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physalian · 1 month ago

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On Subversion through Failure (wasting the audience’s time?)

I want to talk about two arcs today, one pretty much everybody loves, and one most every fan complained about before the fandom died. Both have to do with having characters completely fail to accomplish an objective, something they’ve been working toward for chapters or episodes or maybe the whole season.

Honorable mention to Infinity War’s “did we just lose.” IW and Endgame had meta reasons for happening the way they did, not just in-story. Books don’t have to contend with actor contracts and box office sales. Personally I don’t think Tony had to die at all the way it happened in the movie, but they killed him because of ~symbolism~ and everyone knew it would be coming and, well, he can’t play the character forever. Don’t love Endgame.

More to the point, both movies were more concerned with the legacy of the MCU over the best choices they could have made for the characters.

Failure in fiction is tricky to pull off in the best stories with the best of intentions, too. You don’t want the audience to feel bait-and-switched, like they invested all this time and effort into your book, only to have catharsis ripped away for ~subversion~ *cough*Star Wars*cough*

What was the point of all the nonsense if it all amounted to nothing? Why should we care?

So!

—

The Sophia Arc (The Walking Dead)

Almost the entire second season of this show has the characters stuck in one location, a remote Georgia farm, looking for a missing character, Sophia. Not every single episode is spent searching, but the continued excuse to not move on and to not get kicked out by the farm’s owner is that they haven’t found her yet.

Compared to season 1, which was constantly moving, constantly giving the characters new challenges and new locations and had very high stakes, season 2 was much more character focused, with more personal, low-stakes problems. I like character drama, so I didn’t mind, but if you came to The Walking Dead expecting a repeat of season 1, you were understandably disappointed.

The arc ends rather infamously with the revelation that Sophia had died and turned a long time ago, and was right under their noses in a barn. All that searching, all their effort, all that hope of finding her, was for nothing.

This arc had many issues, but some I think about after the fact include:

Sophia was reduced to a macguffin. She was barely a character in season 1 and disappeared too early in season 2 for anyone to care about her as more than just “she’s a little girl, you should care”. So audiences can only really empathize with her mother, who herself doesn’t go searching for her daughter, and who we also don’t really care about compared to the more present characters.

Sophia’s arc itself made no impact on the plot at large. The barn full of walkers did, but Sophia herself was just a consequence. The plot would have been the same had she not been in the barn, because 'you’ve been keeping them like pets' was the big reveal of the episode, the crux of the debate between the Group and their hosts is “walkers aren’t people you need to adapt to the new world”.

The refusal to leave the farm because they were tied to the Sophia search, on top of having many more episodes than season 1, drastically reduced the pacing audiences were used to. One overarching goal that never got any closer is exhausting. They were never close to finding her, even when they thought they were.

Above all, though, I think what damned this arc the most was that it just didn’t matter. The Walking Dead suffered its entire runtime from redundancy and stagnation. The heroes were never allowed to build a community and grow and make any progress against the walker plague before the writers forced a reset, burned it down, and moved them to the next location. Sophia’s death was the start of it all (though it was good for seasons 3 through 5ish).

She didn’t plague the plot after she was gone. Carol (her mother) mentioned her a few times in passing. The only depth the arc had was “life sucks and this show is grimdark hope is for chumps”. It having no point and no resolution was the point.

—

The Day of Black Sun (ATLA)

Between seasons 2 and 3, the hype for the invasion of the Fire Nation took up a whole season’s worth of episodes. Once Sokka learned of the eclipse, beyond finding Appa, his priority one was reaching the Earth King to get the Earth Kingdom in on a massive invasion that could decide the war before Sozin’s comet.

They brought so many characters back for this, spared no expense in the budget for the rendering of the air fleet and the sub squad, had Aang finally back in his Air Nomad colors and shaved his new hair….

And they lost.

They lost so badly, only the kids could escape with their lives, everyone else got captured as prisoners of war.

And that’s not even mentioning how season 2 ended with “The Earth Kingdom has fallen”. Which I’m not talking about here because that’s not quite fitting the trope here. The threat was always there, but the heroes weren’t fighting all season to protect the Earth Kingdom, only to lose. We only knew about it because we got Azula POV working in the background.

But anyway—Day of Black Sun. Why it worked:

We knew it was doomed from the moment the Earth King told Azula, thinking she was an ally. It did not come out of nowhere. The shock just came from a kids show actually going through with it and not having them triumph despite the odds.

The cost was severe, and felt through the rest of the show (which did not go on for 8 more seasons unlike TWD), and the new stakes were felt immediately. Zuko changed sides, the last real chance to stage a rebellion just died, the Fire Nation has confirmation that the Avatar isn’t dead, and now they have a terrorism incident to propagandize, probably making it easier for Ozai to push his “Phoenix King” vision on his war council and his country.

Failure was imminent from the moment they arrived at the Gates of Azulon. The Fire Nation forces were competent and highly skilled, as they should be, so nothing came out of nowhere or felt like manipulative writing. They were simply an army prepared for their adversaries, fighting for their home, on their homeland.

But they did still fail epically. When you were a kid, you weren’t thinking “but wait the season must have more episodes after this, something must go wrong”. Even knowing what’s about to happen during rewatches, it doesn’t diminish the impact of this arc.

—

Last honorable mentions to the season 4 finale of Supernatural. Where Team Free Will's quest to stop the rise of the Devil became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Due to... a lot of things, namely cope and a CW budget that made the visualisation of the whole world ending a bit too ambitious. But honorable mention nonetheless.

—

So if you’re going to have characters blow it, and this is your plan from day one, you should have consequences, good and bad, coming out of it, otherwise it’s meaningless and the audience will feel duped.

“Did we just lose” was a fantastic twist, don’t get me wrong, but, to me, at least, the setup for Endgame and the execution of Endgame was just a little too polished in too many areas, sacrificing meaningful character development *cough*Natasha*cough* for satisfying the giant MCU machine.

Because the dusting certainly didn’t have lasting consequences equal to the impact in the moment. It was just a blip, mentioned a few times and not mattering at all in one show, and then mattering a whole lot in a different one, but largely the status quo returned. Such is the nature of comics, I guess.

Sophia, too, was a great twist, in isolation executed very well, in the grand scheme of things it just didn’t matter. Had she been a Maes Hughes type, haunting show for four more seasons as some symbol of the loss of innocence or humanity or the better days gone by, then maybe.

I like this trope not just because it's subversive, but because once you decide your hero's going to lose, you have a lot more room to write a conflict designed to fail. More competent villains, more desperate heroes, more 11th hour decisions.

Especially when the audience doesn't yet know failure is inevitable, there's something about not having polished, pre-determined victories that can feel a lot more intense, because subconciously, as a writer, you're not making plot armor for your heroes.

#writing #writeblr #writing a book #writing advice #writing resources #writing tools #writing tips #subverting expectations #atla #the walking dead

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destinyc1020 · 9 months ago

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Confession corner

It’s happening again, the same as it did with Tim.

You all want Austin and Z to be in a movie together, saying how good-looking they are and so on. You lot are already doing what you said ain’t happening, you’re starting to ship them. They are already being shipped on social media, a lot of Austin fans are shipping them. Saying things like, they should leave their partners and go together, they are too cute together, they would make a great couple, it won’t be long till they are together, we need a romantic movie with them in, I would love a friendship like theres.

This is exactly how it started between Tim and Z, everybody thinking it was just innocent. I mean there has already been a number of comments saying how ugly Tom is compared to Austin.

Zendaya really can’t stand next to a person without being shipped, no wonder she’s coming off social media. It’s going to get worse when Challengers comes out.

I mean, all of you lot are shipping them, wanting them in movies together. They have literally just been in a movie together. Can you imagine if they were in a romcom or something, there’s another fandom we’re going to be at war with.

I really do hope she gives her acting, and goes behind-the-scenes. Maybe then she may get some rest.

I just can’t understand how you can’t see this, because this is how it started with Tim.

Thank you for your confession Anon, but I REALLY think you need to take a serious break from Twitter and breathe in, and breathe out. 👀

I'm not seeing half of this Austin/Zendaya "shipping" stuff that you're seeing on Twitter tbh. And I bet you, even if that stuff is going on, it's only a very SMALL handful of Tweets.... if THAT. You can't even begin to compare this to the Timdaya shipping. No way... not in the least.🥴

And the way you're talking, you make it seem like fans can NEVER want Z to work with any other male in the industry unless it's Tom. 🥴 But yet, those same restrictions aren't put on Tom? 🤔

So what if some fans think that Austin and Zendaya are attractive? The REALITY is that they're in rlshps with other ppl. That's not gonna change.

And if ppl want Austin with someone else that has nothing to do with Zendaya. Most ppl just don't want him with Gerber Baby lol. 😅 And fans who don't like Z with Tom are not gonna change, soooo.... You just ignore weirdo fans like that and keep it moving. 🤷🏾‍♀️

Silly weirdos on Twitter shouldn't be disrespecting Tom or Zendaya's rlshp with him like that. It's disgusting and immature imo. 😒

But at some point, you have to realize that just coz ppl tweet nonsense, it doesn't mean there's any basis in reality.

Zendaya really can’t stand next to a person without being shipped, no wonder she’s coming off social media. It’s going to get worse when Challengers comes out.

First off, how do you know that? And second, even if it were to get worse, who cares what some silly ppl on Twitter say? I keep telling you all that what ppl say on Twitter have NO bearing on reality. But some of you seem to think that Twitter = real life, and it just does NOT. 🙄

Wanting two actors to work together is NOT shipping... nor is thinking two actors might look good next to each other. Since when is that "shipping"? 🥴 How is this any different from some fans wanting Tom to work with Taylor Russell, or (my pick) Tati Gabrielle, or Florence Pugh?? 🤔 So now it's somehow WRONG to want two fave actors of yours to one day work together in a project if they're of the opposite sex?

Actual Shipping is having the false belief that little minor innocent interactions mean that the two actors are secretly in love with each other, and are cheating with each other behind each of their significant other's backs. 🙄

I really do hope she gives her acting, and goes behind-the-scenes. Maybe then she may get some rest.

I'm sorry Anon, I know it's Sunday, but let me get this straight.... You want Z to QUIT acting altogether (smthg that she LOVES to do) because she MIGHT be shipped with her male costar? 🥴

Wow...

Y'all give ppl on Twitter WAAAAY too much power, I swear 🤦🏾‍♀️

BTW, if you know anything about Dune Part 2, the "shipping" is more than likely going to be been Timmy and Zendaya and Austin and Lèa after the film comes out. Just saying.... 👀

Boy, some of you all take the fun out of everything.

#Confession Sunday

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fandom-space-princess · 2 years ago

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In Dulci Jubilo

Fandom: Supernatural Rating: Gen Length: 7.1k Pairings: Michael/Adam Milligan Characters: Michael, Adam Milligan, Gabriel, Raphael, Lucifer, Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester, Castiel, Jack Kline Tags: other implied relationships (brief), dean/castiel, sam/gabriel, sam/lucifer, nobody is dead! everybody lives!, holiday fic, half character study half domestic vignette Summary:

It was a compliment, dear one. I wish only for my Brothers to see the mercy of you. For them to see our peace. ----- Invited to a holiday dinner, Adam and Michael explain to each of their siblings their choice to return to each other.

-----------------------------------------

For the Midam Holiday Exchange, a gift for @hectatess!

(Set in the same universe as "The Game of Us" and "None But Shining Hours," but you absolutely do not have to have read those to read this.)

Read below, or on AO3.

-------------------------------------

Once, I would have led the chorus of Heaven in your name. Imagine it: every voice in the Host, raised in celebration of you! For the fact of your fit to me, exultation would have been your due; your refrain, a rallying cry. A battle hymn.

“So they’d have known me? You’d have... what? Introduced me?”

… after a fashion.

“Come on, bud. Spit it out.”

Understand: we were family, yes—of a kind—but second. A distant second. First, in all things, we were shared obligation. Our bonds were fealty; our cause, war. Armies are made to glory, true, but only in swords and generals. I’d have introduced you as—as what you were to be. And your name, in their ears—in my ears—would have sounded no sweeter than your body would have felt, in my hands, as a weapon.

Silence, for a time. Then:

“You gave that up, though. Dean was your sword or whatever. Not me. I’m just... me.”

Indeed.

A shrug.

“So do you still wanna...” Adam tugged at a loose thread on his cuff, thinking. “I mean, you’re the one who wants to do the family thing. What exactly do you want them to look at me and see?”

Beloved, if you are a blade, you are a broken one.

“Hey!”

The impression of a chuckle, a fleeting fizzle of nerves.

It was a compliment, dear one. I wish only for my Brothers to see the mercy of you. For them to see our peace.

“Because I’d make a crappy sword?”

That, too.

-------------------------------------

[An hour before dinner, late in December:]

With the sunset, wet, fluffy snow had begun to fall on the city of Lawrence. They didn’t need to drive through it to reach the bunker. They did not, strictly speaking, need to drive anywhere—ever. But Michael enjoyed the nod to normalcy on Adam’s behalf; enjoyed the idea that he might still be able to be, at least this much, a human. That he might move between destinations on foot, or by car, feeling the passage of distance and of time. That holiday dinners with a family unit might be desirable, pleasant, or at least tolerable, in the multitudinous complicated ways of human relationships.

True, too: some things he enjoyed for himself. That the cold air and exertion from the walk might cast Adam’s cheeks in pink. That snowflakes might settle along his eyelashes, dust his hat and shoulders in downy white and remind Michael, for a moment, of down of other kinds.

“You’re getting more sentimental by the minute. I can tell. You’re doing that thing with your shoulders.”

I know.

The car they had abandoned half a mile back, edged up onto the roadside under scraggling trees already limned in frost. Doubled tracks led back the way they’d come; the snow crunched underfoot. No moon or starlight lit this part of the road, and past the outskirts of town the streetlights had petered out rapidly. Yet Adam was unbothered. For all that Michael tried to encourage him to keep hold of what little of his humanity remained, his eyesight was still far better than it had ever been in his first life. It wasn’t comparable to when Michael had actively possessed him, but—well. Some things would never entirely reset. The limits of human reflexes, human senses—even human mortality—were all less well-defined than they’d once been.

Michael, of course, could always see in the dark.

Around a curve in the road, and the bunker loomed up in front of them, upper stories vanishing into the swirling snow. No wind, and clouds in abundance; for winter in Kansas, the night was almost warm. Packing snow, Adam mused. Memories of snowmen, of snowball fights and sledding on pilfered lunchtrays down the big hill behind his middle school. He thought: if the night takes a turn and the mood needs salvaging, they could always come back outside for a while. Work on Michael’s first snowman, maybe. Remind each other how to laugh.

What are you smiling at?

Michael had stopped to wait near the bottom of the short flight of stairs leading to the bunker’s front door. Adam caught up the two steps he’d fallen behind. “Not much. Thinking about putting snow down Dean’s jacket later,” he replied. “And can you—y'know, out loud?” He gestured vaguely between them. “Just while we’re here.”

Not their usual preference, regardless of the distance between them or lack thereof, but in the company of others speaking aloud was... not easier, precisely, but markedly less of an invitation to prying questions.

Michael nodded. “Of course.”

Adam turned to face the door, considering it. A breath whuffed out of him, vapor ghosting away into the night. He pulled Michael’s hand into his. “We’re doing this?”

Another nod. “We are.”

His other hand found the doorknob, and without bothering to knock, they let themselves in.

----------[ Jack ]----------

Michael hadn’t had to inform Jack about how things lie between himself and Adam, once he had resettled in the world. Jack had already known.

It had been a secondary impetus for his resurrection, apparently. The primary one—that a universe-sans-archangels was destined for an imminent and messy collapse—notwithstanding, if the young godling had felt his predecessors fundamentally untrustworthy, the matter would have been settled before it began. And yet, inexplicably, Jack had trusted him. He had allowed him to return to life, had allowed him to come and go from Heaven as he desired; had extended to him a place in the rebuilding of it. In the boy’s position, Michael couldn’t say he’d have been as forgiving.

“Why?” he’d asked Jack, once, flying wing to shining wing.

They’d both tucked their physical forms away in a plane a few degrees to the left of the ethereal. Together they’d glided along the undergirding of an older corner of Heaven, inspecting it for structural damage, patching what they found as they went along with grace and will.

In angelic form, his nephew-god had no eyes. Which was to say that his eyes, like Michael’s own, were legion. Which was to say—that he saw everything, always, and understood what he saw. Often, he understood what he was seeing better than that which was being seen understood itself.

And with a child’s delight, he loved it all.

“When I told Adam about you, and about Chuck, and everything,” Jack had said, grinning to himself, running a wing along a strut, “he got so quiet. I didn’t know if I said it right. Cas said that I did, later, when I told him. But anyway... He sat for a minute, and then he asked me if I’d let you come back, too. He was so sure.”

Michael curled a wingtip up to cover a wide crack. Under the attention, the crack knit back together. Slowly, at first. Then Jack added his own wing, and the surface-that-wasn't above them smoothed out. Healed. Whole.

“I think it was the first time I ever saw a person that sure about anything that didn’t feel like it came with regret already built in.” Jack tumbled up at him, whirling, winking, playful. It caught Michael off-guard, at times, how alike Jack could be to a much, much younger Lucifer. Shine and certainty and sadness; authority, affection, willfulness. He reacted on reflex, skirling away, a momentary game of tag in a place-that-wasn't, with space enough to be alone forever, to run and never catch one another.

