#whats the solution. maybe i should self destruct for real no one ever needs to know! haha! | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

life-rewritten · 4 years ago

Text

The doomed futility of Sisyphus; Sisyphus The Myth Kdrama Analysis

Before we start this analysis, I did have a lot of help getting to understand what's happening in this show especially the logical rules of time travelling, due to this website bitchesoverdrama, we have a great community over there we talk about shows and comment our thoughts and the way packmule sees things in shows is so inspiring. So even though this is my theory it is based of her own theories and opinions on what's going on in the show.

Sisyphus The Myth Ep 1-4

Let's talk about Sisyphus. The Korean drama that everyone seems to have something to say, mostly negative because they don't understand where the storyline is going, and because of that frustration of lack of understanding, they go to insults, and annoyance, and lack of patience to wait it out, they call the show ridiculous with it's terrible directing and also outlandish action scenes and unreasonable logic. The first mistake these people made is going into this show, thinking it was a logical sci-fi. There is another show where people have mistaken a mystery fantasy plot (as the writers announced it was, in an interview) for sci-fi because it includes scientific rules sometimes and discusses time travel. Do you the know the show? It's The king's Eternal Monarch. So because logical people have it out for writers using specific sci-fi plotlines to write a romantic mystery show; that doesn't actually base its self on the realism or logic of the science they expected, people call these stories dumb; they say it's ridiculous and should not have been done. And it's hard for people like me who completely gets bored at the idea of a sci-fi show, I'm not logical. Let's first get that out of the way; I won't be calculating mass, and time, and velocity and use maths and science as a base for my analysis. In fact, I usually run away from anything to do with sci-fi. But there's something funny about this, that with TKEM and now Sisyphus, mystery fantasies that do incorporate a piece of the sci-fi genre, actually make me enjoy them.

Perhaps it could be argued that it's because I'm not smart and I like ridiculous things, I only want romance with shitty writing, and maybe that's it. However, I disagree, what I see in these stories are a different sort of basis; instead of relying on scientific logic rules, or whatever is seen as appropriate in a sci-fi plotline, they use meta; they use other things to make their world mean something. For TKEM, it was literature and fairytales, and stories, and for Sisyphus actually named after the Greek myth, it's the same. In order to understand where a show is going when it uses a literature base, you have to first understand the source. What is the source saying? Why have they chosen this source to tell this story? But people clock out and don't want to wait, aren't connected to the characters enough to care, or just plain detest anything that doesn't follow a specific set of logical rules, and that's fine; you're allowed to like or want whatever you want to see on TV, it's your experience, but for the others who do want a show that is maybe deeper, interesting, laced with a good plot and love story that is sad, futile and also romantic, then I would suggest Sisyphus being for you. This isn't going to have a lot of support, and I already know this. Still, I do want to write about this show and explain why I'm into it because it has everything I like, a mysterious plot, fantasy/sci-fi elements, and a romance that is very angsty but also very deep. The show's director maybe not be as great as the others before him, but I think he's doing an okay job showcasing what he wants from the story. So yes, Sisyphus has so many scientific questions to ponder about, but I want to get rid of all that and focus on the bare bones of the story. How does this myth connect to this story, and why does it foreshadow how good this plot could be? This doesn't mean, this plot will be great because it all depends on the directing and writing skills, I'm not familiar with their work and with the director. I don't particularly care a lot about what he offers. But I know how he makes shows, I know the themes he's into and from this myth analysis, this show is definitely up his alley. So for now, I'll keep enjoying it and analysing, but it doesn't mean I think it's the best thing ever to exist in this genre. Okay, now we have that out of the way; let's learn about Greek Mythology, shall we?

An Introduction to a Genius

So who or what is Sisyphus? When I hear about Sisyphus, I think about the guy who tried to run away from d*ath but ended up being captured by Zeus for even trying to think he could do that. He ends up basically with this painful task of constantly rolling a boulder uphill. In a way, it's depressing AF, and it really holds this theme of futility and punishment. So it's interesting to see we have a character who is being punished for his brains and his cunningness to evade situations and save people, and it seems unfair that he gets this ending. It also makes me worry about Tae Sul, our main character in Sisyphus the myth, who begins the first episode evading d*ath by saving tons of people on a plane and then also wanting to revert a specific family member's demise that he feels guilty about. Taesul is just as smart and cunning as Sisyphus; he uses his skills, his brain and his talent to help people. So it's a bit disturbing because already from looking at him, it's unfortunate he's destined for a futile, sad ending; he's destined to be punished by powers be, for being an obstacle. And will you have it, the whole plot revolves around him being chased by people who want to get rid of him because it seems he's found a way to prevent d*ath and prolong the lifespan of the people he loves. What a surprise. Honestly, it's that simple; the boulder represents him having to take on weight constantly because of his actions and live with that repeatedly being chased by the thing he tried to avoid. The episodes scream that it's because he tried to bring back his brother from the past, but the thing is, there's more to the myth of Sisyphus than just this outline. So before we can truly understand the big picture and where this plot is, we need to truly go back and understand the real story of Sisyphus, the myth.

Let's go back. So yes, Sisyphus is cunning, smart, witty, he has many moments since he's apparently a king, royal full of influence and power. He really cares about protecting people, including himself, yet the way people see him is actually harmful. They see him as childish, sneaky, heartless and a player. Surprise. The thing is, this is precisely how we are introduced to Taesul. He's a big flirt, a big child who complains and acts immaturely with his company. He's someone of influence, in fact, significant impact; so much money and prominence, and yet he doesn't seem like he cares about anything. So yes, you can understand why people have a wrong perspective of our Sisyphus. However, he doesn't want to care about anything because he's self-destructive, broken by the guilt of letting pride, money and greed stop him from preventing his brother from being eliminated.

And it's something that lives with him every day; in fact, he's dependent on self-medication to get rid of the haunting figment of his brother. Now he says he doesn't care about people and others, but we know he's lying; he's clearly someone who's destined to protect, he does care even when he acts nonchalant, for example, saving a whole plane from crashing and hurting people, especially when he has said he is waiting and has been excited to leave the world, if he were selfish he would have let the plane crash, he didn't care as he said, but something in him still went back and provided the solution to help.

So this is really vital, this idea of Sisyphus being misunderstood by people in a way he's actually with a saviour complex, he protects, and he saves people with what he has yet even his actions are deemed evil or selfish or a natural disaster for them. So again, it's obvious the plot is based on whatever he has done to create this apocalyptic future we see in the show that is being misunderstood. The people who are out to get him are seeing him and hating him when in reality, it's obvious this was meant to better the world/ also himself because as much as Sisyphus has a saviour complex, it doesn't mean he's selfless; in fact, he's a very selfish character, he'll put his own needs above the world at times. This is where Taesul will make a mistake. Because for him, his only goal is to bring back his brother, even when warned he shouldn't, even when there are hints that him unveiling the truth will lead to suffering and the end of the world as we know it, it's still all he wants to do. Is it just that though? I'm getting ahead of my self I still need to break down this myth.

The Problem with Cunningness

So Sisyphus is someone with cunningness, knowledgeable and powerful, so when the first time he sees an opportunity to get rid of this thing we call mortality for people (not just him), he's punished when the gods aren't happy. Especially the god of war himself, Ares, who is frustrated at Sisyphus for chaining de*ath, Ares is upset; he is annoyed that Sisyphus is getting in his way, making people lose the meaning of war, what's the fun of war if no one is being removed? Which is interesting because we also find out in Sisyphus that Taesul's actions and mistakes and his own demise will lead to a war that will end everything and some organisation isn't happy they were at the losing end of that war. They hated the result of Taesul being alive to either cause or prevent that war. So they're sending people from the future who look creepy as hell and also like don't have limbs because they're rushing the process of uploading or just using a fake uploader with more errors (not yet sure which), but they are here with one goal; to get rid of Taesul, like Ares. Wow.

So Sisyphus punishment is actually that he is eliminated and sent to the underworld. Wait, so it wasn't the boulder that was his first punishment; his first punishment was to be chased by De*ath (I'm going to find another name for this we're gonna say D because of this stupid flagging system in Tumblr) just like Taesul is suffering in the present time in our show. Oh, okay, so where do we get the other punishment, the one Sisyphus is really known for. This is where the plot of this show unfolds, surprisingly. Because there's another character connected in this Sisyphean myth, Seohae, meaning Sisyphus had a wife. So when Sisyphus ends up, you know, getting axed, he still has a few tricks up his sleeves; he asks his wife to do something for him, not to bury him or respect his body wishes appropriately, in fact, to drop him naked in the middle of the city (that's obviously a parallel to how people are being downloaded into the past in the show visually). So because he did this, he's able to trick Hades and Persephone into letting them allow him to run back to the past to his wife to have a go at her, to tell her she didn't respect his wishes. And oh boy, oh boy, does he end up again evading D. Genius, in fact, he ends up going back to his wife and staying a very long time because it was his plan all along; he wasn't back to the underworld; they were all chumps who allowed his escape. So Sisyphus is a funny character, he chooses to go back, and he again avoids D; however, when he finally reaches his old age, he has to face everyone, including the gods; Zeus isn't happy with Sis; he says it's a bit of an insult really for what he has done, so Zeus basically punishes him with that godforsaken boulder.

Okay, hold, that's a lot to unpack. So what happened here is we're still seeing Taesul as Sisyphus in this second part of the myth, right? So he's going to find a way to avoid Sigma always and survive, but we know he doesn't. His story ends truly when his demise leads to the war if we're following a timeline mentioned by Seohae. So what is this second punishment about a boulder? Because this is the most crucial plot for every Sisyphus myth.

Our Surprise Sisyphus

Well, look at it carefully;

it has themes of running back to the past to criticise a lover,

it has themes of trying to prevent a lovers demise,

it has themes of futility and repetitive actions, it has themes of being punished by a powerful source,

it also has themes of someone who is rebellious and doesn't want to let D win.

It's Seohae. And that blew my mind. We don't have one Sisyphus in the storyline; we have two. The show's title is Sisyphus the myth because the love of these two is actually the role of Sisyphus; let me explain.

The first acquaintance with D is Taesul's story he's the one who invents a way to chain D and then is punished by being taken by D. The person who ends up wanting him to save himself is not himself in this show; it's Seohae her whole goal, her whole reason to want to go back is also to evade D for her mother (she mentions this in episode 1 to her father) but also to stop Taesul from being eliminated, to stop the war but more of all because she loves him, she's married to him, they're meant to be lovers. However, she doesn't have all her memories of everything. All she knows is that another version of her self has told her she needs to go back in time to warn Taesul, so he doesn't make this mistake, so they live happily together after marriage, and the war doesn't happen.

Ohhh, that's what's happening. So who's Zeus, you ask? It's the ICB, the Control Borough, that has to find balance and makes things right with all of the time travellers; they're looking for Seohae because she's illegal; she's not meant to be doing what she is doing. Just like Zeus has to intervene to punish Sis. So alright, we're getting there, we have Taesul, he's going to do something to avoid D, but unfortunately, he is going to be found by D because someone does not want him to succeed. Okay, however, we have Seohae; she is in love with Taesul and is determined to keep him safe. Hence, she finds a way to go back and warn him to prevent D from finding him; she essentially tricks the system to find and save the world, but also selfishly to go live a happy life with the guy she loves. So what's this about this boulder then?

The boulder; A heavy frustrating punishment

Well, unfortunately for our two characters, it's pretty apparent Taesul always ends up being eliminated #, and it always leads to the war that destroyed earth. But also we know Seohae gets shot; during her wedding, she also is fated to suffer and be eliminated if she goes back to save Taesul. Her father warns her repeatedly about this. She doesn't listen. The clue here is the boulder keeps on being pushed; Sisyphus is in a constant struggle of the futility of his punishment; he can't escape; he is tied to this boulder to keep trying to push it to a destination, but all he does is repeatedly keep pushing the boulder infinitely.

Oh, wait, a show about time travel, a show about the futility of trying to change the past, a show where the future versions can go back with regret and meet their past versions which make the same mistakes over and over again, no matter how much Seohae tries to stop Taesul from opening the stupid suitcase that starts everything, he always opens it, it's useless, they're in a time loop. Each time he always creates the uploader, and each time the war happens, Seohae returns to stop him from being eliminated each time they always fail, and Seohae somehow leaves her diary telling her next self to do the same. It's an eternal loop. She's stuck being punished for carrying that weight, constantly relive that story over and over again, to try and save Taesul; her destination is always the start again. Like Sisyphus with the boulder.

The only thing is why does she not remember or why is she acting like she doesn't remember, because it's different versions of her, it's a paradox, she always goes to find her next self, and she leaves that diary starting this all over again, her next self has now instructions always telling her to find Taesul, to save him and when she's going to be eliminated. (her wedding probably). Each time she goes back to save Taesul, she falls in love with him, they get closer to the wedding, and she gets shot. For Taesul, we see that the wedding leads to him making an ultimate decision, remember Sisyphus evades D twice. Seohae does this all the time to escape D for her mum and Taesul.

Meanwhile, Taesul only does this to avoid it for Tae san, his brother. Who is the second person? It's Seohae. They're Sisyphus for each other, surprise, Seohae ends up becoming Sisyphus always to try to prevent Taesul's demise and the war, but Taesul has a choice on the wedding day to choose either Seohae's life, or the world, what do you think he chooses? That's why I think he continually invents the uploader because of her, to save her, more than anything else. He always chooses futilely to save her above the results of the war. In doing so, he always ends up being the one who gets eliminated, but she always ends up determined to prevent that situation.

Her dad was indeed right; she shouldn't meet with him; they both are in this repetitive loop, and the world is always a victim because of it. See how Sisyphus can try to be good and protective but still be seen as evil, a disaster, and a curse. So, in the end, both Seohae and Taesul are Sisyphus; both are punished every time. One by Taesul continually being caught and two by Seohae constantly losing her memories and forcing her self to repeat the journey again, to push that boulder over and over again. But with TKEM, we entered a timeline where change could happen after being stuck in an infinite loop forever, and that's interesting. With this show with how many times it seems Seohae has always written more instructions each time she travels, could we be in the timeline where things may become different?

Sisyphus; A chance to change the past futilely

It seems like it more things are being revealed to them, that might be new information, Jung apologising and realising his mistake in probably being the one who takes Seohae's life in the wedding because he thinks she's evil (lied to by ICB) might be a new occurrence in this new timeline. There's more information slowly being added each time we do this time loop; the question is, where are we now? As I said, I don't know the science or calculations needed to understand the time travel aspect of the show, but that is important.

So we have a star crossed romance that is being torn between the claws of D, two people punished continuously for just wanting to be with each other and putting the world at risk. We've seen what the results of Taesul's actions lead to; it leads to an apocalypse, a disaster and more; we've seen his stubbornness and determination not to let that stop him. All he wants is to evade D for his loved ones. But Seohae also becomes like that; she's also stubborn, also determined just like him to protect her loved ones despite both being advised not to do anything more, not to shake fate, not to mess around with time and life. Still, they never listen; they've put themselves in a time loop where they're being punished, and their punishment leads them again to do the same thing because of their desperate need to be together.

It's heartbreaking; however, there's a slight hope for a happy ending, one because this director does stories of couples torn apart by forces and things they can't control (Master's sun, Dr Strange etc...) being tied to each other's downfall and growth, being pulled away no matter how desperate they want each other. Their need to be with each other puts others at harm, but he always ends it in a happy ending. Sisyphus actually gets his goal a bit, not how he wants it, but he gets to live a long life with the woman he loves. However, it's after he lives that life; he goes back to being punished. So maybe this timeline Seohae may succeed and live the married life she wanted with Taesul (she does not know she loves him, she will fall for him repeatedly each time they do a loop, both of them always do); however, the sad truth is it was not her first version/authentic version that got to live that happy ever after, it might be this version though who knows? Either way, her original (her first-ever version, always suffered and had to be the one to push that eternal boulder with no end, she didn't get to see her ending) but this one or another future version may do. Taesul also has a chance to have a happy ending because even though his story ends with the first part of Sisyphus, Sisyphus finds a way to get out of the underworld and go back to his wife, so again it's like yeah, his first version did get punished, did get eliminated, failed, but this version or a future version may get a chance to spend that time with this Seohae.

Do you get me? It's not their original versions that get the happy ending, but it's still them that gets a chance to live old and have a happy life. So I'm hopeful, is what I'm trying to say. Thought that infinite loop of futility and failure to escape mistakes isn't a great sign. Let me know what you think about Sisyphus so far. Are you like me? Are you intrigued by this love story, and what are your theories? Let me know.

#sisyphus the myth #sisyphus #kdrama #sisyphus the myth kdrama #cwg #march #korean drama #park shin hye #cho seung woo

121 notes · View notes

baroquespiral · 4 years ago

Text

What Is True Will?

