#will it be a situation where splitting roles like this makes them worse units in the long run?

[fisheito]

"I'm a healer but--" duo

[raisindave]

[Chapter 37] Seeing the World Through Ballistic-Tinted Glasses

Content Warning: Descriptions of violence and death.

All six of those faces met you seconds after you climbed those metal stairs you rose from on your first day at the observatory. All six of those faces impatiently waited for your debrief. Lucky for you, Laswell's communication device she placed in your ear happened to work both ways. You've long since come to terms with the fact that the listening devices and cameras she bears will never be perceptible unless she specifically points them out. If you, the one equipped with them, can't see them, neither will an enemy unit. Audio processing gives you a handful of minutes to drown your thirst in a plastic water bottle's worth of liquid and hone your body temperature back into a cooled state. The scarf that shielded your head from the heat left your hair to spill over your shoulders. 

The rapid succession of events and information churning in your mind forced you to remember to switch your speech patterns back into English, back from your subconscious Arabic monologue. With an occupied mind, you were seconds away from shedding the thick navy and black gown Farah had provided you before the thought struck you that you were scarcely clothed underneath. Spared of a heart attack, you found a seat where Laswell was ushering you to sit, turning a laptop to face you. 

Once again, here's another familiar situation. On diplomatic missions like this, your role as a linguist means being equipped with a recording device during a discussion and returning to base for a debrief. In this case, you're respeaking hour-old dialogue in a new language, sharing devastating intel with the task force. Glimmers of shame and doubt were quashed after it occurred to you that all six of these faces have unquestionably seen worse. Still, that doesn't stop you from having to heave deep, self-soothing breaths before pressing play. 

For the first while, the dialogue was silent. Devoid of anything besides that crumbling sound of wind in an open microphone and crunching gravel under the loafers you still wore. To make use of idle time and fill the silence that made the air feel sickeningly stale, you scribbled the visual notes you had gathered into a fresh notebook. This would be the first replay of many, just an initial brief to relay the time-sensitive info to the crew. After one listen-through, it's time to surrender into that office you've called home, transcribing and editing your findings and serving a polished report to Laswell. 

As the recording started approaching the cafe where you met Basmala, a sense of bashfulness washed over you for reasons beyond your understanding. You'd scarcely worked in a setting where you're presenting information live to this team. Sure, you've done your work in front of them before, but something about having them all stare right into your face as you work these words through your mind makes your shirt collar tight. Like you need to prove yourself to these people who are already more than familiar with working with you. Maybe it's Farah's tilted look at you as you explain every syllable spoken between you and the stranger at the cafe. Maybe she's translating what you're saying in her own mind, judging your iteration of the events. Maybe Ghost is judging your movements with those splitting eyes. You could only hope your face wasn't registering these swirling emotions because every ounce of brainpower actively went to changing the language in the audio. 

Six pairs of eyes watched you with attentive posture, not even fluctuating when the conversation with Basmala shifted into the delicate subject matter. Soap did you the courtesy of furrowing his brows, confirming in your mind that you weren't just speaking into the void, especially when your companion's voice grew more despondent. After all, it wasn't your role to make sense of the information; you only relayed it. You'll feed that pretty little transcript you'll write into the machine, and they'll churn out a solution to this, and you're onto the next mission. You made the mistake of catching Farah's hard gaze as the topic in the recording mentioned child soldiers, as a smouldering inferno simmered behind those dark eyes. 

You couldn't stand meeting Farah's gaze toward the end of the recording, not because of any shame or anything of the sort. You couldn't will yourself to look at that expression she held, so stoic, but with a tinge of raw hate that chilled you to the bone. It's no wonder why she's so personally invested in this, and it took you biting the bullet and returning with civilian conversation for the rest of the team to connect with her. The cloak you wore felt like it was radiating the scalding body heat you created with each passing second, feeling bile and sweet spit pool under your tongue. Bright white lights felt more and more like stage lights toward the end of the presentation. More than anything, you wanted to slip back to that chilled office and hide under the non-existent sheets on your squeaky cot. 

Luckily, there were no remaining questions for you, letting you slink away as they immediately broke into exchanging words and strategy, letting you slip past those squealing metal double doors. Your boots thumped over the thin metal of the catwalk, opening the squeaky door to your office and pressing your back to the plywood barrier with a heaving sigh. You couldn't strip out of these heavy clothes fast enough, opting to switch it up by equipping that standard black tee and green-grey pants. Even though you're inside, the air felt so much less stagnant than it did outside, though that could have easily been because of the blistering heat. Could your face burn after scarcely ten minutes in indirect sunlight? 

Although the transcript in its entirety was no more than 45 minutes, only about 15 was meaningful dialogue. Every time you reached to flip the page in the notebook to start a new line, the orange floral chair made its presence known with a whining creak. Every time you reached that pause, where Basmala was seconds away from leaving, your face contorted into a winge. At times, you'd scrub your eyes with your fists, cringing at the sound of your own voice, though your sense of pride was second to your workplace obligations. 

There was a gentle tap at the door—so gentle that you had to lift your headphone pad off your ear just in case it was imaginary. It gave you a chance to spark life back into your feet, which prickled with pain due to limited blood flow. Another tap, but this time, it came with a voice.

"Lua," Gaz's voice, weirdly soft, came from the other side of the plywood, "you might want to come see this."

"Alright," you were unsettled that he called you by your first name. You'd already said you were not hungry when he offered an MRE, so maybe there was a question about your presentation earlier. 

You met him gesturing with a follow motion as soon as you opened the door, hearing the echoing click of the door clasp behind you reverberate through the open complex. That view over the aluminum railing, probably a 60-foot drop, was particularly discomposing as Gaz wasn't filling the walk with his usual chatter. His speed was barely above your standard pace, forcing you to take bounding steps to maintain a decent following distance. Before you knew it, he was pushing past those steel double doors that opened into the computer room where the rest of the crew had set up command. 

They were all crowded around the broad monitor of a portable display, and all six of them turned in sync, including Laswell. Most of them had their standard blank faces, but it was Farah who gave you the most social context. She looked so disgusted, and her upper lip scrunched ever-so-slightly in a way that made your skin crawl. 

"Is everything alright?" you breathed, settling into a semicircle around the screen that illuminated the dim room. 

Someone responded, but it was hard to say who exactly it was because, at that moment, your senses were entirely locked up. The screen displayed CCTV footage. A grainy and wavy view of that gaudy marble and jade fountain you saw earlier. Your stomach heaved like it was urging you to vomit, and a pang of ice in your throat concurred with that sentiment. A man you'd specifically seen earlier on your walk kneeling on his stoop was heaving a tarp over it, but it was too late. You saw those yellow mary-janes laying face up on that dusty soil. You saw the pool of dark crimson that sprawled under the crinkling tarp. You saw the cylindrical mass that was being shielded from your eyes despite the blue cover's intervention. No, no no. Your knees felt weak, and you felt all the heat slide from your face. It's not real. What you see on that screen isn't real, it's just not.

"All our cameras went dark for about 15 minutes," Laswell's voice broke you out of the deafening uproar in your brain. "They just came back on..."

"I take it that's Basmala," Price sniffed, being the only person in the room who did you the courtesy of not boring through you with their stare. 

"It is- was." Instinctive compliance swept over, overriding any emotions that might threaten to cloud your judgment in this mission.  

Price turned to speak lowly to Laswell about something, but in his stepping aside, it let you spot something more up close. You knelt before the screen, feeling numb knees connect with the cool tile. Even with the grainy footage, you spotted words on a sign on a piece of paper above the body, one that wasn't there before. Your face was pressed so close to the screen that you felt the device's heat radiate on your nose, squinting and blinking to make sense of the words. 

"There's a sign," you began. 

"What does it say?" Price stepped behind you as the rest of the crew's attention fell back onto you. 

The letters were so grainy, but what's the most odd was that they weren't in the swirling abjad script that you'd expect of an Arabic written note. You could only squint at the dark black lines that occupied the billowing white paper that was occasionally obscured by passing panicking civilians. 

"It says- It says za nashe obshcheye delo," your eyes trembled due to the strain. 

You turned on the pads of your boots to look up at the crew as you steadied yourself on the desk. Everyone shared a furrowed look except for Price, who shared a look of seriousness with you that solidified your dread. If the world couldn't get more foggy, it just did, even with the numbing electricity that cracked through your aching muscles. 

"It means 'for our common cause' in… Russian," your voice came out like a croak. 

Soap was rocking on his ankles as soon as you finished speaking, his look to Ghost gave you every bit of reassurance you needed that this was deadly serious. It's impossible to know what details the rest of them are processing behind those stern looks. Ghost was shouting some command to Gaz, and Soap was throwing his hands up in frustration, though all the voices were drowned out. This situation just went from an already strenuous pace to the kind of speed that makes your kneck burn from the G-force. Your heart felt like it could pound out of your chest, but you insisted on remaining composed outwardly. The door swinging shut with a clambering ringing made your eyes jolt up to see the tail end of Farah surging down the hall. 

"Grant, we need those reports done," Price pointed to you, meeting your gaze with those horrifying, piercing eyes that clarified his seriousness. 

In an instant, you were pushing the cold tile away from you, clambering to your feet and feeling trickling anxiety fizzle down your thighs. The boys were now crowded around a circular table, pointing at documents or maybe maps, but it's hard to tell. You had your role, and they had theirs. With the door swinging shut behind your ankles, you heard the tail end of a heated discussion and names you didn't recognize being thrown around hotly. By the time that orange chair creaked below you, you'd nearly crushed the laptop screen with the force of your panic. It's time to slow it down. Time to focus.  

 

The rest of the transcription was a blur. You had to do this thing where you pretend everything that's happened was just a bad Hollywood movie. Pretend that the corpse that hemorrhaged blood on the sandy gravel was a mannequin and the panicking civilians were a meandering camera crew. The movie will be in theatres for a week before another better picture comes out, and it'll briefly entertain snacking moviegoers until they're back to their mundane lives. Maybe it'd get nominated for an award at some glitzy award show where actors are dressed to the nines in glittering dresses and prim suits, but it probably wouldn't win; the story is too predictable. Anything you could do to distract yourself from the prickling mist that manifested on your waterline and complete the task at hand. Anything to distract yourself from the fact that you're listening to the voice of a dead woman, a ghost, and you were the last person who spoke to her.  

"Excellent," Laswell flipped the booklet into her pale fingers once you're returned to the command room.

She began waving it to Price until it caught his attention, and he nodded before returning to his discussion with the rest of the crew. The room was tense, that much goes without saying, but an unholy cacophony of emotions overrode any perceptive skills you might have. It's an odd, unsynergized mix of fear, rage, numbing apathy, and a twinge of nausea. It made you wonder if this observatory was a good enough hiding spot, seeing as this had happened only minutes away. You can only hope she's had a nice burial, maybe somewhere next to the empty graves of her husband and daughter. 

"Get some sleep, Lua," Laswell's calm voice brought your eyes up from their void stare. 

You nodded and smiled politely, putting every molecule of composure into manifesting a calm demeanour. By the time you were back in your room, the cot was squealing under your added weight, and you fell into a pensive trance. Cracked grey ceilings hosted flowering brown rings, showing a rich history of water damage and a lack of maintenance. Nighttime came in a blink, though you didn't bother to crack alight that camping lantern Price provided. The world moved around you, and not you it. 

In this line of work, it will always be hard to rank the mental difficulty of a job. Often, you're making impossible choices under brutal conditions that will regularly test your moral compass and push your ethics to the limit. This one really got to you. Yes, it's your job to be impartial. Not to get frazzled, and just do your duty. Having your emotions get in the way of missions has happened more times than you'd like to admit, and you refuse to let that happen again. These emotions will just have to be digested in a few weeks or months or whenever you end up on home soil, and you can only pray it won't be in a coffin. This one will take more than a few mandated therapy sessions to pry out of your nightmares. 

It makes you wonder if she knew she was putting a bounty on her head. The more you dwelled on the thought, the more it made sense. Though you weren't sure if that was comforting or inspired a deeper dread. The best thing you could do for Basmala is follow orders and hope that the powers that be have some scheme to make this warlord group come undone. It's the only way you could have a meaningful impact without ending up in those dunes. It's a type of terror that no gunfight or sheer cliff could come close to inspiring, like it could freeze the marrow in your bones and make your nerves snap. 