He let Jack catch him. He had always let Heylel win, too.

“And do you? Regret this?”

“No,” Jack laughed. In a nearby dimension, something young and green bloomed at the sound. “And he doesn’t either. I know.”

----------[ Sam ]----------

When Adam was finally forced to spell it out for Sam, it... had not gone great.

"I don’t get what’s confusing about this,” Adam ground out, into the strained silence on the other end of the phone. He took a deep breath through his nose. Deliberately measured his words. “Michael and I are a package deal. Again. Still. You feel weird about that, I—”

Sam’s voice was equal parts frustration and concern. “Adam, he—you know he went back to Chuck—”

“Yeah. Yep. That sucked for everybody. And he worked it out with Jack.”

“—he hurt us both, used you—”

“—I really don’t think you have any—”

“—he sold us out!”

“ Cope.” Adam’s temper got the better of him. “Look, thanks for calling. I don’t think I really do holidays anymore, but the invitation is appreciated or whatever. If you want to talk to me or Michael, you know how to contact us both.” As though aware of his place in the conversation, he felt Michael chime a question at the edge of his attention. He’d been busy in the kitchen, but Adam knew that if he didn’t lower his voice, Michael would join him on the couch, and the phone call would venture into new and exciting dimensions of annoyance.

From the other end of the line, there were the sounds of a scuffle, and muted grumbling. Someone dropped the phone.

“... hey, shortstack. That you?”

Ah. Great. “Nope. Bought this number on the black market.”

Gabriel’s grin was audible through the phone. “Giving Sammy a hard time? Never would have suspected it of you.”

“I’m not giving him the time of day. He’s the one who can’t deal.”

“Don’t know why he’s got so much sand in his shorts about you and Mikey. The big hypocrite.” Her voice was fond.

His stomach did something complicated that wouldn’t have been out of place at a gymnastics tournament. “He. I. Uh. He told you. About.”

“You know, I see what he sees in you. It’s your eloquence.” She laughed again. He hadn’t known her, before. He had only known her in this new incarnation; in the After that they were all navigating, now. But she seemed to be constantly laughing. He got the impression that she was making up for lost time. “Anywho. Big Bro did clue me in, in a manner of speaking. Family deals with family.” She paused. “That goes for you, too, by the by. We’ve been dutifully keeping your big news from Samshine here, obviously” — the scuffling sounds resumed, briefly; Adam got the distinct impression that Sam had just been sat on — “but you still get the joy of informing Deano, since Cassie isn’t squawking either. Nobody is.”

What sounded like muffled cursing, and the beep of keys being pressed. Gabriel’s voice came from far off: “Come to dinner, though! I wanna bug Mi—”

The line went dead.

----------[ Gabriel ]----------

In many respects, Gabriel had been the easiest place to start. If they were all to live this life anew, Michael wanted—more than most anything else—to do right by the three beings in the universe he had previously done so badly wrong. Among other things, that meant sharing this new part of himself with them. Gabriel had delivered messages, once. She had been charged with heralding momentous change, personal upheavals, the remaking of nations.

Was this so different? Surely, surely she would understand.

He found her on Earth. It wasn’t hard, once he went looking. What surprised him was where he found her: in a café on the outskirts of Lawrence, idly prodding the pile of foam atop a truly enormous latte with a wooden stir stick. He watched her for a handful of minutes from afar, as she alternately poked the touchscreen of a phone like the one Adam had, and shot furtive glances over the counter at the barista.

“You just gonna stand there all day and take in the ambience?” she called over to him, eventually. She turned her head to meet his gaze, with a grin that showed every one of her too-sharp teeth.

He took the chair opposite her. She clicked a drink into existence in front of him which bore a striking similarity to her own. Cautiously, he sniffed it. Caramelized sugars and the acrid tang of caffeine in abundance; the cloying, sweet-sour smell of steamed milk. Michael gave the drink a stern glare. It immediately and politely became a small paper cup of something that smelled of herbs and smoke, and which looked almost, but not quite, like coffee. Gabriel rolled her eyes, but let it be.

“So,” she started, chewing on the end of the stir stick. “How’s tricks?”

“You always choose your words so well, Sister.”

“Don’t I, though?”

“Mmm.” He found himself leaning across the table, not into her space exactly, but in a companionably human closeness. To his delight, he realized she was mirroring the posture. Whether this had been a conscious choice for her, it wasn’t for him, and a warm feeling spread through his limbs at the realization. This body was still new, made for him and him alone, and it had pleased him that his comfort with it grew by the day. “I am well, since you ask. I wanted to talk to you.”

“You know? Think I got that.” Her gaze wandered over his shoulder for a moment, then snapped back to his face. “Heard you’ve been keeping Jack and Cassie company as your new primary hobby. Fixing up the old digs. Which—just saying—a little manual labor looks good on you.”

She reached out to poke his shoulder with one long, white-tipped fingernail. Adam had told him that his own vessel didn’t register as obviously odd or inhuman in any way that he could discern—which made sense. Michael’s vessel was human, insofar as it went, although it housed no human soul; it had been crafted for him, in the days of the first humans, that he might walk the Earth among them. Gabriel’s vessel, though... she had resurrected, by choice, into an only partially human one. The glamor she wore to move through the world warded off alarm from all but the most psychically sensitive humans. But he had seen her without it, seen her eyes go from human hazel to serpent-slitted gold, seen her freckles morph to scales and her nails extend to dainty claws.

When he had asked why, she simply shrugged, and told him that she was trying something new.

He thought, perhaps, that they both were.

Michael raised a shoulder, a gesture he briefly wondered if he’d picked up from Adam. “I’ve been enjoying the work. That isn’t what I wanted to discuss, however. I wanted to let you know—”

“—that you’ve gone back to shacking up with your boytoy?”

His eyes widened. “Castiel told you.”

“Nah, Cassie didn’t have to. I just know you. What, you were going to get back to the world and not go straight back to the only person who’s helped you get your head on straight in millennia?”

“I think it’s a bit more—”

“It really isn’t,” she replied firmly. Her eyes strayed behind him again, for the length of a blink. “Look, I’m not judging you. What do you think I’m doing here?”

Michael sneaked a glance over his shoulder. “What has that man done to earn your attention?”

“The coffee guy? He just tells good stories.” She shook her hair out of her face, then raised her cup and drained it. “Sam’s taken a shine to him. They’re friends. The kid’s waiting on some big news about a couple scholarships. So I’ve been pulling a lever here, putting in a good word there. He’s gonna get a heck of a present under his tree this year.”

He studied her more closely, then. “You’ve been staying with Samuel Winchester.”

“What can I say? I like him. He’s decent company.” Gabriel laughed again, and finally stood. Her skirt trickled over her knees, swirled around her ankles, and her ash-white ringlets pooled over her shoulders, in constant motion even when she was still. She extended a hand, and he took it; she helped him stand. And unexpectedly pulled him into a hug.

There had been a time when he would not have known how to hug back. Now, he wrapped her in his arms. Felt her sturdiness and her strength, the surety of her presence.

“We both deserve this, Michael,” she said, chin on his shoulder. She squeezed him fiercely. “We can choose for ourselves what we want. Isn’t that great? Isn’t it fucking terrifying?”

“It is,” he said, and meant it.

----------[ Raphael ]----------

To tell Raphael anything, Michael first had to go and find them. He told himself that his nervousness about approaching them was only this: that they had, at Jack’s request, chosen to remain in the Empty. Not as dead and dreaming sleeper, no, but as steward and caretaker. Michael walked the sunless path leading to their domain, and listened to the skitter of gravel beneath his feet, the rustle of leaves and the murmur of the faraway sea. As this place was shaped by the will of its inhabitants, he was unsurprised that the environs surrounding Raphael’s home would have retained the character of the forest. Unbothered by anything resembling human civilization—in Michael’s experience, nature, or a facsimile of it, was where Raphael had seemed most at home.

Their front gate was tall, and wrought of bone in intricate curlicues. It opened soundlessly under the brush of his hand.

“Welcome back, Brother,” came a stone-dry voice, a climbing-vines and crumbling-walls voice.

Michael stepped forward, into a garden.

In truth, “garden” hardly did justice to the space. In the darkest heart of the land of the dead, Heaven’s healer had called forth life. The bower was enclosed not in walls, but fences, which extended mazelike in all directions. These—and many other surfaces—were overgrown with thick-creeping ivy, lush and lustrous. The maze was equally composed of stands of ancient trees: spreading willow and fragrant olive, cedar and pine and birch. He moved among the trunks and leaves until, at the shore of a central pond dotted in lilies, he found Raphael, seated on a low stone bench. His sibling scooted to one side, and Michael sat beside them.

“And I thought you’d seen enough of this place,” they began. Like Gabriel, they had chosen a form almost, but not quite, human; in Raphael’s case, a hamadryad. They extended one bare foot out to the edge of the pond, rippling the water there, and the skin along the arch darkened with the moisture like the bark of an oak in rain. Though their complexion was as deep brown as Michael’s own, it was a color undertoned with the suggestion of green—of sap, of spring. Where Michael had thick twisting curls, Raphael’s head was crowned by ivy. As he watched, it snaked over their shoulders, along their biceps, twining slowly but inexorably downward.

“I certainly have,” he returned. “I have not seen enough of you.”

“No?”

“No.”

They turned their eyes to him, then, black and bottomless and kind. “Well, you’re here, and so am I. What would you have of me?”

He took a deep breath. Breathing was unnecessary, especially here. He exhaled, then inhaled once more, regardless.

“I came to see how you were settling into your new duties,” he said, “and tell you of my own. And—tell you other things.”

“My duties go well enough. The dreamers sleep more soundly, with me near. I caretake what needs caretaking.” Raphael brought up a palm. In their hand they called a flower into being, spinning it out of silvery air: a dandelion, late in life, in full feather. They blew on it, and watched the seeds drift out across the water.

Then they smiled to themself, a little, chin turned down and eyes on the rippling water. “I like to watch the vines grow.”

He gently nudged them with his shoulder. “You deserve that. It does me good to see you here, like this.”

Raphael shook their head, still smiling. “And your own work? The dreams—the Heaven they show is more whole by the day.”

“It goes well. I find that repairing broken things suits me.”

When he did not continue, they glanced at him. “And yet you... have not resumed your post. Our nephew doesn’t ask you to his side.” It wasn’t a question.

He returned their glance sheepishly.

“Ah,” they said, after a moment.

There was a protracted silence.

At last, their face performed a complicated press of lips and scrunching of eyebrows. Michael watched them, apprehensive.

“Would you ever have considered coming back for me? To me?” they finally asked. Nothing in their voice suggested anger or sadness, but Michael thought there was something subtler there, or many somethings: resignation, compassion, perhaps mirth. He thought he understood what it meant for them, to feel free to ask such a question; was surprised to find himself proud, that they had come so far in their own healing.

“Honestly?”

“I don’t want anything else.”

“I... don’t know. Truly. As I was?” He shifted in his seat. “I doubt it.”

Raphael’s brow smoothed out. They watched Michael fidget for a moment, then laid their palm across the back of his hand. He stilled. “You’re here now,” they said. “And you’re there with him. You’ll keep being there, for him.”

Whatever tension had been between them evaporated. Michael leaned back on the heels of his hands, smiling to himself.

“I think being a little bit human suits you,” Raphael said.

-------------------------------------

[Half an hour before dinner:]

Once inside, the bunker proved to be far more prepared for festivity than its exterior had suggested. Strings of lights lined the walls and stairs, and the large map table Adam remembered had been pushed aside in favor of filling the common area with an assortment of more comfortable seating. Sam and Raphael sat on opposite ends of a sagging, overstuffed couch, Sam tapping his hands on his knees, Raphael cradling a glass of some deep burgundy liquid between their palms. They had evidently taken a page from Gabriel’s book: the subtle magic they wore reshaped their face and limbs into a more human aspect. When they saw Adam and Michael descending the stairs, they hid a small smile behind the rim of their glass.

Sam rose, stumbling a little as he did so, and moved toward them. “Adam,” he said. He extended a hand, glanced behind Adam at Michael, and faltered.

“Sam,” Adam nodded back, and waved him off. He wasn’t sure whether his half-brother looked disappointed, or relieved. He looked past Sam’s shoulder. “Hey, Raphael.”

Raphael raised their glass in a subtle greeting. “I'm glad you’ve come.” The words were for Michael, but they directed them at Adam, with a raised eyebrow.

“Well, you know. Michael insisted,” he replied, staring at Sam. To his credit, Sam immediately looked apologetic. Before the awkwardness of the moment could deepen, it was interrupted by a thump from behind them. Gabriel strode out of the library, arms laden with garlands, trailed by Jack and Castiel.

“Adam! Mikey!” she called, dropping the pile of ivy and mistletoe in a corner. “You made it!”

Michael stepped around Adam, and pulled Gabriel into a brief hug. When they separated, Castiel offered a warm smile and clasping handshake. Jack had seated himself on the floor, partially ensnared by strands of ivy, and Michael settled next to him and began the patient process of untangling him.

Beside him, Sam exhaled audibly.

“Adam, I,” he started. Stopped. Started again. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Adam looked at him from the corners of his eyes. “Are we good?”

Just then, Lucifer’s head and shoulders appeared around the edge of the kitchen door. The smell of cooking drifted out around him. He called for Raphael. Sam watched them step carefully around Jack and Michael on their way to the kitchen. Michael’s head turned to watch them leave, too, and he smiled up at Adam before returning his attention to Jack.

“Yeah,” Sam said quietly, looking not at Adam but at the pair on the floor. “We’re good.”

----------[ Lucifer ]----------

Michael saved the hardest for last. In multiple senses.

Simply finding Lucifer was something of an ordeal. Wherever he was supposed to be—and Michael was unsure of that, hadn’t communicated with him more than in passing since returning to life—it wasn’t anywhere obvious to him. Heaven was out; Raphael didn’t know; and when he had tried asking Gabriel, she had simply shaken her head and replied that it wasn’t her place to say. This implied that she did know, and that puzzled him, but he did not push her. Instead, he had returned to Jack.

If anyone could find the Lightbringer, it would be his child.

So it came that he found Lucifer in the very last place he would have supposed: the basement lounge of a seedy back-alley bar.

From up in the corner of the stage, a graying man plunked out a melody on an out-of-tune piano. With his back to the door, Michael almost missed Lucifer, at first. But when the song ended, his head picked up, and his eyes caught the stage light: retinal reflection that shone, not human red, but owlish bronze. He did not turn to acknowledge Michael, gaze fixed on the old musician’s bows, but under the bar he held a palm open in his direction, and subtly beckoned him over.

Michael slid into the chair next to him. The basement was humid, and both the bar top and plastic seat were unpleasantly tacky in the close heat. Lucifer waved a hand, and after a moment the bartender slid two identical drinks in their direction. Michael took one. It smelled sweet, a little smoky, and a twist of orange rind circled a bright red cherry under the oily liquid surface.

Lucifer sipped his, grimaced, and sipped it again.

“So. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I wanted to catch up,” Michael said, lightly. “Though I admit that this did not head the list of places I expected to find you.”

“I wonder where you expected me to be?”

Michael shook his head. “Simply... not here.”

“Disappointed?” Lucifer pushed the ice determinedly around the bottom of his glass with the straw. He watched Michael as he did it. He seemed to be waiting for something, and Michael got the impression that it wasn’t him—whatever it was.

“No.”

“Well, I am.”

“Why are you here, then?”

“Killing time.”

“Until?”

“Until I decide I’m done,” Lucifer shrugged. At Michael’s raised eyebrow, he sighed. “Fine. I’m shirking my responsibilities, such as they are. They’ll keep. I wanted to sit for a moment and not be bothered. Satisfied?”

“I didn’t...” Michael sighed. Pinched the bridge of his nose. “ ‘Hello, Michael, it’s good to see you too. It pleases me to know that Earthly life is treating you well.’ There, I’ve gotten everything I wanted from our conversation. This has been approximately as pleasant as anticipated. Enjoy your idling.”

He made to stand, feeling irritated and, irrationally, impatient with himself for his irritation. But a hand landed on his forearm. Lucifer looked back at him from under quirked eyebrows, mouth set in a curious frown.

Rather than pull him back down to his seat, his brother pushed his unsatisfying drink away, and rose as well.

“Come on,” Lucifer said. “Let’s walk.”

They ascended a different flight of stairs than the one Michael had taken on entrance, and exited the bar out a creaking metal door that opened onto an alley. “Are we walking in any direction in particular?”

A nod. “Can’t shirk everything. Gotta check in.” He offered no elaboration, but Michael fell into step beside him anyway.

What exactly Lucifer needed to check in on, Michael could not begin to guess. But, apart from his curiosity, he was determined to see what he deemed relevant enough to show him. He slid his hands into the pockets of his jacket as he walked. Beside him, without looking, Lucifer did the same. It did not often occur to Michael to wonder what humans saw when they looked at him, but he thought about it now: two men emerging from the darkness between buildings, matched in height and build but otherwise, in many ways, as opposite as humans could be. Lucifer, starlight etched in mortal form, all but glowing under the streetlights, golden eyes and golden curls that haloed him as effectively as his own grace would have—and Michael, a shadow cut loose from the night, as earth-made as the first of the men he had been commanded to revere.

But here they were, side by side, identical in posture and bearing; no physical bodies could camouflage the way they carried themselves. Their heads unbowed and spines unbent. Adam had once told him that he walked as though his feet had never touched the ground.