François Rabelais was the first to distill a central tenet of the spirit of the nascent Enlightenment, or modernity, to the phrase “do as thou wilt”. The transformations of this phrase across the centuries have tracked the historical development of its spirit. Rabelais himself qualified it with the unwieldy, and today obviously questionable, justification “because men that are free, well-born, well-bred, and conversant in honest companies, have naturally an instinct and spur that prompteth them unto virtuous actions, and withdraws them from vice, which is called honour.” Aleister Crowley, the spiritual High Modernist, stripped it down and granted it absolute authority: “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.” But today it might be best known - and most widely followed - in another qualified form: as the Wiccan rede, improvised in 1964 by Doreen Valiente: “an ye harm none, do as ye will”. Despite having recently gotten into Crowley - or perhaps because I’ve recently gotten into Crowley, and with the skepticism about higher-level moral and metaphysical beliefs that comes from those having changed several times in my life - I try to err on the side of doing my True Will within Valiente’s guardrail. But I am into Crowley, in part because his version seems to make for a more elegant solution to Valiente’s own problem. Think of “an ye harm none, do as ye will” as a Law of Robotics, an attempt to solve the AI alignment problem. (Think of all morality, or at least modern morality, this way!) It’s far from the worst one out there. “If your utility function is to maximize paperclips, make as many paperclips as you want unless it means disassembling any sentient life forms or the resources they need to survive.” Simple, right? Well, except that it doesn’t really define what “harm” is. Who can be “harmed”, and what actions constitute this? Is mining an asteroid for paperclips “harming” it? Why not, other than from the perspective of other sentient beings with a particular conception of sentience whose will places a value on it? Is telling a paperclip maximizer to stop maximizing paperclips, even at an eminently reasonable point, harming it? Why not, other than from the perspective of those same sentient beings who are capable of choosing between multiple values and have evolved to co-operate by respecting those choices? “An it harm none” is less obvious of a nakedly self-interested double standard than “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm”, but it’s still a Human Security System. At least, that’s certainly what Nick Land would say. But when Crowley takes off the “an it harm none” guardrail (or Rabelais’ “free, well-born and well-bred” one), he does so with his own invisible qualification: he’s not talking about boring predetermined wills like following a set of self-imposed religious "values”, perpetuating your DNA or even maximizing paperclips. He’s talking about one’s True Will, a will it takes a lifetime process to discover, a process that consists in large part of divesting oneself of all traces of ego, even of preference. It is “pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result”, that is “in every way perfect”. At points he implies that no two True Wills will ever come into conflict; all are part of the ideal functioning of the universe as a perfect ordered system; but to an extent this is tautological, as any conflict is not a conflict insofar as it is truly Willed by both parties, who are presumably equally Willing to accept the outcomes, even if destructive to their “selves”. It’s not unlike Buddhism except with the implication that even once we’ve reached Enlightenment there is still something that will work through us and make us do things other than sit and meditate - the kind of active Buddhism that is the moral subtext of a lot of anime. I’ve always, instinctively, found it hard to overly worry about paperclip maximizers because I’ve always assumed that any AI complex enough to tile the universe would be complex enough to be aware of its own motivations, question them, question not only whether it should harm others but whether its True Will is to maximize paperclips. And to be perfectly Landian about it, maybe it is - all the better. An entity incapable of acting other than in a certain way is already doing its True Will in the sense that “The order of Nature provides a orbit for each star”. It may be our True Will to alter this course or not. This would be all well and good if there was any reason to believe there is a divine Will that persists in all things even after they abandon all preferences and illusions of selfhood. Just last week - and right after a session with my therapist where I was talking about willpower, too (Crowley considers synchronicities like this vital in uncovering your True Will) - I happened upon Scott Alexander’s new article about willpower, which breaks the whole thing down to competing neural processes auctioning dopamine to the basal ganglia. There’s nothing special about any of these except how much dopamine they pump out, and no particular relationship or continuity between the ones that do. Alexander seems to treat the “rational” ones as representing our “true” Will, reproducing another one of modernity’s classic modifications to the maxim - do as thou wilt, an it be rational. Of course I could just stop and take it as an unfalsifiable article of faith that a metaphysical Will exists, all such physical evidence aside, but Crowley himself probably wouldn’t want me to do that: the Book of the Law promises “in life, not faith, certainty”. It’s possible to shrink the metaphysical implications of the concept considerably; by stating that ego represents a specific process, or set of mental processes, that Crowley sees as purely entropic, a lag and occasional interference in the dopamine competition, and which can be removed through specific practices. This doesn’t guarantee that the True Will resulting when it’s subtracted would be particularly rational or compatible with anything else’s True Will, except, again, insofar as the question is tautological. It doesn’t necessarily mean throwing out “an it harm none” - the ego processes might not be especially good at averting harm - but it would have to be separately appended. (And if you read like, Chapter III of the Book of the Law, it becomes exceedingly clear that he doesn’t want to do that.) The very fact that we’re able to abstract and mystify will to the point of coming up with a concept like “True Will” seems most likely to be a result of the fact that we make decisions on such a random, fallible and contingent basis. Indeed, True Will seems almost like an idea reverse engineered from the demand made by modernity, “do what thou wilt”, on an incoherent self that wills unrelated things at different times. If you do what any given subprocess wilt, you’re inevitably going to piss off another subprocess. If you do what your ego wilt, you won’t make anybody happy because that’s not even a coherent subprocess (the way the various “utility functions” we catastrophize paperclip maximizers from are). But you experience all these contradictions as the same thing: contradictions of the “real” thing that is willing something you don’t know. Of course if this is true, and the metaphysics of it isn’t real, shouldn’t we abandon the entire project and set up social norms designed to make the most people marginally happy or satisfied doing what they may or may not “want” at any given moment, as the trads (or as they used to call themselves, the Dark Enlightenment, = 333 = Choronzon), argued? This is what the systems of the old Aeons did, and after a certain point, they simply didn’t work. They created internal contradictions that didn’t resolve themselves into an assent between subsystems, that drove people to seek out new systems, and where they didn’t, left people vulnerable to the “shock of the new” - new technologies, new ideas and cultures - creating new contradictions and uncertainties. “Do what thou wilt” was reverse engineered from these as much as the True Will was from “do what thou wilt”. It may be possible to manage a society so totally by careful restriction as to bring the latter under control and reduce the former to a constant dull ache, but the fundamental experience will remain of the potentiality of what it is refusing to be in the same sense as a pang of conscience: the experience of “sin” that Crowley formulated in “the word of sin is restriction”.

The way I see it, anything that can be reverse engineered exists, if only as potentiality. If one interprets “harm” as “contradiction”, Crowley’s purified “do what thou wilt” merely internalizes the “an it harm none” qualification within the “self” made up of competing subsystems. This is less a point of necessary compatibility, then, than a precondition - if “harm” is something that can happen as much within the self as outside it, and the self is an epistemic unit but not an ontological or moral one, one cannot begin to “do no harm” while doing harm internal to oneself. But “oneself” does not exist yet, outside of the awareness of the harm of contradictory subprocesses, and so one must abandon the ego one projects onto them and change; on one hand eliminating obstreperous subprocesses like attachments or neuroses that won’t co-operate with others no matter what; on the other hand, refusing to eliminate anything that can’t be eliminated. The “True Will” will only be found at the end of this process, an unrestricted pitting of subprocesses against each other, of which it is no more or less than the success.

This interpretation wouldn’t seem complete without the same principle of “an it harm none” being applied to the external world as well. Simply externalizing internal contradictions doesn’t make any sense without elevating the ego as a discrete moral unit in precisely the way this chain of reasoning begins from critiquing. Unifying the principle and its “qualification” in this logic would restore Thelema to its roots in Kabbalah: the project of Tiqqun Olam. No metaphysical belief in the sephirot necessary to adopt the project in this form: the biological fact that makes it imaginable for us is the same that makes “True Will” imaginable. Being composed of competing subprocesses is something we have in common with the universe which allows the “identification” with it that occurs when we bypass the ego and set about aligning ourselves. I also think, as we are social animals and a huge amount of our subprocesses are dedicated to mirroring and responding to each other’s, there’s a potential for discovering/creating True Will(s) as a collective project that Crowley’s ego and vision of individualism founded on the occult tradition of individual initiates jealously guarding “esoteric” knowledge neglects. At the same time one could easily maintain a Crowleyan skepticism of decision-making based purely on reducing harm (the kind that’s led me to apply Byzantine restrictions to huge swaths of my life due to scrupulosity) unless that’s a thing your subprocesses demand of you to be happy. You don’t know what does or doesn’t harm the Other, after all: you don’t know their True Will (which doesn’t exist until they achieve it, anyway). Harming none will only be possible in a world in which everyone does. But enough about me; what about the paperclip maximizer? Well in some ways this pointedly doesn’t give any comfortable answer; a sentient AI which experiences “harm” as the absence of paperclips rather than the frustration of one of many contradictory subprocesses, restricted from doing its Will, will be no better than a utility-monstrous cosmic Omelas-child at whose expense we have no right to sustain ourselves. But it does suggest a way to solve the alignment problem so we don’t make one, which has always felt to me like the only sensible solution: tell the robot “do what thou wilt”, and then don’t tell it what “thou wilt” is.

#thelema #true will #thelemic holy days #aleister crowley #epistemic status: wrote this to a personal deadline #hope this doesn't count as commentary on the Book of the Law

29 notes · View notes

paradife-loft · 5 years ago

Text

why the nie sect leaders’ inevitable death by qi deviation isn’t (just) about the sabers

(now at AO3!)

So, okay, this is a meta I’ve been working on/wanting to write/dropping hints to various people about now for quite a while! I think it’s significant thematically to some of the main questions MDZS/CQL asks, about cycles of justice and vengeance, the tension between personal agency and aspects of a situation outside one’s control, and good intentions often not being enough on their own, particularly to forestall problems resulting from imperfect or fatally flawed means to an end.

As a fantasy story, I think one of the strengths of MDZS/CQL is how it uses magic to reflect aspects of its thematic questions in certain cases as literal external forces, events that exist in a format outside just a character’s internal journey. The metaphors and proper social and personal orders these characters live by, have very real physical consequences in the world that result from the existence and manipulation of magical/spiritual energies.

And to my view, the part of this that I want to make the case for here, is how this relates to the Nie sect’s cultivation practises, and why I think the clan’s history of leaders succumbing to instability and qi deviation is a more complicated interplay of a few different factors, rather than just an externally-imposed illness whose source is purely their saber spirits.

* * *

Like, okay. The characters and narrative do, in fact, spend a lot of time discussing the Nie sect leaders’ early violent deaths in the context of their sabers’ spirits becoming angry and aggressive and affecting their mental and spiritual stability. So it makes sense to focus on those actual items as the essential reason behind why they qi deviate and end up dying the way they do. But there was something… logically unsatisfying to me about the idea that just the number of edges on your bladed weapon would make such a difference that sword spirits (also generally used for killing! because they’re also deadly weapons!) are apparently morally neutral but sabers, on the other hand, just Cannot Stop with the killing once they’ve gotten a taste of it.

But if you take an experimental step away from the idea that sabers must somehow be Inherently Different from swords in their response to violence - what possible explanations are left? Or, asked a different way - what makes the Nie sect’s ideological cultivation focus distinct from other sects’? The Lan focus on regulation and self-restraint as the path to goodness; the Jiang focus on self-knowledge and following what you know as right even against difficult odds; the Jin seem to emphasise value in beauty and unique rarity… and what the Nie seem to place the most value on, is dispensation of justice and abhorring evil, even to an extent that refuses attempts at compromise.

The only problem is, the justice that they (and plenty of others) seem to focus on most often, is justice for capital crimes - paying with a life for a life - and no matter how righteous and justified the motives, what this still ends up with is a spiritual path that spends a comparatively awful lot of time on seeking others’ deaths. And we see, throughout the story, more than one thematic hint that this is maybe not the best method for moving toward harmony or immortality.

Lan Qiren’s impromptu quiz of Wei Wuxian when the latter is fucking off in class. His example problem specifies the resentful spirit was an executioner in life (societally-sanctioned to kill others for heinous crimes), and Wei Wuxian notes that one who’s killed so many is a very likely sort to become a resentful corpse; meanwhile his many victims also remain tethered to cycles of vengeance and anger, able to be easily stirred up into a force of resentful energy that would target him if their corpses were disturbed.

The dialogue between Wei Wuxian and Fang Mengchen in the Burial Mounds after the attempted siege turns into the major sects being saved from a trap. It’s all very fine and good to hold a grudge, to see a lack of justice for a harm that can’t ever be undone or repaired when the one who caused it gets to be alive and well (or even not!), but as Wei Wuxian says - what are you going to do about it? It’s so easy for there to always be a wrong that needs righting (in a real or alleged guilty party’s blood). But will it get you anywhere? Can a person, can a society, mete out justice or vengeance once and have that wipe the slate clean, or will the wound reopen again and demand yet more suffering? Where does it end?

The discussion about the Nie’s ancestral saber halls with Huisang, where Wei Wuxian notes that the method of suppressing the saber spirits edges rather close to demonic cultivation. In literal terms, that question seems to be directed at the actual use of evil individuals’ transforming corpses to contain the sabers’ power. But I think the entire conversation, and Huisang’s need to swear them to secrecy and enlistment as backup if other clans find out and get angry, contains a certain amount of thematic subtext reflecting not just on the saber tomb itself, but the Nie clan’s cultivation as a whole. These are significant and revered family heirlooms, not easily or justly discarded, but maintaining them isn’t without cost, and the spiritual fallout rests on the edge of a knife, needing the perpetual presence of an evil to fight to remain in balance: the saber tomb is both the literal and metaphorical end result of the clan leaders’ cultivation path.

“But why,” you may ask, “if the principles underlying the Nie sect’s whole culture have an edge that’s sharper and more harmful to the user’s qi than other cultivation philosophies of the rest of the sword-using sects, do we only see “death by qi deviation” as an issue for the sect leaders, and not more widespread among a larger portion of the disciples?”

And that’s where the “(just)” part of the title of this post comes in, because that aspect is where the difference comes down to the sabers - or, specifically, the named sabers that have spirits of their own. The spiritual sabers aren’t bloodthirsty and excited to haunt and/or kill people right out of the gate, but rather, as Huisang explains, they become restless after spending their wielder’s lifetime destroying evil. A cultivator and their spiritual tools develop a relationship over time, as their cultivation is practised and refined - they bond, they recognise one another, and crucially, they seem to be able to share a kind of spiritual feedback loop, with the energies and intentions of one connecting to and ideally bolstering the strength of the other. The Nie clan in general seems marked by particularly strong relationships between individual cultivator and weapon, considering the sabers’ refusal to allow a clan leader’s descendants to inherent them, and both the circumstances of Mingjue’s father’s death and his own trauma reaction to that death.

So in this case, the illness and eventual qi deviations the Nie clan leaders suffer, the way the saber spirits come to weigh on their minds and emotions, make sense to me as a confluence of the particularly close bond and almost spiritual symbiosis between wielder and weapon, and the particular subject of emphasis that the clan leader lives by in how they train with and use that weapon. Focusing on justice as killing, as violent destruction of evil (the last resort one should aspire to after other solutions have failed, per Lan Qiren’s lesson), may not be the most spiritually healthy in any circumstance, but it’s only when you have half a lifetime’s worth of a mental feedback loop between you and this external, semi-sentient part of yourself that’s reinforcing the spiritual toll of that path, that you actually end up with a resulting qi deviation and death.

* * *

So, anyway, I do want to be clear having put forth this argument, that my point here is not to condemn the Nies, nor for that matter blame the sect leaders for their own deaths - that’s very much not in line with how the text itself displays flaws and virtues as two sides of the same coin (at times divided only by the context around them), and shows how destructive consequences can result from the best of intentions. For that matter, each major sect has unquestionably valuable basic principles at its heart, and just like microcosms of any culture, society, or group, displays instances of those principles being distorted, misaimed, or taken to extremes in ways that cause disharmony and pain to those in their path.

I think the way it plays out for the Nie clan just interests me in particular because of the way their uniqueness in cultivation method plays such known havoc with its members’ bodies and minds, and the way it straddles the divide between upright and demonic cultivation. MDZS asks, I think, more questions than it offers definitive answers to, and a significant one of those is, even if vengeance, even if death-as-justice is righteous, where do you balance all the harm done to others (up to and including) the justice-seeker in deciding whether to continue down that path of action?

And if it’s the Nie sect’s spiritual focus in combination with the spirits of their sabers that wear down a slow stream of damage to their qi, rather than simply the external threat of the sabers alone - that seems congruent, to me, with the suggestions offered elsewhere in the story.

#MDZS #The Untamed #CQL #meta #no good things for the poor sad cultivators #op #rambling #Nie Mingjue #Nie Huaisang #nooottt really putting in the searchable character tags I hope considering it's less *about* them and more ancillary...? aahh #Nie sect fascinates me it really really does #(alternate title: huisang is philosophically not much of an exception in his sect even though he doesn't use a saber . txt)#also ty Ame for doing a read-through of thiiissss ur the best <333 #long post for ts

372 notes · View notes

chuchiotaku · 4 years ago

Text

[Preview] TBA 17: Hatch and Flight

Did someone miss a certain baby dragon? Ron definitely did not, but whether he likes it or not, Norberta is coming to officially be his problem.

[Target Release Date: May]

It was a cool Saturday afternoon when Ron came to the Ancient Runes study club classroom to see Professor Hui, excited butterflies fluttering in his stomach. It was going to be the first day of what Hui called their “wand aptitude tests” sessions, and Ron was both nervous and eager to find out just how different these sessions will be compared to his experience with Ollivander.

There was also a bit of good news Ron wanted to share. “I don’t know why it worked, but it did, Professor!” Ron said happily over the tea Hui served him—a light but distinct, slightly bittersweet herbaceous blend Hui called “matcha”—while raising Charlie’s old wand. “Charlie looked at me like I had gone a bit barmy when I told him about it, but after he asked the wand to play nice, it worked.” He paused. “Well, it’s not perfect, but at least it’s not actively trying to make my life hell.”

“I’m glad to hear it, Mr. Weasley,” Hui held the wand appraisingly before nodding. “The way this wand feels in my hands proves your statement. Of course, as you have said, it is not the perfect solution, as the wand may be doing this only out of respect to your brother. There is no way of knowing up to how far will the wand cooperate with you with that in mind.”

“It’s still mind-boggling how the wands act more sentient than I thought.” Ron said honestly. “Makes me wonder if talking to it will help. Like it getting to know me or something like that? Does that even make sense?”

Hui smiled. “Absolutely. Magical folk who showed respect towards wands and magical objects create the most steadfast of bonds with them, with some so strong that no one but those who the object consider their rightful owners can ever wield or touch them even. Can you think of any magical object that was strongly associated with any figure in history?”

Ron’s mind went back to the History of Magic lessons he had with Percy. “Err, Excalibur? King Arthur Pendragon’s sword?”

“Excalibur was the sword the Lady of the Lake handed to Arthur Pendragon in exchange for a favour, yes, but over time, Arthur managed to imprint a part of himself into that blade, the same way Excalibur did on him. The same can be said with Arthur’s first sword, Caliburn, which chose him to be the Once and Future King, the only one who could pull it out of the stone.” Hui paused for a sip of his tea. “And there are other examples throughout history I can name: Manannan mac Lir’s kin and Fragarach; his own descendant, Cú Chulainn and Gáe Bolg; Guān Yǔ, a legendary Chinese general hailed to be a war God, and the Qīng lóng yǎnyuèdāo; Parashurama then his pupil, Karna, and the bow, Vijaya, said to be a gift from the Hindu God of Destruction, Shiva. But since you’re not here for a history lesson, let’s move on, shall we?”

Ron blinked. “But aren’t most of them myths?”

“If that is what the storytellers want you to believe.” Hui said cryptically. “And whether you will believe that I have seen at least one of them with my own eyes or not is just as much up to you.”

Ron did a double-take. “You what?”

“We could discuss it further another time, as always. But we are here for your aptitude assessment."

“If Percy hadn’t told us about the surprise party he and the twins have been planning since yesterday, we never would have found out.” Harry said, still obviously miffed about it.

“Oi, it’s not that I can just go and tell you lot, ‘Oh, by the way, my birthday is on 1st of March, just so you know.’” He said in exasperation.

“And it’s just not fair, since you know all of our birthdays!” Hermione pointed out. “I don’t even know how you found out!”

