nice to see her becoming a more supportive mom and letting her kids suck at stuff instead of never trying at all.

 And now, for Cooliver. Let’s begin with the thought that kept me up at night:

1.       Oliver said “We are COOLIVER”. OMG yes. Yes yes yes, just- yes. I don’t want to be a bitch but it always rubbed me the wrong way when people call the ship “Coopoliver”, which I learnt people do when I tried searching the tag on Instagram; so the fact they even pronounced the letters C O O L I V E R made me so happy. It’s official.

 2.       Are you telling me Trevor thinks they’re dating? YES PLEASE. Does this mean people at school ALSO believe they are dating? Are Cooper and Oliver the only people who don’t know they’re dating?

 3.       I know we all want canon Cooliver, but I was actually happy they didn’t do it in this episode. I am really loving this slow-burn. Cooper has been having a lot of personal growth this season; I love how he’s getting to know himself and what he wants and he’s starting to prioritize himself. I’m not going too in depth about this because I don’t feel like right now, but I’m assuming Cooper latched onto Oliver’s dreams simply because he didn’t have any of his own; always living a materialistic life drifted him away from thinking about his feelings and his soul’s ambitions, and now that he gave up all that, has started to realize there’s more to him that what he originally thought. All of this is just going to make Oliver fall more in love with him in the end, because there’s so much he still doesn’t know about Cooper.

 4.       I am clearly not a writer in this show and my opinions are worth -1%, but I’d want for the show to build this story up and give us an actual, tangible, well-constructed romance. I wouldn’t want them to go take the “Oh do I like you? Yes you like me omg let’s be boyfriends” route, because that’s not sustainable in any way, but giving us a real slow-burn where they start realizing things, and then thinking about things- and talking about things- and THEN making it official? YES. I don’t know about you guys, but I’m a sucker for slow-burn and I hate when things are rushed, and I honestly fear seeing this relationship die because of poor writing.

 I want to say that although I don’t what’s going to happen to this show, and I only found out this existed like two months ago, it’s been a good run. This show is so much better than MANY others and has brought me my good dose of laughs, I also met a really nice fandom and people who are very supportive of each other, you guys really are amazing. Every other fandom I am (or was) a part of is either toxic af or dead, and although this one is pretty small, it’s really cool!

[realm-sweet-realm]

Like a Heart Needs a Beat, chapter 1.

Hello, everyone. This is part one of two of an Abby x Lacie story. The first chapter is pretty much just going to be pure fluff, and next chapter the ink-related angst will kick in.

This story, and the next two two-part shipping stories I write, will be “canon” to my version of events.

---

It wouldn’t have been the first time that Bertrum had dragged Lacie to one of the parties he hosted, but that didn’t mean that she had to like it. She got it, she really did- Bertrum thought she deserved to experience the finer things in life (some of which, to be fair, Lacie did enjoy), and didn’t get that no amount of exposure would make her enjoy this. Still, as she was now, forced into a suit once owned by Bertrum’s son and listening to Bertrum trade compliments that were really insults (or whatever they were. They had a strange way of communicating with each other that Lacie didn’t think she wanted to understand) with his client while dozens of men were flirting with each others’ trophy wives in the background, she felt out of place and a little irritated at Bertrum for insisting she come. It was as Joey and Bertrum were getting especially petty that Lacie just had to look away, and across the room, Lacie saw a woman who looked twice as miserable as she was and only slightly more in-her-element.

Lacie approached her. It was a pretty girl, despite looking like she was completely done with this party. She was wearing a grey suit, clearly tailored for her, and had short, curly hair, dark eyes, clear, dark skin. Her body was pretty nice, too. Yeah, Lacie was going to do this.

“Hey,” Lacie said, “You look like you could use some air. Want me to show you a place where we can get away from the party for a while?”

The woman slowly turned her head to look at her. “Sure. Why not?” she replied without changing expression. Lacie would have to hope that would change and that the woman wasn’t just a natural sourpuss.

Lacie smiled. “Come with me.”