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Master List

[kristenreviewsmedia]

The Barbie Movie

Teen Movie Title: The Barbie Movie Writer: Greta Gerway and Noach Baumbach Gerwig, G., & Baumbach, N. (Writers). (2023). The Barbie Movie. Warner Bros., Heyday Films, LuckyChap Entertainment, NBGG Pictures, Mattel Film

Rating: 5 stars The Barbie Movie by Greta Gerway and Noach Baumbach starts off in Barbie Land, where life is perfect for the Barbies. However, a glitch causes Stereotypical Barbie (Margo Robbie) to question her existence and mortality. Barbie notices something is off when things become imperfect, such as a cold shower, spoiled milk, and, even worse, flat feet. To understand what is going on, Barbie talks to weird Barbie, a Barbie with a funny haircut, face drawings, and always doing the splits because it got played with too hard. She learns from this that she must embark on a journey to the real world, accompanied unexpectedly by Beach Ken (Ryan Gosling), who constantly seeks Barbie's acceptance.

Barbie and Ken find themselves in Los Angeles, where Barbies starts to discover the flaws of the human world. For example, women are not in charge of things like back home, and she can sense but not understand why the comments make her feel uncomfortable. Barbie thought that she fixed sexism and made things better for women until she encountered Sasha, who let her know what the world is like. Meanwhile, Ken is getting to experience male privilege for the first time, and he sees that men here occupy many positions of power and are respected. Mattel then discovers Barbie is out in the real world and tries to get her back so they do not have another Skipper situation. After Mattel fails to capture Barbie Sasha's mother Gloria (America Ferrera) saves her and they head back to Barbie Land where we find out it was Gloria who was the source of Barbie's existential crisis. When they return to Barbieland, they discover Ken has overturned the matriarchal system and brainwashed the Barbies into being weak-minded and willing to follow anything the Kens want. A battle of ideologies comes to a head. Barbie and her group of friends devise a plan to unite the dolls by reminding them how impossible it is to be a woman; once they wake all the Barbies up, they plan to dismantle the regime by turning the Kens against each other to allow the restoration of Barbie land. In the end Barbies tells Ken that he needs to find out who he is without Barbie, the Barbies also make sure that the Kens have some part in the new system, but Barbie, is still uncertain of her purpose, encounters the spirit of Ruth Handler, the creator. Ruth encourages Barbie to embrace the ever-evolving journey of self-discovery. Barbie decides to venture into the real world and adopts the name Barbara Handler, which is Ruth’s daughter’s name, symbolizing a newfound sense of identity.

This movie has been controversial because some men feel as if it is bashing the male exitance by saying boys are dumb, but in fact, this movie is for men and women, but you have to be willing to listen and accept the message. The lessons that the movie tries to point out are that women do not need to fulfill the role of the “ideal” woman, that things will be complex, and that there will be heartache. As women, it's ok to have imperfections. We do not have to confirm the ideas that society puts on us. For men, it is essential to understand that you do not need to fit into this idea of hyper-masculinity. It’s okay to have emotions and really feel them. Don’t let what you wear or your job, or who you date be your identity. Like Ken’s sweatshirt said in the end, know that you are “Kenough.” There are some adult jokes in here, so watching with young children should be at the parent's discretion.

Awards: Golden Globe Awards (2024) - Cinematic and Box Office Achievement Alliance of Women Film Journalists - Best Screenplay, Original Critics' Choice Movie Awards-Best Production Design Chicago Film Critics Association Awards- Best Art Direction/Production Design Celebration of Cinema & Television -Groundbreaker Award - America Ferrera

[fyrbol]

[ SACRIFICE ]:     knowing that the circumstances only allow one of them to survive, the sender sacrifices their life in order to guarantee the receiver’s survival and safety.

settling dust prompts / accepting.

THEY HAD ALWAYS BEEN UNITED   in their undesirability. the role of social pariah is a cumbersome one to wield and ultimately one neither of them were willing to shed   —   in spite of and especially because   who would they be without it   ?   he had always found robin's demeanour a charm, thought that if he could find badassery in the characteristics she was so often chastised for, maybe a black boy in hawkins had a chance as well.   idols are funny things.

he was indebted to them, really   :   erica had told tall tales of their adventures into enemy lines   (   much to lucas' horror   )   and robin's strict curtailings on otherwise reckless games.   he was thankful for that.   had promised her in unspoken terms   —   promised himself, really — that he would re - pay them the favour.   name your price, say the word.

so they find themselves at the precipice together   —   robin nigh fallen, lucas holding on to their arm for dear life   —   a caricature of a cliff - edge beckoning, maw wide open and waiting for payment. as if the tectonic plates themselves had split where they stood, tearing away from one another like the parting red sea.   this is your moment.   the groans of the dead echo endlessly   :   if lucas looks down past robin's swaying shoulder he sees colonies of them climbing up from the earth's core, their eyes set on the surface. he can't afford to think about them.

he owes her.

heaving with all his might, both arms tugging on her one, his shoulders strain at the sockets. he's already slipped once, knees grazing beyond bloody recognition and embedded with stone   :   the sacrifice he makes to not go tumbling down with them. panic is surging with the growing tide, though. every passing minute, those living corpses get a little bit closer, rotting mouths wet with the thought of biting into the bait on a hook that is robin.

❛   you need a foothold, a tree root,   anything   !   i've got you   —   i'm not letting go.   ❜   teeth chew into his lower lip, brow clenched stubbornly. this, he knows.   to let go would be to relinquish her.   he'd not considered that he didn't have to be the one letting go for her to fall. they are kindred in their snap assessments of a situation, but lucas' judgment is clouded by that which he owes.   robin has to live.   they say something he doesn't quite catch nor process, and then like a stone, sudden as a violin string snapping,   she plummets.   she lets go.

he is still with the shock of it. hands still gripping to the empty space robin once took up. grasping for their presence. a phantom ache at its absence. there is no thud or splash or sound to suggest she ever reached the bottom   (   if this gaping chasm even had an end   )   and he doesn't know what's worse. the sickening crunch of certain death, or   an endless limbo of maybes.   he thinks an earthquake is beginning, but realises it is just his fingers, his wrists, shoulders, body trembling. he is wracked with the loss that simply   hadn't been an option.

the ache sets in, blurs his vision.   the best of them has fallen.   his first, immediate and selfish thought is who is he supposed to look up to now   ?   his second is how he's going to tell the others.   tell steve.

his third is to jump down with them.   pariahs be damned.

[stxrrywildflower]

for better or for worse (3)

pairing - spencer reid x reader

summary - when the people they love the most are kidnapped and ripped out of their hands, the bau does everything they can to get them back before it turns dire

warnings - mentions of case, injury details, angst

series masterlist

bloody jewelry and seven smashed phones.

that’s all the bau team had to go off of in the investigation.

just like hotch had offered, he stepped up to take charge of the situation. emily was thankful to be able to step down for the case, the stress was bulding up and she was ready to crack.

hotch fell back into his leadership role naturally, already pulling someone up from the tech department to do their research and computer work. morgan focused on getting everyone back in the mindset they needed.

luke and spencer were most difficult.

for luke, he felt extremely guilty. morgan did the best he could in helping the agent, though penelope missing did affect him as well.

spencer was a whole different story. he couldn’t think straight, they caught him shaking more than once. sure a walk emily had sent him on did help, though coming back started the cycle all over again.

“hey pretty boy,” morgan started. that nickname alone made spencer flinch. “mind if we go and talk?”

the two men stood up, nodding towards emily and hotch who waved them off.

“i feel like a lot of conversations are happening in here,” spencer commented upon entering morgan’s old office.

“what can i say, it’s a good space,” morgan smiled.

morgan sat on the edge of the desk while spencer took the couch, immediately grabbing a pillow to hold against him. “i’ve already talked to alvez but i figured we need to sit down one on one.”

“it’s not your job to be the team therapist.”

both laughed at that. “yeah well as your friend and honorary older brother, it’s my job to check up on you. and i know how hard this case is for you. i may not be a profiler anymore but your body language is all over the place. and i’m sure that-”

“you know what the last thing i said to y/n was?” spencer interrupted.

morgan stayed quiet, not wanting to say the wrong thing to potentially set him off. “i told her i loved her too,” spencer revealed quietly. “i was dropped her off at her apartment and she kissed me goodnight before telling me she loved me.”

the older agent hugged spencer, not exactly knowing how else to console him other than that. it broke his heart at both the confession and the tears that had started to flow down his cheeks. morgan’s hugs were comforting, they always were. “we’ll get her back kid. that way you can tell her you love her again.”

they stayed in there for a little while longer, talking to refresh their minds of the situation. “we should head back. who knows what the team has discovered by now,” morgan offered. spencer accepted the extended hand to help him up and the two headed back towards the bullpen.

all bets must have been placed on the unsubs making contact sometime soon and through a phone call. a phone incase of ransom or demands was set up on luke’s desk, another machine set up to help trace a call.

hotch and emily remained by the desk while the others work, though main focus was on the device.

the second the phone rang, all members of the team’s attention immediately went to the device. hotch held his hand out, letting them know to keep quiet before signaling emily to pick up the phone.

“hello?” the unit chief answered.

a staticky voice, obviously altered in some form, played over the speaker of the phone.

“you will be receiving a note in exactly fifteen minutes. i expect you to choose wisely.”

sixteen words. sixteen words was all the communication they had from your captors. and it still didn’t feel like enough. “good and bad news,” the new tech analyst announced. “i didn’t pinpoint an exact location but i did narrow it down to areas. they’re no where in the city, somewhere west.”

“choose, what do they mean choose?” j.j. rushed out, panic evident in her tone.

“i need everyone up in the conference room.”

just like the unsub has said, anderson entered the office holding a long office envelope. he handed it over to hotch, who placed it on the round table for examination.

a piece of paper was the first thing pulled out, folded neatly and sealed with wax. with gloved hands, hotch pulled at the folds, breaking the seal. inside, in perfect red ink, was the promised note.

seventy million in twenty dollar bills for their safe return. ten million for each person

or,

ten million for one. your choice. you have 24 hours.

“they want us to choose?”

hotch frowned, reaching back into the envelope

spencer held his hand over his mouth, not even close to being prepared for what he, and the rest of the team, saw.

seven polaroids, all glossy and crisp, were layed out on the table. each was a different picture, all from the neck up. you, along with the others, occupied a square. your injuries were shown, displaying the level of injuries everyone had suffered.

you, andrew, and will were easily the worst. your face was bruised and bloody, dried blood on your nose and dripping from a cut on your forehead. andrew had a similar cut, this time on both of his cheeks. will had a split lip and swollen eyes.

the others, had just a few knicks and bruises. they looked relatively fine, just in shock from the situation.

“oh my god,” j.j. was the first to speak, reaching out to pick up the photo of her husband. the rest did the same, no one knowing how to react to the pictures.

spencer was seconds away from running out of the room, his stomach was flipping and he just overall felt sick. he wanted to rip the photo up, never wanting to see it again.

“we need to start from the begining,” hotch announced. “they’re obviously a team. there’s no way they could have taken seven people without assistance. but that does raise another risk, they could potentially split if something does go wrong.”

that sentence didn’t ease the team at all.

“let’s focus on what they left. broken phones is to let us know they’re missing. but i think we should be focusing on the word love,” morgan added.

“that’s obvious,” matt spoke up. “they’re the people we love the most. by taking them away from us, they want us to experience a certain type of pain.

“we could be looking at siblings!” emily exclaimed.

j.j. nodded at that. “that does make sense. usually partnerships like this wouldn’t have the same level of hatred unless they shared the exact same experience. abandonment or losing someone could be a trigger.”

“we need to look at triplets and siblings who experienced some from of loss in the family. it’s going to be a long list but we can reduce it by the property owned,” hotch ordered.

while the tech analyst did their own digging, the rest of the team went through a box of every case involving families in the state.

it was a painful process, taking seven hours before anyone actually found anything. by then, the conference room was a mess of papers scattered around and empty coffee mugs.

the team narrowed it town to triplets, one girl and two boys. their parents had passed when they were teenagers, the oldest boy gaining custody of them. they were forced to live on their own, fending for each other. they had it out for the bau ever since they denied looking into their case.

besides motive, they owned a ranch a bit further outside of the city. a perfect place to conceal their plans. adding on to the lack of paper trail and trigger, it was more than likely that they were the unsubs.

no one from the bau team was allowed to go on the raid, their emotions could greatly alter the arrest. hotch and morgan led it, accompanied by swat.

instead, they were sent to the hospital. it was inevitable that all of you would need medical attention, it was the best option for them to go and wait, hoping for your safe return.

almost an hour went by without any news.

the team sat in one of the designated waiting rooms, all having some nervous quirk to help calm them down.

with little warning, a flood of doctors and nurses passed the room, a few police officers and swat agents as well. at the end of it all were hotch and morgan, both taking off their kevlar vests as they entered the room.

in an instant, everyone was standing up. emily was the first one to attempt to leave the room. hotch blocked the doorway, using his hand to prevent her from going anywhere.

“hotch what the hell. let me through,” emily demanded.

one flick of the eyes back and forth between the two former agents was all the team needed to raise further questions. it was and has always been a telltale sign that they were either lying or hiding information.