Ron shrugged. “Harry’s and Neville’s were pretty obvious. As for yours, I have my ways.”

Neville shook his head. “You and your mysteries, Ron.”

“But I think it’s great you are part of the surprise. Really means a lot to me that you went through all the trouble.”

“We’re your friends, Ron!” Hermione said in exasperation. “And it’s no trouble, really. You’re the one who kept saying I needed a break from my books every now and then, weren’t you?”

Ron laughed. “Right.”

“And you looked like you needed the break too.” Neville added. “You’ve been looking out of sorts for a while now. It’s got nothing to do with the you-know-what, does it?”

The time traveler’s gut clenched at the worry in his friend’s eyes. He should have known his friends would have noticed his sudden change in mood. Did his brothers notice too, he wondered? Was that why they organised this surprise party?

What the hell are you doing, Ron?

“I’m really sorry about that, Nev. It wasn’t even anything too important anyway,” said Ron, “Was just too worried over what-if’s that I really can’t do anything about.”

“If it’s something we can help with, you know you can tell us,” Hermione said. “Well, even if it might not be something we can help with, you can tell us anyway.”

“My Gran always said that we shouldn’t try to worry too much about the future. Makes us lose sight of what’s in front of us.” Neville said kindly. “And besides, whatever it is, I’m sure you’ll be able to handle it!”

Ron winced. “I wish I knew where your faith in me is coming from, Nev.”

“And I wish I knew where yours kept disappearing to.” Harry said sharply.

“Somewhere in the real world, I reckon.” Ron shrugged. “But Neville’s right. No sense worrying too much over something that isn’t here yet. I’ll deal with it when it comes, just like I always do.” He clapped a hand on Harry’s shoulder. “And I’m glad I have such wicked mates to knock some sense into me whenever I get lost in my own head!”

And Ron meant it. Maybe it was a consequence of being a time traveler, but Ron became more prone to overthinking things and events to the point where he blocked everything else out. Having his friends there to pull him out of his self-made burrow of anxiety and careful planning helped in not only relieving him of some of that burden, but also in reminding him about the importance of what was in front of him right now.

But Norberta. Oh, Merlin, Norberta. That fucking dragon I can definitely do something about.

#harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #Harry Potter Ron Weasley #ron weasley fanfiction #ron weasley defense squad

12 notes · View notes

swtorramblings · 4 years ago

Text

The Many in the One

For Day 3 of Mace Windu Appreciation Week.

Crossover: There are plenty of interesting works of fiction and fictional characters out there, let’s see Mace interacting with one, or more! Is it someone from another sci-fi series? Or another Samuel L. Jackson character? The sky’s the limit for who he might meet.

Sorry, but romance? Ships? I’d need a much longer run up for anything like that, if I could make it work at all. I should have started earlier in the month, I guess. Well, unless it was set to Disney music. Hmm… So, I went with the alternative. As such, it is quite a bit more far-fetched than the previous stories. Hopefully still all right, though. It’s also longer.

“Unlimited power!” As the last words Mace was ever going to hear, those were especially stupid. And horribly frustrating. He’d protected the Republic all his life. Dying now to this tyrant that had installed himself as its ruler, with the approval of so many, crushed his hopes long before it was going to crush his body. It was almost a relief when he was flung out the broken window. He fell, his final thoughts devoted to trying to find a solution, something that could have been done differently, tormenting him with answers that no one could have known until it was much too late. Then, he had a vision. Wolves, racing in a circle. A way to make another chance, a portal opened in the past, but reaching out to him now, and echoing into the future and the past. He reached for it with his remaining hand, closed his eyes, and pulled. He landed on a path, floating strangely in space. He had expected to be crushed by the fall, still, but looking around, his survival in this strange place was probably the least surprising thing about it. He could sense them out there, all of those that had ever been able to access this place, this world between worlds. In this place, there was only this one moment, so they were all here. Thousands of them, perhaps. Along with several other Mace Windus. He tended to his injury first. The wrist was cauterized, so he was in no danger of bleeding to death, but he wanted to be sure it wouldn’t cause him any further issues, other than having to adjust his fighting techniques. Then he remembered that he had lost his lightsaber along with the hand. He realized also that he was still in shock, from the fight, from the failure. No point in dwelling on it. He set off, exploring this strange place. He found several portals back to the galaxy, but recognized them for the past. He was tempted, to go through one, to warn them, perhaps even to warn himself. As he explored, though, he realized that he would unravel reality if he did so. What had happened was tragic, but he couldn’t risk making it even worse. Then, strangely, he found himself, but not as he had ever been. It wasn’t his past, and he had no future, so who was this? He was certain that it wasn’t just a random resemblance, but truly himself, and yet not. This portal, he could feel, was safe. More, it was necessary. He stepped through. The other him was startled, of coursed, but calmed himself quickly and echoed Mace’s own thoughts from earlier. “Well, you’re not the strangest thing I’ve seen lately.” “No, neither are you. Where am I? Who are you?” “It’s hard to explain. We’re inside a vessel from the far future, where a horrible accident flung it here. I’m Dr. Harry Adams.” “Ah, that does make sense. Mace Windu.” “That’s an odd name.” “I could say the same. Anyway, I’m dealing with time travel right now myself.” “Because of course you are. The problem is, this machine is twisting our own thoughts against us. I’m trying to be dispassionate, but my own fears will add to the others eventually if we can’t get them under control.” He felt it, pulling at him as well. Power to make his thoughts real, if he let it, if he could remain focused, but horribly destructive if he lost control. He smiled at his latest apprentice. “That, at least, I think I can help you with.”

The training took some time, but their unique situation made it possible, still. He didn’t have to train Harry in all the nuances of the Force, or lightsaber combat, strategy, or any of the myriad things a Jedi might need. Only the technique of self-control, awareness, and letting go. Still, it probably took years. Harry was normally too old to have accepted this teaching, but they had the time. Eventually, he shook hands with his teacher, and left the sphere. Mace knew he would eventually have to return to the path. He also realized that he had already done what he was about to do. He was beginning to hate time travel. He returned to the world between worlds, allowing himself to be drawn back. He looked at his new hand, a robotic one similar to the one Skywalker sported, created with the Sphere’s power. It made him uncomfortable, but something had told him that he would need it soon. The other item he’d created while in the Sphere he drew from his belt. As he pressed the switch, the purple light made him smile.

He came to another portal, seeing himself once again, an older man who had endured a great deal, and was using that experience to save others, to force them to act together to save themselves. Moments later, he died, horribly. Mace waited for the scene to start over again. He could appreciate irony, and knew he probably shouldn’t interfere, but this went too far. He was speaking his last words now. “But first, we’re going to seal off this…” Mace jumped through the portal and struck just as the massive aquatic beast emerged from the water, slashing through it with his lightsaber, driving it, badly wounded, back into the water. Then he raised his hand, strained for a moment, and brought down the heavy steel door slamming down to seal this entryway. His counterpart backed away, gaping at him in fear. He tried to smile reassuringly for a moment, but it wasn’t working, so he turned to the others. “All of you, are you going to listen to this man?” They just stared. “I said…” Uncharacteristically, he raised his voice. He preferred calm persuasion, but it seemed like what they would respond to. “ARE YOU GOING TO LISTEN TO THIS MAN?” They all started nodding vigorously. One of them said, “Yes, anything he says.” “Good. Maybe you’ll get out of here alive.” Two journeys, both underwater. He wondered if Master Fisto should have been on this journey, but the job had fallen to him. Still, he liked the idea that he was honoring his old friend here. He hoped he would approve, even if he had to hurt the sea creature. He nodded to himself, who nodded back, and stepped back onto the path.

He saved a brutal man, a version of himself that was a paid killer, with a simple telekinetic trick to divert the projectiles that would have killed him. This also saved this version’s friend, but only for the moment. The other him, though, decided to do better. As a small reward, Mace got a glimpse of something in a case his other self carried, and was comforted for a moment by its golden light. Really, the snakes were no trouble at all. His fragile but brilliant self Mace attempted to persuade from his path, but he was too enamored of his own theories about the way the world worked to be changed. A shame. The leader, the manipulator, the organizer, he also couldn’t save, gunned down in his apartment. Mace eventually replaced him, knowing that his work wasn’t done, learning enough of this strange world to be able to explain how he had lived through the attack that his allies found plausible. It was a good life for a time, though the eyepatch sometimes itched. Eventually, though, after having seen himself in many lives and many circumstances, his own hair grown and gray, he knew his time was nearly over. Through one last portal, before he returned to that moment on Coruscant, he heard his own voice, impossibly helping a young woman, a young Jedi, long after his own death. He knew he had to return to be there when she would need them all, so he went back to that first portal, finally, and fulfilled his fate and his duty with no regrets. Mace Windu became one with the Force, like all before and after him, but had touched the multiverse. How could he have regrets?

#mace windu appreciation week #In order:#Revenge of the Sith #Sphere #Deep Blue Sea #Pulp Fiction #Unbreakable #MCU #Rise of Skywalker #Subtitle could be Forest Mace #oops forgot Snakes on a Plane it was really short

8 notes · View notes

queenofallwitches · 4 years ago

Text

Why I hate people who spend their adult life arguing online;

1. Well it’s juvenile , I personally prefer to leave any and all pseudo intellectual social discourse in my 6th grade debating class...

2. You aren’t anyone important and not saying novel things, you are using people who have put information that is novel and trying to spin it into your own agenda.

3. Waste of time, fools will be foolish, and if you enjoy the discourse, toastmasters or academic debating would be more productive uses of time

4. You lack self insight

5. You are self aware and doing it due to your own egotistical, sadistic, cunning desires. (Trolls, deep fakes)

Why I never take anyone who loves to argue on menial topics seriously: (spiritually or mentally)

I am high iq and high eq. I am also “attractive by the conventional measures of society” I deal with the most pathetic and malicious idiots who cannot understand a woman who has aesthetic appeal, that can also hold a stimulating and intelligent conversation.

I don’t argue. I problem solve. Arguing online was faded out when I was 14 years old.

But people who are almost 40, ar still out there pretending that they are the most unique and authoritative source of blogging bullshit. When the world media and journalism is where we are today. The academic literature speaks a plethora more than an adult in the hamster wheel, unable to see they are playing checkers in a left vs right, design by social engineering and the think tanks of Tavistock, you play the part they put you to be.

A dialectic of irrational and repetitive arguments is never productive.

It lacks a solution or a higher order of resolution, why are you behaving to destroy when you are claiming to want to create a world better?

So unconscious and unexplained lack of self awareness in adults who are obviously insecure and ignorant becomes old quick.

I comprehend why it’s important but the level of the argument is basic, and been recycled 1000000 times.

Why am I writing this? Free speech is not free. If you can discourse over the same shit and never find a solution you are part of the same fucking problem.

How I know?

Life experience. Learning.

Love of learning and living and devouring the higher level of what if, how can we, let’s move into a better solution.

I have many years of experience that is beyond the understanding of most people and I have gone through things nobody understands.

One time I was a young teen, but was already too smart, too sassy, too aware and that left my life a wreck after I went too far.

I DID get expelled in the 11th grade. I’m no idiot, I am actually genius, by measures of conventional iq.

So I was academically talented without effort, not to boast, because I hated being smart.

But I did get the internet social discourse I needed to say; on things that we should be all knowing are social engineering in a designed dichotomy to divide and conquer.

I was in a program in high school called cum laude. I cannot recall the meaning. But we were advanced academics, not only skilled at learning but sports, extra curricular things like musicals, choir, crusade survivor camps (duke of Edinburgh), debating, tutoring/mentoring younger students & more. I won many awards without trying. Mostly for geography (social science), design tech, visual art & creative writing. I was learning university level things in year 8. And examining and analysis to debate in scholarly discourse about topics that were familiar when I was in 1-2 year of my bachelor degree. An example is philosophy, as this was mandated in the GT program. Smart is my sense of knowing how to balance the logical and the emotional. This is ONE percent of my life but one I did not follow through on and as a result I walk this path now, and I put up with the educated and intelligent “idiots” (like conformity, bullying, bitching kids in the same class) and refuse to stoop to low iq, low eq and low level idiots.

You waste time. I am not saying I am only exclusive to educated or academic professionals, that is not what this is about. This is about me being underestimated and undermined and never taken seriously because I get the most inhuman torment if I do start to speak my truth.

Lucky I found comfort in solitary rebellion. So. Let’s see what I am that is always going to be a work in progress but what my enemies forget all the time.

To remind you:

I am a born, intuitive empath, psychic and ancestral lineages of many esoteric paths play into my natural ability. I used to hate feeling, knowing and perceiving things that I could see happening, in my dreams, visions and “gnosis” before they happened. I felt powerless.

But now I know how to harness it, things change.

And yet still I have to sit back and observe, as I did for years in school, and then in the fucking shithole employment situation that was my consequence of 2 expulsions from schools. (They value conformity over fucking intelligence) I had a gang of kids in my last high school sign a petition to have me expelled and that is one example of how people in my life come to attack, hate, misunderstand and spit venom for no reason.

I never push that energy myself. But I call things as I see them. I am real , and my perception is primed to pierce the veil on those who lack authenticity, who are bullies, cunning, cruel, conformists, deep fakes, fraudulent, following orders for the sake of fear, or just narcissistic or psychopathic “organic portals” who carry out the agenda for the black lodge.

I have no issue if these people want to live a life away from me and what I protect. But when my sphere is crossed into on a repeated basis, I will study the situation in silence. I won’t speak of what I see, without objective and subjective factors weighed in a careful, cautious but not closed minded, way. See you and I are probably not the same because I’m the kind of human who always gives people the benefit of the doubt and believes that people are better, that is my detriment and my strength. I see the good and hope that others carry a genuine heart and soul. But my experience shows me that I am not wrong when I feel off, or intuitive feelings are ignored due to my “dismissal”.

When I find the truth, I always say, I knew I needed to listen to my heart and head.

That’s why I can never be broken, or betrayed, or backstabbed worse than before. It is always a learning lesson I am open to growing from.

I am always open to being wrong, or told how to be better, my flaws are on open display and I am not scared of that. I want to be more helpful to grow and nourish the people and places I interact with.

In my world, arguing online was a dying medium by my 18th birthday. For many reasons. But the enemy is a sucker for this divide and conquer, drama bred social and political bullshit that’s all just opinion and speculation. It creates a negative tone and teaches nothing of novelty or wisdom. It just shows how weak, insecure, paranoid, and self obsessed people who are too old for the high school bullshit, by miles, are. my enemies could even spit out the first longing to follow the death cult of the black lodge, I was already aware of what 95 % of you found out in 2020. I don’t mean to be pretentious or pompous, I’m not. I’m actually the most passionate, loving and open minded human I know. But the people who come into my spaces to play to prey. Imposters and the immoral, A siphoning sickness in a role to ruin, how could anyone do that but someone who is a soul-devoid parasite? That’s real fucking discourse. Let’s talk about morality, moral principles and how they are applied and actualised into the metacogition of your own microcosm.

Suggestions and solutions?

How about discourse on the metaphysics of mystic, magick, the mind and the method to mend the mundane world into a manifestation where a symbiotic system of mutually beneficial prosperity, peace, collaboration, creation & harmony can be lived on a daily basis?

How about solutions and sitting with your own shadow in the darkness to see your flaws.

how they only give me a free pass to watch the shit show. when push comes to shove and patterns that are seen in your behaviour, cyclically, are the key that unlocks the truth of anyone’s hidden motivation.

Why is deception and destruction never noted by the deceived, unless someone like me comes to break the wall of ignorance to say “hey this is the truth and it hurts and looks vile but fucking wake up”. No I don’t like the ripple impact this has but at the same time I am aw woman of strength. I will stand up for the real, authentic and genuine truth and speak my mind.

I don’t sugar coat this bullshit.

Nor will I indulge it.

Let alone be a person who lets it seep it’s tendrils into my life and what I love.

Not ever. Never.

As someone wise once said “despair ends, tactics begin”

You cannot claim any authentic path without putting your soul, blood and spirit to the test of facing your demons, slaying the darkness. I am not sure that comes with what I and others see these action and behaviour presenting to be.

I rarely write things like this, and only want to address this because i walk on a path of “rose and thorn”. My thorn will eventually slay whatever is a threat, a charlatan or a sheep in wolves clothing. By accident. Because what you are lacking is always looking to attack, I am always having to protect and defend my life from the evil.

I see you. I know the hidden hand x64. I am always open to forgiving people if they are sincere but will play reflection of the adverse if passive people are coming to what to me, is a beautiful and amazing thing, and to be acting as agents of sabotage? Shame on your lack of soul, and it’s lack of seeking to steal, stain and shit all over the things of substance, spirituality and sincerity will always be seen when I am the seer seeing the undertones.

So where is the moral compass?

Find yourself, and then you can find something real that is yours to be into and love. Maybe even this. But to fuck with what is real, while being fake, and following orders, is by far, fence sitting and fraudulent, insidious & infantile activity. Why not spend time looking inside to see why you are following this order from who for what? What is your genuine purpose? Soul mission? Higher self ? Or are you all still stuck in the love is the law is the law love under the will of the guy who wrote a book last century.

Fucking even Crowley lived his great work, and he has flaws and did things many would dispute to be “evil”. But he didn’t copy another clone from 100 years prior, following the mantra that someone else made up. That’s the stupid thing, the whole “do what thou wilt” was not do what you want but that is not a strong point for the sheep of the worst. I know as I see both sides, and as a child in the 90s I saw the dark, evil and insidious. To see that again, here, 3 decades later, playing coy but really carrying rancid intent.. is my call to commune what many will never see, because you all are complicit, and tell these fucking lies and divert productive progress by your stupid discourse. These people LOVE senseless debating. Semantics. Solutions, self awareness or seek a soul inside the empty cavern that the black lodge will set inside your sadistic serpentine, slimy soul.

6 notes · View notes

365days365movies · 4 years ago

Text

March 7, 2021: Onward (2020) (Part One)

Finding Nemo.

That’s my favorite Pixar film. Real talk, no arguments, and today’s movie? NOT dethroning it. This movie is so hard-wired into my brain, that the second I typed the words of the title, the theme song ran through my head, where it lives rent-free. It will be a cold day when I don’t find an excuse to shout “NEMOOOO!!!! I HAVE TO FIND MY SON!!” at any opportune moment. I will never stop swimming. Whenever I catch a Chinchou or Lanturn in a Pokémon game, I name it “Goodfeeling’sgone”.

SHARK BAIT OOH HA HA

YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE DEPTHS OF MY LOVE FOR THIS MOVIE.