Bertrum was a nice man. He allowed Lacie to step out of parties when she needed to, and even gave her one heck of a place to go when she did: Bertrum’s bird room.

Bertrum loved birds. Bertrum raised birds. It was his favourite hobby. The bird room contained two cages of small, pet-store birds, a larger cage for his doves, and a number of nests for his other birds- three chickens, two ducks, a goose, a swan, and (out of place as they looked amongst the farm fowl) two peafowl. It was easy to keep so many pets when you could pay people to look after them. The bird room opened up to an outdoor enclosure, but this time of day they were all in their nests.

“Pretty cool, right?” Lacie said. “Wanna feed em’? I’m the host’s plus-one. Don’t worry, he won’t mind.”

The woman seemed pretty impressed. “Sure,” she replied.

Lacie showed her to the plastic barrel of dried corn in the corner. The birds crowded them, eager, which made them laugh.

After they’d spent a while feeding the birds, the woman had cheered up significantly, and so Lacie tried to make conversation.

“So. My name’s Lacie. And you know why I’m here. What’s your name, and why are you here? And why don't you want to be here? Because it's obvious you don't.”

The woman rolled her eyes. “Abby Lambert. Nice to meet you, Lacie. I’m here because Joey Drew begged me to be his plus one so he wouldn’t have to come alone. And... instead of telling people that I was his friend or his coworker, or lying and telling people I was his girlfriend, he made up this lie that I’d won a contest to get to go with him. That I was his biggest fan. I’ll be honest- that pissed me off. He didn’t think it was right for his image, I guess."

“Oof, that sucks. You know, I’m just one of Bertrum’s engineers, and I don’t know an eighth of the high society stuff he does, but he would still never do that.”

“Thanks. And thanks for taking me out for some air.”

“No problem.”

It was a few more minutes of feeding birds before Lacie decided to throw her shot. “If Joey wants to be a jerk he can stay here on his own. Wanna get out of here?”

Abby looked Lacie up and down, and suddenly Lacie wished she were wearing something a little more revealing than this ill-fitting suit- especially since Abby’s was accentuating every curve of her body. But Abby clearly liked what she saw.

“Yeah. Yeah, that would be nice.”

The two took a cab to Abby’s apartment, where they spent the night.

---

After the one-night stand, Abby had left Lacie her number. If one night was good, why not make it several? And then, Lacie had surprised her by asking her out. To an art museum.

“You like art, right? It’s not just a job? I mean, I wouldn’t want you taking me to a construction site.”

God, she was a dork. A muscular, handsome dork. Abby had to roll her eyes at herself for being so caught up on a woman, but she eventually broke down and asked Joey a few pointed questions during their lunch break a few days before the date. “So, Mr. Romantic- can you give me some tips about how to sweep a woman off her feet? I’m meeting someone tonight.”

Joey had smiled teasingly at her. “Oh, my. The ever-serious Abby Lambert is lovestruck!”

“You’re gross. It was good sex. That’s all.”

“Right. That’s why you came to me for advice. Well, I’d say just be natural. Be friendly, make jokes, find common interests, all that common-sense stuff. And then at the end of the night invite her over for some wine and radio, read her signs, and that’s when you start getting physical.” Joey suddenly went from smiling and talking with his hands to being much more serious. “Oh, and... I’m sorry about the other night. You know how it is... I respect you, the art department respects you, but I can’t trust random people to do so, and I can’t avoid interacting with people who won’t.”

He didn’t even have to say that it was because she was a black woman. It was the same reason why Joey had promoted someone else ahead of her as head of the art department- he hadn’t trusted that the others would accept her authority. But, after she’d handled the art department while her ex-superior was on vacation and there hadn’t been any problems, Joey had snatched the promotion right out of his hands and put it in Abby’s. Not fair to the ex-head of the art department, but Joey rarely was. Even if he wasn’t perfect, though, he was still one of the few in this day and age who would hand a high position to her under any circumstance, and one of the few she could discuss her relationships with.

“Maybe we should just not talk about that. See you soon, Joey.” Why think about that when Abby had more cheerful things to think about?