“what aren’t you telling us?”

hotch let out a sigh. the tense silence in the room did nothing for anyone’s nerves.

“we only got four of them.”

☆ ☆ ☆

teaser

tags - @zozoleesi @emxlyprentxss @spencerreidfanatic00 @mrs-dr-reid @irjuejjsaa @ogmilkis @sageellesworth05 @mortallythoughtfulgurl @brainyreid @ah-blossom @kissessforharryyy @ssareidbby @spencersglasses @spenciepoo338 @mggstyles @emilouu @loki-an-idiot @reidsmyhusband-emilysmymistress @pianofirepirate @ssa-morgan @afuckingshituniverse @spencerslatte @reminiscing-writer @kianagilder-blog @ssaic-jareau @theatrenerd101601 @drprettyboyreid @emilyxprentiss

[uchihasakurawrites]

A Lesson in Practicality (1)

Rating: T for language & depictions of violence

Summary: It takes a near-death experience in Yukigakure for Sakura to realize that Sasuke has her back in more ways than one.

Word Count: 3,154

A/N: This idea was going to be a short drabble, but the storyline ended up going in a direction that I didn’t initially plan for. There will be a Part Two (of 2). Part One has more implied SasuSaku - Sasuke will play a much more significant role in the next part! There’s a very high chance that this is going to be a prequel for the longer SasuSaku fic I’m currently working on. 

Let me know what you think, please!! Thank you to everyone who has left feedback on my work thus far~ 

Cross-posted on AO3 and Fanfiction

______________________________________________   

Sakura had heard enough stories from her fellow kunoichi about birthday gifts from their boyfriends to know that Sasuke’s definition of a gift was unique, to say the least.

Sai’s most recent gift to Ino was simple - a modest bouquet of flowers, carefully cultivated to convey a special message, a basket of cherry tomatoes from his personal garden, and a painting of the two of them on what Ino later told Sakura was their engagement day. Naruto once took Hinata on a two-week getaway to the hot spring resorts of Yugakure for her first birthday after they became official (though Hinata later let it slip that Naruto hadn’t informed Hiashi of their vacation and was subsequently banned from the Hyuuga compound for the foreseeable future). Chouji hosted a surprise birthday party for Karui just a few months after she migrated to Konoha, complete with her closest friends from Kumogakure and a home-cooked buffet. Even Shikamaru had stepped up his game with a private couple’s cooking class at Amaguriama, knowing that Temari would punt him to Suna if he showed up with just the personalized shogi piece he had originally planned on giving to her.

Temari had still barely let him escape, fully aware that Shikamaru had organized the class in hopes of never having to go out of his way to buy her favorite sweets again if she could just make them herself. Watching him burn three batches of roasted chestnuts was enough of a gift in itself.

Sasuke hadn’t been in the village for any of Sakura’s birthdays since before his defection back in their genin days. Even then, she couldn’t remember him going out of his way to give her a gift beyond grumbling out a low “Happy Birthday” if team training happened to coincide with her birthday.

To say that Sakura was shocked when she awoke to the tap tap tap of a messenger bird at her window before dawn on her nineteenth birthday was an understatement. Her grumbles at being awakened at such an hour on a day Ino had explicitly banned Sakura from working stopped the second she recognized the bird as Sasuke’s hawk. After fumbling with the latch on her window for a moment - she swore that the hawk gave her some serious side-eye when it took her three tries to get the latch to unstick - she held out her wrist for the bird. It left in the next breath, right after Sakura untied the scroll it was carrying. Sakura frowned at the hawk’s manners as she hadn’t even gotten to send a reply but realized she shouldn’t expect much. Of course Sasuke’s summons would take on his taciturn attitude.

The note tied to the scroll was simple: A last resort.

Huffing a laugh at the note, which was so very Sasuke, Sakura made quick work of the scroll’s seal. She immediately recognized the script as a summoning scroll, though she couldn’t parse out exactly what the summons was. Most likely one of Sasuke’s if he had sent it to her - a hawk or a snake. She sincerely hoped for the former.

Her first Chunin exams had effectively wrecked snakes for her.

Sakura resealed the scroll with a small smile. She had learned what she was getting into quite quickly when she first realized her love for Sasuke ran deeper than a surface-level crush. Any relationship she had with him wouldn’t be normal, be it romantic or platonic. Sasuke’s definition of a relationship was understandably different than most others; she had to learn how to read into the small gestures and unspoken words he left between them - the forehead pokes, the thank you’s, and the occasional mumbled annoying. There would be no typical gifts, no grand romantic gestures, and she was okay with that.

She had hardly expected a congratulatory note for her birthday, let alone a physical gift. Sure, a summoning scroll might not be the most conventional gift, but Sakura figured the practicality of it summed up Sasuke’s approach to relationships perfectly: securing the safety of those closest to him. This particular gesture meant she was at least somewhere on his (very short) list of valuable people in his life.  

So when she tucked the scroll away, she did so with a smile, knowing that the added weight next to her medical supplies was a comfort that Sasuke had her back no matter where he was.

                                                 *   *   *   *   *

Sakura discovered that sentiment was far more literal than she had initially thought as she fled the scene of an assassination mission gone wrong in Yukigakure. Eliminating the target - a noble displaced by the war who sought to sow seeds of discontent against the ruling family - was fairly straightforward. A quick henge, a few unconscious guards, and a convenient chakra-induced heart attack left no trace to Konoha or the royal family.

The bounty hunters on her tail were decidedly less straightforward.

Since the end of the war, Sakura’s field mission count had dropped drastically. With Tsunade out of the village, rebuilding and strengthening Konoha’s medical system fell squarely on her shoulders. Ino’s support with the Children’s Mental Health Clinic left some room in her schedule for diplomatic medical missions to neighboring villages as a show of goodwill after the Allied Shinobi Forces dissolved, but she was rarely included in combat units. Kakashi had only assigned her to this solo mission as a favor to Koyuki since she was already familiar with Sakura from her genin days. Relations between Konoha and Iwagakure had been steady enough after the war, but Kakashi couldn’t risk instability in a country so close to Iwa.

While Sakura had kept up with her combat skills as well as she could through spars and periodic demonstrations at the Academy, she could feel the rust in her reaction times as she adjusted her own fighting style to the unfamiliar terrain. Snow meant additional chakra expenditure to maintain body temperature and keep her feet planted firmly on the ground; it took her the first few moments of the pursuit just to adjust her fighting style so that she wouldn’t go skidding across ice when she followed through on her punches.

It was the split second of hesitation between her noticing the first hunter rapidly approaching from behind and actually lunging to the left to avoid his attack that cost her a kunai to the thigh. The wound was deep, but Sakura was less concerned about the fact that she could clearly see the muscle fibers in her leg and more concerned about neutralizing the unknown poison that was trying to spread from it. Sewing the skin together enough to stop the bleeding was second nature; it was maintaining a chakra net around the wound to contain the poison that required a bit more focus.

Based on both their speed and specialized jutsu, Sakura guessed the hunters were at least jounin-level. Ten to twelve  total based on a quick extension of her sensory jutsu. Had this been a different situation, Sakura would have been flattered that someone thought she was dangerous enough to send so many high-level shinobi to ambush her. She made a quick mental note to thank Karin for training her in a variant of the Kagura Shingan jutsu.

Running forever wasn’t an option, especially at the pace she was being forced to keep. She needed to start picking these guys off - she figured she had faced far worse odds and won.

Sakura slid to a stop and waited precisely six seconds for about half of the hunters to catch up before she drove her fist into the ground. Unsteady ground and low visibility from the snow she had loosened caught the two closest hunters off guard, and she pressed her advantage to neatly slice their jugulars open with chakra scalpels. She took note of their appearance, standard shinobi gear in shades of white and grey and curiously blank hitai-ates linked around both of their necks, and paused just long enough to snatch one of the headbands for later inspection. She tucked it into her medical pouch before rounding to face the next wave of hunters.

Most of the remaining nin were smart enough to keep their distance; they must have done enough research on her to know that engaging her in close-combat was the fastest way to lose. The nin fell into a loose semicircle formation around her, half close enough for mid-range attacks and half further back. If they were Iwa or Yuki missing nin, she could expect mostly Water and Earth-style jutsu - the same affinities she had, but probably much more practiced.

Keeping a firm hold on her Kagura Shingan to track her opponents, Sakura quickly formed the seals for Suiton: Kiri Shikaku she had picked up during a brief stay in Kiri and saw an immediate improvement in her vision. She caught four hunters in her visual range and charged forward, hoping to close the distance between them fast enough for her to get a clean hit. All four flew through the same familiar sequence of hand signs she had seen from Iwa nin during the war, and a solid rock wall about ten feet high erupted in her path.

Not deterred in the slightest by the barrier, Sakura augmented her speed with chakra and drove a fist into the wall. The rock gave more resistance to her wrist than normal, so she quickly adjusted the chakra concentration in her knuckles to absorb the additional force. The hunters, she guessed, had infused their chakra into the wall in hopes that the reinforcement would injure her wrist or at least slow her down.

Sakura smirked as her fist drove clean through the wall and followed her punch up with a roundhouse to shatter it. Their chakra control was good if they could spread it so finely across the surface of the wall - but hers was better.

She darted towards the closest target and delivered a punch to his gut that snapped his spine clean in half. His partner appeared at her side in the next breath, driving his katana towards her neck and forcing her to drop to her knees to dodge. Sakura swept her leg underneath the nin’s feet, ignoring the stinging sensation of the snow on her skin as she followed the nin’s dodge up with a well-aimed kunai. The weapon landed squarely in the back of his dominant hand and forced him to change grips on his katana.

A small part of Sakura’s mind was immediately suspicious when the two other nin closest to them chose to charge her head-on instead of retreating. Perhaps she had given them too much credit if they were reckless enough to rush into a taijutsu battle with her just because she had taken a few of them out.

It made more sense when chains of water shot out from the ground to bind her ankles and wrists firmly to the ground - the work of the long-range nins’ combined Suiton: Suikusari no Jutsu. They must have been watching for an opening to slow her down long enough for the mid-range hunters to close in on her and deliver a killing blow.

The chains were sturdier than any suiton she had faced in the past, no doubt due to the number of hunters who were focused on restraining her. Sakura channeled a burst of pure chakra to the surface of the skin on her wrists, ankles, and torso; anywhere the chains touched, she honed in on. She could either drive her chakra into the chains, slow down the water molecules in them so that they turned to ice, and shatter them, or push her chakra directly outwards to free herself long enough to move away from the chains.

The first option would have been a more permanent solution, but the breath of a hunter nin on her neck forced Sakura into the second. With a shannaro! Sakura willfully tore her body out of the chains, redirected the chakra to her feet, and used the closest nin’s chest as a platform to fling herself over the chains and out of reach. She shoved one foot into the woman’s chest and used the other to bat a kunai with an explosive tag away from them both.

What Sakura didn’t account for was the nin she had planted her foot on reacting quickly enough to snag her ankle and drag her to the ground with her. She used the momentum of her fall to slide further away from the chains and twisted her ankle to free herself. Ice-covered rocks sliced at her forearms and stomach, but she drove her fingers into the ground to lever herself forward.

Crippling pain radiated from her ankle as soon as she was free, drawing a hoarse cry from her throat. She hadn’t seen a weapon in the nin’s hand, and there was no open wound. A second wave of searing pain nearly brought Sakura to her knees yet again, and she reached out for her medical chakra to send to inspect the area as she narrowly vaulted over a windmill shuriken -

Only to find that summoning her chakra felt like pulling a viscous liquid through a fine sieve. The chakra that had been isolating the poison around her wounds only stayed in place from sheer force of will. She spared a quick glance at her ankle, eyes widening at the black seal branded onto her skin.

Fuinjutsu.

Sakura didn’t recognize the seal and didn’t have time to inspect it further. Water chains exploded from the ground beneath her just as four hunters lunged at her from each direction. She jumped into the air, twisting to narrowly avoid a series of kunai. A loose shuriken lodged into her calf. Sakura immediately recognized the signs of poison digging into her system; she also recognized with a growing trepidation that it took far more of her concentration than she could spare to dredge up the medical chakra necessary to isolate it.

Whatever seal the hunters had placed on her was blocking her chakra flow, but not in a way she had experienced before. Training with Shizune’s poisons and Hinata’s tenketsu blocks hadn’t prepared her for this. Her chakra wasn’t completely inaccessible, but it was as though a fine mesh had settled over each of her chakra points. It was as though the hunters hoped she would continue trying to mold her chakra, exhausting herself enough in the process that they could take her out.

Her dread grew when she reached out for her Byakugo only to feel the same fine mesh blocking her access. She could still feel the mass of chakra settled behind her forehead, but she doubted she could summon enough of it fast enough to make a significant difference in this fight.