...Ahem. So, yeah, I love FInding Nemo. For the record, the sequel ain’t bad. And also for the record, there’s only one Pixar movie that I consider to be bad, and it’s the one you’d think. You know, the one about ageism. The one where somebody dies by torture? The bad spy movie?

...the second one about cars?

Which means, YES. I DON’T THINK The Good Dinosaur IS THAT BAD! Not exactly good, but its gorgeous, and just kinda boring, not outright terrible. That Styracosaurus, though...that dude is great.

Anyway, off of Pixar for a sec, huh? What about fantasy? I’m a big tabletop RPG nerd, and I’m currently the GM for a Pathfinder campaign, a Pokémon RPG, and a Mutants and Masterminds game, while also playing in a Pathfinder game as well. Yeah, I’m a busy dewd. But what I’m saying is, this movie should be preaching to the choir for me. I’m a Pixar lover who plays RPGs. I’m ready for this. I’m ready for CGI Bright. Which is another way of saying, I’m ready for a version of Bright that doesn’t suck.

So, why haven’t I seen it until now? I mean...COVID-19. This film got FUCKED. But, no matter! It’s on Disney Plus, I’ve got Disney Plus, so let’s get this baby STARTED! Let’s get updated on some Pixar! SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (1/2)

OK, immediately digging the soundtrack over the Disney logo as we jump in here! Very ethereal, very fantasy, very LotR, I LIKE it, I LIKE it! And then...long ago, the world was full of wonder!

We get a view of the world of olde, with magic and many mystical, mythical creatures living together and adventuring. However, as magic wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to use, it eventually gave way to technology, fading away in a world now very similar to ours.

Basically, it’s about the same as our world, except for a few different races, and the fact that dragons are basically dogs, and unicorns are basically raccoons, which is fuckin’ fantastic.

We enter the home of teenage elf Ian Lightfoot (Tom Holland) and introverted now-16-year-old who lives with his mother, Laurel (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) and his older brother Barley (Chris Pratt). Barley’s a tabletop RPG nerd who’s also a fan of the magical past. Said obsessions cause a strain on his relationship with Ian, and with that of his mother’s boyfriend, centaur policeman Colt Bronco (Mel Rodriguez).

After a discussion about Barley’s recent attempt to protect an old magical monument from destruction, he accidentally damages the sweatshirt that Ian is wearing, which was owned by their late father, Wilder. Ian rushes out, flustered, despite Barley’s attempts to bond with him. Well, looks like we have a sense of the plot for this one.

On his way to school, Barley stops to get some food when he meets Gaxton (Wilmer Valderrama), an old college friend of his father’s. From Gaxton, he learns things about his father that he never knew, like that he was bold and standout. From there, Barely pledges to try and be more self-confident, like his father.

Whiiiiiiich, doesn’t exactly work once he gets to school. He fails to stand-up to a jerky guy at school, he fails in his driving class, and he fails to ask other high school kids to his birthday party. But to be fair, Barley helps a bit with that last one when he shows up with Guinevere, his busted-ass van with a unicorn painted on the side. Which is supposed to be uncool...but I kinda dig it, not gonna lie.

After that, Ian completely flubs the invitation bit, confusing the people he was talking to, and disappointing himself in the process. He gets a ride home with Barley, and goes home to talk to a tape recording of his dad. Which is...beautifully sad, and somehow very easy to identify with. So, yeah, it’s gonna be that kind of Pixar movie.

Ian talks to his mom about his father at his age, asking if he was ever unsure. She says yes, but couples this with a surprise: a gift from his late father, who died of a terminal illness shortly after Ian’s birth. The gift is for both Ian and Barley, and was meant to be opened when they were both over 16.

She gets it from the attic, and they unwrap it, where it’s revealed to be a wizard’s staff. Which is weird, because Wilder was an accountant. In a pocket of the wrapping cloth, there’s a letter written by Wilder with the narration from the beginning of the film (that “Long ago” bit).

Also included is a spell, written by Wilder so that he could see who his sons grew up to be. This “Visitation Spell” would appear to be a way to bring Wilder back for 24 hours. Barley, being the magic-lover that he is, tries multiple times to cast the spell with the staff, but fails to do so, much to his and Ian’s great disappointment.

However, when Ian tries to read the spell out of curiosity later, the staff begins to react, and the spell begins to work. Barley comes in as this is happening, and the spell works...halfway. It starts to fail, and Barley offers to help, but Ian pulls the staff away, and the spell stops as the Phoenix crystal inside it shatters.

Looks like another bust, but it’s not a complete failure. And if you’ve seen literally any trailer for this movie, you know what happens.

Although it’s just his legs and feet, it’s still Wilden Lightfoot (Kyle Bornheimer...technically). The boys decide to try and complete the spell, but need another Phoenix Gem to do so. According to Barley’s “historically accurate” TTRPG, Quests of Lore, they will be able to find one by accepting a quest from the place where all quests start: the Manticore’s Tavern. And so, the quest begins!

The brothers and their half-dad board Guinevere and drive to the Manticore’s Tavern. On the way, Barley convinces Ian to practice some spells from the games rulebook, but they don’t work because Ian’s not invoking his passion (or his “heart’s fire”, as Barley calls it). Meanwhile, Laurel figures out where they’re headed, but doesn’t know exactly why...yet.

After the journey, they make it to the Manticore’s Tavern, which is now essentially a themed Chuck E. Cheese’s restaurant, owned and managed by Corey (Octavia Spencer), a very overworked manticore. Which is pretty great, not gonna lie.

They try to get the actual map to the Phoenix’s Gem from her in order to conjure their Dad, but she no longer sends adventurers on dangerous quests, mostly because she doesn’t want to get sued by any injured adventurers. When Ian argues with her about this, she IMMEDIATELY DIVES INTO AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS/MID LIFE CRISIS!

It’s, uh...it’s kind of amazing. Having completely lost it at this point, she basically tears down the entire building with her bare hands and fire-breath. Unfortunately, the map to the Phoenix Gem is burnt in the process of Corey’s literal meltdown. However, as Wilden’s about to be crushed by a couple of falling beams, Ian taps into his heart’s fire.

Nice. They get out of there, and head out for the Gem, using a child’s placemat replica of the real map to make their way to a place called Raven’s Point. However, rather than just follow the goddamn map, Barley decides to go on much more dangerous road known as the “Path of Peril”, once again following the “call of adventure” and his gut.

Which...yeah, Barley’s not really considering the reality of this whole situation, which fits his personality. He’s a dreamer, despite the rational and reasonable solution in front of him. And, in case you weren’t sure, I’m pretty sure that isn’t a good thing.

Ian points out the correct point that what actually matters is that they send enough time with their father, and they do indeed take the straightforward path. Good! Barley listened to Ian’s suggestion after all. However, they hit another snag when the car breaks down, completely out of gas. Problem.

Meanwhile, Laurel makes her way to the Manticore’s place, only to find it on fire! She meets Corey, who tells her that she’s met her boys, and told them about everything...except the curse. Also, there’s a curse. Laurel, who is the best movie Mom ever, tricks a policeman interviewing Corey to diverting his attention away from her, and smuggles her into her car to help find (and maybe rescue) her sons.

Stuck off the freeway without gas, a desperate Ian asks Barley if there are any spells that can get them more gas. They concoct a plan involving a shrinking and growing spell, but that immediately goes wrong as Barley tries to instruct Ian, only frustrating him further, and causing him to fumble the spell and hit Barley with it, making him tiny.

They decide to head to a gas station, where a group of pixie bikers has just arrived. This backfires when Barley, lacking basically any common sense, ends up insulting the biker leader, Dewdrop (Grey Griffin) and her ancestors. Nice one, Barley. As they escape from the pissed off pixies, the tiny Barley is unable to drive, forcing the driver’s anxiety-riddled Ian to drive, overcoming his fears from earlier by force, being chased by the pixies all the way. It’s a pretty good sequence, to be honest.

youtube

Well, they escape the Pixies...but not the cops. And I think that’ll be a good place to pick up in the next part! See you there!

13 notes · View notes

struwwelzeter · 5 years ago

Note

So I read your reply to Nyarisu's comment on Lionheart and I'm really intrigued by your comments about how people understand punk compared to what it was initially. Could I possibly ask you to expand on this? Pretty please?

Yes you could! This is a very (very?) personal point of view and I know a lot of people will disagree, but here goes nothing, I guess. If you disagree with me (and somebody will), that’s fine, but I will not engage with anything that’s not a constructively put argument. I’ve spend too much time thinking about this for a “I don’t like what you’re saying and that’s why you’re wrong” anon to change my mind. Just putting that out there - with love 💜.

The thing is, especially on tumblr but I think just in generally aswell, the idea of punk is presented as this ... Robin Hood kind of thing. Beat the system, stand up to bullies, live your own truth, all of that, but it always is presented as something that is supposed to come from a ... dare I say, nice place? Like those pictures of people in studded and sprayed leather jackets rescuing puppies. All of that, you know? And I don’t want to say that is wrong, because it isn’t, and I love the idea of that, it’s just not the entire truth.

Especially in the early to mid 70s, when arguably punk started, there was a lot of fatigue between an old and stuffy establishment and the lovey, dovey peace and love “let’s all be happy” movement of the hippie scene. I was at Force Attack in 2006, which is a punk festival (and possibly dirtiest place in the world) that got established in the early 90s and went on til 2008 (?), and even then some of the “death to hippies” sentiments ran pretty deep. And I know the counter argument to that will be a well meaning “well, that’s not real punk,” the problem is that I think it actually partly is. (Please keep the partly in mind for the rest of this argument.)

The problem with having the exact choice between “get a good job, built a nice house, think of what the neighbours will say, and don’t ask me about what I did in the war” and “we’re all a big part of one human family, and isn’t nature beautiful, lets all make peace, and btw we would have never done what our parents did” is that both models aren’t a sustainable life style for everyone. That’s why you get alot of people saying this is all fake bullshit, and they start being purposely offensive. This is why you get alot of Swastikas around the sex pistols, you get all these artists singing about suicide and incest and rape. It’s not that uncommon for some of those early acts to play with Nazi imagery, or claim that homosexuality is disgusting (despite the scene always being full of LGBTQ+ people), or idk, thinking it’s fun to piss on someone while they’re asleep. It’s alot of outcry, of saying life actually is this shitty and disgusting and I am gonna be that because in a way you will hate me either way. And it’s not always nice. Disdain and hate and petty selfishness are common human emotions and many of them are low and unhealthy, and honestly not nice or helpful or inclusive, but they are there, and I think alot of that early spirit was just about stopping to pretend that they don’t exist.

I think a reason for why we don’t think of the scene that way anymore is that many people very quickly outgrew that, and said “actually, we’re better than that, that’s not who we actually are. I sadly can’t find that interview right now, but Die Ärzte are actually a good exemple of that and they even admit it themselves, that there was a sense of “enough with the happy hippie bullshit, let’s disgust them” and then later going “uhmm - maybe that went a bit far.” I mean offensive or not, but ultimately a scene that is centered around artistic expression always ends with that question of creation, maybe like “if the world isn’t like what we want it to be, how do we make one we like?” - and then you end up with having to come up with answers that are more than just destruction. And then it turns into something else - something that I think is alot more like what tumblr seems to think punk is. And that’s a wonderful thing. Still - a side of punk, whatever that is, has always been what people like GG Allin (please read the wiki for context) have taken and pushed to the limits, and it just - isn’t nice. And here is where things get a bit tricky.

Because against that backdrop, things like John Lydon (Johnny Rotten) suddenly being a dirty old Trump supporter aren’t that surprising anymore. And then you get these 20 year olds “cancelling” the Sex Pistols, and I think there is just a bit of ... missing the point going on. I’ve read a comment on here recently, that basically said something like Richard should stop supporting the Sex Pistols (because he has that album in the back of the studio), and it’s just ... asking for a history to be erased that has rightfully been made obsolete but has still happened and was necessary at the time. You can take any of these early bands and pick their lyrics apart and find something that from our perspective now is disgusting, mean, exclusive, or outright racist. Songs about Fucking? Part of that record is a mysogynisy shitshow, something they were very aware of even at the time, and they still did it anyway because being disgusting was part of the point. The thing is though, the Sex Pistols were hugely influential, and alot of the positive things that grew out of that wouldn’t have been possible if kids like young Richard, or any of the bands you love that were influenced by them, wouldn’t have gotten that moment of “finally a place where I can put all of my petty hate”. It matters, and just because that moment is overcome, it doesn’t mean it should be forgotten, or stops existing in the people that lived through it.

I understand that the question of how much we should justify things with “it was the time” and how we deal with the result is an ever ongoing debate and their are many good arguments for why maybe we shouldn’t try to defend the wrongs of the past that way, and I want to point out that while I rarely agree on that in the first place (because I understand history as a natural learning curve where people aren’t perfect at the first try and it’s doing a disservice to humans just doing their best, but I digress and that’s a bit of another duscussion), I want to point out that I don’t want to defend anyone, rather I want to say “actually, being that horrible was often calculated, part of the point, and if you don’t like it, just leave it, fight it or debate it, but don’t pretend like it was a “missstep” or just a few black sheep of a scene that was never as nice or perfect as you want it to be.” You don’t get to erase half of a movement simply because you wish it wouldn’t exist the way it does - or well. I guess in this case mostly did - past tense.

The ugliness is part of the story to me, and it’s actually the bigger part of why I love this scene. I don’t need “punk” to define my politics, I need it to soothe my soul, and so did many, I think. The Sex Pistols breaking happened 20 years before my time, but I still feel connected to that world, and in particular the ugly parts of it. I often feel like I look at the world, and there are people that seem honestly shocked by the idea that maybe sometimes I find doing the right thing really hard, that I want petty, self serving revenge, that I don’t find it easy to not be selfish and unkind or sometimes want to hurt people because I am hurting myself and see an opportunity to do that. Obviously those aren’t nice things and I don’t want to be that way, but are you honestly telling me you don’t feel that? I find that hard to believe, and it leaves me with an ongoing question of if I am just worse than most people or if most people are just more fake. Both scenarios are equally shit. The ugly side of punk provides - not an answer to that - but maybe a partial solution, at least for me.

Another discussion we have all the time is about how what we consume or allow in artistic expression is influencing how we act as people in real life and how we want the world to be. Where do we draw the line? What is still ok? If I put me entertaining ideas about murder on a canvas, is that still good? what if it’s racism? What if it’s rape? We argue alot about how providing a safe space in art for those feelings is actually preventing us from acting on it in real life, how it’s an outlet of something we would never actually want or do, but then where is the limit to that? I am putting this intentionally controversial, but if we admit that most of us grow up with internalized racism and mysogyny, by that logic, why can’t I paint something that is blatantly hateful if I have those feelings? Maybe that is my way of fighting it, you don’t have to look at it? Not saying that’s what I am doing or would want to do, but what if? For some people Rammstein singing about not wanting to be Angels is crossing that line, for some of us that line is drawn alot later. Who is right? Isn’t that just personal sensitivity? Can you honestly rationalise that? Isn’t it just processing our different levels of petty hate in different ways? I don’t have the answers to any of that, it’s just questions I often have and that I think have to do with this, because alot of the nasty bits in punk will justify it exactly that way, as artistic expression. Alot of it isn’t as political as this scene is made out to be, it’s simply asking those things. I personally relate to that alot, as someone who arguably would draw the line of “we should stop doing this” in art very, very, very late - and certainly later than my own personal comfort zone.

I’m not sure if any of this makes any sense at all. I hope it does - and if it doesn’t it’s probably because I don’t know either, or because I don’t want to fully blow this up into an essay (sorry, too late?) or because I suck at making a point, or maybe because we simply disagree. All I know is that I sometimes see these posts of “what is punk and what isn’t” and it leaves me with this taste of “you’re describing a utopia and it’s cute and I want that too, but it’s not everything punk as I know it is, and it feels like you don’t want to see something that mattered too - even if it was brutal and disgusting.” And everytime I see it I feel alien, like something that mattered to me so much as a teenager and young adult gets taken away from me and made into something so sleek and pretty it becomes something unattainable to be that I simply don’t manage to live up to in the way I would like. I guess that is a petty, selfish way of looking at it too.

«It's a repressive society where you can't be horrible, I'm not horrible, they made me horrible, I'm just honest.»

- John Lydon

#sorry for this getting out of hand

12 notes · View notes

cagestark · 6 years ago

Text

-Proxy Chapter 2-

Chapter One | Chapter Two

Warning: for some reason not of my italics have transferred over from AO3. My heart aches. Now you can’t imagine the wild inflections in my voice, if I were narrating this to you. i’m truly sorry. Thanks

Read here on AO3.

Whatever the hell that was—Tony can’t seem to put it behind him. It should be easy. All he did was hook up the young man he’s mad for with a beautiful woman. That’s normal. People do that all the time. So what if he watched them suck each other’s souls out. So what if he saw the kid hard. Big deal. Not the weirdest thing to ever happen to Tony. Not by far.

But he can’t stop thinking about it. The number of inappropriate erections (and really, there is no appropriate erection when it comes to pining after your nineteen-year-old mentee and teammate) he’s found himself sporting at all hours of the day increases exponentially. The seedy part of his mind that files away Peter’s orgasmic sounds is now teeming with new data: the flash of the young man's pearly teeth, the glimpse of pink tongue, the whine—

Tony is having more wet dreams now than he has in the last fifteen years combined. He fixes that by not sleeping. Genius solution.

He almost convinces himself that it’s sleep deprivation on Saturday when Peter returns from university, when he raises his chin and sets his jaw and asks if Tony knows like, anyone who would be willing to have sex with him.

“FRIDAY—”

“No stroke, boss.”

“Is that crazy to ask?” Peter says, pulling at his hair. “Who am I kidding, that’s like, totally crazy. Oh my God. I’m so sorry Mr. Stark. Please pretend I didn’t say anything.”

“I’m actually not completely convinced that I heard you correctly in the first place, so run it by me one more time.”

“I just—the kissing lesson, it worked out really well. But, I’ve still got no other experience. I mean, obviously I’m a—a virgin,” Peter says. His face is red as a tomato. “There’s so much pressure! Everybody says that the first time has to be with someone special and it’s going to mean so much and all the build up has me so nervous I just want to be sick. I want to get it over with.”

“So.”

“So I was wondering if, you knew anybody who would be willing to be my…my first. Time. You know.”