Looking at his twin, he could see it.

Their way led them along side streets and byways. Across patches of crumbling city sidewalk; through an unused parking lot, dark and crusted near the edges with broken bits of concrete barriers; and, after several minutes of walking, around the back of a monolithic warehouse. A lightless dead-end alley and a brick wall greeted them. Nothing Michael could see that would deserve his Brother’s attention, or the practiced indifference with which he turned to face the brickwork.

The place was humming with power, though. Pitched below the background noise of the physical world—psychic potential.

Lucifer reached out a hand, carelessly, and sketched a sigil in the air before the wall. Light crept through the cracks in the grout. A moment more, and the glow coalesced into a portal, round, an armspan in diameter. Nothing but light came through, but as they stood watching, the light dimmed, then brightened, then dimmed again. This was, apparently, expected: while he gave no verbal reply, Lucifer nodded, with the impression of giving confirmation, or assent. Another ebb and flow of light, and then the portal receded as swiftly as it had appeared.

In the darkness that replaced it, Michael studied Lucifer, the close, hunched lines of his shoulders.

“Of all the tasks you could set yourself,” he began, watching Lucifer’s face carefully, “choosing involvement with Purgatory surprises me more than any other. What prompted such a thing?”

His Brother gave a noncommittal slump of one shoulder. “It’s what I’m doing right now.”

“For what purpose?”

“Just... can’t sit still, I guess.” They turned their backs on the brick wall, and exited the alley. Lucifer turned left out onto the sidewalk, and Michael followed. Walking without aim, now.

“Then why are you here on Earth at all?”

Lucifer sent a stone skittering far up the path ahead of him with the toe of his boot, and watched it roll to a stop. “Gabriel,” he said, by way of explanation. Another shrug. Then, more softly: “Sam.”

In profile, his expression was difficult for Michael to discern. “Gabriel implied she’d seen you. You’ve... also been staying with them?”

“Occasionally.” Passing under streetlights between pools of darkness, shadows crawled across his face like clouds. “Sometimes. Yes.”

He’d known his Brother long enough and well enough, at least, to know when he didn’t want to continue a line of conversation. Michael decided on another approach. “Why Purgatory, then, intermittently or otherwise?”

Lucifer scoffed. “Have you seen that place? If you think da— Chuck left Heaven a mess...”

“Why should that bother you?” He avoided mentioning the small slip in words, the sour look that had flickered across Lucifer’s face when he’d said it. “I would not have expected sympathy for the impure. Not from you. Forgive me, that isn’t intended as a slight. Merely an observation.”

The look Lucifer gave him was caught between narrow-eyed distaste and something more thoughtful. “Those creatures can’t help but be what they are. They aren’t like the demons.” The word came out sounding almost normal, with little of his usual scorn. He wouldn’t meet Michael’s eyes.

“Someone owes responsibility to the realm. Jack suggested I might have something of value to offer it.” At his son’s name, a flash of the pride Michael remembered so well passed over him. Then it was gone, his face smoothing. Lucifer glanced back at him. “Maybe I’m just eager to follow your lead. Jack says you’ve been busy. Helping out in Heaven?”

Michael returned his earlier shrug. With deliberate casualness, he said: “Sometimes, yes.”

“But you’re here now.”

“Yes. I’m on Earth now. I... live here. As strange as that is to say.”

Lucifer stared. “All the time?”

He took a steadying breath. “Well. With Adam.”

Abruptly, Lucifer threw back his head, startling Michael. A full-body laugh shook him from shoulders to heels. The sound echoed away up the empty street into a ghostly chorus, a reverberant cacophony. Then, to his amazement, Lucifer grasped a hand on his shoulder, hard but companionable. When the laughter passed, he stepped away, but rather than retreating entirely, Lucifer slid his arm around Michael’s shoulders. They set off down the street once again, this time knocking together in an astonishingly human closeness.

“Are you happy? You seem like you’re happy.” Lucifer asked. He ruffled his fingers through Michael’s hair.

For his trouble, Michael elbowed him in the ribs, and he fell back with a muttered oof and a grin.

“I am,” Michael answered.

There came a muted buzz. From his left jacket pocket, Lucifer extracted a phone, the glow of the screen reflected in his eyes. He gave it a slantways half-smile. “Do you ever have regrets? About... any of it?”

Michael watched the movement of his fingertips over the screen, and didn’t need to ask what he meant.

“I have many regrets,” he replied, hand closing over top of the phone—over top of Lucifer’s own. “Where I am now is not among them.”

Lucifer gave a small nod. He slid the phone back into his pocket.

“Is where you are now among your regrets?” Michael asked.

Another laugh, this one quieter. Lucifer looked away, then back at Michael; he grinned. Then he was gone, the stir of wings raising a breeze, the only mark of his sudden absence.

Michael smiled to himself, and then he, too, left the empty street behind.

----------[ Dean ]----------

Several days had passed, and Sam’s phone call had all but slipped his mind, when Dean appeared at Adam’s door. Considering that Adam (intentionally) had not told his half-brothers where he lived, this came as a surprise.

Two terse knocks and a muffled, “open up, kid, special delivery,” were all the warning he received before his living room abruptly contained two more bodies than usual. Michael had let them in. Adam shot a withering glare his way, but Michael ignored it. He was too preoccupied with Gabriel, who flopped down dramatically the moment she was through the doorway. Only once she was horizontal, legs kicked up over the back of the couch and heels knocking smudges into the wall, did she toe off her shoes and allow them to fall past her head and onto the floor.

“What are you, twelve?” Dean asked down at her with a smirk, as Michael collected her shoes and placed them neatly near the door.

Her hair fanned out behind her head, cascading off the edge of the cushions. Upside-down, she winked at him. “Why, you planning to put me in time out?

Dean snickered, and even Michael chuckled. Adam rolled his eyes at them. “Yeah, hey, hi and all, glad to see you, but uh... what? Why?”

Gabriel turned her gaze on him. “Why what, bucko?”

He gestured. “Why are you here? Did Dean... why is Dean here?”

Dean wrinkled his brow, in mock affront. “First: rude. Second: because Gabe wanted a lift.”

Adam stared down at her. “You can fly.”

“Yeah. But.” She wrinkled her nose. “That sounded like effort. Besides, Mikey invited me over, and Deanie boy needed to get out for some fresh air. Win-win.”

As Dean reached down to cuff her on the shoulder, Adam turned to Michael. “You invited her?”

“Well. Yes.” He moved into the kitchen and opened a cupboard, bringing out bowls and fussing with their arrangement on the countertop. "Gabriel asked if I—if we would contribute something to the upcoming holiday meal.”

He couldn’t keep the incredulity from his voice. “So you’re going to... Michael, are you going to cook together ?”

From her place on the couch, Gabriel chirped, “Yep!”

Adam could think of no coherent reply. Before his brain could find its footing again, Dean was putting an arm across his shoulder and steering him toward the door. “Come on, kid, leave them to it. It’ll be fine.” He frowned. “It’ll probably be fine. Let’s go get a burger. Get out of the way for a while.”

And without getting another word in, he was shuffled out his own front door and unceremoniously bundled into the Impala.

-----

“Relax,” Dean said, nudging Adam into a crackly plastic diner booth and taking the seat opposite. “Gabriel cooks in the bunker all the time, and the place is still standing.”

“Not really what I was worried about,” Adam replied. Then, after a moment’s thought: “Well. Not the main thing.”

“Then what’s the big deal?”

A waiter drifted past, accepting their order and leaving full mugs of coffee in his wake. Over the edge of his mug, he examined Dean. His half-brother seemed at ease. Posture relaxed, expression open: in their (admittedly limited) experiences with one another, Adam couldn’t recall ever seeing him anything but tense.

“I thought you’d be weirder about this, I guess. Not that I care, but—Sam was weirder about it.”

Dean raised an eyebrow. “About Mike?”

Adam squirmed a little, digging his shoulders into the seat. “Yeah.” Then: “Who told you?”

“Nobody. He had to be somewhere. I worked out the rest.”

“You worked it out,” Adam replied, suspicious. “And you’re not going to rag me about it?”

“Believe this or don’t, but given the circumstances I am not only not surprised to find him at your place, I think I’m actually kinda relieved.”

“What? Why?”

“All the other possibilities were weirder,” Dean shrugged. “He isn’t with Jack and Cas full-time, and it’s not like he’s hanging out with Sam and Gabriel. He’s never around when Lucifer is. Still have no clue where Lucifer runs off to when he isn’t haunting our damn library, but my only other guess was to wherever Michael was holed up.” He frowned, then shook his head as if to clear it. “Whatever. Point is, he’s behaving himself when he’s with you. Right?”

Adam narrowed his eyes, and said, “He’s not a pet.”

“Yeah, sorry. Didn’t mean it like that.”

Their food arrived. Plates piled high with nearly-identical hamburgers and stacks of fries. Adam laid into his meal without hesitation, elbows on the table, but paused when he caught their reflection in the diner window out of the corner of his eye. Until that moment, he had never seen himself in either of his half-brothers. And yet. Across from him: Dean. Wolfing down a hamburger like he was forever one decent meal short of well-fed. Elbows on the table. And something else, too: a cautious contentment, written in the soft crinkling lines near his eyes and the slant of his shoulders.

Over the preceding months, Adam had watched Michael come to a similar ease in his newfound freedom. It let him move through the world differently than before. For the first time, Adam realized what that might look like not just on Michael, but on himself as well.

That he realized this through looking at Dean might have bothered him, once. Now, though, he felt only a sort of grudging fondness.

“So,” he grunted, around a mouthful of food. “Holiday dinner at your place, huh?”

-------------------------------------

[Now:]

“You might have to get Sam to do that one,” Jack said, peering doubtfully up at Gabriel.

“Call me short again, I dare you. I’ll just—there!” From the top of the ladder, she stretched up on tiptoe to the full extent of her reach, looping a garland over a light. Anyone with a more human sense of balance would certainly have fallen. Instead, she turned a gravity- and anatomy-defying pirouette, and sat down gracefully atop the last step.

Adam watched them past piles of dishes. Dinner had been excellent, and cleanup had been delayed in favor of pushing the table to one side of the room. No one (aside from Gabriel) had been especially eager to do anything in the wake of eating so much food. So Adam and Michael sat at one end of the longest couch, Raphael curled with a mug of steaming tea at the other end. Dean had dragged out a pair of old leather armchairs from somewhere deeper within the bunker, and he and Castiel occupied these.

Across from them, Sam had taken the smaller couch. He sat in silence, alternately glancing between Gabriel’s attempts to “add a little more color” to the bunker, and to the place where Michael held Adam’s hand in his own, idly tapping the back of Adam’s knuckles with the tips of his fingers. The little furrow between Sam’s brows was hard for Adam to parse, as was the slow way his right hand curled and uncurled into the edge of the couch cushions. He and Sam had spent more time together than he had with any other living soul. Under terrible circumstances, of course. But he sometimes wondered if they wouldn’t have understood each other better, had they known each other less well.

Lucifer sat cross-legged on the floor. He had started out sitting upright, but as Adam watched, he had been slowly but surely leaning himself more firmly against Sam. When, in the course of turning his head to watch his son and sibling tangle themselves in ivy once again, he set his chin on Sam’s knee, Sam’s attention turned to him.

Sam didn’t say anything. But he looked from Lucifer, to Michael, and back to Lucifer, and the frown between his eyebrows smoothed out, and his right hand uncurled from the couch and drifted up to scratch lightly at the nape of Lucifer’s neck.

“Oh the weather outside is frightful,” Gabriel half-hummed. At last finding satisfaction with the decorations, she descended the ladder. On the way down, she ruffled Jack’s hair. “So, what next, kiddo? Wanna get introduced to the joys of eggnog?”

Castiel asked, with a hint of amused indulgence, “As a holiday activity, I do not believe I have ever made a... what’s the term? ‘Snow angel?’”

As Jack’s face lit up at the idea, Michael leaned his head on Adam’s shoulder. He whispered in his ear: “I think you might find the opportunity you were seeking earlier, in relation to snow and your brothers.”

Adam understood immediately, and laughed. He turned his head and caught Michael’s mouth with his, a kiss and a grin all in one.

-------------------------------------

#spn #midam #michael spn #adam milligan #archangels spn #fanfic #gift fic

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isnt-it-pretty · 2 years ago

Note

any advice for someone who never wrote a fanfic before?

Writing is a skill like any other. You wouldn't expect to pick up a flute and know how to play, would you? So no matter what, just keep writing.

Beyond that, here's a few pieces of general writing advice:

- Make sure your dialogue formatting is correct. A new paragraph every time a new person speaks, proper quotation marks, etc.

- Remember your tense. If you're writing in past tense, make sure everything is in past tense. The same applies if you're writing in present tense. It's an easy mistake to make, but people will notice.

- Don't use physical descriptors in place of nouns. Like this:

"Dialogue dialogue," the raven haired man said.

It's one of the quickest ways to turn people off your work. Use pronouns or the character's name unless the reader doesn't know the character's name. Sometimes you can get away with character relationships, ("blah blah," his father said), but use them sparingly.

- In a similar vein, just use 'said.' Words like whispered, shouted, etc., should be used for emphasis, not for regular dialogue.

- Don't learn to write from reading fics. You can tell when somebody does because they use all the tropes common to fanfiction, but honestly, those aren't very good (we've had passionate debates in my discord server about whether "golden orbs" or "the bluette said" is a greater sin. There is still no agreement.)

- Run your work through Grammarly. Copy and paste it into Grammarly's word processor since that works better than their google docs extension. Even the free Grammarly will help you a lot with little grammar things you don't notice. I know it picks up typos and such for me all the time.

- Personally, I suggest checking out some nonfiction writing books too. I'm fond of Stein on Writing by Sol Stein, and The Story Graph by Shawn Coney, but most people never do that, and they write fic just fine.

- Depending on the topic you plan on writing, research. I'm serious; the number of stories I've read that just toss in a deaf character because the author likes the headcanon is insane. If you want to deal with topics like disability or social issues, you need to research.

- If you post on ao3, learn the tagging system and use it properly. For example, "/" is romantic, and "&" is platonic. In general, don't use both for the same two characters.

- This is an excellent master list of writing advice by tumblr user she-who-fights-and-writes. Not all of it will apply to fic writing, but the basics are the same.

None writing but still important things:

- You'll never be happy if you compare your work to others. You can look at your pieces all day and wonder why they don't sound right or feel right or why it isn't like your favourite fic author, and it won't to make a difference.

- Coming off that, jealousy is a natural part of being involved in a skill-based community, but don't let it sour your friendships or make you bitter. I've seen it happen, and it makes everybody involved feel shitty. Meet people with kindness and move on, even if you think they don't deserve their popularity.

- Make friends! Fandom is a community. Authors should make friends with each other and with their readers. They should participate in the community by leaving comments on fics, reblogging art on social media, etc. This is supposed to be fun, so let it be.

- It is illegal to earn money off fan works. Don't mention anything to do with money on ao3. Don't link a kofi, paypal, say a work was a commission, etc. It breaks the terms of service.

- Just be kind and have fun.

#asks #writing #i'm sorry if this isn't helpful #i'm not very good at giving advice

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antianakin · 2 months ago

Text

Honestly, I remember when I first realized that the way I understood Star Wars had been really limited by popular fandom interpretations being most of what I knew about it. I managed to get lucky enough to wander into a few fandom spaces where people were posting quotes by Lucas and comparing it to what we see in the films and in TCW (a show Lucas was heavily involved in until it was canceled after season 6), in order to see how the themes he spoke about in interviews were shown in his work. It was an eye-opening experience that definitely made me appreciate Star Wars a lot more than I ever had previously. If you really want to see masters at work, feel free to check out @ david-talks-sw (this is the person whose posts I got the quotes from) and @ gffa. Both of them are people who regularly talk a lot about Lucas's intentions and provide quotes from Lucas and examples from the source material to analyze Star Wars from that level.

I've talked about balance by using a more literal metaphor before, too. If you're standing or walking somewhere, you have to have balance in order to do so easily. But the terrain you walk on might provide obstacles of any sort, from rocks or roots on the ground if you're outside in nature to the rocking of the ocean if you're on a ship at sea. Sometimes losing your balance can be as easy to correct as just shifting your weight, sometimes it takes a lot more effort, sometimes you fall all the way down and get hurt and it could take months or longer to recover that balance. Sometimes you need assistance in order to regain balance, either from a tool or from other people or both. Balance might be more difficult for some people than others due to a number of different factors, but it's something everyone is usually striving towards as much as possible because life is simply a lot easier that way. There's also no middle ground here. If you lose your balance, you are now UNBALANCED. You cannot be both balanced and unbalanced at once, it simply isn't possible.

Your foot hitting a root while hiking on a trail then is perhaps equivalent to getting a little irritated or nervous about something. It's a slight inconvenience and pretty easy to get over by just taking some deep breaths or taking a break. Being on a ship on the ocean might be more similar to, say, a more long-term situation causing you stress that you can't just walk away from, like you've got a big project due at work and it's requiring a lot of effort and coordination and maybe you're not able to sleep as much or you're skipping meals sometimes to get things done, so now it's a lot harder to keep your cool at things that wouldn't have even bothered you before.