Sakura had a sinking feeling that this seal, which she hadn’t even come across in the Uzumaki fuinjutsu scrolls Naruto had lent to her, was designed specifically to hinder ninja with her level of chakra control and reserves. It didn’t matter how much control she had if it took her six times as long to drag her chakra to a specific point. Keeping the poison in her system at bay occupied enough of her attention at the moment. Evading the seemingly endless water chains that followed her and the four nins on her tail only added to her exhaustion.

One of the hunters managed to land a kick squarely on her side, cracking at least two ribs. Sakura took another blow to her back, and she twisted to catch the nin’s ankle. She snapped it cleanly in two, baring her teeth as she drove a kunai into the kunoichi’s neck before she could finish the seals for an Earth-style jutsu.

She managed to keep with this rhythm long enough to incapacitate another two nin but knew that she was reaching her limit. She took a half dozen more hits from the closest hunters and a particularly nasty cut from a katana before she pulled back, focused on her seal, and pushed. Black lines twisted down her face and startled the hunters long enough for her to shunt what chakra she could get ahold of to the soles of her boots. The force of the chakra from her seal was enough to push what little she needed through.

Sakura took off at a sprint, running as far and as fast as she could in the opposite direction of the hunters who immediately followed suit. Knowing her options were limited, Sakura scrambled behind the first large boulder she could find and snapped the highest level genjutsu she could manage over the surrounding area. Her jaw clenched to choke off a scream at the fire that lanced through her chakra network as she forced her chakra into the jutsu.

Her chakra control, it seemed, was not better than whichever nin had developed this seal.

She quickly surveyed her condition - several lacerations, at least two cracked ribs, and more poison in her system than she could afford to isolate at once - and realized that the seal on her ankle was not only making it more difficult to mold chakra but also draining it. Sakura immediately withdrew her own chakra, slamming her Yin seal down before the hunter’s seal could touch her reserves. Without her Byakugo, Sakura figured she barely had enough chakra to maintain her genjutsu and keep the poison around her major wounds locked in place. Healing herself would do nothing but leave her drained and vulnerable when the hunter nins eventually found her.

Her genjutsu skills had improved drastically under Kurenai’s tutelage, but the hunter nins would eventually figure out what she had done and double back to find her. They knew as well as she did that she wasn’t in a condition to flee very far.

Without hesitation, Sakura withdrew the summoning scroll Sasuke had given her from a pouch at her hip and snapped it open. She didn’t have enough chakra to summon enough of Katsuyu to be useful, and Sakura would be long dead before reinforcements came even if she did ask Katsuyu to send a message to Konoha.

As much as she hated snakes, Sakura desperately hoped for Aoda as she drew a bloodied thumb across the parchment (though the rational part of her brain noted she probably didn’t have the chakra to handle that level of summons either). She blanched at the strain the summons put on her chakra network and wondered belatedly if she had overestimated how much of what little chakra she had left she could actually direct towards the summons. Slamming her eyes shut with a choked cry, Sakura visualized grabbing onto the thin trails of chakra that creaked through her veins and pulled.

If she’d had the energy for it, Sakura is certain she would have screamed when it was neither a hawk nor a snake that appeared before her - but rather, Sasuke Uchiha himself.

[oss-crime]

Chapter 2-Project “Ma” –Eve–; Scene 5

Original Sin Story: Crime, pages 48-56

Before they arrived at the village, Adam asked only once, “So you…were the ‘Witch of the Forest’ after all?”

After Eve replied shortly that she was, he didn’t ask anything further.

Naturally, he likely wasn’t going to just let that slide. This simply wasn’t the place for him to pry deeper on that…She was sure that’s all it was.

In actuality, Eve wasn’t that afraid of having her true identity outed at this point. Adam and the others had said that they didn’t intend to harm the “Witch of the Forest”, and over the last several days she had become certain that they were people deserving of her trust.

Rather, if it truly meant that she could become queen, she was deeply honored by it. Only…that was assuming she could get permission from her adoptive father. Eve hadn’t wanted to reveal her identity if it meant going against his wishes, should he not want her to.

But she couldn’t help being found out now. As for how she’d persuade her adoptive father later…That might have been something Adam needed to do, as well as Eve’s role.

Whatever the case, first they needed to make sure that he was alright.

--As they left the forest and saw the buildings of Nemu village, she was forced to conclude that the situation was much more grave than she’d thought.

Houses all over were on fire. Surrounding them all were not villagers, but unfamiliar men clad in red costumes.

“Those…aren’t soldiers of the white army.” Adam paled. “They’re red devotees…The henchmen of the ‘Witch of Merrigod’.”

Eve remembered that name.

As she recalled, Seth had said it the first time he and Adam had come to the village.

“Is she also an ‘Ma’ candidate?”

Adam nodded at Eve’s question. “It would be more accurate to say she was. She certainly has powerful magical ability, but more than that…She’s far too cruel. The institute and the senate ultimately concluded that she would be unsuited to being queen.”

The moment they stopped the carriage just inside the villager’s entrance, they were surrounded by the “red devotees”.

Eve quickly got down from the carriage, spoon ready in hand instead of a staff.

“Where are the people of the village!?”

The men made no move to reply, simply gazing upon Eve with vacant expressions.

“…If you won’t tell me…”

Eve started to put magic into the spoon. These people unsettled her, but she was so agitated that she couldn’t bring herself to care about that.

She didn’t want to just kill people recklessly…But at the very least it was clear that they were threatening the village.

At that moment, the group of men split in two.

Walking between them up to the front, wearing clothing just as red as theirs—was a woman.

“Oh my…You got back a lot sooner than I expected,” she uttered, her posture calm.

She had an adult air about her, but in age she seemed to be somewhat younger than Eve.

“I guess those white army troops weren’t up to snuff…They might be ‘Salem Inheritors’ but I guess they’re just robbers after all.”

Maybe she was the leader of this red-dyed group…This “Witch of Merrigod”.

“Are you an ally of those robbers?”

Eve glared at the Witch of Merrigod.

“Me? You mean did I come to plunder this village? This smelly pauper village? Ha ha, that’s funny.”

“Then why are you…”

“There’s a lot of reasons. Starting from the least important—” The Witch of Merrigod looked over at Adam, still sitting in the carriage. “—This is payback on the Institute for making a fool of me.”

Adam replied to that, his expression twisting, “Payback? We were the ones who got off worse back then.”

“You eggheads shouldn’t have come up to Merrigod Plateau so casually.”

“Oh yes. We’re all regretting that…The others from where they are in the afterlife.”

Though Adam displayed an outspoken hostility towards her, he made no move to get down from the carriage.

It was clear…Adam was afraid of her.

But Eve wasn’t.

They called her the Witch of Merrigod. She must have strong magic too.

But that didn’t mean she had any intention of just backing down.

I must protect the village…Protect everyone…

Yes, she couldn’t see any of the villagers anywhere, including the village chief.

Their homes continued to burn, but there were no corpses of the people who lived in them lying around.

The only possibilities that she could think of…Maybe they all ran off before Eve and Adam arrived…Or else they were being held prisoner somewhere.

“Where is everyone?”

This time Eve posed her question from earlier to the Witch of Merrigod.

“Are you worried about your father and the others? Ha ha…Then go see for yourself.”

The Witch of Merrigod pointed further into the village—in the direction of the village chief’s house.

Eve couldn’t help but feel anxious at that.

She was letting her see the other villagers quite easily. Which must mean—

Adam finally got down from the carriage, and stood by Eve.

“…Let’s go together.”

His expression was stiff. He too must have thought up the worst case scenario.

After sharing a nod, the both of them started to sprint in the direction of the village chief’s house.

The Witch of Merrigod and her devotees showed no sign that they intended to stop them.

She just continued to smirk.

.

--The fate that had befallen Raiou Zvezda, village chief of Nemu.

It became clear the moment that they arrived before the house.

“This can’t…”

Eve was at a loss for words.

Her kindhearted adoptive father had been crucified on a large cross that had been erected in the garden.

There was no light in his eyes, and his exposed, naked body was covered in wounds.

Anyone could tell that he was already dead.

And standing around that cross—were the men of the village.

They didn’t look to be restrained or anything like that.

But just like the “Red Devotees”, they wore vacant expressions, and, without giving any indication that they were going to let the village chief down from that cross, they just…stood there.

Adam stopped Eve as she tried to walk closer to them.

“Don’t. They’re not themselves.”

“How!? I don’t understand!” Tears flowed from Eve’s eyes. “My father was the most powerful sorcerer in the village! He wouldn’t lose to anyone…The white army never attacked because they were afraid of him! So how could they…so easily…”

“…This’ll be hard to say, but…” Adam hesitated for a moment, but then he continued, marshalling his strength, “It probably…wasn’t the Witch of Merrigod and her henchmen who attacked the village chief directly.”

“…!?”

“It was those villagers standing around him. The village chief likely hadn’t been able to bring himself to use his magic on people that he knew.”

“That can’t…That’s impossible! No one would ever hurt my father—”

“That is the power that the Witch of Merrigod—that Meta Salmhofer has. She…can change members of the opposite sex into her puppets using the power of an ‘Inheritor of Gilles’.”

“…”

“One of Meta’s aims must have been the village chief’s life…Though I don’t know why.”

“…That woman…Because of her, my father…”

“Whatever happened, we should get out of the village for now.”

But Eve shook her head, crying. “No! That woman…I won’t forgive her.”

She tightly gripped the spoon in her hand.

“Eve…You must realize that if you were to fight against Meta—The villagers that she’s controlling would come to stop you.”

“…”

“Would you…be willing to shoot lightning at your friends?”

“…”

She could never.

Adam gently embraced Eve’s shoulders.

“First we should reconvene with Gammon. Then we’ll figure out what to—”

--Boom!

An explosion suddenly rang out from the entrance to the village.

“…What!?”

In response to Eve’s confusion, Adam seemed to immediately guess what the source of the noise was.

“That’s—the sound of the heavy artillery of the larger model carriages. It’s the reinforcements from the capital!”

--Adam’s prediction had been correct.

The main unit of the peacekeeping force that had been dispatched from the capital for combat against the white army had arrived at Nemu village with impeccable timing.

Their main aim had been to rendezvous with Gammon, who had been in the village, but as they happened to come across the area being attacked by the red devotees, they simply switched their purpose to suppressing them, instead.

The result—Either because they concluded they were hopelessly outnumbered, or because they had already achieved their goal, the Witch of Merrigod and her cohorts quickly fled.

But as this also resulted in the village men who were the primary residents of this place being driven off as well, the only ones left in the village of Nemu were Adam and Eve.

After the village had been secured, the army put out the fires on its homes.

And then, inside a small cattle pen in the deepest part of the village…they discovered the corpses of all the village’s women.

.

At Adam’s invitation, Eve ended up riding along to the Twelve Royal Capitals on one of the heavy military carriages.

She had no reason to refuse.

She had already lost any place she could return to.

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[fireemblems24]

Flame Emperor Reveal Analysis

This game is all over the place with this. This level delivered some of the most intense and emotional moments so far, but doesn’t always capitalize on character development and conflict. 

I’m playing all four routes in Fire Emblem Three Houses mostly blind. Below is spoilers for all four routes (which I’m learning the names of now). And for the first it’s actually 4! 

Crimson Flower & Silver Snow

I lied. Originally I planned on writing a different analysis for Crimson Flower and Silver Snow, but the build up is the same. Only the fallout is different, and yeah there’s a lot to say about how things played out. 

The Black Eagles routes have the biggest advantage for this scene because your main character is the Flame Emperor. It does not hold back. All of your students, sans Edelgard and Hubert, are terrified, confused, and hurt. None of them grasp fully what’s going on when Edelgard takes her mask off and orders her army to kill anyone who stands against her. The voice actors do a fantastic job here: Dorothea, Caspar, Bernadetta, and others sell the mess of emotions the Black Eagles experience, and Edelgard sounds stone-cold and in-command. Her betrayal is the gut-punch it should be. 

The level presents a no-win scenario. One of your students is willing to kill you and everyone else you’re supposed to protect, and Rhea is out for blood. No matter what happens, no matter what you do, you lose. It’s a heartbreaking, emotional mess of a situation the writing sets up. 

Even prior to all this, the dance between revealing to much or to little about Edelgard’s true intentions is fantastic. Where the Blue Lions basically dumps the answer in your lap and the Golden Deer gives little to no hints at the Flame Emperor’s identity, the Black Eagles is the only route where I do not know if I would’ve guessed correctly or had so few clues that I didn’t bother trying to guess. 