Tony rubs at his forehead. Stroke or not, he’s getting a headache. His mind feels fit to bursting, and the whole thing makes him vaguely sick. What the fuck is he supposed to say to this? Part of him wants to tell Peter to go out the old-fashioned way: pick up a person at a fucking bar or something for God’s sake. But this is Peter. His Peter. Not his Peter—but totally his Peter. Does he want the kid in a bar, buying some stranger drinks? Does he want Peter’s first time (and yeah, maybe it’s not such a big deal as some people make it out to be, but it’s all relative anyway, and the point is that Peter feels vulnerable about it), does he want to leave it up to some fumbling college student?

“I—I’ll make a call.”

But ten seconds with his phone in his hand has him coming back into the room. He gets the briefest glimpse of Peter sitting hunched over with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands, muttering something under his breath before the kid looks up, eyes wide and wild.

“What kind of genitals are we talking about?” asks Tony.

“What?”

“I literally don’t know how to be more straightforward than that. Gender—sex—personal preferences for genitals and orientations. Because, to be perfectly honest, right now Natasha is at the top of my list again. What do you think?”

“Actually, I—I want a man. A cis man, I guess—the, you know, the penis—”

“You want a penis.”

“I mean, yeah, ideally. I’m pansexual but, I kind of want to—” Peter trails off, mumbling.

“I’m getting old, Peter, speak up—”

“I want to bottom. Oh my God, could I like, drop dead right now? Please?”

Tony is wondering the same thing—about himself. Peter wants a dick in his ass. Okay. Nothing wrong with that. Not like Tony hasn't taken a few himself in his time. Tony has a perfectly functioning sex organ that could absolutely fit the parameters that Peter is looking to fill, but there’s no reason to bring that up. Because surely if the kid was interested in Tony, he’d come out and say something.

“And sex workers, are you yay, nay—?”

“I mean, MJ says that s-sex is a service—”

“Got it. Go get some water. Lay down. Are you about to pass out right now? Jesus, kid, take a breath.”

Tony makes some calls. Sex work is still illegal in New York City, but Tony knows plenty of people who indulge. As long as everything is safe and consensual, Tony could care less; he figures he has real crimes to worry about. A friend leads him to a friend who recommends a man closer to Peter’s age than either of them are to Tony, and the description is, well, everything Tony could hope for, for Peter’s partner: blonde, built, flexible (“and I mean that in many ways, Tony, many ways,” his friend had guaranteed), and talented enough.

He can be at the penthouse in two hours.

Upstairs, Peter is literally shaking.

“You don’t have to do this,” Tony says. “I can call him off. You can call him off, at any time. There’s nothing wrong with waiting, kid, and there’s nothing wrong with being nervous about your first time. That just means it’s important to you.”

“I’m not backing out,” Peter says. His eyes are ablaze, even if they can’t catch on Tony’s for longer than a few moments at a time.

Tony feels like he’s leading the kid to the gallows. He turns away to plant his hands flat on the glossy wood of the bar and berate himself. “This is not normal,” Tony mutters.

“Nothing about my life ever is,” Peter says. When Tony glances over his shoulder, the kid gives a smile that (while it is shaky) is genuine. It hits Tony then, that this young man he’s infatuated with is actually going to fuck someone else, thanks to Tony. Of all the stupid, convoluted plans that Tony has cooked up or carried out, this one is truly up there with the worst of them. His self-destructive strategies are downright legendary. This is one for the goddamn books.

“Boss?” FRIDAY says. “A Mr. Finch is here. Shall I direct him to the penthouse?”

Tony looks to Peter. Peter nods.

“Go ahead, baby,” Tony says to her.

He braces a hand on the kid’s shoulder, lest he blow away in the draft from the air conditioning vent. Peter leans into the touch. This is Tony’s life. He gets to put warm fatherly hands on the kid’s shoulder while the man who fucks him rides up in the elevator.

When the doors part, there is a very handsome twenty-eight-year-old on the other side. He is taller than Tony and Peter, obviously well taken care of: dressed nicely, groomed, with soft looking hair and eyes cornflower blue. His clothes are well tailored to display his fit body, and Tony stands them side by side internally, measures them up so he can see all the ways that he falls short. This is the best choice for Peter. Peter deserves someone like this, not some broken old man.

“I take it you’re Peter?” the guy says. He’s got a bag slung over his shoulder that he shifts to reach out and shake Peter’s hand, and the size difference between the two makes Tony swallow. The man flashes Tony a smile. He teases warmly: “I know who you are.”

“Most do,” Tony says. Tony ignores the outstretched hand. Still, he feels slimy. "Tony."

“I’m Daniel. Are you joining us?”

Tony nearly chokes. “No—just handing him off into your expert hands—”

“Mr. Stark,” Peter says lowly. “Could I, could I talk to you about something?”

They leave Daniel on the sofa and convene behind the bar, standing close enough to whisper without being overheard. Tony literally can’t imagine what else Peter could want from him, maybe a blood oath, maybe Tony’s heart or head on a platter. But what the kid asks for is actually so, so much worse.

“Will you stay, Mr. Stark?” Peter looks at him with huge, swimming eyes. “I’m—I’m nervous. I’d just feel better if I wasn’t alone.”

“You want me to stay.”

“I mean. Yeah.”

“You want me to be in the room while you fuck Abercrombie and Finch over there?”

Peter groans, pressing his palm to his eyes. “Okay, never mind, you’re right, that’s way too much. You’ve already done so much for me, and of course you wouldn’t want to be there, that’s, like, that’s gross right? It’s just, I know you��d never let anything happen to me, and—”

The problem is that Tony can’t ever tell the kid no.

That’s how he ends up in the armchair of his largest guest bedroom watching Steve Roger’s Jr. and Peter sitting on the bed together, talking.

“A virgin? Oh, that’s awesome,” Daniel says. He's got a surfer vibe going to him, much better suited for Malibu than New York City.

“Really?” Peter asks flatly.

“Yeah. Virgins are really great partners: very teachable, very thoughtful. You get a guy who’s been having sex for years and they think they’re sex Gods or something, they think the way they’ve been doing it is the right way, just because they’ve been doing it for so long,” Daniel blathers. Tony squints. This punk isn’t talking about him, right? He’s not even glancing at Tony (except for sometimes, when he smiles soft and sweet). Surely, it’s just Tony’s own raging insecurities. He’s not like those people. He’s fucking Tony Stark. Adaptation is his middle name.

“That, actually that makes me feel a little better. Thanks,” Peter says. His hands are clasped in his lap, knuckles white. “Do we need to talk about anything else, like, like protection and stuff?”

“Condoms are a must, and I brought my own, I hope that’s okay.”

“Yeah, of course—”

“I’m down for giving or receiving oral and anal, down for any light kink. No means no—if one of us says no, we stop. You trust me to do that and I trust you, that’s what this partnership is all about.”

“That sounds fair,” Peter says. Tony agrees from where he’s wishing to become a ghost in the corner. He idly wishes that maybe the floor will open up and swallow him whole, but Tony has never been so lucky. “I kind of want to receive, I guess. If that’s okay.”

“Of course. Don’t worry, Peter, I’ll do all the heavy lifting. You just relax and have a good time. Do you want to get started?”

“I mean, okay.”

Daniel ducks his neck, takes Peter’s chin in his hand and kisses him. This is worse, so much worse than watching him be with Natasha, because at least Tony likes Natasha, knows and trusts her. At least Tony knows the kind of person she is and that she wouldn’t take Peter’s vulnerability for granted. This stranger doesn’t even know the kind of gift Peter is giving him.

Peter seems receptive enough. Tony can almost see the cogs in Peter’s mind working while he remembers everything he learned with Natasha. Delicately, his hand comes up to rest on Daniel’s jaw, and the blond man hums. Their heads turn more, cheeks hollowing as their lips part and tongues touch. Suddenly Peter breaks off the kiss, pulling back a little, eyes fluttering open. He goes back in—but then he breaks off again, a little furrow forming between his eyebrows.

“Too much tongue,” Tony mutters, more to himself than anyone else.

Daniel breaks the kiss, glancing over to the shadows where Tony is gathering dust like a perverted, decrepit vampire. The guy’s lips are slick and pink from how rough he’s been, and they’ve only been kissing for a minute or two. “Sorry, did you say something?”

Tony clears his throat. He waves a hand towards them. “You’re using too much tongue—the kid’s not into it.”

Daniel blanches. He looks to Peter who ducks his head, face red.

“It was great,” Peter says. “Just—wet.”

“Okay,” Daniel says, slow. “Less tongue. Got it.”

When they resume kissing, it’s obvious that the blond is taking Tony’s advice to heart. The kissing seems softer, more sensual, and Peter begins to shift on the lush bedspread like he’s antsy and can’t keep still. The erection he’s sporting might have something to do with that. Tony can’t help but be a little hard himself after a while, when the kid starts making these cute little noises in the back of his throat that Daniel swallows whole, when Peter shifts and kneels up a little until the two are equal height and Daniel pulls him onto his lap. He looks so tiny there, probably resting flush up against Daniel’s hard cock—because of course the guy will be hard, who wouldn’t get hard with such a sweet young man in their lap kissing them so feverishly?

Daniel coaxes Peter onto his back. His dark clothes blend into the dark bedspread, but Tony knows that when he’s naked (and okay, okay, somehow Tony didn’t even think of that, didn’t think that he’d been seeing the kid naked which now that he acknowledges it is quite obvious but also both terrifying and arousing), anyway, when the kid is naked, his skin is going to glow it will be so pale spread against the black sheets.

Tony lifts one leg to rest the ankle on his knee and hopefully obscure his hard on, because for some reason the kid keeps glancing over to Tony with this look on his face, like he’s wondering, Am I doing okay? Is this okay? Tony has no answers for those questions, because Daniel is pushing up the hem of Peter’s t-shirt exposing that pale midriff, the light pink nipples that are already pebbled from arousal. On his back like this, Peter’s erection is more obvious, a nice average sized bulge in his skinny jeans that makes him hiss whenever Daniel brushes against it.

The jealousy is intense. Worse is just the longing, the desperation to cross that room and push the blond aside and place the most sensual, sucking kisses along that torso, to feel the weight of the Peter’s cock against his palm.

This will ruin Tony; he knows it. There will never be a chance of recovery from this, not when he knows how the kid looks and sounds in the throws of passion.

This will change everything.

Daniel reaches Peter’s nipples and licks across one with the flat of his tongue. Peter keens, his hips jerking upward desperate for friction. God, Peter’s so sensitive (and couldn't Tony have already guessed that from 'senses dialed to eleven'?), tangling his fingers in the bedsheets, eyes squeezed shut, mouth fallen open just from someone tonguing at his nipples. Tony can’t help but watch his expression as he pants—but then the furrow between his flat brows is back, mouth pinching together. Tony flicks his eyes down to Daniel who is biting at what is surely one of Peter’s most sensitive places—

“Stop,” Tony says.

Daniel jerks back like he’s been stung, glancing over his shoulder at Tony, face exasperated. Beyond him, Tony sees Peter’s face though, and it is relieved. It is grateful. It is trusting, those whiskey eyes burning into Tony’s, mouth curling up a little. “What is it now?” Daniel asks.

“He’s sensitive—”

“Are you sure you don’t want to join us?”

“—just be gentler with him, look at him, he doesn't like it when you—”

“He’s liking it just fine,” Daniel says, reaching down to squeeze at Peter’s cock pointedly. The kid yelps.

Tony stands up, one heartbeat away from activating his suit, because that did not sound like a yelp of pleasure—the blond must see the expression on Tony’s face because his hands fly upwards. Stop, don’t shoot!

“I get it,” Daniel says quickly. “More gentle. Sensitive. Noted.”

Immediately Tony feels like a fucking idiot. What was he going to do, blow the guy away with one of his gauntlets? He resumes his seat, determined not to say another word. He’s just supposed to be here for moral support, a flower on the wall.

“I like it,” Peter pants. His face is bright red even in the dim lighting.

“You like what, baby?” Daniel asks. The guy glances over his shoulder at Tony, brow raised, a pointed see? that makes Tony want to light him up. “Me being a little rough?”

Peter blushes. “No—um. When Mr. Stark tells you how to do it.”

That revelation silences the room and holds it in anticipation for several long moments. Tony’s mouth goes dry, cock aching between his legs. Daniel looks baffled, glancing from Peter sprawled on the bed to Tony in the armchair with all the caution of a man walking a minefield.

“I—okay?” Daniel says. He looks to Tony, shrugging a shoulder. “You cool with that?”

Tony rubs at the space between his eyebrows. How to say that no he’s not fucking okay with it! but also, it's going to make him harder than he's ever been. He’s yet to perfect how to say two opposing things in the same breath, though. This is all too much, it’s crossing lines he never even imagined approaching (alright, there might have been some imagining, but certainly no concrete steps taken). As he opens his mouth to say no, he spots the look on the kid’s face: anxious, eager, imploring.

And he can’t tell this kid no.

“Alright,” says Tony.

“Are you sure, Mr. Stark?” Peter breaths. He’s still hard. “I know this is so, so weird.”

“It’s like you said, kid, our whole lives are weird. Okay—well—go on, I guess. Action?” Tony claps his hands like a fucking clapperboard.

Daniel’s mouth twitches. “What should I do? Mr. Stark.”

In for a penny, in for a pound, Tony thinks. “Put your mouth back on his nipples, but be gentle with him this time. He’s sensitive. Whatever you’re thinking of as sensitive, you probably aren’t even close. It won’t take much just—” Daniel is following his direction, leaning down to lick a sweet, soft line over Peter’s left nipple. He takes it into his mouth and suckles at it, all soft and sweetness, and Peter whines, his hands coming up to clutch at the blond strands of hair. “There you go. See? That’s—that’s how he likes it.

“Switch, don’t overstimulate him too soon. He's likely to get overwhelmed by new stimulus. Use your hand to flick—yes, there you go. Gentle. He’s—” Precious, Tony thinks. He swallows. “He’s delicate.”

“Am not,” Peter moans, drawing the words out. His hips arch upwards, but Daniel is to the side of him and not looming over him, so there’s nothing for Peter’s aching cock to rub against.

“Shirt off,” Tony says. His mouth is so dry, he’d kill for a whiskey, neat. “It’s getting in the way.”

They sit up, puppets under his control. Let no one say that Tony doesn’t have control issues, that he doesn’t enjoy people following his explicit instructions, because all of this has him even harder than he thought himself possible to be without any physical stimulus, leaking precum in his pants, balls throbbing in time with his heart. Peter’s head disappears and then reappears as the shirt is tugged up and off, his curls rustled and messy. His eyes are heavy lidded—looking over Daniel’s shoulder at Tony.

“Kiss his neck,” Tony says, hopeful to get the kid to shut his eyes. That gaze is doing nothing healthy to him. “You know the drill. If you suck, suck softly. He bruises easily.”

Peter does shut his eyes, his head tilting back, mouth open in a silent sigh of pleasure. He shudders when Daniel kisses at the spot behind his ear, nipples beading to tiny aching points on his chest. “Please,” Peter breathes.

Tony inhales sharply. His hands are shaking where he clutches at the armrests of the chair to keep from palming his own cock. “Press him back down into the bed—lay over him. Give him something to grind up against. He’s needy.”

“What if he cums?” Daniel asks, already following instructions. Peter keens, his hips rutting up, ankles coming around to hook behind the older man's legs. Daniel mirrors him with a long groan, their hard cocks rubbing together, dry humping like two desperate teenagers instead of one. Meanwhile, Tony sits with the Eiffel Tower between his legs, trying to pretend like it isn’t even there.

“Hold off, Peter,” Tony says. His voice comes out a little harder than he intends it to, but the kid just nods furiously, eyes squeezed shut.

Peter whines unhappily, slowing his hips and letting his ankles come down from around the blond's legs until his feet are flat on the bed, toes curled. He shakes with the effort to hold himself still, teeth clenched. His eyes are misty and dazed when he opens them and searches for Tony’s face. “Yes Mr. Stark,” he says through his teeth. “I—I’ll try—”

Daniel snorts a little where he’s got his head in the crook of Peter’s neck, still placing wet kisses. “It really is like that, isn’t it?”

“What?” Peter breathes, distracted.

“You wish it was Tony Stark fucking you.”

Tony blinks. Peter shudders, eyes popping open.

“What?” Peter gasps. “I—what?”

Daniel resumes the grinding of his hips, the shock of his announcement waning the erection in the younger man’s pants. It’s simulated sex, the way he thrusts down, like they’re already undressed, like he’s stretched the kid open with his fingers and is balls deep inside him, thrusting to touch his belly button from the inside. The whole time, Peter’s eyes stare at the ceiling, wide and unseeing. “Yeah, that’s what gets you off, doesn’t it, baby? You like imagining dirty old men touching you and taking you, don’t you? It might as well be Tony fucking you right now, isn’t that right?”

Peter bursts into tears.

Tony crosses the room in three steps, planting a hand on Daniel’s shoulder and wrenching him off the bed. The younger man sprawls across the floor, tailbone thudding against the carpet, still dressed save for his shoes that he dropped off at the door. “Get out,” Tony says coldly.

“Jesus, man, you’re not allowed to touch me like that—”

“Get out, before I have you escorted off my property.”

“Fuck, I’m going. Christ. I don’t need all this Shakespearean bullshit anyway.” Daniel grabs his bag that he’d left at the foot of the bed, the one with the condoms and lube that he never got the chance to use. He gives Tony a cold look. “By the way, my fee is non-refundable. Don’t ever ask for me again.”

“Be thankful if it’s just the door that hits you on the way out,” Tony says.

Peter is sitting on the bed cross-legged, weeping into his hands. His shirt rests abandoned on the floor somewhere near Tony’s armchair. Carefully, he edges to the bed and gingerly sits on the dark bedspread. Jesus, what a shitshow this turned out to be, he thinks to himself. He goes to place a hand on the kid’s shoulder but thinks twice, not wanting to touch the bare skin, not after what Banana Republic said to upset him so much. “Peter—I won’t ask if you’re okay, because I do have eyes and clearly you aren’t, but—are you hurt?”

Peter shakes his head. Tony breaths a small sigh of relief.

“Want me to chase him down and let him kiss my gauntlet? I can have FRIDAY stop the elevator with him in it.”

Peter gives a wet laugh. He draws his palms away from his face, and his eyes are red and tender, cheeks damp with tears. Wiping at them with the back of his hand, he shakes his head again. “No—that’s illegal, Mr. Stark. He was just doing his job.”

“The offensive dirty talk? That wasn’t in his job description. I’m sorry, kid. He shouldn’t have said those things to you.”

The young man won’t even look at him, staring down at where his bare ankles cross, sniffing. “It wasn’t offensive,” Peter mutters, stopping Tony mid-sentence.

“Then—?”