Being unbalanced is something that happens to everybody, it's just a natural part of being alive because we all move through the world in our own ways and the world happens to be full of different obstacles. Losing your balance doesn't have to mean you're now a terrible person, but regaining it is often up to you and you'll probably be a lot happier in your life once you do.

That's the metaphor that works better for me. It still uses that concept of balance in a real world context the way you were going for, it just isn't utilizing a scale.

Sith lovers need to just accept that balance occurs when all the Sith are killed.

#balance

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xxsycamore · 2 years ago

Text

—𝘊𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘶𝘱𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯

► SYNOPSIS:

Yuan chokes you, and you don't fight - it simply feels too good.

▍yuan x f!reader

▍rating: E

▍tags: Choking; Asphyxiation; Masochism; Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot; Virginity; Reader is a virgin; Coming In Pants; Coming Untouched; Verbal Humiliation; Praise Kink; Dirty Talk; in Tsudaken's voice nonetheless! if you can hear it

▍wordcount: 1,254

▍a/n: Happy Episodio 1926 release everybody! 🎉I knew I would come back to writing fics for this fandom but I didn't know it would be that soon. I'm three chapters into Yang's route as of right now and it was enough to stir some emotions :') Now, this is not Lily, because I simply can't see a scenario where she lets that happen. So treat this as simply taking out my (our?) horny frustration that Yuan is to blame for 🙏�� I tried to keep this as plotless as possible. No spoilers ahead. Heed the tags & I hope you enjoy ❤

▍masterlist

The person in front of you is speaking, yet his words barely reach your mind. His tall frame looms over you casting a shadow, leaving you on your knees in the darkness of the already dimly lit room. Your eyes are glued to his face; the way his lips move, the way his gaze remains unwavering.

"… You're not hearing a word I say, aren't you, little mouse?"

His brows are slightly joined in a frown, as if he's pitying you - again, his gaze is unwavering. It's as if his eyes are depthless pools to drown in, dead seas; his animated features - simply an act.

You're telling yourself that the reason you're not running away from this man is because you're being realistic - there is no running away from him. It surely has nothing to do with the twisted tang of anticipation curling at the pit of your belly.

He leans in closer, yes, he's too tall and you're down on your knees, it's good that he does that - and you have a chance to admire him up close. The color of his eyes, a pretty red, a color that some might compare to a rose, but not you. His eyes are the color of danger, of blood. A screaming caution.

It's easy to get distracted, even if such instinctive sensations should send you into alert. But his speed is inhuman, who can blame you?

A hand is wrapped around your neck in an instant; an imprint of each of the five fingers bites into your skin, marring it - the pain is sudden and it knocks the air out of your lungs at once.

You find out that inhaling is not impossible, even if the air you take in is highly limited - is he not using his full force? Your thinking abilities are not at their sharpest as it is, but you conclude that he's going to torture you like this as long as he can. Strangely though, you can't help but see it as receiving more of his attention.

"Hmm… That's an interesting reaction. I thought it was fear, but it seems to be something else…" He drags his words, speaking slowly, almost as if to catch up with your low comprehension level in the situation.

"Could it be that you're excited?" he adapts a lighter tone, lips curling in a smile, his faintly wrinkled skin stretching. He appears to be no less than forty in age, a man who has seen many things. But what is he seeing now?

"Or even, perhaps… aroused?"

His hand is so sturdy when holding you in place, a vice-like grip that is just enough to let you breathe and that's it. The oxygen flowing through you is scarce, head spinning as the world is nothing but a soft buzz. Aroused…? What is he talking about?

He presses a bit more harshly and you remember that you do have room to retreat, albeit limited. Or maybe that's exactly what he wants you to do, as your knees buckle and you fall backwards, sitting on your heels.

Yuan uses the tip of his shoe to nudge the place between your legs, unceremoniously brushing aside the hem of your dress, dirtying it in the process. The cloth betrays you quickly as your panty-covered crouch is humiliatingly revealed to the chill air and to Yuan's venomous gaze.

There is a faint humming sound of approval, as if the man above you has laid his eyes upon a treasure that heads had to fly for, and then some more. You know for a fact he might has experience with these things, yet the reason is beyond you. Either way, your eyes sparkle, and it doesn't go unnoticed by Yuan.

"Aren't you a rare one? Getting so aroused by me clutching your life in my hand like that… A miserable little thing, aren't you?"

He pities you again, repeating the word 'aroused', and you suddenly put two and two together. Your mind really is in a haze, or maybe what's reminding of your sanity has been telling you it can't be true. But why wouldn't it? A poor, miserable thing you are, just like he said - ever since you laid your eyes upon Yuan, way before you found yourself in this position, you couldn't help but fall badly for him. In the most twisted, wanton-marked way, in the worst way.

If choking got you into this mess you made of yourself, choking would take you to peak. That much Yuan decides before strengthening his grip.

You would be moaning if you could manage. Your heart should be leaping twice, thrice as much, but your heartbeat is significantly slowed due to the lack of air in your lungs. The only thing increasing is arouse, as you try to trash your legs to a favorable position - proving to be futile, as Yuan's foot is preventing you from clutching them together.

"Would you break, I wonder? How much time do we have to play together?"

His lazy gaze bores into you as you try not to come undone on the spot under his intense eyes alone. There is no doubt the clear indication of your desire would be the drenched cloth covering your pussy.

"To get off this easily, you must be truly untouched. I like that, I see a slut in your eyes but there is a pure maiden underneath. How intriguing."

His praise is coloring your cheeks, at least a little, considering you might have gone too pale already. All he speaks is true; from the pristine maidenhood to the sinful desire sleeping underneath. You should have more shame.

The undeniable build-up in your core is an approaching orgasm, you know that much, but you never experienced one - therefore you never expected it to be this intense. It hits you at once, not asking if you want to linger in the moment a little more, not considering that you might want to think what would happen to you once Yuan satisfies his curiosity of seeing someone come from being strangled by his hand.

The world quakes, spins, and finally shatters to a deep black - it would appear that you're losing conscious, but not from lack of oxygen, then, from pleasure?

Your neck is awfully lonely without his hand.

You cough and cough, weakly feeling around your neck as if it would help you soothe the pain. Your nethers are burning, pulsing maddeningly, finally having had a taste from the forbidden fruit.

Yuan straightens his posture and you almost can't focus your eyes on his face, but you will yourself into it. His eyes are just as lifeless, but he appears to be very content with how things played out.

"You didn't break, in the end. What a good girl you are."

His hand caresses lightly your face and his praise means the world to you in that moment, all reservations thrown away. Your eyes sparkle again, brighter, having returned their light. Yuan puts his lips in a thin line, then chuckles a little.

"My, did the little mouse think I got amused by her? I'll let you know, not once in my life was I amused."

It makes something burn in you. Not hatred and surely not rage.

If you passed the test of not dying by his hand, then he surely won't enjoy simply killing you off now. Which tells you there will be next time.

Yes, burning deep into your now corrupted soul is the desire to prove yourself further to Yuan.

Taglist: @arsnovacadenza @ale-teodora @kimi00twin @otomelady @privilegedpancake @g-kleran @thehappycat123 @pumpumnnnp @thesirenwashere @theuwuisunreal @ravenarld @kyokirigiri-22 @kimmy-banana @devonares @animeworldsposts @randomanimatedhusbandoseeker @galaxyprison @trishtori @sadshaxk @starshards26 @pro-cat-stination @acethephoenix256 @ikevamp-shrine-2 @nad-zeta @crystal13unny @keen19thcenturygoatsstudent @lordsister @ikemen-banshou @themysticalbeing @canaria-blackwell @otome-scribbles @rhodolitesrose @fun-ghoul-neela @salty-fed-up-bitch @coornn @cilokgoang @kpop-and-otome @queen-dahlia @kisara-16 @chaosangel767 @ikemenlibrary @queengiuliettafirstlady @aurora-morning @aquagirl1978 @ikemenlover24 @violettduchess @mcofthemansion @tiny-wooden-robot @joy-the-reader Let me know if you want to be tagged/untagged!

#piofiore fated memories #piofiore episodio 1926 #piofiore #piofiore yuan #yuan piofiore #piofiore episodio 1926 yuan #otome #piofiore yang #episodio 1926 #piofiore fanfiction #piofiore fanfic #piofiore smut

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hellofeanor · 3 years ago

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Fëanorian Quenya

Hey friends! Do you like elves? Do you like the Silmarillion? Do you like Fëanor and co? And most of all, do you like spending hours thinking about minor details pertaining to made-up languages??? If so, boy do I have a treat for you! Let’s delve into the weird world of Fëanorian Quenya and explore some history and mechanics of why they talk Like That.

I’ve seen a lot of posts joking about the Fëanorian lisp, which is about as funny as a joke about a speech impediment can be. 👍 It’s important to understand, though, that this IS a joke. No, they didn’t really speak with a lisp. Yes, they did pronounce some S sounds as TH. That’s the critical disclaimer here: SOME. It’s not a blanket pronunciation. There’s a lot of background research that goes into determining which words would be pronounced with S and which would be TH, and that’s what we’re going to look at.

So if this is something you’ve come across in fandom and you’re not totally sure on the details, or if you ARE sure and just want some more in-depth info, read on.

The stuff probably everybody knows already

For anyone who’s been hanging around the Fëanorian corner of the Silm fandom for more than three minutes, there’s about a 100% chance you’ve heard of Fëanor’s penchant for retaining an archaic TH pronunciation after the majority of the Noldor went ahead and started pronouncing this sound as S instead. You may also know that this sound is represented by the letter thorn (Þ) in HoME, but since thorn doesn’t exist in modern English orthography and it’s a pain to keep typing the ALT code, I’m sticking to TH here. Anyway, all this was due to the fact that Fëanor was a huge mama’s boy, and his mom Míriel Therindë (later called Serindë, which made Fëanor want to punch walls and possibly also fellow elves) was an outlier who retained the TH after it fell out of use. Her son Fëanor, in turn, kept this up to honor her. Now, whether or not he would have bothered if this sound hadn’t literally been a critical part of her name is debatable, but that debate is outside the scope of this essay.

Fëanor continued to use the TH pronunciation until his death, and required his sons to use it as well. Finwë, however, switched over to S after the death of Míriel and before his marriage to Indis. Fëanor, reasonable and level-headed as he was, took this as a personal insult and decided that anybody who rejected TH likewise rejected him. So presumably, his loyal followers would have obeyed his totally reasonable demands not to give in to the seductive S-shift.

Why tho

Why did the Noldor decide to alter their pronunciation from TH to S? Great question. Nobody really knows. For the hell of it? IDK. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ But the important thing to understand is that elves, and especially Noldor, were really committed to making sure their language sounds cool. This is why it changed so much and so comparatively quickly for an immortal population: they were actively invested in changing it. They liked inventing new words and exploring new sounds and messing around with grammar.

So at some point some influential Noldo might have been like, hey y’all, let’s stop saying TH and say S instead! And everyone (except Míriel I guess, who was known for her elegant manner of speech and didn’t want to muck that up by changing pronunciation of a whole letter) was like, whoa, capital idea my good egg. And they went with it. Previous ideas along these lines included ‘hey y’all, let’s stop saying KH and say H instead’ and ‘hey y’all, let’s stop saying Z and say R instead’, and those went over swimmingly. Nobody could have foreseen the problem this TH to S business would cause.

Now here’s a fun fact. There was another change to Noldorin pronunciation that happened AFTER Fëanor’s birth, that he himself was involved in. This one was all about bilabial to labiodental F. And those sure are some words, so if you don’t know what I’m talking about (I don’t blame you), BILABIAL is a more whispery sound that happens when you say F using only air passing through your pursed lips, and LABIODENTAL is when you say F with your top teeth touching your bottom lip. Going forward I’m going to use PH to represent the bilabial sound, and F for the labiodental.

So F got on the radar of the Noldor via the Teleri, who used this sound in their language. And ol’ Fëanor figured it would be awesome to incorporate it into Quenya because he thought the PH sounded too close to HW, and the two were getting confused by lazy speakers. Why did he care? Because of his dad’s name and his own, of course. If people started to get lazy in their pronunciation, we’d end up with Hwinwë and Hwëanáro, which would be terrible and stupid and unacceptable. He accused the Vanyar of leaning down that road, and he wanted to stop that kind of shift before it happened to the Noldor. How to do that? Why, by instigating a different shift from traditional Noldorin PH to Telerin F!

“Hey y’all, let’s stop saying PH and say F instead!”

“Whoa, capital idea my good egg.”

Moral of the story: Fëanor is only concerned with Quenya pronunciation insofar as it affects his own name and the names of family members he likes. He does not care whether it’s staying the same or moving to a new sound so long as it personally makes him feel good and his name sound cool. Therefore the true way to piss him off would be to call him Curuhwinwë Hwëanáro, son of Serindë.

Okay so here’s how it works

Now that history is out of the way, let’s get back to how TH was used by the Fëanorians. As I mentioned earlier, TH wasn’t a blanket pronunciation. It all depended on the original form of the word, and whether the root had a TH or an S. And some very similar-sounding words come from different roots, so this can get tricky. A great resource that’ll give you this information is Eldamo: Quenya words where the S was originally TH are marked out with the Þ (thorn) symbol in the wordlist.

Some examples:

Súlë (spirit, breath) comes from the root THŪ, which means it would be pronounced with a TH. Silma (white crystal) comes from the root SIL, so it and related words like Silmaril would be pronounced with an S. No Fëanorian would say Thilmaril. Isil (moon), however, is a similar-sounding word that comes from a different root: THIL. Olos (mass of flowers) comes from the word LOTH, but: Olos (dream) comes from the root LOS. Fëanorian pronunciation would immediately differentiate between these two words.

While Fëanorians may have retained the distinct pronunciation of TH vs S, other Noldor can still differentiate between original S and S-that-used-to-be-TH in their writing. There are specific tengwar to use depending on the word’s original form. Silmë (the one that looks like a 6) is used for original S, while súlë (or thúlë, the one that looks like an h) is used for original TH.

Which other elves used this sound in their speech?

Fandom has really latched on to this TH as a Fëanorian thing, but it wasn’t that exclusively. The TH sound was actually ubiquitous in other elven languages, and in Valinor, only the Noldor dropped it. It was still used in Telerin and in Vanyarin Quendya. The Vanyar retained the TH not because of anything to do with Míriel, but just because they were a little more conservative and their language didn’t pick up on all the changes that the Noldor made. They also noped out of the Z to R shift the Noldor initiated, opting to keep the Z around.

When Indis married Finwë, she stopped using the normal Vanyarin TH and switched over to S as a gesture of loyalty to him and his people. Finarfin, however, out of love for the Vanyar and Teleri, switched BACK to TH. I like to think about how much it would have annoyed Fëanor that his snot-nosed kid brother was speaking correctly, but for the wrong reason. Go down one more generation, and Galadriel very specifically did not use TH. But this time it was absolutely a choice made as a glaring middle finger to Fëanor.

What this means for your fanfic or whatever

The big takeaway here: you can’t just have Fëanorians replace every S with TH and call it a day.

If you’re inventing names for your Fëanorian OCs or coming up with phrases for them to say, it’s important to look into the history of all Quenya S-words you end up using to determine if they should be S or TH. If Fëanor got mad about somebody saying Serindë instead of Therindë, he’d get equally mad about somebody saying Thilmaril instead of Silmaril and assume they were mocking him. Remember: this is a dude with no chill. (On the other hand, if you WANT somebody to be mocking Fëanor, Galadriel would 100% do this because she has an equally negligible amount of chill.)

It’s also important to note that the TH isn’t a true shibboleth, since pretty much all elves EXCEPT the non-Fëanorian Noldor use it. And even the S-preferring Noldor would still be able to pronounce the TH. Those who went into exile would go on to use it commonly in Sindarin, and those who remained in Valinor would still encounter it among the Vanyar and Teleri. So if you’re writing a scene where somebody has to pronounce a TH word to prove their loyalty… yeah, everyone can pass this test. And in the opposite direction, you can’t use TH to prove somebody’s an evil Fëanorian, either. They might just be Vanyarin or something. Or, like. Really Old.

Would the sons (and followers) of Fëanor keep using TH after his death? Oh hell yeah. This is an entire family unfamiliar with the concept of not dying on hills. They will keep using it unto the ending of the world. Actually, with Sindarin becoming the common language of Middle-earth from the First Age, probably not a lot of change happened in exilic Quenya. It became a lore language: a piece of living history. It would have been preserved as it was when the original speakers left Valinor.

(And then, thousands of years later, Galadriel finally returns home to Tirion like, Long have mine eyes awaited this most blissful of sights, and ne’er hath my sprit soared with such grace, for I am returned! And all the Amanyar Noldor stare at her like, whatchu bangin on bout, eh? Because they had nothing better to do in the peace of Valinor than push Quenya to brave and frankly questionable new horizons.)

Anyway, there you go: a somewhat brief history of Fëanorian Quenya. I hope you found this informative and useful, or at the very least not boring. Obvs this is super condensed and, uh, not particularly scholarly, but I promise I know what I’m talking about. I have a university degree! (Not in anything even remotely related to what’s written above, but I hardly see how that’s relevant. It’s still a DEGREE.)

Questions? Need clarification or want more info? My asks are always open!

#feanor #silmarillion #quenya #tolkien #middle earth

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batarangsoundsdumb · 4 years ago

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guess fucking what? my inbox is so fucking full right now i'm unloading all of this shit in one post.