Edelgard drops enough hints to guess correctly if you’re looking for them. She always questions Byleth about his thoughts on the Flame Emperor, trying to drive a wedge between the Emperor and the heinous actions the masked knight is involved in.  Likewise, Edelgard constantly asks Byleth if he’d pick her over the whole world. She also makes alarming declarations that tow the line between reformer and despot. All of these actions make sense in retrospect - she was fishing to see who would and would not side with her regardless of her actions. 

The scene in the Holy Tomb builds up to a crescendo, Edelgard is defeated, and Rhea makes her demand to kill Edelgard. It’s a bit telling Rhea needed to go so extreme in order to make siding with Edelgard believable, but it’s counteracted  by the game going as far as making Edelgard an enemy unit who can and will kill her classmates. Both women resort to extremes. Rhea is emotional, hateful, and screaming for blood. Edelgard is cold, calculated, and resorting to using victims of human experimentation to kill her own friends. These are two driven, passionate women exposing their ugliest sides in an emotional scene ripe for fantastic character development and conflict. 

And then . . . the wrap-up. 

Silver Snow

Should you choose to kill Edelgard, you land in Silver Snow. Rhea’s angry rant against Edelgard is fantastically delivered and makes me anticipate further development from her character. Back in Garreg Mach Monastery, Rhea  juxtaposes her earlier scene for a softer one. She implies a willingness to sacrifice her life to protect her home, and asks Byleth to take her role should something happen to her. Rhea’s plan all along was to put Byleth (who is connected to Sothis, who is connected to Rhea, though the details are still unknown to me) in charge. After hearing Rhea call for blood, it’s a sweet scene between Byleth and the archbishop. The problem with it is that every route gets these scenes sans Crimson Flower. It’s two great scenes for Rhea, but not unique to Silver Snow. 

And here’s the weird part - there is no unique content for Rhea outside of a few initial lines when choosing to kill Edelgard. Instead, we get the Black Eagles upset and unsure about Edelgard’s actions, a few wondering how much she planned all along and how involved she was in every horrible thing that happened during their school year. It’s necessary, but there’s nothing stand-out in anyone’s dialogue to bring home a real gut-punch. 

Seteth gets the best unique content in Silver Snow when he offers the Black Eagles a chance to defect to the Empire should they desire. It’s delivered softly with no threat behind it, showing an earnest desire for the students to feel comfortable even if it means they’re going to turn around and try to slaughter him in thanks. Thankfully, none of the students leave. Cyril and Catherine automatically join your team, and Hilda is now recruitable as well to make up for losing Hubert and Edelgard.   

The fall out for choosing to stand against Edelgard is . . . fine. For such a unique event in Fire Emblem (siding against your lord, possibly losing two units you’ve heavily invested in should you not know what’s coming), I expected a bit more drama and flare and a lot more Rhea. However, this is only the start, and it gave what it needed to give. 

The stage has been well set. Everyone’s in a no-win situation. Should they lose, they and everyone else in Fodlan will suffer an all-out, dragged-out war. They’ll lose their school and have to fight against their home country (sans Petra) where most of their family and friends live. Killing Edelgard ends the conflict, but she is their former friend, classmate, and rightful leader. She gives them no choice - fight for me or die standing against me. Neither option will leave Byleth and the remaining students wholly satisfied, so I foresee more bittersweet confrontations coming, and I look forward to it.

Crimson Flower 

Deciding to protect Edelgard lands you on the Crimson Flower path. I have to say, I’ve read and watched thousands of stories and this one scene stands out among all others. 

Never in my life have I ever seen characters react to a situation in a way that makes less sense. Even more baffling is how much potential gets tossed out the window. Stories thrive on conflict and character development and this scene is ripe with potential, but instead of even letting the fruit grow rancid they just . . . act like it never existed. 

After Byleth picks to guard Edelgard, Rhea loses it and is ready to tear Byleth to pieces before turning into a dragon. The Black Eagles and Edelgard all run away and, not long after, make it back to Enbarr safely. How they escaped a rampaging dragon or successfully fled Garreg Mach is hand-waved away. This is the kind of hand-waving I can forgive. It’s lazy writing, but it doesn’t really impede the story. What I cannot forgive is the hand-waving that comes next. 

Edelgard has a brief scene where she tells her classmates her intentions - she wants to rid Fodlan of the Church of Serios’s control, claims that Rhea and her fellow beasts have secretly ruled humanity and held them back, and is going to declare war. She asks who will join her. Predictably, all of them do - except Flayn. Edelgard mentions that Flayn has opted not to stay with the group. 

Hmmm. I wonder why. Could it be Edelgard’s lackey kidnapped and tortured her for a whole month, preparing her for blood experiments at the hands of an evil group of mages who just happen to be Edelgard’s allies? Maybe that had something to do with it. The fact the game presents this is as some magnanimous act is hilarious. I believe Edelgard would let someone like, say Petra, turn away too, but she deserves no “brownie points” for allowing someone who she allowed to get tortured and set-up for a slow death as a human sacrifice to leave and not decide to attack her the home where her father still lives. I think this aspect of Edelgard’s character would’ve hit home significantly harder if someone who wasn’t so throughly victimized by Edelgard’s actions had fled, or you actually saw Flayn leave. 

No one asks about the Death Knight. No one asks about Flayn’s kidnapping. No one asks about Kostas attempting to kill students. No one asks about the students kidnapped and experimented on or Remire Village or Jeralt. No one asks where the Crest Beasts Edelgard is using came from. No one asks about the fact she just tried to kill all of them, or what she’s going to do with the Crest Stones. No one even mentions the Flame Emperor. No one questions the history she spilled on them, claiming the church was behind the splitting of Fodlan despite not even having enough knights to guard their own monastery and needed students to help out at events. 

I could buy the Black Eagles running away with Edelgard. The scene where Byleth chooses Rhea or Edelgard is highly emotional. Things happen quickly and no one is given much of a chance to process anything. Rhea doesn’t give anyone much of a choice by shifting into a dragon. I wish they didn’t rely so much on “Rhea bad” to make any sense of siding with Edelgard, but it is believable. What I cannot buy is how no one questions anything afterwards. 

It’s like the whole cast just forgot the first eleven chapters. No one even mentions the Flame Emperor’s existence. The moment the mask came off, it ceased to exist. Everyone mindlessly believes everything Edelgard says, and no one even asks any questions - not about Rhea, not about the history of Fodlan, not about the Flame Emperor’s actions. Barely anyone bats an eyelash at the idea of attacking their own school and killing former classmates, teachers, and friends. Everyone comes across borderline brainwashed. Did the writers have so little faith in Edelgard’s position they were afraid to even attempt exploring it? Even worse is the strategy meeting is just Edelgard, Hubert, and Byleth - the Black Eagles are no where to be seen. It makes them come across like mindless puppets rather than anyone remotely rational - like pawns arranged on a board required for gameplay reasons than actual characters.        

Never in my life have I seen a story throw away so much potential character development and conflict. The situation here is intriguing. Edelgard’s stance is fascinating, but everything falls short when all that’s interesting about it is getting tossed out the window because Rhea is secretly evil and nothing Edelgard did beforehand seems to matter anymore. I am seriously concerned about where this route is heading, because despite the massive potential, it seems like it cares less about that and more about making sure Edelgard looks good rather than complex and interesting, even at the cost of logic, character development, and by turning other interesting characters black so Edelgard has someone she can look better than in comparison rather than standing on her own ideals.     

Verdant Wind

Am I correct in assuming the fandom consensus is that Verdant Wind had the least impactful Flame Emperor reveal? Because it did. 

Edelgard had little to no presence in Verdant Wind. Outside of pre and post class vs class battle banter, her only scene consisted of interrogating Claude and getting and giving no answers. Claude has no connection to Edelgard and neither does Byleth or any of the Golden Deer. When the mask comes off and it’s her face behind it, there’s no emotional response. 

The fallout is equally lackluster. Claude demands answers from Edelgard, which she refuses to answer, and she warps away. Afterwards, things play out the same way they do on every route. And that’s the core issue here. Claude and the Golden Deer bring nothing unique to this scene. Elements of surprise that Edelgard is the Flame Emperor, her willingness to kill all your units to get crest stones, and her declaration of war is there on every route. Claude’s character and goals have had no impact on the plot. 

Analyzing this scene has brought to light my main issue with the Verdant Wind route thus far. It’s that Claude and friends have done nothing to move the plot forward. Things just happen; no character is making anything happen. You could argue it’s the same for the Azure Moon route, but Dimitri’s clearly defined goals and emotional connection makes it a streamlined story with a sense of forward progression instead of plot points getting dumped in the player’s lap. 

It’s too bad, because Verdant Wind could’ve approached this differently. Instead of Claude getting nothing done and shouting about every relic that showed up, he and Byleth could’ve solved mysteries together a la Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boy. For all of Claude’s questioning everything, very little attention was paid to unmasking the Flame Emperor. Verdant Wind guided its players to look at the wrong mysteries - mysteries that ultimately got no answers while ignoring the one part one was actually about figuring out, and if this was flipped, Verdant Wind would’ve had a much more impactful Flame Emperor reveal. 

I will give Verdant Wind major bonus points though. It is nice to see a character question Edelgard about her involvement in things. Dimitri’s too caught up in his Duscur trauma (which I don’t believe Edelgard participated in) and neither Silver Snow and especially Crimson Flower question Edelgard’s actions as the Flame Emperor, but Claude throws at her all the questions I wanted to hear: what about Flayn? What about Jeralt? What about Remire? So congrats Claude, you’re the only character and the only route that’s holding Edelgard actually responsible for her actual actions. If only she was the mystery you were investigating instead of one that went exactly no where for eleven straight chapters. 

Azure Moon

What’s interesting here is that the Flame Emperor’s reveal is less about who the mystery person is and more about our protagonist’s, Dimitri’s, reaction to it. And that is core reason behind this scene’s success. 

Multiple users on here told me to play chapter eleven of Blue Lions first, and I’m both glad and upset I listened to them. Glad, because they were all right, this route had by far the best Flame Emperor reveal, but sad because it all went downhill from there. 

The Crimson Flower/Silver Snow routes should’ve had the best Flame Emperor reveal. After all, those are the routes where Edelgard plays the biggest role, but the follow up to the scene is fairly lackluster, especially in Crimson Flower. Azure Moon, on the other hand, did everything Crimson Flower was afraid to - address the elephant in the room.   

Characters in Crimson Flower respond to the situation as if Edelgard didn’t just try to kill all of them, nor do they ask any questions about her actions as the Flame Emperor. Everyone acts as if none of that ever happened, and by not bothering to even mention it, those actions stick out even worse than they would’ve otherwise. 

The opposite is true in Azure Moon. Everyone is unnerved by Dimitri’s violent outburst. Felix jumps at the chance to tell everyone, “I told you so.” No one knows what to do about Dimitri, nor do they really have time to process anything with Edelgard’s war machine knocking on their front door. However, this is the base expectation of a story - that characters respond realistically to what happened prior instead of teleporting to some surreal dimension where Edelgard isn’t working with people who perform human experimentation. 

So what exactly did Azure Moon do to make this reveal so successful? It utilized the route’s unique aspects: Dimitri’s mental instability and desire for revenge, terrible family history, and emotional connection to Edelgard. 

Unlike Verdant Wind, Edelgard has an actual presence and relevance in Azure Moon thanks to her connection to Dimitri. He cares about her like family, which makes her betrayal more personal and automatically more impactful than in Verdant Wind. Even more brilliant here is milking the emotional aspect of what happened. Instead of focusing on “shocking” the reader with Edelgard’s betrayal, it drops hints about her secret identity with all the subtly of a lead brick. 

You know what inevitable, dramatic, and tragic outcome is coming. Edelgard, Dimitri’s only remaining family (outside of an uncle he’s on bad terms with), is working hand-in-hand with the people who caused the deaths of his family which led to the genocide of a race of people and the source all of his trauma.  Dimitri makes it quite clear he’s out for revenge, and that anything related to Duscur triggers his PTSD so bad it seems like a dissociative or psychotic episode. Azure Moon does not build up a mystery, it builds up an emotional conflict - like watching a train wreck that you know is coming and can’t stop. 

And that’s the brilliance of it - this scene isn’t about Edelgard being the Flame Emperor, we already know that, it’s about Dimitri, who this route is about and who the player is emotionally invested in during this version of the story. 

Nor does this game disappoint here. There’s no softening anything to try and make Dimitri look “better.” He has a full-on violent breakdown. It’s devastating. He is succumbing fully to his demons after fighting against it over and over while getting tossed into triggering situations ad nauseam and getting no help in return (after all, therapy, medication, hell even the concept of mental illness simply doesn’t exist). All the signs that the route has built up explode in an emotional scene, and probably thee best cut scene so far with some of the best voice acting in Fire Emblem to carry it out. Every plot thread comes to a head: Dimitri’s lust for revenge, his unstable mental health, the mystery of the Flame Emperor’s identity, etc . . . 