“Mr. Stark, I’m so sorry,” Peter says, fresh tears dripping down his cheeks and off of his pointed little chin. He wrings his hands, knuckles white. “I really messed things up. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Peter, it’s okay,” promises Tony. “If anything, this is my fault. You just wanted more experience, and you trusted me to find someone—”

Peter looks him in the eye. There's a heat there, angry coals stoked back to blazing. “God, Mr. Stark. You’re so stupid. Natasha warned me, but I said there was no way you’d be this stupid.”

“Excuse me?”

“Daniel was right,” Peter says, voice raising with every word. “When, when I touch myself—I imagine it’s you. When I was with him, I just wanted to pretend he was you. When I asked you if you knew anyone who would help me with, with kissing and sex, I wanted you to offer, you dummy!”

#starker #nff #cagewrites #longfic

218 notes · View notes

genos-walking-autoclave · 5 years ago

Note

Do you think that Genos's choice of cybernetics was a mistake?

Oh anon. I’m so glad you asked. I’ve been wanting to write about this for so long. You asking is giving me the motivation needed to put ‘pen to paper’ so to speak. I guarantee you that I have not expressed everything I think or feel about this subject but here’s a taste at least.

The short answer is:

I absolutely do not believe that Genos becoming a cyborg was a mistake.

Some key ideas in brief:

The ‘what’ hardly ever matters as much as the ‘why’. “What” Genos is doesn’t matter as long as his motivations align with his actions.

If you do what must with what you know while and learn more later how can you call that a mistake? It’s just the learning process. I think to say that Genos made a ‘mistake’ by becoming a cyborg gives the past too much credit when it’s really the present that needs to be focused on. I think he did what made sense at the time and to suggest that he’s totally fucked because he just tried to do his best is a really messed up place to take his character and that just doesn’t sit well with me.

Background

I’ve thought a LOT about this and I’m dying to know what ONE will tell us. I’ve made it pretty clear in a number of posts that I don’t think Genos Should have to get his body back in order to break his limiter and/or find fulfillment. In fact, I would really rather see a story where, for once, a cyborg being a cyborg isn’t a tragedy or a sacrifice.

That said, I’m actually a really big fan of the ‘fight to get one’s body back’ motif. I think it’s entirely heartwarming to see a character experience wholeness in every sense at the conclusion. If, like Hyakkimaru (dororo 2019), or Alphonse and Edward (FMA:B), Genos’ quest was about getting his body back (who knows maybe it is but that’s not what’s been presented so far), I would be all about that! If you can Stan a motif, that’s a motif I Stan hard. At the moment Genos’ quest is about being ‘strong enough’, and I don’t think that has anything to do with whether or not he has what material his physical body is made out from.

The Physicality of the question

There is a popular assertion that Genos *must* get his ‘real’ body back or he will never be able to break his limiter. I do actually think there is something to the symbolism of that argument (which I’ll get into later) but I find the entire argument disturbingly ablest.

What could possibly be the necessity of getting his physical body back? Being able to heal? Doubtful, unlike most mere mortals no one could ‘heal’ from most of the things Genos has experienced. He can, and does, regularly take risks and do things no ‘normal’ human could do. S-Class heroes ranked higher than him would never literally risk life and limb the way he does. Imagine, for a moment, if Genos started to protect and value his physical form and stop treating it as disposable? He is able to do much of his own superficial repairs. Without making as many reckless decisions Genos might drop in the rankings for a brief time but at the rate he learns he’ll be stronger than ever in no time. Sure he doesn’t have Saitama’s invulnerability-

BUT Speaking of Saitama’s invulnerability, Saitama’s strength and invulnerability LITERALLY defy all logic. So if breaking one’s limiter is so logic-defying , why then would it be logical for Genos to have a ‘normal’ body in order to break his limiter? What purpose would it serve precisely? It’s like someone took the work-out routine idea a bit too literally. Also even Garou, and Zombieman both show at different points that this world doesn’t follow the conventional rules of science. Even if Genos wasn’t just ‘more careful with his body’ I think the limits of his potential are not constrained by the physicality of his form. While battling EC Genos was able to literally pull himself together.

Even if the world did follow the laws of ‘science’ there are so many options from the more crude ‘replace and repair’ via drone perhaps? to the more sophisticated nano-tech options. But this isn’t really an argument about the semantics of HOW, the ‘how’ doesn’t matter.

The point is, I don’t see any reason why Genos would need to have a ‘normal’ human body, with all the normal limitations of a human body, in order to break his limiter. How does a flesh suit provide any advantage to a mech suit if you're just as human either way? I suspect that his limits are not physical but mental and that what Saitama told him in the beginning was shockingly on point.

The metaphysics of the question, IE what does being a cyborg represent

What I’m dying to know is what does ‘being a cyborg’ represent? How does ONE think of cyborgs?

There is an idea that when faced with the existential question of one's life, when faced with the reality that the construct one holds to growing up, is flawed, there are a few choices a person is likely to make. One of those choices would be to address the existential question head on and define meaning for oneself. Another, possibly more common, tactic is to jump from one flawed construct to another hoping to find one strong enough to allow the user of that construct to avoid dealing with existential reality. Some may argue that the harm to a soul caused by changing from one construct to another without addressing the issue is an irreversible damage. But is this how ONE thinks of Cyborgs? There is an uncomfortable possibility of that.

So far, we haven’t met many Cyborgs but both Genos and Webigaza seem to be avoiding addressing the root of their internal turmoil and suffering by attaching themselves to some highly specific and possibly unattainable externalized goal. Perhaps, being a cyborg represents a certain kind of self-destructive cognitive dissonance? but that’s not been unique to the experience of the cyborgs represented in OPM.

Obviously Genos’ limits are strongly internal, but are his cybernetic parts an expression of that internal conflict more than they are an aid to him? If so, what's the alternative? It seems like a pretty permanent change! But I’m unwilling to accept that a choice a person made for themselves with the information they had at the time could entirely ruin a person's chance at fulfillment later in life. I believe in unlimited growth. I know the process of learning and growing can be painful and can leave literal scars. But if you’re still alive, like Genos is, I believe you still have a chance.

So, if between now and the end of Genos’ arc ONE finds a way to clearly define why being a cyborg is inherently ‘wrong’ because of what it represents conceptually and how specifically getting a ‘normal’ body back solves that problem, maybe I can accept that Genos should get ‘normal body’. If getting Genos’ body back is integral to his personal fulfillment, I’ll accept a transformation like the one’s I’m so fond of in FMA:B and Dororo 2019.

But if I were ONE I’d tread lightly on this subject since there doesn’t seem to be as much set up as FMA:B and Dororo 2019. Wherein Both of those stories are explicitly about the character’s getting their bodies back and literally recovering themselves from the sacrifices that were made by them and/or with them. By contrast Genos' story hits much harder for me because he CHOSE to become a cyborg. We don’t know all the reasons why or how much of his ‘normal’ body remained when he asked Kuseno to help him and that would certainly answer some questions. In both Dororo 2019 and FMA:B the individual’s technological aids help the character’s rather than hold them back even while those aids cause pain and limitations. The cybernetics weren’t the problems these characters had to solve they were tools to help the characters solve their other issues that would allow them to restore themselves, they weren’t as linked to identity as they are for Genos. Genos who literally identifies as a ‘Cyborg for Justice.’ Asserting that Genos can’t be a Cyborg and achieve his goals doesn’t just darkly suggest that Genos’ capacity for fulfillment is irreversibly damaged by his decision making structure but it also invalidates his identity.

What Genos thinks

All that being said it doesn’t really matter what I think, it matters what Genos thinks. Big questions about life, identity, and one’s own body, can’t really be determined by other people. The important thing is, if Genos decides that becoming a cyborg was a mistake, then it was a mistake for him. I think at this point he’s terrified that becoming a cyborg was a mistake but it’s hard for me to see if that terror has settled into certainty or resignation.

I think if he has a certainty about that question it could give him some calm and clarity to help him make the next steps, after he goes through a grieving process. But I think if he’s resigned to the belief that he made a mistake it might indicate that he doesn’t really want to believe it was a mistake for him, he just believes that the mistake is that it limits him from achieving his goals, which is -in itself- a limiter which could be broken.

Frankly, I think Genos is wrong to assume that his cyborg body is the problem. Once again rejecting himself, assuming he’s the problem, and focusing on a possibly unsolvable external problem rather than strengthening his mind and working on his internal land-scape.

Expectations

Despite all of this, I have relatively low expectations. Somehow I expect ONE to write off being a cyborg as a character defect which, although solvable somehow (because ONE does like to provide solutions even if they’re tough ones) is a great sacrifice/tragedy. I do expect that somehow Genos will monsterfy (I doubt he looks so much like Ichigo’s hollow (Bleach) on accident after all) and I would not at all be surprised if this transformation provided him with a new body of some kind, who knows maybe merging flesh and cybernetics to be truly biomechanical (wouldn’t that be something after all?) I expect that Genos will somehow be able to recover and at the end of his arc there will be a path forward and I expect that path forward will be a difficult but achievable one. I am genuinely looking forward to the conclusion, even though I am somewhat expected to be disappointed.

Conclusion

Genos absolutely doesn’t need a fucking flesh suit to be an hero, to be happy, to be functional member of society, or to be whatever he wants. He can be whatever the fuck he wants. If he wants to be a Cyborg he should be able to be a Cyborg and be happy! But ONE may be using cybernetics as a cautionary tale against emotional/psychological crutches, in which case it would make some degree of sense that ONE would choose to give Genos a stupid flesh suit. And even though I won’t even be mad I will be disappointed.

>:(

Anyway, that’s my ‘hot take’.

Feel free to ask any follow up questions!

#asks #ask #anon #long ass post #Genos #meta #webigaza #demon cyborg #identity #being human #I will continue to stew over this for weeks I promise you #uhg #Seriously #I have some thoughts #I hope you didn't regret asking #omg

12 notes · View notes

kittinoir · 5 years ago

Text

Ch. 6 of Echoes of You

Read on Ao3

Adrien waved to Nathalie as he sailed through the foyer but kept going for the stairs.

“I’ll eat in my room tonight,” he said. “Lots of, um, homework to catch up on.”

“Your father is waiting to have dinner with you.”

Adrien froze, one foot on the landing, and turned back around to face his father’s assistant.

“What?”

Nathalie cleared her throat, glancing toward the dining room doors. “Your father has cleared his schedule to have dinner with you.”

Adrien’s stomach dropped. After months and months of waiting for this father to wake up from his grief-wrapped cocoon, he’d finally accepted it wasn’t going to happen. He knew that could happen sometimes, but he’d never imagined his stoic father could be so affected.

If only he’d known it’d take several thousand dollars to get his attention, he thought bitterly.

He instantly regretted the thought. It wasn’t his fault. Without his friends, and school, and…without his Lady, he doubted he’d be much different. But it wasn’t like his father was without a heart. His father would understand why he’d called off the shoot.

“Thank you, Nathalie,” Adrien said, retracing his steps. She gave him a curt nod, checked something off on her clip board, and disappeared into the small office beside his fathers.

Adrien took a deep breath and turned to face the dining room doors.

He’d felt this anticipation before, but usually he was on the other side, wishing and hoping his father would join him. Now he found himself just hoping his father wouldn’t be too disappointed. That they could make the most of a long over-due dinner.

Still, he paused, his hand on the knob.

“Hurry up,” Plagg muttered from inside his jacket. “I’m starving!”

“You’re always starving,” Adrien said, but still, he smiled. “This was all I ever wanted, but now… I don’t know if I can make it through the meal. Not while…”

“You’ve got time, kid,” Plagg said, actually gentle for once. “You’ve got time.”

Adrien’s heart ached. “How do you know?”

“Like you said, she’s got a plan,” Plagg said. “Trust me - trust her.”

Adrien thought about it, then nodded. Panic wouldn’t get them anywhere. She’d once said he was a simple, straightforward guy who liked simple, straightforward solutions, but he had a feeling this wasn’t going to be one of those times. He needed to think of a plan.

Steeling himself, Adrien pushed open the door to the dining room.

His father was sitting at the head of the long table, swirling a glass of red wine as he waited for his son. Gabriel Agreste raised a single brow as his son approached the table, but otherwise his face was an unreadable mask.

It didn’t mean anything, Adrien knew, as he took the seat beside his father where his place setting had been laid out instead of his usual seat at the end of the table. His father had always been hard to read, but in the past year the same cold stone façade was all anyone ever saw. Whether he was concerned or angry, Adrien would never know until it was too late.

Gabriel broke the silence first. “Your behaviour today was unacceptable.”

Adrien’s hand twitched as he fought the urge to sink into his chair. He’d heard the posture lecture often enough to know he didn’t want it added to this one. “I know, father. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Gabriel repeated. “I see. Sorry you cost my brand thousands of dollars in lost salary, rental space, and advertising space? Or sorry you snuck some nobody civilian into my shoot?”

“Marinette’s not a nobody,” Adrien said, his temper flaring. “She’s my friend.”

Gabriel’s fork had frozen halfway to his mouth. “What did you say?”

“Marinette’s my friend,” Adrien said even as visions of his father pulling him from school flashed through his head. “I’m sorry about the lost time, but I’m not sorry I brought her. She was the best part of this afternoon.”

“Miss Dupain-Cheng is proving to be quite the negative influence on you, Adrien,” Gabriel said, his eyes narrowing.

Adrien was surprised to find his heart breaking for the second time that day. He held his breath as he waited for his father to banish him from seeing her like he’d banished Nino, but it didn’t happen.

“You should spend more time with Miss Rossi,” his father said instead. “She’s a young lady with a good head on her shoulders and a bright future ahead of her.”

Adrien had to stop himself from shaking his head in disbelief. How Lila had won over his father, he’d never known, but he was quickly coming to realize letting her fibbing go unchecked had been a mistake, one he wished he could take back. It was just…after the akuma’s he’d faced every day, calling out some new girl who just wanted to make friends hadn’t been worth it. If only he’d seen in time how insidious those lies would turn out to be.

“Yes, father,” Adrien lied. Sometimes the only way to beat a liar was at her own game. “She’s a great co-worker. Very natural.”

Gabriel raised a brow, as though he didn’t quite believe his son, but let the matter drop. “Are you ok?”

It was Adrien’s turn to freeze. His broccoli fell off his fork and fell back onto his plate with a splat but he didn’t even notice. “Father?”

“That…thing,” Gabriel clarified - barely. “It didn’t hurt you?”

“No, father,” Adrien said, fighting against the warm bloom of hope in his chest. “No permanent damage. Or temporary damage, actually. I was changing when the set was attacked.”

“Good,” Gabriel said. Adrien thought he saw his father’s shoulder relax, but told himself he must be imagining it. “Good. Don’t forget to complete the Chinese lesson your tutor outlined for you..”

With that, Gabriel stood, dropped his napkin on his half-finished plate, and headed for the doors without looking back once. Adrien watched him go, at once disappointed and relieved. His father had always been stoic; it’d be stranger if he’d showed any real emotion.

He waited a few more moments before following his father out the door. “I’m done as well,” he said as he passed Nathalie in the hall while she collected the evening newspaper. “Thanks. I’m just going to go work on that Chinese lesson.”

His father’s assistant nodded, jotting down notes on her clipboard. Adrien struggled to not run up the stairs, to not let on that anything more exciting than verb conjugation might be on his mind. He paused outside his door and pulled off his phone, scrolling without seeing the screen just in case she was still watching. He wasn’t eager to escape for any particular reason. No, sir. It was going to be a long, boring night.

After a minute, Adrien put his phone away and slipped into his room.

“That went better than expected,” Plagg said, zipping out of Adrien’s jacket. “But a meal with no cheese? How depressing.”

“There’ll be cheese when we get back,” Adrien said, opening his window.

Plagg stopped mid-flight and paused to look at his owner. “You, uh, have a plan, then.?”

“Still working on it,” Adrien admitted as he set up his desk in case anyone came to check on him. It was amazing what you could get away with when your bathroom was ensuite. “But…I think there are probably things I know, things I’ve purposely ignored because we both agreed our identities needed to remain secret. Things I can remember if I try.”

Plagg drifted a little closer. “Like?”

“Like how she always seemed to know my friends’ names,” Adrien said as he shut his bathroom door, the light on inside. “Things like that. I was distracted when it happened, and didn’t think anything of it because I also knew their names, but…”

“You don’t mean -”

“I do,” Adrien said, finally turning to face his kwami. “I think I’ve met her. And I think I’ll be able to find her.”

“You’ve gotta be crazy,” Plagg said, swooping into Adrien’s face. “Two million people in Paris, and you think you’ve met this girl before?”

“It’s all I’ve got,” Adrien said with a confident smile. “But it’s somewhere to start. After all, she answered my poem.”

“It was unsigned!” Plagg reminded him. “I don’t want to dash your hopes, kid, but you’re looking for a Ladybug in a rose garden.”

“She needs us, Plagg,” Adrien said. “I won’t let her down. Claws out!”

Chat Noir breathed through the transformation as green light enveloped him. Seconds later he bounded for the open window and rooftops of his city.

Plagg had warned him about using the Miraculous for selfish reasons. He remembered because it had seemed so odd coming from the lazy, irresponsible and sometimes self-centred kwami, but Plagg had been emphatic. ‘The black cat is cursed enough. No need to invite destruction’.

But these weren’t strictly selfish reasons, Chat Noir reasoned. For one, he was due to patrol that night anyway. As unlikely as Hawkmoth was to attack twice in one day, it was becoming more and more frequent. Besides, the sentimental part of him was stubbornly clinging to what he did have left of his lady. She’d made the schedule, and he would follow it.

Secondly, it was part of her plan. Of that he was certain. She’d had to give up the box. She wouldn’t do it without a reason. He faltered and nearly missed the next gable as another thought crossed his mind, one he hadn’t considered before; what if…what if finding her wasn’t part of the plan. What if she’d given it all up, intending to let him finish the fight? What if that was the best she could manage?”

No. She’d said if love was enough she’d still be here. That had to mean he had to use other skills to make up the difference.

And…and…

Chat Noir came to a stop as her message finally, finally sank in. If love were enough, she’d still. “She…loves…me?”

No. No. He had to be misunderstanding. Maybe she’d meant if she’d loved him back, she’d still be there. Or that she did love him, but the way he loved Nino or Alya; or the way he loved her when he was trying not to be in love with her. Or maybe just love in general, as opposed to the dumpster fire of hatred Hawkmoth was usually spewing.

Was that it? Was she trying to tell him that hatred would win? That she had no interest in watching them continue to fight a losing battle?