---

When Lacie showed up to the art museum, she was wearing a leather jacket, scuffed jeans, and heavy boots. She’d definitely stand out in a dainty place like this.

“So, do you know anything about art?” Abby asked as they went to the first section, which featured a number of surrealist paintings.

“Not a thing!” Lacie admitted, not at all ashamed. “Are you the type who likes to teach, or the type who just wants me to shut up and enjoy it on the level I’m at?”

“I... guess I wouldn’t mind explaining some things.”

“Okay. So, this one,” Lacie gestured at a painting of half-melted clocks hanging off of tree branches and the like. “It must represent something real deep, right?”

“Well, there’s more to art than symbolism, and surrealist stuff doesn’t have to have a deeper meaning. But... maybe it means that time just melts away when you’re having fun.”

It was midnight before Abby was back in her apartment. The museum had closed before they’d felt like any time had passed, and so they’d gone for a walk together in the city and stopped at whatever shops caught their eyes. It had been fun.

Abby’s apartment was the apartment of a chronically single woman in her thirties who had made it. It was clean and organized, but not too clean and organized. It had a large window overlooking the city in the living room, and near it, an eisel had been set up, with a half-done painting on it of a sunset over a city skyline. There was a rack of oft-used wine glasses in the kitchen, lesser-used exercise equipment in the laundry room. Abby’s bedroom contained her collection of houseplants, two floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, and a closet full of suits her mom had tailored for her at a reduced cost.

Joey had always said that he never wanted to get married because he didn’t want to share space with anyone else. Abby had rolled her eyes and punched his arm for that. Joey was always coming up with reasons why he didn’t want a relationship, and none of them were true. Abby, on the other hand, had just assumed and accepted that it just wouldn’t happen. The chances were against it unless she made it a priority in her life, and she was focused on career and art. Could it really happen with this hooligan? It was hard to imagine letting her into this apartment- this apartment of a woman who had made it- on a permanent basis. But, maybe. Only time would tell.

---

Things went from there. They continued to date for over a year. Abby taught Lacie how to draw, and Lacie taught Abby how to fight. They started spending more nights than not over at each other’s places. Joey still didn’t know about it, because Abby knew how jealous Joey got when it came to relationships. Shawn on the other hand definitely knew, and teased the hell out of Lacie for it and later came to Lacie for help with his own relationship once he got into one.

Christmas that year, Shawn had scrapped together enough funds to visit Ireland. This was a problem, because Shawn and Lacie usually spent their Christmases together. As per usual, Lacie didn’t have the means to visit her home state of Alpaccia, so it looked like it would be a lonely Christmas for her.

“You want to come visit my family?” Abby offered as Lacie had been complaining about it.

“Yeah. I’d love that,” Lacie admitted. She hadn’t had a Christmas with a real family in... well, a long time, at any rate.

Abby’s family consisted of her mother and her two-years older brother, who had brought a wife and two kids. The father had died in the war while Abby was a child. They had a traditional Christmas together- old Christmas records, decorating a tree, staying up late to play cards and chat once Abby’s niece and nephew were in bed until they could barely keep their eyes open, and then watching the kids open their presents in the morning.

It kind of hurt Lacie to see such a beautiful family, but it was nice, too. It hurt because she remembered having to go off to her friends’ houses when her parents were too high to remember to feed her. She remembered having to make her own doctor’s appointments at the age of nine, and running off to live with her big sister at fourteen. But it was still nice to be there, just because it was.

As they were packing up in the guest bedroom, Lacie started crying, and Abby took notice. She’d never seen her cry before.

“What’s wrong?

“Nothing,” she said, and thankfully Abby had left her alone about it.

It was a week later, after Lacie had had some time to think, that she made her offer. “Abby, I want to start a family with you. I know we can’t get married in the traditional sense, but we can get a place together, find some man to give us a kid, and stay together for the rest of our lives. I could even buy you a ring if you want. Do you wanna do this?”

Abby was awestruck. “Lacie... oh my God, yes. Let’s do it.”