The upcoming battle has more meaning now. It has what is at steak in the other routes - win or lose and the fear of having to kill former classmates - and more. Because it isn’t just about the battle of Edelgard vs the world, but also the battle for Dimitri’s mental health and for his soul. There’s a bit of a catch-22 here, is Edelgard dying really the best ending? Killing her saves many lives, but at the cost of Dimitri’s mental health? What if she dies and he doesn’t kill her, but what if he does? Would he kill himself now that the dead are avenged? Or what if she lives and this drags on longer? No option is good. There isn’t an easy win button by offing Edelgard or taking over the school. Every possible ending is a bad ending. Your lead character is in the middle of a mental breakdown, and giving into his demons and lust for revenge (which is a separate issue exasperated by ill mental health) and the situation only makes it worse and is to dire to properly let anyone deal with said breakdown. The tension, the drama, the sense of foreboding dread, is all so much more here than in all the other routes. 

What makes Azure Moon’s handling of the Flame Emperor so good is that it widely succeeded where the other two routes failed. Verdant Wind didn’t make the reveal relevant to anything Claude was interested in or working towards. Crimson Flower completely and utterly failed to address Edelgard’s actions let alone use that to create compelling tension. Azure Moon did both. It made the Flame Emperor reveal relevant to the route, even made it actually about the main character of the route. Nor is it shying away from conflict and tension, even if it means letting it’s main character fall out of grace and risking the player’s infatuation/admiration/whatever with/of Dimitri by having him succumb to his dark side. Because it’s not protecting him, he’s going to turn out a way better character for it. 

I will admit though, that I think playing all four routes impacted this a bit. It didn’t benefit Azure Moon, but I think this route spoiling who the Flame Emperor is hurt the other routes. Verdant Wind might’ve had at least some tiny smudge of an impact because it’s the only route where there’s very little way to correctly guess who the Flame Emperor is - the only one where it may be truly a surprise. Crimson Flower/Silver Snow does make it a bit more obvious, but doesn’t quite spell it out for you the way Azure Moon does. Here, the player kind of has to be looking for it. Obviously though, you can only learn this once, and good writing could’ve made all the routes impactful with very small tweaks - have Verdant Wind actually focus on the mystery that’s solved at the end of Part 1 (who is the Flame Emperor) and actually have characters react to and get answers about Edelgard’s actions. I also think the choice between Silver Snow and Crimson Flower looses its tension when you go into it knowing you’ll pick both. Azure Moon easily had the best reveal, so I want to ultimately thank everyone who told me to do this one first - you were all very, very right. 

[hitbythunder]

Chandrilan Moons -4

A Kylo Ren x Reader story with much angst, possessiveness and dark themes (warnings will be updated as the story progresses) –> Read also on AO3

Summary: Growing up under the loving care of your foster-mother, Leia Organa, there had been nothing for you and Rey to want for. Though not of kin, you loved Rey as your sister and spent a happy childhood with her on Chandrila. But when the boiling galactic politics demanded for Leia to take action, for the Resistance to rise and fight, the girls could no longer evade the cruelty of the world. Kylo Ren sought a map as a key to revenge, to freedom, and had no use for a force-unsensitive young girl like you. You were simply a means to an end. Until his darkness latched onto you, drawn in by your light as you were by the demon that is Kylo Ren - inevitably gravitating towards each other, bound to be one. Like the Chandrilan moons.

**** WARNING: description of violence, use of the Force

____________________________xXx____________________________

4- A Ruffled Little Bird

Pure adrenaline rushed through my body, dulling the pain of my injuries and keeping my head clear enough to realize who that hooded, black creature in a mask was. Looming above me was Kylo Ren in the flesh, the nightmare of the galaxy. For a brief moment, I doubted my vision - because why would he be here of all places? - but watching Ren slaughter both thieves in the blink of an eye and with such unique vigor, convinced me of his reality and made it very clear that my situation had just gotten so much worse. Like to totally terrifying, end-of-life scenario.

Luckily my body's flight-mode took over then and somehow I managed to get off the ground, stumbling away from the black giant on shaky feet. I didn't get far, though, because my mind spun too much to maintain balance, forcing me back on the ground after a few steps. The jolt of pain in my right hand, which had earlier been stepped on, allowed for a moment of clarity in my mind and above the frantic beating of my heart I heard Kylo Ren's heavy footsteps approaching.

  +++

  What a fascinating mechanism, this will to live, ingrained at the very base level of any living being and making the girl flee him despite her injured state. Honestly, Kylo was surprised that she even made it that far and watched with almost clinical curiosity how she fell and now cowered on the ground. Panic and sheer horror radiated off her, both peaking when she rolled onto her back and faced him. Looming above her and with the sabre at the ready, Kylo hesitated to end her misery as the gentle whisper of the Force suggested him to spare her.

Suspicious of this whole affair, he took his time to muster her from head to toe. Beige functional blouse, brown combat-pants and boots (all dirty and scruffy by now) exhibited her affiliation to the Resistance, but her built was too small and soft for her to be an active fighter. Perhaps a scout or carrier-pilot. The top of her hair was pulled back and tied in a bun, while the rest lay in a braid over her shoulder, many strands having already escaped. With her right hand cradled against her chest, she looked quite like a ruffled little bird - not at all what he had expected to find amidst the thicket. So why had he come here? He caught her wondering the same, ire rising within him at this waste of time.

 "Where's the droid?" he spoke finally, the girl jumping as his distorted voice filled the silence around them.

"I don't-" but he didn't let her finish, for she would have lied anyways, and invaded her mind without preamble nor hindrance. Her latest memories swirled around there, so fresh and raw, yet not in exact chronological order, but Kylo got the gist rather quickly. A snipped of memory revealed that the droid had fled the scene, as confirmed by the suspicious tracks he had spotted earlier, and with it the map was gone. The map. The map. The map.

 Kylo felt her mind shutting down, more and more memories and thoughts vanishing into the dark void of her unconsciousness, beyond his access. She's fainting, he knew but continued, skipping through the remaining snippets before those too were gone, and at the next glimpse she was out cold. It had been there, just for a split-second, yet long enough for him to recognize the ripple in the Force which had prompted him to come here. This girl, as insignificant she otherwise might be, had seen the map to Luke Skywalker with her own eyes.

 And she'll show it to me. Kylo thought without doubt and deactivated his sabre. In one fluid movement, he then gathered her in his arms and picked her up, making his way back to the ship.

   Effortlessly he carried her through the thicket in a quick pace, a rush of elation and excitement flooding his mind upon the apparent success of this mission. As soon as he stepped out of the forest, two of his officers came running towards him, their white boots scrunching on the charred earth. In the background, Kylo made out shouts and shots as stormtroopers fought everything that moved between the smoke and flames, upon the ruins of Takodana castle.

 "Resistance back-up is approaching from the sea-side, Sir. Likely contact in 7 minutes!" one of the officers reported after a quick salute to their superior. Still looking at the battle-field, Kylo could sense the other force-user there and briefly frowned at the missed confrontation. But the map inside that girl's mind was of too much value to let it slip his hands - literally.

 "Abort mission and have all units return to the Finalizer. I've got what we need." Kylo commanded in a cool, almost detached tone, that left no room for argument. Not that any of his subordinates would ever be as foolish as to contradict him. No, that role was solely reserved for Hux.

"Yes, Sir!" they barked in unison as the trained dogs they were and dashed off to follow his orders. Kylo felt the girl stir in his arms then and sensed that her mind was drifting back to the surface of consciousness upon the noise of the ongoing battle around them. It took but a thought of him to put her back into a deep slumber, her small frame relaxing peacefully, as he cradled her closer against his chest.

   +++

  Blaster shots and debris whirled past Rey and Poe, both ducking in unison behind a large chunk of the castle's wall - or had it been a ceiling, one couldn't be sure anymore. They had all been caught unawares, in a moment of false security, and suddenly the castle had been under attack. The white ants of the First Order had swarmed the place and pure chaos had risen among the canteen's guests. Staying closely together, Han had led their small group through a secret tunnel that connected the castle with the ground level at the bottom of the main stairs. One could reach the landing area much quicker that way, which was where Chewie and _________ would already wait for them.

 But Chewie had come running towards them, firing left and right at approaching troopers. So they had split up to save time: Han and Fin fought their way to the Falcon and would get it ready for take-off, while Rey and Poe turned the other direction to where she sensed her sister. Uneducated in the Force and its ways, Poe was impressed by Rey's capability to track her sister in the vicinity and dashed off as soon as she told him the direction. The thought of __________ and two thugs alone in the woods didn't sit well with Poe at all and he cursed the girl for her foolish bravery.

 It's gonna be fine. We'll find her, get out of here and have that drink I promised her.

 Oh how foolish of him to believe that. The countless stormtroopers kept blocking their way, slowing down any approach towards the forest, and Poe cursed the stars for being on the ground right now. If only he was in his star-fighter. Peeking up from behind their hiding spot, Poe scanned the area for any useful vessel or a better point of vantage for them to occupy. His sharp eyes landed on a black sleek ship that looked very much like a fancy First Order high-tech starfighter and as he considered the theft thereof he noticed a hooded figure, clad in black from head to toe, approaching the ship.

 Kylo Ren, Poe's mind supplied and for a brief moment he visualized what a triumph it would be for the Resistance if they got hold (or rid of) the Frist Order's second-in-command. But such thoughts were wiped away, his mind cleansed until naked dread remained, when Poe's gaze dropped to the girl in Ren's arms.

 "No. No, no, no, no! NO!" he yelled as panic overtook him and if not for Rey pulling him back behind their cover he would be sporting a hole in his head.

"Kriff, Poe! What's gotten-" Rey barked but he cut her right off, almost shouting at her to let him go and in the next moment he was dashing across the charred earth towards the black ship. But the ranks of white troopers kept a tight line surrounding their superior, blocking off any further advance, and forcing Poe - as well as Rey, who had followed him of course - to watch helplessly as the galaxy's nightmare carried an unconscious _____________ on board.

   Poe nearly burst with frustration and shame when he and the rest of his little group stood in front of the General's ship. All dirtied, with minor wounds and glum faces, they made a miserable welcoming-party indeed. Leia hadn't even properly set a foot on the ground when Rey had thrown herself at her foster-mother in despair.

 "What happened, my dear?" the wise lady prompted, quickly glancing at everyone of the group before focusing again on Rey. "Where's your sister?"

"Kylo Ren ... H-he took her!" the young girl wailed under tears and Leia froze on the spot. It lasted only a fracture of a second, but Poe saw it, and he realized with dread that the General was afraid of Kylo Ren. Or at least afraid of what he would do to her girl. And at that moment, it seemed there would be little chance to get ________ back. Not that anybody dared to voice that opinion.

"Hush, darling, hush now." Leia cooed and lovingly embraced Rey to spend some comfort. "We'll think of something. But now we must gather our forces and leave for the base."

"I'll get her on board, General." Poe offered instantly, hoping to distract himself by being useful, and with a nod Leia dismissed him and Rey.

"We'll check on the Falcon, then." Han in his typical avoiding-behavior tried to make himself scarce too but Leia wouldn't have it.

"A moment, Han?" and by her tone he knew it wasn't negotiable.

 Stepping a little away from the carrier, they had some privacy and Han spied the cracks in Leia's hardened facade. Understandably, really, for he himself felt devastated at the situation. He then explained as best as he could what had happened, feeling very uncomfortable under Leia's scrutinizing gaze. She nodded, averted her eyes that had glassed over, and Han could feel her pain pinching his heart. He pulled her into his arms without hesitation.

"Do you think he knows?" she whispered against his chest, her head tucked in under his chin like a perfect fit.

"How could he? It's a secret between us three and we've not spoken 'bout it in all those years. He simply can't know." he replied and held her lovingly, like he should have done many occasions prior. Leia slung her arms around his torso, closed her eyes and sighed deeply.

 "And may the Force keep it that way."

[userarchive]

Unexpected Circumstances Ch 11

Warnings: Language, talk of the job/sex trafficking. A/N: Y’all this took a fcking WEEK to work through cause there was so much detailing to pay attention to. Sue me if things aren’t accurate/canon/whatever. I think it turned out okay enough?!

**

To say you were practically exhausted would nearly be an understatement at this point. Living undercover was never easy, but with it being the Christmas season simply made things worse, parties were larger, filled with more people you needed to document, the drugs and alcohol moved freely through them, you dealt with more suppliers than any other time of year. You’d finally made your way past Christmas day, relishing in a couple of days of relaxation. Alejandro ordered a feast of delicacies, mimosa’s with breakfast and far too expensive wine with dinner, gifting you with the diamond bracelet you so ‘obviously deserved’ over lunch. While you had to admit, living the high life was something you did sometimes miss from your childhood, you were more than happy knowing there were only six days until SVU would make the bust, only six bullshit parties until you’d finally be free from this specific hell.