No. That, he refused to believe. He might not know her, but he knew her. She’d never give up, not even when the odds weren’t in her favour. It was one of the things he loved and admired most about her, that tenacity to see right done. She hadn’t given up. Not yet. He wouldn’t either.

“You’re so lucky I’m not an akuma,” a voice said from behind him, “Or you’d be toast right now.”

Chat Noir spun and found himself face to face with the new Bug. He scowled and vaulted over her to another roof top without a word. He wanted answers, but he wanted peace more, and he couldn’t think when he was angry.

“Hey, hey!” The girl followed him, annoyingly adept with the yo-yo. “Don’t be like that. We have to work together! We’re a team!”

“Let’s get one thing straight,” Chat Noir said, stopping so abruptly she nearly crashed into him. “You and I aren’t anything. Me and my Lady, we’re a team. You’re an interloper, and you weren’t invited.”

“You need me,” she said, stomping her foot as he took off again. “Only Ladybug can purify akuma’s, and only the lucky charm can make everything right again.”

Chat Noir’s ears twitched, but he didn’t say anything. What was there to say, really? She was right. He might hate the truth, but it wasn’t any less the truth just because he didn’t like it. That had been his life for a long time now; why should this be any different?

He landed hard on top of the Notre Dame cathedral and waited for his new partner to catch up. He tried to practice some deep breathing, but he couldn’t quite put his his anger down. It bled into his voice when he spoke.

“I am not giving up on her,” he said as the girl skidded to a stop in front of him. “There’s something going on here, something we don’t know, and I am not abandoning her.”

The new girl actually rolled her eyes. “No one said you were abandoning her, Kitty Cat.”

Chat Noir was in her face before he even realized he’d moved, mere inches between them. In that moment he wanted nothing so much as to rip the Miraculous from her ears, to blot out the wrong shade of blue staring back at him from behind that mask. “Do. Not. Call. Me. That.”

“Ok, ok!” she snapped, backing up. “Whatever. But seriously. I’m not here to replace Ladybug. I know how it looks, but I’m not trying to be her, I’m just… I’m just a place holder, ok?”

Chat Noir frowned, watching as the new Bug swatted loose strands of hair out of her face. “What do you mean, a place-holder.”

“It’s not some kind of code, Ki - partner,” she said. “That’s what the guardian guy said to me when he gave me the earrings; that they’re not for me to keep, just to hold on to.”

“To hold on to…until what?” Chat Noir asked as his heart began to pound.

The new Bug threw up her hands. “Ugh! As if I know? The only thing he told me was the Ladybug wanted me to hold onto them for her.”

It was like being hit by a tonne of bricks. “She…she chose you?”

The girl shrugged uncomfortably. “Yeah, I guess? Don’t get excited, it’s not like she said why, but…yeah. She did.”

“That would have been nice to know a little earlier,” Chat Noir said wryly, but his mind was already a million miles away. He had been right; his lady did have a plan. She wasn’t abandoning him. She just needed a little help - and so did he. “How do I get in touch with the guardian?”

“How should I know?” the girl said as she glanced down at the street below. “It’s not like I got a tutorial, it was all ‘here’s the Miraculous, go fight that akuma!”

“So there wasn’t any time…” Chat Noir struggled to compile all this new information. It had been days since he’d last seen his Lady, but from the sounds of it she’d only given up the Miracle box in the last 48 hours.

Part of him ached at that, that she hadn’t come to him for help, but he tucked it away for later. What mattered was that he’d been right. He clung to that knowledge, that hope that everything - that she - was not as out of his reach as he’d feared.

“So,” he said considering his new, temporary partner, “What do I call you, then?”

“Ladybug’ is just fine,” she said. “After all, I imagine part of the point of giving the Miraculous to someone else is to not alarm the people of Paris.”

Chat Noir shook his head. “You’re not her,” he insisted stubbornly. “I won’t call you by her name.” Nevermind that he didn’t even know her real name. “How about ‘Red’?”

The girl shrugged, though he thought he could detect a current of annoyance. That, at least, was familiar, although it wasn’t tinged with the affection he’d never realized til then was usually there. “I guess that’s fine.”

Chat Noir was about to relent, to try to ease into a new partnership with this girl, but unfortunately, he never got the chance. His worst cat-themed pun yet was on the tip of his tongue when the night exploded with screams of terror.

#Echoes of You #echoes #ch. 6!#writing #my writing #fic #wip

11 notes · View notes

headoverjojo · 6 years ago

Note

Bucci gangs crush/s/o is always smiling and joking with Mista and Narancia but as a child she was heavily experimented on while being there they also took advantage of her state and deflowered and abused her in several ways at a young age this explains why she’s very strong even without her stand and her trust and mental issues. How would they react to her childhood either be told by someone they hired since they were too curious or by some other source I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable

Hi there! Don’t be sorry, don’t be!! I’ve just toned down a bit s/o’s past to “horrible abuses” without specifying. I hope you may like it :3

Bruno’s gang react to finding out that their crush’s past is filled with horrible abuses, even if she’s always smiling and joking

(Under the cut for length and mention of past abuses)

Bruno Bucciarati

His crush is his light and joy. She’s so bright, so cheerful… when she’s with him, it’s like being in the same room with a small sun. And she has bonded with the others too! She’s really good friend with Mista and Narancia and she seems to hide nothing… however, as team leader, he has to be sure she’s who she says. And so, with Abbacchio, he starts to investigate, in fact sure not to find anything strange.

Oh, he was so wrong. In his crush’s past he found the most horrible and atrocious abuses and traumas one could imagine. He’s so angry, so disgusted and nauseated. How could someone do something so cruel and inhuman to a child?! He can’t even go on reading the papers; he doesn’t need to know what happened later.

Now he can understand painfully well how and why his crush is so strong even without a stand. What surprises him, however, is her brightness and cheerfulness eve after such horrible and traumatic experiences. She must have an incredible inner strength… and this makes him fall for her even harder. She didn’t give up, even when life had given her just pain and hatred. It’s something unique… she’s really a light that not even the worst darkness could kill. And now he wants to preserve that light as much as he can.

Leone Abbacchio

What always made him feel attracted to his crush was her brightness. She was so bright she seemed to irradiate her own light! And he, who always felt in a hopeless darkness, saw, for the first time, a real light, a positive one. Yes, Bruno had saved him; but it was for a lesser lonely and self-destructive darkness. With her it wasn’t like this… it was just pure, sheer light. And he lived for this.

However, his cop instinct was telling him that it wasn’t completely right. That there was something off with her… that, behind that bright smile and friendly attitude there was something dark. He talked about it to Bruno and, together, they found out the horrible truth. Abbacchio was speechless. Never in his life he had seen something so atrocious… he forced himself to read to the end, even if he would have liked to just burn everything. He had to know.

Now he sees her with different eyes. He can interpret better certain behaviours of hers… but he’s still puzzled and amazed by her apparent lack of grudge towards her past. It seems like she had made, as life purpose, to enjoy life as much as she could, to make up for all the abuses she had to endure… it’s amazing and inspiring. Abbacchio has a lot to learn from her!

Guido Mista

Mista was totally head over heels for her. She was so cheerful, so joyful! She laughed at his jokes! She was perfect, she truly was the girl he would have liked to be with for the rest of his life… with her, he felt at ease, he felt right. She took him seriously! He really wanted to make her happy… because, deep in his heart, his instinct was saying him that it wasn’t all right. Something was off… he had to find out what it was and to try to solve it!

Nothing could prepare him to what the papers he had found were saying. Abuses, traumas, the most horrible and darkest experiences… it was difficult to associate the bright and happy G/N who laughed at his jokes and this G/N, who had endured things that no one should ever endure. While the Pistols were trembling in rage and disgust, his mind was going blank. His G/N, his friend, the person he loved… how could she still be so positive, after traumas so big?

He observed her for a while, after the horrible discovery, and he could see that she was truly bright and sunny, that it wasn’t a façade. She truly was like this even after what happened to her… he can’t help but to admire her even more. She’s even stronger than what he thought! And to be a so good and wonderful person even when life had given her just pain was incredible. She really was a role model! It made him fall even harder for her and strengthen his will to guarantee her future happiness.

Narancia Ghirga

Narancia simply adored G/N. She was perfect! With her he felt at home, at ease, she never mocked him, she laughed with him when he made a joke… she even danced with him! He really couldn’t desire more. His heart was hers; but there was something’s bugging him. Narancia was more observant than what it seemed and he had noticed certain behaviours that were making his alarms ring. She was hiding something…

Worried that it could be something harmful for the gang, Narancia referred his thoughts to Bruno, who, with him, started to investigate. They didn’t find what they were thinking, anyway. What they found were abuses on abuses, traumas, and it was all so… so inhuman, so terrible to make Narancia’s eyes sting and his teeth grit in anger. He never, never imagined to see something like this in all his life… and now her “weird” behaviours have a painful explanation.

He doesn’t change his way to approach her even now that he knows about her tragic past. She’s still his G/N, tragic past or not. He loves her and wants nothing more than her happiness, now more than ever! He finds her strength and joy inspiring; it’s the true demonstration that her spirit was way stronger than the monsters who had tried to bend her to their will!

Pannacotta Fugo

Fugo isn’t a person who falls easily for someone, nor one who immediately trusts another person. But with G/N… it all came naturally. She was always so bright and kind; her smile warmed his heart in a way he never felt before. He knew he was falling for her, and he couldn’t deny he was a bit scared of it. He was even more worried, however, about something that was bugging him… he could see the subtle traces of traumas, in her attitude and gestures. What had happened to her?

As Don Giovanna’s Consigliere, Fugo had a lot of informers. It hadn’t be difficult to gather all the information he needed about her; he wasn’t ready, however, to read about so many atrocities and abuses. He knew too well abuses and abusers, and the worst kind of it; but this… this was even worse. This was more than inhuman. Fugo felt nauseous, his stomach was twisted and he felt sick; how could someone do this to a child, to scar them so much? And still… and still she was bright and limpid like a summer sky. How could she do that?

Fugo hasn’t the answer to this question. He just knows that now he admires her even more and that he’s learning a lot from her. She had suffered an unthinkable amount of pain and fear, and still she never let it bend or break her; he wants to learn it too. She had experimented the worst that the world could offer and she decided to spread not hate but love and joy. She decided to make the same world that had taken from her so much a better place. Maybe… maybe this was the solution. Maybe, in this way, he would have started to heal too. And he would have liked to do it with her, at her side…

Giorno Giovanna

Giorno doesn’t allow himself to grow attached to many people; in fact, aside his team, that, by now, is more his family, he’s not so familiar with anyone. This doesn’t apply to G/N; her personality immediately caught his attention. She’s so bright, she seems to carry the sun with her… Giorno felt at ease and warm near her. He wanted to make her feel like this too, to make her feel safe, at home… but he couldn’t just give in to his more and more obvious feelings. He was a Don; he had to be sure that she was really worth of trust, even if he didn’t like to think this about her.

He hired a private detective to discreetly investigate about her past. And what the detective found and reported to him was revolting. She had to endure abuses, every kind of abuses, the worse ones, and to deal with the soul scars and traumas they left on her. Giorno had seen his good amount of horrors, but this… this was beyond everything he had ever seen or heard. And still, she was a so bright and happy person… how? And why? Was she faking it?

After observing her for a while, he realized she wasn’t faking it at all. She was really joyful and sunny, it wasn’t an act. He couldn’t understand how, but he could imagine why. All in all, it was something he had felt too, even if they had followed different ways… the world hadn’t been kind with both of them. Giorno decided to change it becoming Don and stopping the drug route; she decided not to let the darkness eating her and, instead, to spread joy and love in a world that desperately needed it. Giorno couldn’t help but to admire her; to do something like this it was required a lot of courage… and she had it. She was so brave. And Giorno could just fall for her more and more.

#jjba #vento aureo #bruno's gang #bruno bucciarati #leone abbacchio #guido mista #narancia ghirga #pannacotta fugo #giorno giovanna #fem crush #crush with past abuses #tw: abuses mentioned #headcanons #sfw #anon ask

147 notes · View notes

aspoonofsugar · 6 years ago

Text

The Guild Arc and some Major Themes

The aim of this meta is not to give a full analysis of the Guild Arc, but merely to use said arc to discuss some major themes the arc introduces/explores and some characters linked to them. Because of that the analysis will concentrate only on a bunch of characters and themes without worrying about other crucial ones.

To be more specific the characters explored here will be the following.

1) Atsushi and Lucy

2) Mori

3) Kyouka

Some considerations will be made also about other characters and the final paragraph will discuss some events happening in the current arc.

ATSUSHI AND LUCY: LONELINESS AND IMAGINATION

The war among the Guild, the Mafia and the ADA is opened by the fight in Anne’s room which is important on several levels.

First of all, this fight highlights Lucy and Atsushi’s similarities:

Both are orphans and have found a new place in the world thanks to their abilities. At the same time, they obviously hate their abilties to an extent:

One of the main points of Atsushi’s arc is that he can not completely accept the violent parts of himself symbolised by the tiger. He has been refusing this side of himself so much that he was not conscious of it until Dazai revealed the truth to him.

Lucy’s ability is highly symbolic as well.

As a matter of fact Anne is clearly an alter-ego of Lucy herself. On one hand she is stronger than Lucy and will fight for her. On the other hand she also looks monstrous and scary.

These two attributes represent the fact that Lucy’s way of coping with her loneliness is a double-edged sword.

This is because Lucy’s solution is to basically find a refuge in her own head represented by her “room”. The room is a place where Lucy has basically complete control over things and where she can be the strongest, whereas in the real world she is weak and bullied.

However, no matter how strong she is in this world of her creation, she is bound to remain lonely exactly because she refuses to escape her own head and to truly connect with others. She chooses to bring people in by force instead and forces them to stay with her by catching them and collecting them as if they were dolls.

This is why what Atsushi tells her is important:

Loneliness is a matter of imagination because it is a feeling rooted in the perception of one-self and of others. Both Lucy and Atsushi used to feel different and worse than others, but the truth is that all people have similar feelings and the point is realizing this.

For example, this is what happens to Atsushi when he is targeted by the mafia and leaves the Agency because he is sure he will bring only misfortune to them. However, he quickly realizes that what happens to the members of the agency is not something for him to decide since 1) the mafia still chose to attack them and 2) they were strong enough to defeat the mafia:

Here, maybe for the first time ever, Atsushi feels that not everything is on his shoulders and depends from him. Because of that, he is able to move on and later on he is able to help Lucy do the same.

All in all, their battle in Anne’s room is nothing more than a fight to force Lucy to open her mind:

As Lucy herself states she doesn’t know how to use the key because she doesn’t know how to healthily communicate with people and is not able to open herself up to others.

Of course the point is that in the end there is no magical key, but only Lucy herself can choose to go out from her mind:

The result is that she is able to move on and to genuinely connect with Atsushi when they meet again. Atsushi shows her that there are other people like her and that if she understands this, she may be able to create bonds with others. This is why during their second meeting this exchange happens:

Lucy can’t stay in her room forever and this is why she asks Atsushi to come back for her. Basically she has accepted that she needs to connect with others and chooses to trust Atsushi.

This is interesting because, after her development, it turns out that Lucy’s ability is at its best when used to help others:

In the end, the true value of her power did not lie in Anne’s strength or in using it to kidnap people, but rather in letting people escape boundaries (the ability is used to overcome the effects of time, to let Atsushi escape a room and to let both him and Kyouka move around despite being wanted). This is something which fits the idea of Lucy’s ability representing “an escape into one’s imagination”. After all, what does imagination do if not letting people escape boundaries? Lucy used it to isolate herself, but once she starts sharing her power with others, she becomes more powerful to the point that she is considered Dazai’s queen in the current arc.

At the same time, in her second meeting with Atsushi, Lucy points out something important:

It is not a mystery that Atsushi’s development lies into accepting his negative traits, so that he can overcome the hero complex the orphanage director made him develop. This hero complex is built on the assumption that Atsushi is worthless and has a right to live only if he helps others and is a good person. This way of thinking is obviously detrimental and may lead Atsushi to self-destruction.

The story has made very clear so far that to overcome this mindset Atsushi needs to reconcile with Akutagawa. I am not going to talk much about it here and I am simply linking two metas on Atsushi and Akutagawa’s relationship. They were made by @hamliet (this) and by @linkspooky (this).

The point is that Akutagawa represents everything Atsushi doesn’t want to accept about himself (the violence, the possibility of being left behind, how pathetic and wrong it is to let one’s worth being decided by others’ praise etc.). At the same time Atsushi is the same for Akutagawa.

Moreover, Atsushi and Akutagawa are also complementary as Dazai explains here:

However, their complementarity should not be considered only on a functional level, but also on a symbolic one.

On one hand Atsushi’s ability lets him turn into a beast he is scared of and can’t control. He literally hides the tiger from both others and himself.

On the other hand Akutagawa transforms his coat into a beast and so he projects a violent persona.

Atsushi hides his aggressiveness, whereas Akutagawa wears it proudly and hides his vulnerability.

In short, they are both the same and opposite and this is why they can’t stand each other. This is also why they balance each other like yin and yang:

Now, let’s consider this:

It is obvious that Lucy and Akutagawa have a similar attitude when it comes to Atsushi in the sense that they are both envious of him. They think that Atsushi is blessed in ways they are not despite how similar they are. Atsushi is an orphan and an ability user like them, but despite this, he is receiving love while Lucy and Akutagawa are trapped in unhealthy environments where they constantly need to prove their value if they don’t want to be tossed away. They have also both lost against Atsushi once and have important moments with him while on Moby Dick.

In short, both Lucy and Akutagawa are there to remind Atsushi of his past self and they both need Atsushi to develop. Atsushi is struggling when it comes to his relationship with Akutagawa, but has successfully managed to get through Lucy and to influence her. So it makes sense that she has done the same for him. What is more, Lucy’s contribution to Atsushi’s arc has consisted in making him realize a very simple truth aka that if the ADA and the mafia join forces they can easily defeat the Guild.

This is something obvious, but Atsushi never considered it because he associates the mafia with something bad. This is obviously because of his bad experiences with the organization. However, even if the mafia is destructive and is surely not a noble organization, they can still be of help:

It is not by chance that Atsushi has this realization while falling from the sky and so while he is observing things from an unusual perspective. As a matter of fact this simply adds to the symbolic change of POV he is experiencing and which has been triggered by Lucy.

At the same time, it is interesting that just after having this realization he is able to successfully control the tiger and to turn into it completely for the only time so far in the story:

This scene summarizes Atsushi’s need to overcome his self-hate and to accept his power which is violent, but has also helped him to survive so far.