For the 11th gotham memes: gothamites react to bruce being jacked in a tiktok he made with kids, like super yoked, ripped as hell

fucking hilarious thanks. i think i did it in one meme post, but i genuinely don't remember which one

i dunno which of the batfam would do this but one time i was sleeping over at a friends house and ended up on the floor bc the bed was so very small and i just stayed there because the rug was soft

that's a drunk jason move i don't know what to tell you

tim and jason are "i listen to pop punk" solidarity. whenever jason highjacks the batmobile theyll go on long ass car rides blaring mcr and paramore and then never talk about it again

as they should!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tim: no jason it's my turn using the aux cord i gotta put on my jams jason: don't you dare put on weird shit tim: don't worry, you're gonna love this *plays fearless (taylor's version)

hear me out hear me out, red hood stans 🤝 nightwing stans t h i g h s

holy shit yes.

SNL au: Bruce breaks character when pretending to superman and says something like "I'm not superman! You've seen his gps!! It's from 2001!!!" @sabeanybabe

superman flies past the snl building the next day just to say 'actually it's from 2005, i'm not a heathen'

does your back hurt from carrying the batfam fandom

it hurts more from the exotic rock collection i keep in my backpack, but thanks for the concern.

I love your posts by why would you always leave the best parts in the tags?

as a treat for the people that check the tags ;) (and also because i'm committed to the short post aesthetic)

somehow your playlist was everything i never knew i needed. i mean it. this is my new favorite playlist.

and don't you dare get a new favourite playlist!

babe ur stoner tim playlist is exactly too perfect, earth is literally blessed by ur existence

babe thanks so much! i love my stoner tim playlist because it's just my usual playlist but people think it's an artistic choice that i put taylor swift and britney spears in there, when it's just what i unironically like listening to

JANDKSKDK BILLY RAY CYRUS ON THE STONER TIM PLAYLIST I LOVE IT IT

again it's not even an ironic choice, i know every single word and i genuinely like the song

The last chapter of Fundamentals of Casework has me crying at work. Thanks I love it @dudelookitsalesbian

oh babe, i'm sorry, but also, not sorry i love chapter 4 so much it's my lovechild with the 'mental illness' tag

soooo....stumbled on your tumblr by some stroke of fate??? read your DC fanfic first. which is PHENOMENAL btw. then found all the batmemes; the funniest thing EVER bc everyone forgets about regular old gothamites. kept scrolling and your blog pops up as recommended. clicked on the ao3 for shits and giggles and waddaya know?!?!? it's YOU!!! you're LEGEND!!!! ever seen that meme? it's a video of a cat that got into a baseball field and the two announcers get really invested in his escape attempt and start giving a play by play of the cat instead of the game. memeable moment: "GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!"

i seriously think about this ask every single day and it's so fucking funny to me that i've never seen the meme you're referencing, but i still find myself going 'GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!' whenever i see something funny. but wow i'm glad you liked this steaming pile of garbage

Fav dc character overall? And fav batfamily character?

don't ask me to pick between the loves of my life, but i can tell you i've cried about every single batfamily member and also wally west (my beloved)

What's your opinion on fans having a problem with batfam being "too big"? And some even claim that batfam is just "Bruce Alfred Dick Damian" and the rest of them are just "friends and allies" (source: reddit) Personally, I like batfam because of this reason but idk

stupid. a family can never be too big. i'm not that big a fan of like huge batfam stuff with everybody from every single universe, because as much as it's funny for bruce to have like 30 kids, it just feels a little too OOC for me.

This is the best tag I've seen involving the batfam, thanks for thinking of it

This is canon now @nctxrejects

lmao yeah i think at that point alfred has had to sit through like at least a dozen coming out talks and just has a pride flag collection in the attic that he pulls out whenever a kid comes out

idk why batfam hits different as compared to any other superhero family

bc it's found family and usually the other superhero families are almost all genetically related in one way or another

I don't know if you watch the umbrella academy but I saw your last post about batcest and saw the similarities. But the thing is (although I think it's weird) in TUA, they addressed it by saying "they were raised as weapons, not siblings" or something along those lines, which is simply not the case with batfam.

yeah i watched tua but i also thought it was ridiculous and they still treated each other as siblings so i didn't like the luthor/allison thing, and am glad they stopped doing that shit bc it fucking sucked.

Hot take: Batcest shippers are the same people who believe adopted siblings are not actual siblings

smoking hot take: batcest shippers are the people who watch 'my sister got stuck in the washing machine' porn

Duke was adopted by Bruce?

not technically no, but do i, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb, look like i care?

True story but I had to change my freaking name because it used to be "Damien" and most people would go "OH LIKE DAMIAN WAYNE" like please I'm just tryna live

true story, but i don't actually think of damian when i hear the name damian, literally the first thing that pops up is damian darkh like bruh what?

apparently dc comics company supported comic stores by giving out new titles and stuff during the beginning of the pandemic to help them run and I just think that's wholesome

ah yeah that's so fucking cool, still don't like dc, the company, because this world is a capitalist hellhole and we're all owned by warner brothers or disney with no in between.

ayo looking at tumblr head canons and finding out bruce is actually a terrible father is a punch in the gut

lmao yes, in like 50% of comics bruce is a terrible father and it gives me whiplash

oooh I just saw the jason todd vs winter soldier post and the real question is: batman vs iron man

while iron man has like hundreds of cases of armor, batman could throw out an emp and have the guy dropping out of the sky in 2 seconds.

dickfast = fastdick = quickdick = quickie

magnum hot take

hey bata(?) just thought I'd let you know I have copied the obnoxious emoji and Billy Ray post for use on simping men going forth

thank you 😘🌷 (@spacebarsidecar)

why would you do that to your followers???? i get why i did it, but why would you???

what is scarecrow made the nightwing funko pop himself, like those diy-ers that paint over other ones

oh god no, horrible take, horrible take, that's a disgusting thought oh no

I see your HC that Bruce and Oliver fucked and raise you this: Dick and Roy ALSO fucked

yes they did and it was a horrible moment for jason to find out dick has fucked both of his best friends

"at this rate bruce adds like 1 child to his family every decade or so" Duke is introduced in 2013, Damian as Damian, not as an unnamed child, in 2006. And he is already 14 years old, Robins rarely remain Robins after 16 😬 It looks like a new Robin and Batkid will appear in a couple of years

i mean i can't wait? but somebody will probably die first tho, we're due for another major character death. my money's on either cass or duke this time.

BRO you're so right all of your Bruce's ex headcanons are amazing but they aren't ships, that's kinda wild. Like I don't want any peeks into how their relationship was I just want to see everyone make fun of them

lmao YES it's just i love bruce being a slut, like good for him.

I am in love with your posts your honour thank you

omg thanks are we like,, gonna kiss now?

The justice league needs to have a meeting to discuss how many of their members/partners have slept with bruce. Because through a combination of cannon & fannon (if DC wasn’t homophobic) we have AT LEAST: 1) clark 2) lois 3) oliver 4) dinah 5) john

Thats not counting villains or random civilians @dudelookitsalesbian

yes yes yes, they'll have a yearly meeting about how many of their collective exes could be out for revenge and batman's list just keeps getting longer.

tim was like "i'm drake now" and everyone was like ahh so your fursona is a dragon and tim was like pffffft no. ducks.

and what about it?

when steph's fighting livewire and she zaps her with lighting and nothing happens and then they both just. stand there awkwardly for a second and talk. yeah i couldn't stop laughing at that batgirl steph is the BEST

oh yeah that was fucking hilarious and i think it would be so cool and sexy of dc to give steph a little comic series,,, as a treat

Hi I absolutely adore all of yours "Bruce and Oliver very badly pretending they didn't fuck each other" memes

lmao i do too

I need you to know that “Bruce Wayne had frosted tips” is one of my favorite Bruce takes of all time it’s so galaxy brained. you’re right and you should say it

he also painted his hair blonde once when he was travelling and in conclusion, this is why he's being blackmailed by the gotham gazette.

you know my thing about gordon being branded as the only good cop in gotham is its a load of shit like arguably he's a good person and not working to screw people over or anything but the fact that he also works w. batman makes him a shit cop. like yea batman is better than the mob but its still illegal its still an abuse of power he just not making bank

babe, all cops are bad cops. (but yeah youre absolutely right, working with vigilantes makes you a shit cop, but also working against vigilantes just makes you an asshole cop yanno?)

ruh roh i think i’m about to add “so not yeehaw” every time i don’t like something

that's a very good vocabulary upgrade

somehow i feel like steph already knew. like babs obviously knew but i feel like bruce got high/drunk in front of steph and started telling his boarding school stories and steph was just like “oh you fucked up i’m never gonna forget this”

steph and bruce have weird uncle/rebellious niece dynamic and they just hang out sometimes and bruce will be like 'i once broke my arm when i tripped over a hedge when i was drunk so oliver drove me to the hospital on an electric scooter' and steph will just have to sit there with that knowledge in her head.

Hello I just wanted to tell you you are So right in all your steph opinions bc she is, in fact amazing and I think that's very sexy of you. Ps. Your Bruce/Oliver fic is hilarious

babe, thank you so much and yes steph is amazing and i love her and she deserves the world and she's the best member of the batfam hands down. also thanks

In Supersons we see a couple of kids that are implied to be Damian and Jon's children and the boy has laser eyes and can fly, so I asume he's not adopted. The girl, who calls Bruce grandpa, can also fly, btw. So it's canon (probably by accident) that Jon can have kids and he must have married one of Bruce's kids. (I'm hoping for Damian, mostly because any other of his children would be waaaaaaaaaaaaay too old.) @artemisa97

lmao that was probably an accident seeing as jon is a 17 year old superhero in the year 3000 (by the jonas brothers)

You know, I'm a die hard fan of your memes, but I gotta say one thing: if Gothamites actually took gas mask everywhere with them, then the Scarecrow would just be a weird dude in a weird costume, and not a villain oh so scary. DC really should just takes notes from you.

bold of you to assume there's no gothamite anti-maskers

How does it feel being the funniest person on this app?

horrible, next question.

I can't listen to Green Day or Billy Joel without thinking of your post about how Bruce got arrested at a Billy Joel concert @nightwings-kid

yeah that's your mistake, i on the other hand can't enjoy billy joel without thinking about the glee rendition of 'uptown girl'

I've FINALLY been watching the Batman animated series and I gotta say, after watching "the gray ghost" I am CONVINCED that Batman is a closeted super hero geek who was 100% freaking out the first time he met Superman and is just REALLY good at hiding it.

superman: so what do you do in your free time? batman, thinking about the superman fanfiction he's writing on the batcomputer: i have no free time

bruce and oliver be like boyfriends to co-workers 401k (do the justice leagues get 401ks??? not that bruce and ollie would need them, but-)

lmao yes just 400 thousand words of bruce realising 'oh dip oliver is such a fucking dumbass' (also i don't know what a 401 k is but i assume they don't?)

Gothamites would totally boo superman as he saves Gotham while batman is out. @meenje

he's like 'okay think about that next time you want to be saved from an alien octopus'

I just took long break from dc comics and I come back to see ric grayson ??

i think it's very cool and sexy of dc to see dick and just think 'you know what? let's just give him a traumatic brain injury' and then didn't develop his character in any real way

SPEAKING OF RIC GRAYSON, gothamites making confused memes out of ric grayson is much needed

'dick grayson is my taxi driver? can anyone explain what the fuck happened he looks like an italian plumber?'

i hate to say it but batfam are def "marvel characters" in that sense they are characters who are human but become superheroes unlike most dc characters who are gods trying to be human maybe this is why I like batfam

fair enough

#this is only like half of it #but at least you can get like a few answers #yanno fuck it #bataranswers #ask #asks #anon

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jobrookekarev · 3 years ago

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The In-Laws

Chapter One of One

Words: 5970

Summary: When one of Meredith's dinner parties goes disastrously wrong, Meredith, Alex, Amelia, and Maggie go up to her room to drink and talk, while Jo, Link, Hayes, Winston, and the kids all hang out in the backyard as the in-laws talk together.

Fandom: Grey’s Anatomy.

Relationship: Meredith Grey/Cormac Hayes, Alex Karev/Jo Wilson, Atticus Lincoln/Amelia Shepherd, and Maggie Pierce/Winston Ndugu.

Characters: Meredith Grey, Cormac Hayes, Alex Karev, Jo Wilson, Maggie Pierce, Winston Ndugu, Amelia Shepherd, Atticus Lincoln, Zola Grey Shepherd, Derek Bailey Shepherd, Ellis Shepherd, Liam Hayes, Austin Hayes, Scout Shepherd-Lincoln, and Luna Ashton-Wilson.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences,

Additional Tags: Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Kids, Dinner Parties, Drinking (Mentioned), Babies, Pregnancy, Labor, Ice Cream, and S’mores.

Read at AO3

Read at FFN

AN: I've had this one in my draft box for a long time and I finally just got around to finishing it. I hope you all enjoy it.

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“Hey, good you're all here,” Meredith said as she came and the attending’s lounge.

Everyone was eating lunch. Link and Amelia were with Scout in a highchair next to Cormac, while a pregnant Jo and Maggie sat on the couch with Winston, Alex, and Luna.

“So, as you all know, Carolyn, Derek's mother, is coming to town next weekend,” Meredith said, folding her hands together as she stood in front of the group.

“Yep, we've got it all planned out,” Link said, as he offered some of his pasta to one-year-old Scout. “We’ll have a dinner party, where she will get to meet her new grandson, and the other kids get to play with Grandma before following up with desserts and a quick exit, short, simple, and fun.”

“And our emergency get away excuse is an MVC in the ER with encephalitis and multiple broken bones,” Amelia said with a smile as she fed Scout another spoon full of applesauce.

“Either that or Jo going into labor, it depends on the situation,” Link said as he and Jo exchanged a look of agreement.

“We have a secret text code and everything,” Jo said as she nodded and she rubbed her eight-month pregnant belly while Alex bounced Luna in his arms.

“I, for one, am looking forward to meeting your ex-mother-in-law,” Cormac said with a smile as he looked over at Meredith.

The two of them had been dating for a little while, and although things were still new they were beginning to introduce each other to the other’s extended families.

“Well, plans have kinda changed,” Meredith said, a little hesitant before she dropped the bomb on them. “Your sisters got word of Carolyn's trip, and now Nancy is tagging along with her family, kids and all.”

“Nancy is coming!” Amelia said, putting down the spoon and sitting up.

“I've met Nancy. Are you sure this is a good idea?” Link asked, looking between Amelia and Meredith.

“Yeah, she did spend the entire time she was here calling me a slut,” Meredith countered despite the hesitant look on her face.

“This is bad,” Amelia said as she started to freak out. “Nancy is the worst of them all.”

“She also wants her kids to spend more time with their cousins,” Meredith argued. “And I don't think she'd do anything too bad with the kids around.”

“So you're okay with her comparing her perfect kids to our four messy kids because that is exactly what she's going to do,” Amelia said, pointing the spoon at Meredith to make her point.

“Well, Luna's a bit fussy, so we should go put her down for a nap,” Alex said despite the completely calm baby in his arms as he got up off the couch and pulled Jo up with him.

“Wait, just hang on for a second,” Meredith said to him, holding up her hand.

“Why none of this concerns us?” Alex said, of course, as Meredith’s best friend, he was willing to go to dinner with her and her family, but not if he could avoid it.

“Well, I was hoping to make a dinner party out of it and extend the invitation to you, Jo, Maggie, and Winston as well,” Meredith said, plastering on a smile and trying to seem like it was a good idea.

“No, that is a terrible idea,” Jo said, looking over at her wide eyed.

“It can't be that bad, I’ll make my lasagna, and I think it would be nice to meet Derek's mom and his other sisters,” Maggie said with a shrug, that jostling Winston from where he had pressed his head against her five-month pregnant belly. “Sorry, honey.”

“My other sisters are nothing like Derek and I,” Amelia added angrily, staring at the applesauce before Link put his arm around her shoulders.

“Exactly,” Jo said, nervously rubbing her belly. “And besides, every time we have a dinner party at your place, it ends in disaster.”

“That's not true,” Alex said, only for Jo to give him a look.

“Oh really, what about the dinner party a couple of years ago where Callie brought Penny?”

“That was an extenuating circumstance,” Meredith countered.

“What about that game night that you tried to host two years ago? Half of you didn't show up, which I guess it's a good thing as I heard from Jackson that it was a huge disaster,” Jo said, waving her arm around gesturing to the magnitude of the disaster.

“Again, there were kind of extenuating circumstances there,” Maggie argued again before Jo cut her off.

“What about all the times we tried to get together the year Meredith was gone or that time your mom came into town and made lasagna. This group and dinner parties have a bad track record, and this is one train wreck that I do not want to be a part of.”

“Well, suck it up, Karev. You're part of the family now, and that means whether you like it or not, we are all going to at least attempt to have a nice time at this dinner party,” Meredith said, glaring at Jo before she looked over at everybody else. “So, is everyone on board?”

“I think we can make it work,” Maggie agreed with a nod from Winston.

“I will help you cook, and I'm sure we can prevent any disasters,” Winston said, kissing Maggie's cheek before he leaned down and kissed her stomach.

“I'll be there,” Cormac said, getting up and putting his hand on Meredith's back. “And I'll do everything in my power to make sure things go over smoothly.”

“What do you think?” Link asked as he looked over at Amelia.

“I am going to reserve my right to bail at a moment's notice and there better be cake,” Amelia said, pointing to Meredith, who nodded in a quick agreement.