It was the evening of the 26th, you’d wrapped up Christmas, the penthouse returning to its normal decoration, prepping for the New Years Eve party. You’d set up a number of rooms for clients and girls, the top wing where your and Alejandro’s rooms were clearly off limits, but you had security placed at the top of that staircase. You traipsed down the stairs, heels in your hand, hair curled loosely around your shoulders, blue dress hugging every inch of your body like no tomorrow. The log book tucked under your arm, a smirk on your lips as you met Alejandro’s gaze.

“You ready?” You asked at the base of the stairs, slipping your feet into the heels, “Should be an easy night.”

“I’m just waiting for the 31st Chiquita.” He replied. You gave him a soft smile, happily indulging into the food he’d ordered for the two of you, gratefully accepting the glass of champagne he poured for you.

Slowly over the next couple of hours the girls started to arrive, escorted by their pimps/madams, you were quick to baby them, reminding them that when they were in your house, they didn’t need to do anything they didn’t want to. Anything unacceptable happens, they were to call you, and you’d fix the situation. You were quick to remind the pimps that it was, your house, your rules, you knew most of the girls that came through your parties were of age and willingly doing this, but there was always a limit of no. If they didn’t want it, you didn’t allow it and you were definitely going to kick a customer out and red list him from as many parties as possible.

A few hours later and the party was in full swing, you had a good handful of perps throughout the suite, everything was going smoothly, the money, booze and drugs were flowing smoothly. Alejandro kept a protective eye while you finished up the books, handing you a fresh glass of champagne when you flipped the book shut, letting out a hefty sigh. You passed it off to one of the nearby security guards, insisting he put it upstairs where you kept the others. 

“You okay Mija?” He questioned as you moved from the island, facing the extravagant living room.

“Yeah.” You ran a hand through your hair as you took a hefty gulp of the alcohol “I just have a bad feeling about tonight…” You glanced up at him,  “I think you should get out of here.”

“And what? Leave you to deal with the blow out on your own?” You tossed him a wicked grin,

“We both know all I have to do is shed a few tears and flip on a few of these idiots and I’ll be walking away with a misdemeanour. That last bust…wasn’t vice, sex crimes is onto us now. The target on our back is getting bigger.” Your words were quietly muttered into the rim of your champagne flute, eyes watching the room. 

“Well it sounds like you know the drill, do exactly that, and we run. How do you feel about the French Polynesia? Sure beats the New York winter.” You rolled your eyes at his comment. Sure, a tropical getaway of a vacation sounded fucking wonderful right about now, but the last thing you wanted was another year under. You took a swig of champagne, leaving the glass on the counter, muttering that you were going to do a quick round of the house, not that you would find any trouble upstairs. Oh no, the trouble was walking in the door while you made your way back down the staircase.

“You really think you can throw a party on my turf without me darlin’?” Fucking Declan.

“Last I checked you weren’t invited O’Rourke.” You strode towards him, hands settling on your hips, “Not to mention this isn’t your turf.”

“C’mon sweetheart, you forget what I have to offer?” You scoffed at that, noticing Alejandro cautiously moving towards the two of you.

“Oh, what!? Strung out sixteen year olds?!” A hand wildly gestured to the four girls behind him, obviously under age and obviously not sober. “You’re just here to pretend you’re fancy when you are in fact, a piece of trash. Get the fuck out of here.”  Your personal rage towards the man, knowing that he still had his bosses convinced that he was undercover when he was in fact a criminal, blinded you from noticing him pulling the gun from inside his coat. You yelped as he crashed the butt of it into the side of your head, yelling something about how you were no better than a stupid whore.

“HEY!” The shout came from Alejandro, he moved to push Declan against a wall but you were a hot second faster, a heel to the balls, you had the gun out of his hand and unloaded in a matter of seconds, tossing the magazine to the floor in the direction of the nearest security. Nonetheless he shoved his shoulders hard enough to send the other man stumbling in the direction of the elevator. You heard the all too familiar ‘gun!’ shout with just enough time to look up at Alejandro.

“Run!” Grasping your hand he tugged you towards the back entrance, you were halfway through the door when ESU caught you, coming from that entrance. The cops behind them were more than quick to wrench you and Alejandro apart, no doubt knowing exactly who you were, and catching the big fish was more important than trying to gather up minnows.

‘You have got to be fucking kidding me…’

***

You knew hours had passed, you’d been taken down to the 2-4 and very unceremoniously tossed into an interrogation room, at least they’d been generous enough to un-cuff you and give you an ice pack for the pistol whipping you’d taken. Whenever a bust happened with you and Alejandro they were always going to send in the big guns, and they usually let you wait it out while they started with him. You’d collapsed yourself against the cold metal table, legs dangling off the edge, you couldn’t believe this, five days, five fucking days until SVU was supposed to make the bust. You were livid with whatever dumb ass Captain approved the bust without communicating to other units, and on the 26th of all days?! It was your smallest party, aside from the added bonus of Declan in cuffs, there was no upside to this whatsoever.

With the sound of the door opening, you lolled your head to the side, annoyed expression on your face matching the one on man who walked in, clearly Alejandro wasn’t talking.

“Get up.” Shooting a glare at the way he kicked the leg of the table, you rolled your eyes. Stereotypical, send in the big burly guy to play bad cop with the Queen. You knew who he was, and if Elliot Stabler was questioning you, Organized Crime seemed to also be on your tail.

“Make me.” It slipped out before you stop yourself. It was late, way too late for you to be strapped into a too tight dress and stilettos, you knew you were either spending the night in a holding cell or heading back to your precinct to work the case, your attitude wasn’t exactly ideal. Stabler sighed heavily, grabbing the leg of the table by your head and giving it a hefty tug, pulling it out from under you causing you to nearly topple over as your heels met the floor. He moved back in front of you, a tilt of the head, smirk on his lips, sizing you up as he moved in closer.

“Your King’s not talking, figured maybe you’d be more up for it.”

“Am I supposed to be afraid of you?” You cocked a brow, “Cause it certainly isn’t working, this whole, bad cop thing? Hasn’t aged well.”

“Sit down.” 

“And I suppose you want me to not shut up this time.” The only reason you even considered obeying the order was the aching in your feet from being in heels all night, “What does Organized Crime want with us anyways. It’s usually Vice.” He stalled slightly at that, making you smirk, you loved having the upper hand on men like him.

“Someone let it slip on the way in?”

“Oh…no. Sergeant Stabler, you know who I am, why shouldn’t I know who you are?” Yeah…this was definitely Organized Crime’s first time dealing with the royalty of Manhattan. “Shame you didn’t run your little op past the other departments, would’ve heard New Year’s was the night to go in.”

“What, you got cops working for you? Letting you know the little secrets so you can evade arrest?”

“Am I under arrest Sergeant?” You gave a smirk at the sigh he released in response.

“Technically, we don’t have anything on you…yet.”

“That’s what I thought.” You stood from the table, eager to get the fuck out of the unfamiliar precinct and back to the confines of your own. You barely noticed Stabler moving faster than you could imagine behind you. The door never made it open, you were jerked backwards, his hand closed around your wrist, 

“I said yet.” You felt the cement of the wall hit your body, head ricocheting off it, his forearm pressing into your collarbone. Your hand shot up, fingers hitting his parotid, the reaction causing his elbow to slam into you mouth, you felt your lip split as he stumbled from you. You were done playing, and you were certainly done playing the good girl role.

“You touch me again and I’ll have IAB so fucking far up your ass you won’t be able to shit for a month. Do I make myself clear?”

“Playing the cop angle now? You just assaulted a police officer.” He shot back, still right up in your face, rubbing the spot behind his ear you’d hit.

“Oh wow, I’m so scared! A class C felony, mark yourself down for the same offence. I’m undercover you moron.” You growled at him, if there were this many different departments on your ass there was no way you were going to be able to hide for six months, much less restart the ring afterwards.

“Yeah, right.” He scoffed, “Colour of the day?”

“Gold.” You shot back. Your heart immediately dropping into your stomach when you saw the laugh on his lips. Fuck. Gold was the 31st, you’d been so focussed on the SVU bust you’d forgotten today’s.

“Nice try.” He smirked, “Now you can either sit your ass down in that chair and tell us everything you know about Alejandro Martinez, or you can go to jail for solicitation and that assault collar.”

“I don’t make deals with cops. I make deals with A.D.A’s.” You crossed your arms over your chest, “And you’ll never find the evidence you need in the penthouse even if I do flip on Alejandro.”

“What exactly is it you want then?”

“Take me back to the apartment, I’ll get you what you want, but you take me to A.D.A. Carisi at the 16th. And in the meantime you can call Rita Calhoun ‘cause I’m not saying another word without my lawyer.” He gave out a huff at that, 

“Fine.” You rolled your eyes when he pulled the cuffs from his belt, thankful at the very least that he cuffed your hands in the front, giving you a little bit more movement ability.

**

All you could do on the way to the 1-6 was pray that some amount of the squad was there, preferably Olivia or Fin, you knew Sonny would’ve been called, and honestly felt horrible for dragging Rita out of bed in the middle of the night for literally nothing. No matter what kind of facts you relayed to Stabler he wasn’t about to believe the fact that you were a cop. You’d spewed off your badge number so fast you’d accidentally swapped the last two numbers, the exhaustion and multiple glasses of champagne wearing on you by then. Thankfully you’d been able to retrieve what you needed from the penthouse, before being not so gently shoved into the back of the cop car on the way to your own workplace. 

The desk sergeant was nearly asleep as the three of you made your way into the precinct, not noticing that their apparent perp was someone he saw nearly every day. Elliot’s partner was carrying the books you’d grabbed from the house. It was when you finally made your way into the bullpen that he dropped the heavy books down onto an open desk, gaining the attention of the minimal people in the room.

“Doll..Oh ma god.” Sonny took one look at you before nearly freaking out, “Imma grab some ice.” His lips hit the unbruised side of your head lightning fast before Rita spoke up.

“Un cuff her now!” The outburst brought Olivia out of her office, and exhausted look on her face that mirrored yours.

“Why should I?” Stabler shot back,

“Because she’s one of mine! Jesus El.”

“She had the wrong colour of the day.” You rolled your eyes, thankful at the release of the metal on your wrists, rubbing at the reddened skin of your wrists.

“Montgomery, you okay?” Olivia asked softly, noticing the marks on your face.

“Yeah,” You murmured, “No thanks to your old partner.” You accepted the bag of ice from Sonny, alternating it between your lip and purpling eye, “Murphy showed up at the party, fucking pistol whipped me.” You turned back to Stabler, “Keep him in fucking custody, guy’s dirty, has been for years.” You felt Sonny’s arms wrap around you, the shaky exhale of his breath making you realize just how relived he was to have you in his arms again, how happy he was you were okay. You gave him a gentle squeeze with your free arm before pulling away, turning to Rita. “Sorry to drag you out at this hour, but you know how these guys won’t stop until they hear the word lawyer.”

“You sure you’re okay?” She asked, giving your arm a gentle squeeze as you nodded.

“Yeah, get outta here.” Rita was an old family friend, she was always your go to when you needed a lawyer over the years of undercover work, even if she never actually had to defend, you were always quick to buy her dinner for waking her up. You turned to Benson, “Cap, I’ve got the books, call in Kat and Fin if you wanna start working on the case.” You shot a glare back to Stabler, “And for the love of God, keep Martinez in custody this time, but do not mention anything about me being a cop, understand? On the rare chance he gets off or doesn’t have a reason for arrest, I don’t need him knowing I’m a UC.” He glanced up to Olivia for confirmation, who simply gave him the very obvious nod, 

“She’s been working this ring for nearly 8 years, I’d trust her if I were you.”

“Okay.” He held up his hands in defeat, “I’ll send the case your way.”

“Thank you.” You practically groaned, your eyes back on your Captain, “Please tell me I can at least power nap before the others get here?”

“Yes.” She gave you a soft smile, noticing how you grabbed Sonny’s hand, “Hey! No funny business.”

“Liv I’m too tired to even think about that right now.” You called over your shoulder as you dragged him into the bunk room. Even if it was only going to be twenty minutes, twenty minutes curled in your husbands arms was the only way you wanted to end today. 

[welleqholisticapp]

Holistic App for Physical, Mental, and Emotional Wellbeing

As children, we always wondered how amazing it would be to grow up. Have independence, being in charge of your own money, going out without your guardian hovering around you. But nobody warned us that adult life will be the most stressful time in our entire life and worse, it is never-ending. Kids are protected from the horrible truth of life, that once you go into adult life, it will welcome you with stress and anxiety and you might end up needing a holistic app to look after your emotional wellbeing.