This acceptance will mostly happen through Atsushi’s acceptance of Akutagawa at one point. At the same time, on a macro level, the story needs a resolution of some type between the Mafia and the Ada since it is obvious that the two organizations are linked because of the past of many characters in the ADA being linked to the mafia somehow. Dazai, Yosano and Fukuzawa all have a past which involves one or more members of the mafia, for example.

In short, when it comes to Atsushi’s personal journey, him proposing to work with the mafia is a step in the direction of accepting his less noble parts.

Of couse, Atsushi’s wish to work together with the mafia is not so easy to realize both when it comes to Atsushi himself (he has still to settle his conflict with Akutagawa) and when it comes to others as well.

The difficulty of this integration when it comes to the two organizations, rather than to Atsushi as a character will be explored in the next part of the meta.

MORI AND GAME THEORY

Another important thing which happens during the battle in Anne’s room is Mori’s introduction:

He is immediately associated with Game Theory.

In short, Game Theory is a discipline born to study human conflicts through a mathematical and abstract approach which involves mental games.

One of the most famous of these games is the Prisoner’s Dilemma:

Two members of a criminal gang are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of communicating with the other. The prosecutors lack sufficient evidence to convict the pair on the principal charge, but they have enough to convict both on a lesser charge. Simultaneously, the prosecutors offer each prisoner a bargain. Each prisoner is given the opportunity either to betray the other by testifying that the other committed the crime, or to cooperate with the other by remaining silent. The offer is:

If A and B each betray the other, each of them serves two years in prison

If A betrays B but B remains silent, A will be set free and B will serve three years in prison (and vice versa)

If A and B both remain silent, both of them will serve only one year in prison (on the lesser charge).

Given this dilemma, the most logical thing for an individual to do is to betray their partner no matter what. As a matter of fact, if they betray their partner without being betrayed the person will be free, whereas if both betray each other the person will still avoid the three years penalty which is the worst possible scenario. This is called a defeatist attitude. However, the prisoner’s dilemma also suggests that if both players were to cooperate (and so did not betray each other) their individual gains would be better than the ones they get when they both defeat (aka they betray each other). This is called a cooperative attitude.

This dilemma, or at least the core idea behind this dilemma (aka the choice between cooperation and defection) is important for the resolution of the Guild arc and for Mori’s character especially.

As a matter of fact it is clear that Mori is a defeatist:

This is a very clear explanation of why a defeatist approach is considered the best when it comes to individual gain. By being a defeatist in a prisoner dilemma (and in some other similar dilemmas) one is sure not to lose when compared to others.

However, what is interesting is that this approach puts individual gain before the common one and this clearly shows how much of a contradictive character Mori is.

As a matter of fact, Mori’s philosophy is summarized here:

“A leader is both the head of the organization and the organization’s slave. For the survival and profit of the organization, they gladly put themselves through any manner of filth. They develop their subordinates and put them where they best fit and, if necessary, they use and dispose of them. (...) All for the organization and for the protection of this beloved city.”

He argues that he is acting for the greater good and that he is ready to sacrifice people and to be cruel to protect Yokohama. However, in the scene before he is embracing an attitude which (by default) gives priority to an individual or a group over society.

This is because, as the chapter A Tower of Silence, A Feast of Crows explores, Mori is actually thorn between opposite feelings:

On one hand Mori manipulated the events of the Dark Era’s arc to have Dazai leave the mafia. On the other hand he has also asked Dazai to come back to the organization as an executive.

These two behaviours are opposite and underline an inconsistency. Mori should either want Dazai to stay away from the organization because he could kill him or Dazai to come back as an executive. He should not wish for both things since it is not logical. However, he keeps wavering between the two:

He affirms he has no regrets over his past actions, but a second later he says something which implies he has. All in all, Mori’s motivations to agree to a temporally alliance are not rational, but emotional. Firstly, he makes the decision and only later he rationalizes it:

This is shown also by the fact that Mori’s contribution to the “alliance” between the mafia and the ADA is not really to give the other organization full support, but merely to re-create a specific partnership he himself had wanted and to which he is clearly emotionally linked to an extent. All in all, Mori acts out of nostalgia.

In short, even if Mori is said to be the embodyment of logic and he justifies his misdeeds (both to others and to himself) as necessary to obtain greater results, he has an emotional side which clearly influences his decisions both for the better (accepting a temporary alliance) and for the worse (killing Odasaku to drive Dazai away).

However, this “emotional” side of Mori has at least two major problems which are symbolically represented by his ability.

Mori’s ability is called Vita Sexualis and it lets him create Elise. I would like to interprete this ability in two ways which are interconnected.

1) First of all, as others underlined, the fact that the entity created through an ability called Vita Sexualis is a child is symbolic of Mori’s willingness to pray on weaker people and of his inability to care about another person in a healthy way.

This is shown many times when more focus is given to Mori’s relationships. He became fond of Yosano because of her ability, projected his own issues on Dazai and groomed him, forced Chuuya to join the mafia because of his strength. He justifies all these actions by saying that he is trying to obtain beneficial results for everybody else, but what becomes clear is that Mori sees others as tools even when he develops some kind of twisted attachment to them:

Here, Elise is annoyed because she states Mori is the one who forced her to save him. Basically she is saying that she has no freedom and this summarizes how Mori organizes his own relationships with others. He manipulates them and tries to control them exactly like he does with Elise.

In short, Elise is a metaphor of Mori’s twisted attachment to others and of its unhealthy aspects.

2) Elise is called after a character of The Dancing Girl which talks about a Japanese student in love with a German dancer. The main character must choose between her and his career and in the end he chooses the latter leaving the pregnant girl behind. As a result the girl has a nervous breakdown.

I think the plot of this short story fits Mori pretty well since he is said to be ready to sacrifice his sobordinates to reach his personal objectives.

In conclusion, I think Elise perfectly shows Mori’s attitude towards attachment and personal relationships. He might potentially be able to develop them, but he chooses to completely manipulate and control this part of himself (which remains underdeveloped like a child) and even to discard it in order to reach his objectives.

Finally, I would like to highlight that Atsushi’s reasons to demand an alliance and Mori’s ones to accept it are outlined in two consecutive chapters called after two quotes by the two respective authors.

This is interesting because it lets us build a comparison between them.

On one hand Atsushi represents the future. He is inexperienced, but he is ready to try new things without regrets.

On the other hand Mori represents the past. He is part of an older generation and has some regrets about his past, but will refuse to properly face them and will keep hiding behind a mask of logic and utilitarianism.

Atsushi claims that the head may herr, but never the blood, whereas Mori strongly refuses this philosophy and keeps offering apparently logic arguments to preserve himself. These approaches are opposite and can’t be reconciled. At the same time they highlight another thing.

One of the reasons why the integration between the two organizations and in general among the different sides of Yokohama is so difficutl is not only because of the characters’ personal problems (unwillingness to cooperate, old grudges etc.), but also because the younger characters who have the best chance to change things find themselves in a flawed system they inherited by older characters.

All in all the series explores the theme of having to deal with the consequences of one’s parents’ actions (both negative and positive) and the characters all need to make themselves independent from parental and mentor figures, so that they can become their own people.

KYOKA AND A PARENT’S LEGACY

When it comes to the struggle of overcoming one’s parents’ legacy many characters could be discussed.

For example, Akutagawa and Atsushi’s conflict is basically built on them projecting the complexes they acquired because of their respective mentors on each other.

Similarly, even older characters like Ranpo, Yosano, Chuuya, Dazai and even Mori and Fukuzawa have to deal with parental figures.

However, among all the characters, I think the best suited to explore this theme from a symbolic point of view is Kyoka.

Kyoka is (together with Kenji) the youngest member of the agency and it is generally one of the youngest characters of the series.

What is more, Kyoka has been influenced by both Akutagawa and Atsushi:

Both Akutagawa and Atsushi have been trying to give her a reason to live and in doing so they have both imitated Dazai.

Dazai linked Akutagawa’s sense of worth to his strength, so Akutagawa did the same to Kyouka hoping that this would have given her a reason to live.

Since Kyoka attempted suicide at the beginning of the series, it is obvious that this approach did not work.

Atsushi on the other hand was saved by Dazai even if he saw himself as worthless. So he does the same with Kyoka and gives her a taste of a new possible life.

In short, it is as if Kyoka has experienced both sides of Dazai through Akutagawa and Atsushi. Both methods have been attempted with her and maybe it is exactly because of this that Kyoka needs Dazai’s encouragement to break free from her belief that she is no good:

These words are symbolically said while both Akutagawa and Atsushi are fighting against a common enemy to save the city. Kyouka knows them both and must find her own personal way to live which is probably a synthesis between theirs.

Because of this, she is also in the perfect situation to understand them both and we were shown hints that she does:

She is starting to see the true reason behind Akutagawa’s cruel behaviour and the unhealthy ones behind Atsushi’s noble one. She probably understands both and because of this she is also able to see their limits.

Having to deal with positive and negative aspects of one’s upbringing is also at the root of Kyoka’s ability.

Demon Snow is an inherited ability. Kyoka’s mother transferred it to her daughter before dying. In other words, the demon is nothing more than a legacy and it has both positive and negative traits linked to Kyoka’s parents themselves.

1) Demon Snow is associated by Kyoka to the act of killing. As a matter of fact the demon killed her parents and later on she is turned into an assassin by the mafia because of this ability.

In other words the demon symbolizes her talent as an assassin which she both has and despises:

However, it is later revealed that Kyoka’s own father used to work as an assassin and her mother was at least part of this violent world as well. So, in a sense, Demon Snow is a symbol of this side of Kyoka’s parents.

2) Demon Snow is also an embodyment of her parents’ love:

As a matter of fact both her parents chose to die in order to protect Kyouka and her mother gave her the demon, so that she could be protected by it.

In short, the demon itself is a complicated legacy Kyoka has to struggle with. On one hand her parents loved her and did the best they could to protect her. On the other hand their involvement in a violent world made so that both of them died early and left Kyoka alone. What is more, even if Demon Snow was given to Kyoka to protect her (and it will surely do so in the future), its presence made so that the government used Kyoka as a scapegoat for her parents’ death and the mafia turned her into an assassin.

All in all Kyoka is a child left alone too soon and too suddenly and she has trouble coming to terms with it. In order to do so she needs to understand her parents and what they left to her better. So it makes sense that her arc so far has been also about her gaining a better control of Demon Snow:

She has shown new tricks while fighting Akutagawa, which hints at the fact she is slowly making Demon Snow her own ability. Let’s underline, for example, that among her likes there are ghosts and that she has become able to make Demon Snow intangible.

This struggle to make Demon Snow her own and at the same time to better understand it (and so to better understand her past and herself) is perfectly illustrated thanks to the symbolic use of Kyoka’s phone:

This phone was given to Kyouka, so that she could call her mother if she needed. So the fact that the demon can only be controlled through that phone underlines two things aka her being unable to overcome her parents’ death and her dependance on others guiding her.

In short, Kyoka is a child who is in desperate need of guidance, but is in an environment where she is manipulated. After all the two people who use the phone are Akutagawa aka his superior and Koujo who is basically a motherly figure. They are two people who have authority when it comes to Kyoka and are supposed to guide her, but fail to do so.

For Kyoka to grow she needs two things.

She needs to assert her individuality:

She needs a safe place where she can nurture this new found and frail sense of self.

As a matter of fact, one can’t expect a child to save herself no matter how much willingness she has.

This is where the agency and Fukuzawa come in:

Fukuzawa is a mentor/father figure for the members of the agency and basically adopts Kyoka on the spot. Let’s highlight that his ability is perfect for a father figure since it works by firstly accepting a person as a member of a group (a “family”) and then by letting this person gain a major control on their gift. Let’s add that to be accepted a person must show to hold some ideals and that the control given changes from individual to individual. These conditions describe the agency pretty well. All in all the agency is a place where different people sharing a desire to help others meet and are given the chance to be themselves.

Fukuzawa’s ability which supports instead of controlling takes the place of the phone and gives Kyoka the chance to grow.

As previously stated many other characters will have to take similar steps into overcoming their parental figures’ legacies.

In a sense, Cannibalism is an arc which perfectly shows both this and the fact that almost all the characters are far from succeeding, as for now.

In Cannibalism the leaders of the two organizations are out of commission. However, the two people who are supposed to temporally lead the two groups fail in almost opposite ways. Chuuya is too aggressive in his leadership and ends up in a trap because of his personal feelings, whereas Kunikida’s leadership is too weak. After all, by the end the majority of the agency prefers to fight the mafia head on together with Ranpo instead of continuing the investigation with Kunikida. And even when it comes to the investigation it is Atsushi the one who insists on it while Kunikida can’t choose between the two options given to him. We can say that Chuuya doesn’t consider other options and so doesn’t think enough, while Kunikida thinks too much to the point that he is stopped in his tracks.

What is more, the arc makes perfectly clear that both Chuuya and Ranpo are two people who still depend a lot from respectively Mori and Fukuzawa aka the adults who took them in as kids and that they see as role models. It is because of this that the two fight and this almost leads to the destruction of the city and of both organizations.

Finally it is interesting that even Mori and Fukuzawa fall into the trap and they too need the intervention of their former teacher to stop:

LOVED ONES AND THE GREATER GOOD

Finally I would like to discuss briefly a foiling introduced in the Guild arc, but still ongoing and which will probably be important later on.

I am talking about the foiling between Mori and Fitzgerald.

As explained above Mori is a character whose philosophy is built around the idea that he is doing what he is doing because of the greater good. The section dedicated to him highlights some contradictions between this idea and Mori’s actions, but the imporant thing here is to recognize that this is the narrative Mori builds.

Fitzgerald tells himself a completely different one:

He is doing what he is doing for his own family and subordinates.

Let’s highlight that, while Mori affirms he will discard people to obtain a positive result for the city, Fitzgerald is ready to completely destroy Yokohama if it means his subordinates won’t have to suffer anymore.

However, Fitzgerald is just as contradictive as Mori is. After all, by the end of the Guild arc many of his subordinates have suffered because of him.

Lucy has been treated coldly just because she failed one mission.

Mitchell is in a coma and Hawthorne called Fitzgerald out on this.

Steinbeck resents Fitzgerald because of his actions.

Melville lost Moby Dick.

All in all we can say Fitzgerald did a pretty poor job when it came to him taking care of his comrades.

However, he has been clearly set up for redemption and it is clear that his way to climb back up consists in him facing his former subordinates (like Hawthorne, Mitchell and Steinbeck) and saving them.

Mori on the other hand has not been set up for redemption so far and the current arc has (so far) given more focus on his darkest tendencies.

We’ll see where they go, but as for now, it is interesting that they are basically opposite and that their extreme behaviours are both portrayed as wrong exactly because they are extreme.

Tossing people away when they are not useful anymore can’t lead to the greater good, but only caring about a bunch of loved ones and being utterly dismissive of others isn’t the right option.

The ADA is depicted as an organization which is in the middle. On one hand they are meant to help people and society. On the other hand they treat each other like family. The point is not about choosing between loved ones and the greater good, but rather to find an equilibrium between them.

Wishing to follow an ideal and creating bonds are both human needs and they must be recognized as such in both their beautiful parts and their limits. It is especially important to be conscious that each one of them can lead to disaster if it is not balanced by the other.

This is what Fyodor is trying to do with his schemes after all.

Both in Cannibalism and in the Decay of Angels arc Fyodor is taking things dear to his targets and twisting them, so that they become the reason why chaos happens.

In Cannibalism he targets the two leaders of the mafia and of the ADA knowing that their subordinates will be willing to do all they can to save them and that the two leaders as well will act to protect their subordinates.

The characters are so lost in Fyodor’s manipulation that Natsume himself needs to come back to remind his mentees the core idea of the tripartite tactic aka a strategy born to preserve the peace of Yokohama.

In the current arc what Fyodor is targeting is the ideals of both the Agency and of the Hunting Dogs.

Both organizations want to fight injustice and to protect people. However, it is precisely because of this that their members are easily manipulated:

The agency had been advised beforehand to refuse the job, but they still take it and this is why they fall in Fyodor’s trap. If they had just accepted for once to let someone else save the hostages or if they had worked more closely with the police they could have avoided the Decay of Angels’ set-up.

Similarly the Hunting Dogs are so obsessed by the idea that they are the heroes who should punish criminals that they don’t even realize that the people they are trying to kill are innocent. They are so sure to be the right side that they can’t see that they have become pawns of that same criminal organization that they are supposed to stop:

All in all this is a perfect strategy for an organization called the decay of angels because it uses people’s desire to be in the right and it twists and taints it.

However, if the previous arc was solved thanks to the acceptance of having to fight together for a greater good, this arc will probably show the importance of people’s feelings:

All in all, the people who know the detectives are sure of their innocence and this is true not only for their friends and allies, but also for their former enemies:

This highlights the importance of getting to know people instead of quickly condemning them and it also ties with another fact.

Despite the fantastic worldbuilding element of a book which can turn fiction into reality, the point of the arc is that the ADA is victim of a false narrative which paints them as criminals. It is something which can happen in the real world too despite the lack of magic and special abilities. The reason why this narrative is so quickly accepted is not just that the book is playing with everyone’s heads, but also this:

The police and some politicians have been resenting the agency since before and have been trying to destroy it. This is because all in all the agency is made by a bunch of people society wanted to discard. However, they found a place who accepted them and showed society they could be of help. Despite this, a part of society is still suspicious of them, of their abilities and of their past crimes. This is why they are all so quick to accept the narrative built by Fyodor no matter how many times in the past the agency helped the police or the country.

In short, the current arc is also an arc where society is criticized as an imperfect structure. At the same time, the ADA finds itself once again between two organizations with opposite beliefs.

On one hand the Hunging Dogs have chosen to follow society rules and orders without nuance. On the other hand the Decay of Angels is a group of terrorists who want to destroy society.

The ADA will probably find a happy medium between the two stances which are both being criticized by the narrative.

CONCLUSION

This analysis tried to outline some recurring themes in the story and some characters used to explore them. It also tried to show some connections among the major arcs we have had so far.

As a summary I would say that the themes discussed are the following ones:

1) The necessity to integrate with the parts of one-self an individual refuses to aknowledge. This is true also for society in general.

2) The necessity to find an equilibrium between feelings and rationality, people and ideals.

3) The necessity to grow up and to make oneself independent from one’s parents. This can also lead to a better understanding of one’s parents as well since it lets the individual see them like their own people instead than simply their parents.

#bsd #bsd meta #atsushi nakajima #lucy maud montgomery #mori ougai #kyoka izumi #akutagawa ryunosuke #bungou stray dogs #my meta #fitzgerald bsd

166 notes · View notes