“I think we can make it too,” Alex said, looking over at Jo for confirmation. “I’ll rub your feet and change all of Luna’s dirty diapers for a week.”

“Okay fine,” Jo said, crossing her arms before pointing a finger at Meredith. “But when everything goes to hell, and you, Alex, Maggie, and Amelia are all falling apart upstairs drinking and eating cake because shit hit the fan. I'm going to be in the backyard with your kids and getting them hopped up on candy.”

“You can't feed my baby candy Jo,” Amelia said, looking over at her.

“He’s a year old, I can feed him ice cream,” Jo countered, raising her eyebrow over at Amelia as Link laughed before Amelia silenced him with a look.

“Well, you better keep the candy in your car, Karev, because you're not going to need it. This dinner party is going to be great!” Meredith insisted as if she was trying to convince herself.

She gave Cormac a quick kiss before she left and Alex raced after her and followed her out of the room.

“Are you sure that this is a good idea? I mean, I know your ex-mother-in-law is pretty nice, but Jo’s kinda right about our history with dinner parties.”

“It's just Carolyn, and she's on good terms with both Amelia and me, and Nancy has promised to be on her best behavior,” Meredith insisted with an optimistic smile that definitely looked out of place. “It's going to be great.”

It was not, in fact, great.

Jo balanced the four cartons of ice cream in her arms. She pulled out the bottle of tequila from the fridge for Meredith and the bottle of sparkling cider for Amelia and Maggie and handed both to Alex. She slowly walked over to the drawer to grab a hand full of spoons and balanced the bowls in her other arm. Given what happened that night, she figured that all the kids deserve endless ice cream.

“Why don't I help you with those,” Alex said, he held Luna in one arm and reaching out to take the ice cream carton from her before she turned away.

“No, set Luna down, and go and take the drinks upstairs and comfort Meredith. She needs you right now. I got ice cream. I’m fine,” Jo said, shoving him off with her hips and a wave of her hand.

Alex tilted his head and smiled as he took the drinks and set Luna down. She toddled over to the back door, calling out for Scout. “Out, out?”

“Lu Lu,” Scout called out to her as she giggled and waved her arms excitedly as she walked into the backyard.

She had started walking a few weeks ago, and since then, Jo and Alex could barely keep up with her. They knew that all of the adults and older kids outside would keep an eye out for her until Jo came out. They both watched Luna through the window for a moment as she and Scout met in a hug.

“Are you sure it's okay?” Alex asked again, catching her before she moved to follow Luna as he reached out and placed his hands on her belly. “I should probably help you out with the kids, Mer will be fine with just Maggie and Amelia.”

“Alex, I told you it's fine. Meredith isn't stealing you away from me. You're helping out our friend now go,” Jo said as she grabbed the bowls and waddled towards the laundry room to head out to the backyard.

“Are you at least going to say I told you so?”

“Maybe next week, once the sting wears off,” Jo said as she turned around to look at him with a smirk before she opened the screen door.

Jo waddled out into the backyard where Link, Hayes, and Winston, were calming down the kids. They were all upset at the things Nancy had said to Meredith, especially Zola. With the bowls in one hand and the ice cream in the other also balanced on her belly, Jo felt the baby kick against the ice cream shuffling the stack of cartons.

“I know it's kind of cold, just hang on, squirt,” Jo said as she put the ice cream on the table and sat back in the lounge chair.

With extra reassurance, cuddles, and ice cream, the kids were doing better. Soon all of them were scattered around the yard. Zola was eating ice cream in the chair next to her while Bailey and Ellis were playing on the play center with Liam and Austin. Jo sat with her carton of rocky road as she fed Luna and Scout a spoonful. She watched her daughter and godson take in the cold treat with wide eyes and exciting squeals. As soon as they were finished with their bite, they would open their mouths and silently demanded more. Their little bodies were vibrating with the amount of sugar.

“Are you sure they're okay up there? What Nancy said was pretty harsh, maybe I should go talk to Meredith,” Cormac asked as he took a step towards the house.

“No, they're fine, trust me, if they wanted us up there, we would be, but they just need some time to talk it out amongst themselves,” Jo said, as she fed Luna another spoonful of ice cream.

“I just feel awkward and a little out of place standing around here. I know Meredith and I have only just started dating, but I feel like I should be there for her more,” Cormac said, staring down at his bowl.

“Yeah, I get that,” Link said, with a nod as he ate some of his own ice cream. “But you were there and stood up for Meredith in front of Nancy when it counted and she appreciates that, but now she needs time to complain about it with her brother and sisters.”

“How long do you think before they're dancing out?” Jo asked, tilting her head up to look at the room where they were all probably still drinking.

“I give it thirty minutes tops,” Link said with a shrug.

“Might be a bit more than that,” Winston said as he took a sip of his beer. “I know how Maggie gets when she's angry, she can rant for at least a half-hour.”

“Yeah, she's pretty good at bringing the thunder,” Jo said as they all chuckled.

She looked around the backyard and smiled. A few years ago, it would have just been her heading back to the loft alone, maybe with Stephanie, maybe not, but now she had Link and Cormac and Winston. Alex, Meredith, Amelia, and Maggie had always been their own little family, and Jo now realized she had her own little in-law party tonight.

“Hey, Aunt Jo,” Zola said, coming over with an empty bowl and putting it on the side table. “Can I use your phone and run inside and grab my speaker so we can have our own dance party?”

“You can use my phone Zola, I've got a really cool playlist I'm sure you'll like,” Liam offered, coming over and pulling out his phone and handing it over to Zola.

“Yeah, that sounds fun,” Jo said before Zola ran inside to grab her speaker.

“I hope this playlist of yours isn't too offensive?” Cormac warned Liam.

“Relax. It's all clean music, I promise,” Liam said as he held up his arms in defense.

“They seem to be getting along pretty well,” Link noted as Zola came back out, and they set up the speaker together.

“Yeah, sometimes a little too well,” Cormac said as Liam and Zola giggled together.

The four of them sat there eating ice cream and talking as they watched the kids run around and dance to the music. It was so adorable to watch Scout and Luna dance to the music. However, it was a little embarrassing when Luna started twerking something Jo had definitely not taught her how to do.

“Hey Liam, what song is this?” Link asked as he sat up his head lately bopping to the music.

“Um, It's,” Liam paused as he checked his phone. “It’s Sam Smith’s, Make It To Me.”

“Nice, I’ll have to add it to my playlist for tomorrow's surgery,” Link said as he added it to his phone as he looked over at her and raised his eyebrows. “A surgery you could get in on too, Jo. I need a general surgeon.”

“Or you could get in on one of my cases’ the next time I deliver a baby with a broken collar bone,” Jo suggested, smirking at him as she glanced back at Luna just in time to see when I reach for the bullet ice cream almost tipping it on to herself before Jo pulled it out of her reach.

“Ah, that's more of just a Ped’s case,” Link said with a shrug.

“I don't know. It's always good to get a second opinion and you are the bone expert,” Cormac said, tilting his head at Link and taking a sip of his beer.

“Yeah, I just miss working with you. It seems like I never see you anymore,” Link complained with a pout.

“I miss working with you too,” Jo said, sharing his pout. “But it's not like we don't see each other all the time. We still have our Wednesday night playdates and Waffle Sunday.”

“Yeah, but that's with the kids. It's never just the two of us,” Link said with a sigh as Scout came over to him and he picked up his son. “I love our kids, and I love that they're such good friends, but I miss having adult time with my best friend.”

“I miss you too,” Jo said, looking over at him. She rubbed her belly as she felt her baby move around inside of her. “Well, it's not just going to be the two of us, but why don't we carpool to work tomorrow and let Alex and Amelia drive the kids. Then we can get breakfast at the coffee stand before work.”

“Sounds good,” Link said as he gave her a fist bump.

“Luna and Scout’s friendship is just so cute. They're definitely going to grow up and be best friends,” Winston said with a smile as he watched them play together on the grass. “I hope our baby has that.”

“Don't worry, I got you,” Jo said, pointing at her stomach as all of the boys laughed.

“Yeah, it's nice that all of our kids are around the same age and will be in the daycare together,” Winston said, walking over to sit next to her.

“You know, when Amelia told me she was pregnant, I kind of hoped that you and Alex would have a baby too so that our kids could grow up together,” Link that with a smile as he watched Luna and Scout dance together. The two of them had grabbed onto each other's arms and were swaying together.

“Was this before or after you freaked out?” Jo said, raising an eyebrow over at him as the boys Winston and Cormac chuckled.

“It was an unplanned pregnancy. I think I'm allowed to freak out a little bit!” Link said, holding up his hand in defense.

“See, that's the hard thing about moving when your kids are older. They lose touch with their friends, but I’m glad Liam and Austin have always been able to make friends here, although I know they miss their friends back in Switzerland.” Hayes said as he watched his boys play with Zola and Bailey.

“Good friends always have a way of coming back to you,” Jo said as she and Link exchanged a smile.

“Which is why you should scrub in on the surgery with me,” Link said as he leaned forward in his chair.

“I'll think about it,” Jo said, and she did mean it because as much as she loved OB, but there were parts of surgery that she did miss.

“What we need is a case that we can all work together,” Hayes said, leaning forward in his chair.

“Oh yeah, that would be so cool,” Winston said as Jo and Link nodded.

“It'd have to be a pretty specific case,” Jo said that she thought about it. “Like a baby with osteogenesis imperfecta and Mom with a bad heart or something.”

“We could probably all work together on a case with a mom and baby with Achondroplasia,” Link said as he snapped his fingers.

“Yeah, that could be possible,” Winston said, lifting his shoulder in a half shrug. “But that doesn't necessarily mean there's a heart issue.”

“It's going to be a needle in a haystack to find a case, but it would be fun for the four of us to work together,” Hayes said, crossing his arms.

“Well, I'll definitely keep an eye out and hopefully, we get to work together before the two of you go on maternity leave,” Link said, looking over at her and Winston.

“It might have to be after my maternity leave. I don't know how much longer this one's going to stay put,” Jo said as she rubbed her belly again when the baby kicked her. At 36 weeks along, she was ready to be done with her pregnancy.

“Speaking of which, did you and Alex finish the paperwork for your maternity leave. Maggie and I went over it this afternoon, but it’s just so complicated. You think two world-class surgeons would be able to figure it out, but it's a little beyond us,” Winston said with a shake of his head.

“Yeah, Alex and I struggled with it when we took leave after we adopted Luna and we put in the paperwork for our leave this time around last month. If you want, I could go over it with you tomorrow at lunch,” Jo offered with a shrug, she remembered how dumbfounded Alex was with the paperwork the first time around, and the two of them had spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to figure it out.

“Yeah, thanks,” Winston said, clearly relieved as he relaxed back into his chair.

The four of them continued talking as they watched the kids dance. The warm evening sunset turned into a chilly evening, and they turned on the porch lights and started a campfire getting out marshmallows and making S'mores for the kids. It had been a few hours since the dinner ended and she could tell the boys were getting anxious. Yet, she wasn't too worried, and she knew how these things could go.

“They've been up there quite a while. Should we be concerned?” Winston asked, looking up at the window where the light was on, but none of them could see the shadows through the blind.

Jo didn't realize that they were staring at her as she had her eyes closed and was breathing out and rubbing her stomach as she had a Braxton Hicks contraction.

“Jo, are you okay?” Link asked, getting up and coming to sit next to her, putting his hands over hers on her belly.

Jo smiled as her baby rewarded their Uncle Link with a soft kick against her belly. “I'm fine. It’s just another Braxton Hicks. I've been getting them more frequently these days. What did you ask Winston?”

“I just thought that maybe one of us should go up there and check on them?” Winston said, stared up at the window and absentmindedly picked at the paper on his beer bottle.

“It's probably best just to let them talk it all out,” Jo said as Link nodded in agreement. “Or else Meredith is going to end up in our bed tonight?”

“Wait, what?” Cormac asked, his eyebrows shooting up into his wrinkled forehead.

“Yeah, Meredith does this thing where she comes over to talk to Alex and crawls in bed next to us. She did it after you guys introduced the kids a few weeks ago,” Jo said before she took in Cormac's hesitant look. “Don't worry. It’s completely platonic, if not a bit annoying. They used to kick me out of bed while I was naked.”

“Wait, you were naked?” Link asked, he had heard the story before, but Jo had left that detail out.

“Yeah, she used to toss me whatever shirt was lying on the ground and rip the covers off of me so she could sit next to Alex,” Jo said, waving her hand and trying to dismiss the conversation.

“And Alex let her do that?” Link asked, and Jo could tell that he was shifting into protective big brother mode, so she put a hand on his chest and shook her head.

“Only because Alex was more of a pushover back then and Meredith trampled all over him. It's better now. These days she just crawls in bed next to me and steals all the blankets,” Jo said with a laugh as she remembered how Meredith had crawled into bed with them a couple of days ago. She had woken up in the middle of the night to pee, only to realize that she was sandwiched in between Meredith and Alex.

“Yeah, she does this thing where she grabs the blankets and holds them close to her chest and almost to cocoons herself,” Cormac said with a soft smile on his face. “But sometimes, she'll share her cocoon with me.”

“Eww, Dad, we did not need to know that!” Austin said, making a face from where he was making a S’more with Bailey.

“Sorry,” Cormac said, holding up his hands.

“Maggie does the same thing with her blanket, except she just rolls around when she's asleep until she's a burrito, and sometimes only her head sticks out,” Winston said, getting this far off look of love on his face. “Which is why I think we work together since I love the cold and sometimes only end up sleeping with a sheet.”

“I’m the opposite. Sometimes I’ll just spread out like a starfish. I kinda take up the whole bed, much to Amelia's annoyance, but she does the same thing too, and sometimes I'll wake up with her on top of me with her foot in my face,” Link said, yet he had a happy smile on his face. “So, of course, Scout does the same thing. That's why he loves the crib, as now he can stretch out. He's got to be able to starfish without any of his limbs touching sides.”

“Luna’s like me, she likes to curl up on her side, and Alex is a little in-between. Usually, he sleeps on his back straight as a plank, but then sometimes, I'll wake up, and he will have rolled over in the middle of the night to cuddle up against me. Which is nice, except for the fact that he runs hot, especially at night. It’s like a human sized furnace sleeping next to me. So I've got him up against my back and then this little one up in my ribs, and if she gets out of her crib, Luna will be up against my chest, and I'm trapped,” Jo said with a shake of her head as she affectionately rubbed her belly and smiled down at Luna who was asleep on her chest.

“I like cuddling with you and Luna, Auntie Jo. You’re both so warm and snuggly,” Ellis said, joining the conversation as she came over and crawled up next to Jo and rested her head on her belly as Jo wrapped her arms around her.

“I like snuggling with you too, Ellis,” Jo said, wrapping her arms around her and pressing a kiss to her forehead as Ellis’ eyes fluttered shut.

It was getting late, but it was also a Saturday, and none of the other kids seemed to mind the later hours as they kept playing and roasting marshmallows. Luna had passed out an hour ago, and after she passed out, Cormac took Ellis upstairs and put her to bed. Jo wished she could join them and fall asleep as well. The peaceful night lulled her to sleep, but her Braxton Hicks contractions kept her awake.

“Okay, maybe one of us should go and check on them. It’s getting pretty late,” Link said as he walked around the yard with Scout as he tried to get the toddler to sleep.

“I doubt any of them are going to come out anytime soon. Most likely, they're still holed up in there with their drinks,” Cormac said, glancing up at the window as well.

“We could fake an emergency? That would get them out,” Winston offered with a shrug.

“Yeah, we could say that Jo is in labor?” Cormac asked, raising his eyebrows over at her.

“Your Braxton Hicks were pretty strong earlier. How are you doing now?” Link asked, looking back at her in concern.

“I’m fine!” Jo insisted a little too loudly as Luna let out a sigh, but thankfully, remained asleep. Jo rubbed her hand up and down Luna’s back before she whispered. “They’re not so bad, but let’s not lie and say I’m in labor. I don’t want Alex to freak out again. A week ago, I had a few close Braxton Hicks contractions, and he was sure I was in labor. So he freaked out, running around and talking about all the baby stuff we didn't have yet.”

“Oh yes, I remember it was quite funny to watch,” Cormac said with a laugh, and the rest of the guys had a chuckle as well.

“Yeah, funny for you to watch. Not so funny for me to have to put up with. He was anxious for the rest of the night,” Jo said as she huffed and their chuckling tapered off.

“I’m sure I'll be calm when the time comes. We’ve got everything planned out, so I feel good about it,” Winston said, with a nod, looking sure about it.

Jo, Cormac, and Link all laughed before they exchanged a look. Jo glanced over to the older kids that were playing on the swing set. She didn't want to freak out any of the kids, but they were far enough away that it could work if they didn't play it up too much. So as Link came over to take Luna from her, Jo closed her eyes as she tended up and pretended to have a fake contraction.

“Are you sure you're okay, Jo? That one looked a bit strong,” Cormac said after she pretended it passed and although he seemed a little too happy to be genuinely concerned.

“It was,” Jo said as she decided to pull out the fake tears, which was actually easier for her to do now that she was so hormonal and was something she absolutely did not abuse in any way. “Guys, I think it might be wise for one of you to go get Alex. I think I might actually be in labor.”

“Oh my god,” Link said as he and Cormac rushed over to her, played along. Although when she looked up at Link, he was biting his lip to keep from smiling.

“Oh my god!” Winston said, jumping up from his seat and dropping his beer that spilled on the grass as he rushed over to her as well.

“Alright, Karev, take it easy,” Cormac said as he came over and helped her stand up, letting her lean into him as she pretended to have another contraction.

“Okay, okay, nobody panic,” Winston said, holding up his hands, clearly panicking. “Okay, okay, we need towels, and hot water, and your hospital bag, and Dr. DeLuca, and the hospital!”

Winston ran around the fire once before he started to head towards the house before coming back and then running back again. He ran around like a madman and Jo wasn't sure how long they should let this go. She didn't want to panic Alex or the kids, but it was so funny to watch. Cormac and Link could barely contain themselves, and Jo let out a cry of pain as she faked another one, biting her lip to contain her giggles. However just as Winston ran to go into the house, Link burst out laughing. He laughed so hard that he had to bend over and put down Luna to hold his sides. They all dropped the act and Jo stood up straighter and started laughing along.

Winston paused still in his panic before catching on and glaring at them as he walked back over. “Okay real funny, guys.”

“Dude, the look on your face,” Link said as he imitated Winston’s look before adopting a high-pitched voice. “Oh my god! Get hot water! Get some disinfectant! Get some Iodine!”

“You were worse than Alex was,” Jo said, she had to lean into Cormac because the two of them were all howling with laughter.

“I've seen a lot of panicked fathers in my time and it's never not hilarious,” Cormac said as he laughed so hard, he snorted.

“What's so funny?” Bailey asked, coming over to them as they just continued giggling like school children.

Winston set them with a glare as he sat back down and pouted in his chair. He swiped a new beer before picking up his old one and setting the empty bottle on the side table. Their laughter tapered off and Cormac helped Jo sit back down in the lounge chair as Link handed her Luna, who had thankfully slept through the whole thing.

“I don't be so hard on yourself,” Link said as he reached out to put a hand on Winston’s shoulder. “It's better to get it out of your system now than to be freaked out when Maggie really does go into labor.”

“Link’s right. When Maggie does go into labor, you need to take a deep breath and not panic because if you panic, she is going to panic, and that's the last thing both of you need,” Jo said with a smile as she shook her head.

“Parenting is the most terrifying thing you could ever do, but if you come at it with a level head, you'll do all right,” Cormac said with a nod as he glanced over at his two boys.

“If you guys want a thank you for this little stunt, you’ll be waiting a long time,” Winston said with a shake of his head, but he smiled as they all laughed again.

The screen door slammed and startled all of them as they looked back to see Meredith, Amelia, Alex, and Maggie come out of the house.

“Hi, Mom,” Zola said, running over to her and giving her a big hug. “I hope you're feeling better.”

“I am Zo Zo, and I see you’re doing good too,” Meredith said as she swung her arm over Zola’s shoulders as they walked over.

“We made S’mores and I saved one for you,” Zola said, holding one up for her.

“That's great, thank you,” Meredith said as she hugged her daughter before wobbling a little as Cormac caught her around her waist.

“Oh, the baby and I want a S'more,” Maggie said, her eyes going wide. Winston had got up to hug her and let her take his seat. “Do you think it goes well with cheese?”

Everyone chuckled as Amelia went over to Link, and he passed Scout over to her before wrapping his arms around her waist as they silently greeted each other with a kiss.

Finally, Alex came up to her, falling to his knees in the grass next to her as he leaned in and pressed his nose into her neck, getting tangled up in her hair. “Umm, your hair smells nice.”

Jo smiled as she turned to look at him. His eyes were glazed over and he had this big dopey smile. He leaned in to give her a sloppy wet kiss and she just giggled when he pulled back. She didn't mind that he was completely drunk because of how adorable and happy he looked.

“Come here,” Jo said as she gently scooted forward so as not to jostle Luna.

Alex climbed in behind her as he wrapped his arms around her, placing both of them on her belly as their baby rewarded their dad with a few kicks, and Alex giggled. “There's a fish in your belly.”

“It's not a fish. It’s a baby,” Jo said with a laugh. “Remember, you put them in me.”

“I did?” Alex said as she turned her head back to look at his wide eyed expression. “I love babies, and our baby is going to be so cute, just like Luna. She's so cute, Jo. Sometimes I just look at her, and my heart melts like, like ice cream. She’s like ice cream.”

“Yeah, she is,” Jo said as he ran his fingers through Luna’s short blonde hair. They settled in and she leaned her head back against his chest as he rested his chin on her shoulder.

“How are you doing?” Jo caught Hayes asking Meredith as they stood by the fire while Zola made her another S'more.

Meredith gave a noncommittal response, but Amelia spoke up from where she was sitting with Link and holding Scout.

“We talked shit, and they drank, and we danced, so we're doing a lot better,” Amelia said, giving Link a smile as she leaned in to kiss him again. “Thanks for looking after the kids and stuff.”

“Yeah, thank you,” Meredith added, looking around at all of them as she patted Hayes’s cheek.

“No problem,” Jo said with a shrug. “We kind of had our own little dance party too.”

“Did you have fun,” Alex asked, his voice hot in her ear.

“Yeah, we did,” Jo said, looking around and catching Winston, Link, and Hayes’ eyes. “We had a lot of fun.”

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lovewillthaw-j · 4 years ago

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Elsa powers appreciation (part 1 of 3) - Creating things from ice/snow

Happy 7th Anniversary, Frozen (1)!

I’ve wanted to do this post for a long time. This post is entirely original, I have not read posts like this or browsed the Frozen wiki (I am assuming there’s an entry there on Elsa’s powers)

I’ve written down every single occurrence of Elsa’s powers in the 2 movies and 2 shorts and analyzed that long list in order to create this post. I won’t bore you with that list unless you want to see it.

I believe that we can categorize Elsa’s powers into 3 main groups: 1. Creating things from ice/snow; 2. Freezing (and the opposite, melting) and 3. Movement/kinetic energy (and the opposite, not moving in situations where movement is expected) I will post 3 separate posts so as to keep each post to a readable length.

Creating things from ice/snow

- with 2 exceptions, the first being light (as in, glowing, bright light). The second is her dresses which start as ice, but become cloth permanently. Let’s get started!

1. Small objects

From L to R: small snowball, ice bowtie for Olaf, ice table, snow teddy bear

2. Small but very intricate objects

The first 3 are cake toppers from Frozen Fever for Anna’s birthday. Notably, Elsa makes each of them in milliseconds, she is that fast! Note the beautiful detail. I have always wanted to own a figurine of #2. In the rightmost pic, is the ice sextant that she made for the little girl. Some in the fandom believe that this is a fully functional sextant with moving parts, signifying that our Queen has mechanical knowledge of the workings and tiny parts of a nautical sextant! I believe so!

3. HUGE structures

1st row: the beautiful ice staircase that she makes. She was testing out her powers for the first time to make something so big and beautiful, and the staircase starts as snow and as she steps on it, re-forms into beautiful chiseled ice. Amazingly she does this as she is running, her powers are just so fast! Next to the stairs are 2 images of the ice castle, which needs no explanation - it is HUGE, has multiple stories, inner chandeliers and fountains, stairs, doors etc

2nd row: the ice “ramp” she makes to try to run over the crashing waves of the Dark Sea. Next to it: the humongous ice wall she (and Nokk) made to stop the tsunami tidal wave from destroying the castle. This could arguably be larger than the ice castle? Again, the speed with which she creates the “ramp” and the wall is breathtaking. She also demonstrates that she can dissolve and remove what she has created when she does that to the ice wall.

4. Light

Elsa’s magic is always accompanied by bright light, but sometimes her icy creations stay lit up. On the leftmost, is the icy trail she left as the royal family galloped to the Trolls. This trail led to Kristoff finding the trolls! Fate.

Secondly, we have the trail “markings” that she made to guide everybody back home after finding Olaf in OFA. In OFA we also have the giant ice Christmas tree, which glows from its own core. This tree also sends a burst of light into the surrounding trees and they glow with tiny crystals of light, which some have said is a foreshadowing of Frozen 2′s ice crystals.

In the last screencap, we have the scene in the forest where the girls discover and acknowledge their Northuldran roots. (Director Chris Buck said that the glowing light comes from Elsa in the ITU documentary - I used to think it was Gale but if Buck said it, it’s canon)

5. Living creations

One of Elsa’s most amazing, if not THE most amazing of her powers, is her ability to create sentient life! Think about it! Arendelle has no need for an army since she can make an army of Marshmallows! On a more thought provoking note, since she brought Olaf back to life because “water has memory”, can she create facsimiles of humans based on the same principle? Can she make copies of herself to do menial tasks?

a. Olaf

I have no screencaps for Olaf, because, who needs them? Haha. What can Olaf do? Let’s see - he has a personality, a sense of humour, intelligence, a soul, musical ability, the ability to separate and control his parts independently and re-form his parts together, his wooden arms can move (how does THAT work?) and he has a “digestive” system of sorts! Olaf can also make his ice glow slightly (he does this in his recap of F1 when acting out the part about Anna freezing to death) and he can breathe out an icy breath (in the same scene).

b. Marshmallow

As an entity independent from Elsa, I’m amazed that Marshmallow can control his own form, in a “Hulk”-like way. When he is angered or threatened, he is able to grow 1) spikes from his knees (compare 1st and 2nd screencaps) and 2) sharp teeth and spikes from his back! The last screencap shows that he can retract the teeth and spikes at will too!

I didn’t have a screencap for it, but he can also roar a powerful icy breath (which he does at Kristoff and Anna)

c. Snowgies

The snowgies are amazingly able to work as a team. Look on the left - they have formed a “dome” and a number of them have “shot” themselves outwards like fireworks. And before this, they had been teaming up to oppose Kristoff and try to steal the cake. On the right, they are amazingly able to SPELL. Think about it! Even Olaf can’t spell at this point and these snowgies are like 5 seconds old!

6. Dress transformations

If we break it down, during Let It Go, Elsa is able to transform existing cloth (her coronation gown) into a different color and fabric entirely. Next, she forms a cape out of ice - but as I alluded to earlier, the icy cape turns into cloth. This is pretty mind boggling. We’re still not done with the cape - she makes snowflakes fly onto the cape and become incorporated into the cape.

In Frozen Fever - Elsa transforms her blue gown into a green gown. She then does something PRETTY amazing - she takes Stargazer lilies from the vase and incorporates them into her cape! She has just turned an organic flower into fabric! (Some have wondered if she could do this to her enemies!! Turn them into “paintings”!!)

For Anna’s dress - she changes the color of the sunflowers on Anna’s skirt and bolero from a dull yellow to a bright golden. She also causes 1 sunflower from the vase to fly and attach itself to Anna’s donut hair. (Elsa herself has affixed 1 lily to the right side of her hair) Note also that she is exhibiting her “kinetic” powers (telekinesis) here by making the flowers fly.

I’m not counting the Ahtohallan dress transformation here as I think that one is purely Ahtohallan magic.

7. Extracting memories from water

This power was introduced in Frozen 2 and some believe it is the 5th spirit’s power. From left to right: memories from Gale’s tornado that move and emit sound; stationary ice statues, also extracted from Gale’s tornado; the horrifying image of the parents at the point of their death - extracted from water in the ship and lastly, an enormous number of memories from Ahtohallan, which move and talk.

8. Special mention - the horse “bridle” and “reins” she uses to tame the Nokk

I have separated this from the rest because I find it amazing. Prior to this, she has never made something out of ice that is so flexible and strong. The bridle magically affixes itself to the Nokk despite his thrashing about; the reins are flexible and yet strong enough to bear her whole weight. (Arguably - she is also using some of her kinetic powers here to move her body - wait for post #3)

I like to think that she’s almost like Peter Parker AKA Spider-man! She can shoot out flexible, sticky “string” and can swing from it!

#elsa #frozen #frozen 2 #disney frozen #olaf #anna #nokk #disneyfeverdaily #frozensnetwork #frozensource #frozen fever #olaf's frozen adventure #disney #let it go #ahtohallan

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aot-snk-4238 · 3 years ago

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My thoughts on AOT No Requiem (Fanmade Ending) Part 1:

With another chapter of this story coming out soon, I thought now would be a good time to share my thoughts on the first part. Before I do that, though, I have a few things that I would like to get off my chest.

A part of me hates that this project exists. Not because I find it disrespectful, but because it serves as a bitter reminder of what a complete mess this ending caused among many fans. I'm still in disbelief how things got so bad so quickly. First, you've got the people who hated it. People began turning on Isayama and calling him a terrible or incompetent writer, regretting ever getting into the series, insisting that it was worse than Game of Thrones, the list goes on and on. People who liked the ending are now endlessly referred to as "ending defenders" or more crude names like "Isayama cockriders," as though they're a bunch of incompetent fools who don't know the first thing about reading comprehension all because they just happened to like it. And then of course you've got the other extreme end of the spectrum where the ones who were disappointed are accused of not understanding the story or they're only upset because their favorite ship or fan theory didn't become canon. This, too, is very demeaning and invalidating for those who grew up with this series that they gave their heart to and cherished for so long, only to have it do what they felt was a complete 180 at the very last second that undid every part of the story they thought was special and unique. It's one of the hardest slaps to the face you can get as a reader and long-time fan, and while I can't fully relate to everyone's feelings, I can at least understand and acknowledge that it's there and it shouldn't be laughed at. Now with all of that out of the way, here are my thoughts and analysis of this fanmade ending and how it differs from Isayama's.

To start things off, I found that part 1 started off similar to how 137 did in the canon manga, with Armin and Zeke conversing in PATHS. The biggest difference would be kid Eren being transported there and seeing his older self. To be fair though, this chapter was only about half the length of what we're used to reading, so I'm sure we'll get a lot more in part 2 onwards.

While Zeke is enlightening Armin on the history of the earth and how the life form that attached itself to Ymir sought to avoid death forever, young Eren is in PATHS too with his older self, witnessing the moment Ymir found the tree and fell in it to become the first titan. At first, there is no dialogue exchanged between them. They just hold hands and watch. Meanwhile, Zeke is still talking to Armin about Ymir and how she continued to serve her oppressive master despite acquiring godlike powers that would allow her to obliterate him whenever she pleased. This is where the team working on this project attempt to provide their own alternate possibilities as to why this happened in a way that would make more sense than what we were given in the canon story in which she simply had a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome and couldn't let him go no matter how much he made her suffer.

So what are these new possibilities? They come in the form of a question, so their validity is not made absolutely certain, but they're presented as the most likely candidates nonetheless.

According to Zeke, she was unable to separate her own desires from King Fritz and was a lost girl who sought meaning. A place to belong. Tragically, King Fritz was the only connection she had in her life, so she clung to it with everything she had despite it being toxic and abusive. I could argue that these are the very reasons why she supposedly loved the king in the official manga, as explained by Eren in 139, but they weren't explained or touched on as plainly as they were here. I feel like they could have been if Isayama had just been given more time, but sadly the whole thing was rushed and underdeveloped.

Moving on, Zeke states that despite his efforts in trying to understand Ymir and her feelings, it was Eren who ultimately was able to get to her and offer her the choice of freedom. The next page transitions to young Eren standing in the clouds with his arms spread out and a smile on his face just like in the official 137, only this time 19yo Eren is next to him. Now I'm going to be honest here, this is where things started to get a little corny for me. Yeah. I know a lot of people hate that argument, but that's just how it felt to me. And before I say anything else, I want everybody to know that I am in no way about to mock anyone's fondness of this Eren over the one we saw in 139, even if it was a little over-the-top. It's perfectly fine to prefer one over the other, I'm just going to try to explain myself the best I can without coming across as harsh or unprofessional.

Eren is drawn in these panels to be a stone-faced, determined and unstoppable force who will "keep moving forward until his enemies are destroyed." This is the Eren that many people grew most familiar with throughout the series, despite his occasional breakdowns, but something about the way it was executed just felt a little too overdramatic and exaggerated. For me, the contrast between this Eren and the Eren we were presented with in 139 is too jarring. It came across to me as the fandom's idealized version of Eren, the "chad" Eren if you will, rather than Isayama's portrayal of Eren who is cold and determined, but has also been experiencing stunted mental growth ever since the day he saw his mother get eaten; side note: I know that Eren himself was responsible for his mother's death, but that's a discussion for a later time. Not only that, but the "keep moving forward" line starts to get overused at this point. We already heard Eren say this a number of times before 137 where this first fanmade chapter takes place, so I didn't find it necessary to include that at the end, but it seemed to be the writers' way of trying to reinforce Eren's ultimate goal.

Regarding the rest of the chapter, young Eren asks older Eren what Ymir is still waiting for after he showed her that she's not alone. 19yo Eren proceeds to explain that while he was able to make her feel something again, she still needs somebody to free her. He shows his younger self all of the visions from PATHS that he's seen so far, ranging from past events to alternate realities to things that couldn't be changed no matter what. Now there is only one path left that he strives toward. The one that he believes will grant him and his people freedom. This next line is the one that stood out to me the most throughout this fanmade chapter. Still talking to kid Eren, adult Eren says, "When you wake up, you will forget what you learned, but not what you felt here. This will all feel just like a long dream." Only when he kisses Historia's hand will it all come back to him. This line more clearly explains why Eren woke up crying in chapter 1, but couldn't remember why. Then he circles back to how he intends to carry out his own plan to end the cycle of hatred once and for all. Despite his efforts along the way, he couldn't change the flow of PATHS and save the friends he lost or prevent certain events from happening altogether, so he had to accept that sacrifices had to be made. In this case, he will have to literally sacrifice the world, much to Armin's horror.

To wrap this up, I'm going to finish comparing this to the canon 137, but since the first part of this project only covers the PATHS portion of it, that's where I'll stop as well. To save a little but of time, I'm just gonna be lazy and copy the first part of a quick overview of the chapter I found as part of the wiki:

So clearly, canon 137 starts off focusing a lot more on Armin and Zeke's differing philosophies and does not provide any further insight into Eren's ultimate motives like this one does, at least not yet. Armin and Eren are bound to face off soon in this fanmade version, but it looks to me like this time the writers are planning on flipping the outcome and having Eren come out victorious instead, especially when I remember the name of this project and what it's based on. I guess that means that in a way, I already know what's ultimately going to happen throughout the rest of this project. Whether it's going to be considered superior to the actual ending is going to depend on if its executed properly. I could very well be wrong about some of this, though. I want to give it a fair shot since these people have clearly put a lot of hard work and passion into this, so I will refrain from further judgement until we get the full picture. On a side note, I just want to say that the artwork is beautiful so far and I commend every artist responsible for their efforts. I also liked the song choice at the beginning and thought it set the mood pretty well.

Thank you to everyone who read the whole thing. This took me far longer to write than it should have because I'm not always good at expressing myself in a way that does not come across as confusing or contradictory. I will continue to share my thoughts as more content is released, which by the looks of it could be any day now.

#snk #aot no requiem #snk fanfiction #snk manga #snk 137 #armin arlert #zeke jaeger #eren jaeger #ymir fritz

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butterfly--empress · 3 years ago

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So About BnHA…

Man! I don’t participate much on here but it sure has been an interesting popcorn eating time, lurking through the good, the bad, and the annoying posts in the spoiler chapter tags. For this week’s chapter, especially!

Not gonna rant (I save those for close friends on discord)

I do notice that lines within this crazy ass fandom have been drawn, tears have been shed and righteous fury has been felt. And no matter wtf Mister Horikoshi has in stored for chapter 320, it’s going to be a make or break chapter for a lot of folks. I did try my best to keep this post Bakugou neutral grounds. I don’t think I’ve bashed nor favored the character just fyi.

But the most inconspicuous opinions can be taken too serious these days…

The Silly:

For chapter 320 onwards, I am and have ALWAYS BEEN 100% Team: The Legend, The Myth, The Champ, Izuku ‘Feral!Rabbit-Cryptid!’ Midoriya! Win or Lose, I ride or die with Midoriya, hands down! ON GOD!

While everybody yelling into the tumblr void over whose gonna win or lose.

I’m sitting here thinking about two things: A) Has no one thought that maybe some of Class 1-A might side with Deku? *coughsUraraka/Iida/Todorokicoughs* *coughsmaybeevenMineta/Asui/Yaoyorozu???coughs* *coughs maybe even a surprise Shinsou/class1-b reveal even though class 1-b don’t know deku that well* B) Did everyone forget in all the excitement that uhh my boi has yet to unlock the 2nd OFA user’s quirk???

I mean, I’m not saying if it does come down to a bawl of drama and angst, that Izuku’s gonna win.

But I am saying, if it does come down to a bawl of drama and angst, that Izuku’s gonna win…I regret nothing with this bet! If my boi loses we just gonna take that L but…ya know…*shrugs*…Baby, beat their Bakugou’s collective asses.

The Serious:

Personally, I honest to god really love this shounen series with all my heart. It is the anime that reignited my love for shounen after my fatigued of constant disappointment with two old shounen favorites.

Now, having said all that: I truly have not had a serious issue with the writing choices made by Horikoshi. Yes, I have my…gripes…(it’s complicated) but considering what I got compared to the stuff I’ve watched/read in the past, it’s definitely better to me. Having read/watched a lot of anime/manga and shounen, (I haven’t watched them ALL, srsly after my great disappointment and real life I sort of had an anime dry spell if you must know. Watched some stuff here and there when I could/in the mood but not as frequent as I’ve done like yrs ago), I’ve come to learn to just…begrudgingly accept/expect certain; I suppose you can say, writing choices or ‘tropes’ that I can just easily ignore them, roll my eyes when I see them, and still enjoy whatever I’m invested in at the time.

The only real frustrations I have is with a certain character. Yes, I mean Bakugou. I have come to tolerate him, I have come to begrudgingly like him, especially after a second rewatch of the series, I could see and accept that in a very typical shounen way, Bakugou did change, though very little, and it’s subtle and undeniably frustrating how it’s happening but it’s there. However, I do question Horikoshi’s writing choices when it comes to him at times. I see the character development, I know it’s there but….*sighs*

Now I’m one of these people who do believe that the creator of this universe, actually knows wtf he’s doing with his own story (even if rabid/hormonal younger fans loudly disagree but YMMV). One thing I’ve noticed, for the most part, he doesn’t just write/draw things for the hell of it, even if a certain plot or a certain character’s development takes a snail’s pace to get to the point. The conclusion of building up to arcs do have a pay off. (And I 100% understand that for some people, moving at a snail’s pace just don’t cut it. Everything cannot please everybody all of the time and that is FINE!)

Katsuki Bakugou…I know the crumbs and very subtle ways he’s changed have to lead somewhere and to something huge. When Bakugou admits to All Might he bullied Midoriya when they were kids, I had an ‘ah ha!’ Moment. The fact that a very prideful guy like Bakugou was finally starting to admit just that much, (even though, we the audience knows it runs way deeper than he’s admitting here) even in his frustrating roundabout way I like to think this is progress, is very in-character and cannot just be for the hell of it. It has to be leading up to something else other than Bakugou jumping in to take that hit for Deku during the war arc. There is unresolved tension still between Bakugou and Midoriya that is not going to just go away because they will it to.

Which brings us to Chapters 318 and especially 319. It’s the perfect set up for all the dirty skeletons to come out of the closet that both Bakugou and Midoriya have been avoiding/trying to pretend doesn’t exists between them, because it’s been a long time coming. The honest to god truth? This is actually how I always thought this confrontation will go, with a showdown that forces Midoriya into a corner where all those repressed negative feelings he’s bottled up inside is bound to come out; Because I Honestly think Izuku would take what Bakugou’s done to him to his grave if he had it, his way. (Boy can be very frustratingly stubborn when he wants to be).

It’s just, after saying all this, I don’t hold my breath that Horikoshi will take it there…The opportunity is there, I want it to go there, it NEEDS to go there! In order for both characters to come out for the better. But will Mister Horikoshi ‘DO THE THING?’

Remains to be seen. A little bit of me is hopeful, another part of me is resigning myself to feeling dissatisfied with what little we got for Bakugou’s character development and by proxy, Izuku’s getting stuck in limbo. I’m not kidding, Bakugou being a very contentious character within this fandom doesn’t just come from nowhere. But this post isn’t about me ranting into the void about Bakugou. (I don’t even think I can muster up the rage I felt the first time watching MHA blindly to rant to high hell about the bullshit Bakugou’s done now.)

I suppose I will just have to internally scream for 1,000 yrs over half baked character development if Horikoshi doesn’t do the FUCKING THING in giving a satisfying pay off to Katsuki and Midoriya’s history. I’ll just frustratingly chalk it up to old freaking shounen logic and just continue to enjoy the series because I’ve been here for Izuku Midoriya since ep 1 and I am not about to let Bakugou or Horikoshi’s unwillingness to do something with him derail that. And there’s always hoping that someone is writing some really good Bakugou gets actual Consequences fanfic out there because ooh boy…I like Bakugou but mofo can catch these hands…and I’m not even a fighter, but Bakugou…this lil shit does make you want to choke the hell out of him at times.

I haven’t been this emotionally frustrated over an anime character since…maybe fucking Louise from Zero no Tsukaima and it takes a LOT to make me actually dislike characters, good or bad.

All in All: Regardless of how the story goes from here on out, we are all about to lose our collective shits. No matter how you feel about which characters…

It’s about to go down!

#anti Bakugou #anti bakugo #bnha recent chapters #tried to stay neutral #but the side that loathes Bakugou #started to peek through #opps that #just my humble 2 cents #either take it or leave it #I don’t have the energy to argue with ‘children’#over my own shared thoughts #compared to what I can do #this mild…rant is tame #gawd i miss internet 1.0 #where i could intentionally avoid the parts of fandom #that i did not want to interact with ever #and rabid fans were a thing you heard of but never if you were lucky actually had to deal with

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iliumheightnights · 4 years ago

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We Have A Jedi [12] | Peter Parker x Male!Reader

Fandom: Marvel and Star Wars

Pairing: Tony Stark x Son!Reader, Peter Parker x Male!Reader

Summary: (M/N) is officially back on earth, so is Sheyo. With the two stranded and the war still raging on, what comes next?

Read from the beginning

…

(M/N) opened his eyes and was confused why he didn’t hear the hum of ship engines. Sitting up he realized he wasn’t in his quarters on the ship, he was in his room on earth. He could tell by how the sun was starting to raise over the city that he had woken up pretty early. Perhaps he was still adjusted to waking up for the next campaign. He stood up and walked over to the closet, inside he found some clothes that could fit him. Once he was dressed he wandered out to the living room.

The quietness of the area told him that no one was up yet. Moving to the kitchen he looked around. Last time he was on earth he was taught a couple of things for cooking. He got to work making something for everybody to eat as they got up. He had got some of the food done by the time someone entered the kitchen. “Do I smell food?” (M/N) smiled and turned to face his intruder. “Hey Steve. I’m making breakfast, grab a plate. most of it is done.” Steve smirked and did so before sitting at the table. “I gotta say, I half expected to wake up and realize last night was a dream. But you’re here...actually here.” He looked at his plate and back to (M/N). “Where have you been kid?”

(M/N) finished his cooking and set everything aside. “I didn’t want to leave. I wanted more time here, with you guys...with dad. But there’s still a war going on and mom wanted to make sure that we realized that.” (M/N) shrugged his shoulders. “I guess she was right though. Once we got back into the fight I realized there were still so many people that needed our help. I couldn’t just stay here or come back...even if I tried at first.” (M/N) had a far away look in his eyes and Steve noticed, the younger book shook his head quickly though. “Anyways that’s the past. I’m here now...I just hope for longer.” Steve nodded his head. “Well I’m glad to have you back, I know everyone else...especially your dad is too.”

Grabbing a plate for himself, (M/N) joined Steve at the table. “So...anything interesting happen when I was gone?” Steve smirked at him. “You’ve missed a lot. Turns out there were lots of hidden Hydra agents in Shield and that was an ordeal. Also...Bucky’s alive.” (M/N) raised a brow at that. Steve had told him of his time in the war, and his best friend Bucky...but that he died. Apparently that wasn’t the case. “How?” Steve sat his fork down, no longer interested in the food. “Hydra.” (M/N) nodded and gave him a small smile. “I’m sorry Steve. We’ll get him back.” Steve genuinely smiled and with that his appetite seemed to return. “Anyways, what have YOU been doing Mr.I’ve lead armies in war?” (M/N) blushed and looked away as Steve made fun of what he last said to them. “Shut up. I’ve just been doing what I’ve always done...fighting in a seemingly endless battle. But I HAVE been learning different art and stuff from different planets.” Steve seemed to be really interested with that. “Art like drawing and painting?” The boy nodded at him. “Yeah, plus pottery, music, theater. All of that. There’s a lot out there.”

Steve was about to say something when we were joined by some others. “(M/N)!” He didn’t have a chance to say anything before Clint pulled him into a tight hug. “Welcome back kiddo. Oh hey breakfast.” Clint let him go and went to get a plate. Natasha took the chance to rub his head and mess up his head. “Welcome back kid.” She also grabbed a plate and the two of them sat down. Just like Steve had asked before, he told them about what he had been up to. It wasn’t long before Tony and Bruce arrived, his dad sitting next to him. (M/N) noticed how his dad was grinning, almost like he thought it might have been a dream. They had told him that Thor had returned to Asgard for a bit but that he should be back soonish. The group were all enjoying their breakfast and talking when (M/N) heard the sound of a crutch. “Oh hey, there’s a group of people now.” (M/N) turned and smiled at Sheyo who looked a lot better than she had the night before. The avengers were looking at her with mixed emotions, who was she and why was she here...also why was she green.

Quickly standing from his seat (M/N) pulled out his chair offering it to Sheyo who gratefully took it. “How did you sleep? You feeling better?” Sheyo smiled at him. “Very much so. I think I should be fine soon hopefully. Now, are you going to introduce me to everyone?” (M/N) nodded and looked around. “Sheyo these are the Avengers. Steve, Clint, Natasha, you already met Bruce, and...my father. Tony Stark.” Sheyo grinned as she looked from me to Tony, soon she lifted her hand out to him. “Nice to meet you Mr.Stark.” It was obvious that everyone was still confused so (M/N) helped explain everything with Sheyo filling in any gaps. It was very similar to how (M/N) was questioned after the battle of New York.

The conversations were dying down and breakfast was coming to an end. (M/N) was enjoying the time he was spending with his family again, this time with his best friend. As everyone broke from the table Sheyo leaned over to him. “(M/N) a word?” He gave her a nod and excused himself from the rest. He took Sheyo to his room and closed the door. “What’s up?” She sat down on his bed and looked around before looking back at him. “So my leg’s out of commission for at least a couple days, but what are we going to do after that? We can’t stay here forever, you know that.”

(M/N) nodded. “I know. I would stay forever if I could but we can’t. The war is still going on and we have to get back. The first problem we’ll have is to find a way off planet. We’ll need a ship with a hyperdrive to get us back. Plus, we have another problem.” (M/N) took out the two infinity stones he has. “We have these to worry about. We can’t keep them together, it makes them a bigger target. We have to separate them.” Sheyo nodded. “So what’s the plan?” (M/N) laid the stones on his desk. “When Thor get’s here I’ll give him the space stone. Let him take it back to Asgard, it should be safe here. The mind stone, I’ll give to my dad. He and the avengers are the best the earth has. They’ll keep it safe.” He looked to Sheyo who only smiled at him. “Sounds like a good plan. Alright. Guess we get to take a little vacation for a bit.” (M/N) put away the stones into a hidden place and grabbed his sabers. “Come on. You may not be able to train, but I want you to at least give me pointers.” She let out a groan then grabbed her crutch and began following him to the training area.

The tower had changed a lot since the last time he came and the training room was no exception. It was now an ACTUAL training room and not just a boxing ring. “Sir. Your father designed a training program for each of the avengers, including you.” Jarvis spoke up. That made (M/N) surprised. He didn’t think his father would have taken his combat teaching into consideration. “Really?” Jarvis’ voice spoke again. “Yes sir. He studied the videos of you fighting during the battle of new york and based the training for you on them.” He smiled at that, his father really did take care in making sure he was included. “Thanks J. Can you start the training?” Sheyo moved to the side and Jarvis began the training exercise. “Starting simulation.”

The simulation room started to hum and the lights dimmed. A holographic image of a Chituari appeared and it began firing at (M/N). He quickly ignited his lightsabers and began deflecting the bolts back on to the oncoming waves. As the waves of holo enemies came towards him, he switched from defense to attack. He slashed through the oncoming waves, as he was doing it he realized that he had improved during his time gone. Perhaps he’d have to talk to his dad about other fighting stances and techniques to help improve the simulation.

While (M/N) was in the simulation, the door to the viewing room opened and Tony, Steve and Clint walked in. “Heard little Stark war doing the simulation, wanted to see his moves.” Clint said. Sheyo smirked at them and nodded to the simulation. “This is easy for him compared to other things.” They all watched as he did a flip with a landing slash on an enemy. “He’s improved a lot since last time.” Steve noted. “That’s my boy. Takes after his father.” Steve laughed. “I’d say he takes after his mother.” Sheyo raised her brow. She was going to find out who his mother was. Tony scoffed and turned back to watching his son.

Steve turned to Sheyo. “So Sheyo. Since you’re a jedi do you do what he does?” He nodded towards (M/N) and she smiles and nods. “You mean being part of a galactic war? Yep. My master’s Dia. His is Janai. I’m sure you know that bit though. Like we said earlier, we were on a mission when we ended up here.” Sheyo looked at Tony, studying him. “You know. He looks like you a lot. We, Jedi, aren’t supposed to know our parents or form attachments. I don’t believe in that. I think it’s a stupid rule...but you should know there’s still a war going on. If he stays here...they’ll come after him. The Jedi. It won’t be pretty. He might have to leave but that doesn’t mean he wants to. I can see he loves you a lot.” Tony smiled sadly at her and nodded. “I know. When he first left I was angry at everyone, myself, his mom, but never at him. I knew he still had a job to do. When it’s time for him to leave again, I just hope he says goodbye this time.”

The simulation ended and (M/N) exited the room. “Oh, hey guys. Were you all watching me practice?” They all nodded. He turned to Sheyo. “Just like the temple training room.” She laughed at that. Clint lightly punched his shoulder. “Well kid. You definitely put on a show.” (M/N) smirked at looked at Tony. “What can I say I take after my dad.” Tony laughed and pointed at Steve. “I told you! Now…” He wrapped his arm around (M/N)’s shoulder. “Let’s figure out what we’re doing today.”

A/N: I realized I haven’t shown you what Sheyo looks like so here she is!

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