Nonetheless, being an adult is not the end of the world, in fact as it comes with a lot of stress; it also brings a lot of joy in your life because as an adult you know that you can make a difference and it’s not like we can help growing up anyway. And to make sure that we don’t stress out as much while making a difference, technology has provided us with Wellness Tracker apps.

In this article, we will understand the importance of healthy living apps and how mental health plays an important role in every aspect of our lives.

Why should we stress mental health more?

Mental health is a taboo in our society. The problem with mental health is, it does not look like you are declining. In the common eyes, it just might look like you are sad and that is why we as a society require more education on mental health. In the United States,1.5% of adults suffer from depression in a year. 2.8% of the men and women suffer from bipolar disorder in a year and 83% of them are severe.

Professional help is required for most of the people in this world but therapists and psychologists are quite expensive and sometimes unaffordable by the middle-class society. Thus, technology has brought to us holistic app for mental health to cope with day-to-day stress and depression.

Mental health can become poor due to various reasons. It can be genetic, due to anger issues, legitimate problems like relationships, or work pressure, and in some young adults, peer pressure. But whatever the cause may be, we need to understand that worrying about them will not bring out any solution and it will have the opposite effect by harming us, emotionally and physically.

How is emotional health related to mental health?

Some might confuse emotional health with mental health but both are two separate things. Emotional health refers to the balance that is maintained by us regardless of the stress in life, and the control we have on our emotions. Some emotional issues are excessive anger, uncontrollable urge to cry and laugh in serious situations.

Mental health, however, is long-term and is a more serious problem which can cause further problems due to poor emotional health. That is why a holistic app for emotional wellbeing stress on emotional health separately. Poor emotional health can lead to long-term depression, constant anxiety, and more mental problems like split-personality disorder.

How does mental health impact physical health?

Holistic apps also comprise the impact that mental health causes on the physicality of a person. Poor mental and emotional health will not only lead to unfortunate mental disorders but also cause a lot of physical problems. There is something called willpower that is inhibited among us. This willpower can make us climb Everest if we wanted. So, when mental health is compromised, the body automatically loses its willpower and thus, it starts deteriorating.

Not only being mentally secure will make your overall health better, but it can also impact the improvement of fatal diseases. For example, Aplastic Anaemia is a disease where the bone marrow does not make any more blood. It is extremely fatal. It needs to be maintained throughout life. So how is that related to mental health? When you have better mental health, there is more secretion of dopamine e and serotonin. Both are known as happy hormones, when you feel happy, you get a blood rush and thus, your body tries to make more blood then.

This is one of the many examples where having good mental health can save your life. This is why a holistic app for physical health helps you to moderate your mental and physical wellbeing.

What can we do to ensure overall wellbeing?

We talked about how mental health impacts physical health as well. Thus, to secure your overall wellbeing, the use of healthy living apps can help you moderate your emotional and mental health and provide you good feedback to see your progress. Apart from that, regular meditation has shown good results in overall mental health. Meditation can also increase willpower and helps you connect to your body and mind so you listen to your intuition and understand what exactly your body needs.

If you feel like mediation is not cutting it, and you need a more skilful approach then go to a therapist without any shame or fear of society. We need to provide equal importance to mental health as we do to physical health.

Moreover, for an overall betterment, eat good food. Study shows that when you are hungry or not well-fed, you can get frustrated and angry which will, in turn, affect your physical health again causing headaches and fatigue. If you don’t know how much to eat or what diet you should be on, a Wellness tracker app can help by a huge margin.

Conclusion

Hence we have established that mental health and physical health go hand-in-hand and it is important to balance both if you want an overall healthy life. It can be frustrating, adult life does not spare anyone, and even as children, there is exam pressure and peer pressure. Thus, nobody should necessarily refrain from their intuition. Listen to what your body and mind are asking you to do and act upon it so you can stay healthy and spread joy to the ones around you.

WellEQ is one such app that provides help to anybody who needs it. Their team of experts is readily available to be there for you, at your home. An overall fitness coach and a mental health professional are provided together in one app. Available on Play store and the App store. Download today!

[massivehistorycowseagle]

Here's the short story I promised. It's called The attack on the outsiders. Hope you enjoy. I have left the ending a bit open so let me know if you want a another one of these in the comments below. Thankyou, Enjoy!

The attack on the outsiders:

Chapter 1: The beginning

Charlie stared at Sophia. Sophia stared back. Charlie despised Sophia. Sophia disliked what Charlie had become. Sophia knew she shouldn't care anymore but she couldn't help herself. She felt lost without him by her side. She felt swept away and uncared for when their friendship fell apart. She missed him but she knew happiness had found her again. Sophia remembered laughing with Charlie. She now had other friends to do this with. Sophia wanted to walk over there and confront Charlie. She didn't have the confidence to though. She knew the new Charlie. He wasn't someone you wanted to approach unless you wanted trouble. Her dream friendship had been broken. Charlie finally stopped pinning her down with his iron cold stare. Sophia finally looked away and back to her friends.

Sophia didn't miss everything about the past. She didn't miss the toxicity of popularity. She found her happiness and what she needed in her new group of friends. Sophia looked at her new friends. She didn't fear dying of embarrassment in school. She may be now one of the lowest links in the food chain at school but the happiest and probably the least scared of silly mistakes. She loved spending time with the people she saw. Emily, her new best friend had never once let her down in the past 8 months of knowing each other.

Chapter 2: Sophia

Sophia knew it wasn't wrong to feel how she felt. She did question it though after her experience with Charlie and the rest of her old group. Her newer friends made her more confident that she was right. Emily, Ryan, Regan and Brooke all supported her. There was a special connection between all of them. Sophia felt it, some more than others and in different ways but she couldn't deny that they were all her friends.

Sophia missed her old group. There was no doubt about that. She knew where she felt happier though. She missed the old Charlie. She missed Oliver, she was almost certain that he would've supported her. She didn't know why but she just felt that. Sabine and Sam are just awesome. Or at least were. Rae. Well she seemed sweet but was she the person to turn them all against her. Rae had only just joined the group when Sophia came out as lesbian....

Oh well. Hopefully not.

Chapter 3: Outsiders

The silence from Sophia hadn't gone unnoticed by her group. Her silence was finally broken by Emily.

"Sophia? Is everything okay?"

"Oh. I'm sorry. Yes. Just lost in my thoughts."

Emily knew this wasn't exactly true but she didn't want to enhance the pain she knew her friend was going through.

Just then a group of girls walked past giggling. Sophia and the rest of her friends heard for the umphteen time today.

"There's the outsiders." laughed the girl in pink. Her name was Becky; she was most commonly known as Bex. She has an important role and storyline but that's for another time.

Once the girls had gone past Ryan piped up "What do you think about this outsiders name, people seem to give us?"

"Well if they can't accept differences that's their problem. I just try to ignore them." Regan said firmly.

"Yeah I agree. They want to hurt us and break us. They never will as long as we have each other." Brooke added on.

"Our differences make us who we are." Sophia assured Ryan.

"I'm glad not to be a sheep." Emily joined into the conversation.

Then the bell rang to signify the end of lunch.

Chapter 4: Help!

The five of them parted and headed off to their lessons with cheery goodbyes.

Sophia felt better after her friends had talked about that elephant in the room and helping to empower each other.

Unbeknown to Sophia, Charlie and his group were approaching behind her. Sophia was about to turn the last corridor towards her classroom when Charlie and his mob surrounded her. Charlie was directly infront of Sophia.

"Let me go Charlie! Leave me alone!" shouted Sophia. Sophia then tried to escape from her old friends but she was well and truly surrounded. Unfortunately her shouts hadn't been heard by anyone.

"Listen to me." Charlie said menacingly "Afterschool I'm going to have sex with you. You'll lose your virginity with a lad whilst your lesbian. You'll never live it down. If you struggle; Oliver you tell her."

"We'll beat you to shreds." Oliver responded.

"You dare tell anyone and both will happen; you'll lose your dignity and virginity." Sabine chipped in.

Charlie and his mob had planned this out nicely. They hoped the last comment would scare Sophia but they couldn't be sure.

Sophia was a bit scared.

'That's what the iron eyes were about at lunchtime.' She thought.

"Now go." Samuel commanded.

"See you later Princess." Charlie called after her.

That really freaked Sophia out. That used to be what he called her as a friend. Now it was like some pornographic turn on for him.

Sophia knew that she had two lessons before afterschool. What was she going to do?

Time was ticking by and Sophia continued to lose concentration in her lesson. She felt sick and the ever increasing doom of the situation.

The bell finally went for the end of the first of Sophia's lessons; a blessing and a curse.

Sophia walked into her second lesson, she was obviously trembling. She was sweating. Emily sat next to Sophia in History, which happened to be their last lesson of the day.

"Hey. What's up?" Emily whispered.

Sophia just shook her head.

"Sophia, please tell me." Emily emplored quietly.

"Charlie. Charlie...." Sophia trailed off.

Emily knew Charlie was a weak spot for Sophia so trod round this subject very carefully.

"What about him love?" Emily quizzed Sophia.

"He's going to rape me, afterschool." Sophia cried quietly.

"Not if I can help it." Emily said taken about.

Emily knew she shouldn't use her phone in lesson but this was an emergency. She texted Ryan, Regan and Brooke and let them know what the situation was.

Would they see the message before the end of the day?

Chapter 5: Friends unite

The school bell rang signifying the end of the day. Emily grabbed hold of Sophia's hand. Sophia felt comforted by this action. Emily and Sophia walked out of school, still hand in hand.

Suddenly Charlie and his mob surrounded them.

"Let us go or we will fight all of you!!!" came Emily's war-like cry.

"Yeah." came Sophia's response less confidently.

"Go." Charlie said confidently whilst he tilted his head.

Rae grabbed Emily and held her back whilst the rest of the mob surrounded Sophia.

Sophia thought she was in for it and even worse whilst her friend Emily was forced to watch. Emily wondered if anyone had actually got her message.

Suddenly the reinforcements came in. There was Ryan and Regan. Emily was relieved. Sophia was scared. Where was Brooke? Suddenly Brooke came around the corner. A sigh of relief came from Sophia.

Ryan grabbed hold of Rae's hair and pulled. As Rae's grip loosened on Emily, Emily managed to elbow her in the face. Emily was now free. A fight had broken out.

Regan hit Sam. His nose started to bleed scarlet red blood. Brooke being at a lower level in her wheelchair managed to trip Sabine as she ran to join the fight.

Charlie was left approaching Sophia. Sophia kneed her old friend where the sun doesn't shine. He momentarily screamed and fell to the floor clutching where he just got kneed. He got up as suddenly as he had got down.

Sophia and her group were winning.

Oliver threw a punch missing absolutely anyone but he didn't want to fight or seem like he wasn't trying.

Charlie ran away from Sophia and  pushed Regan to the floor before she could hit the stunned Sam. Regan was out cold. Sabine got up from the floor, she pulled Ryan off Rae and pushed him into a tree, making him very woozy and out of it. Oliver threw another fake punch. Sam tipped Brooke's wheelchair with quite some force. Sophia screamed.

Charlie and his gang had one more to take down before he could get his hands on Sophia. Rae landed a punch on Emily leaving her clean out cold.

Chapter 6: At a loss

Charlie approached Sophia. He and his gang had won. Victory felt even sweeter. Sophia was alone and done for she knew it. The thing she didn't know was that she wasn't the only one crying nearby.

Charlie started to lift Sophia's skirt. Sophia cringed at this. Then Charlie for a moment stopped, let go, started laughing and enjoying himself then slowly, sensually started to undo his trousers.

Then there was a russle from the bushes. But before anyone could concentrate on that Ryan found some extra strength from somewhere, fulled by anger.

Chapter 7: Ryan

Ryan, sweat and blood covered ran inbetween Sophia and Charlie. He pushed Charlie away a bit to force space between Charlie and Sophia. Charlie was almost knocked off balance. This was why Ryan was Sophia's go to guy.

Charlie stunned took a moment before being ready to stike Ryan back down.

Oliver saw this. He knew what was about to happen. To happen to his Ryan. Not his yet but he so wanted Ryan to be his. He hated fighting at the best of times but he couldn't stand by and watch his crush get hit.

Oliver in that split second ran inbetween Ryan and Charlie.

He grabbed Charlie's fist screaming "No! No! Stop this now!" Ryan, Sophia, Charlie and the rest of the mob were all taken aback by this.

Chapter 8: Getaway

"Get out of my way Oliver!" commanded Charlie.

"No Charlie!" Oliver cried

"What?! Are you trying to protect these freaks?" Charlie screamed.

Tears started streaming down Oliver's face as Charlie barked at him. Oliver's hand stayed firm though.

The rest of Charlie's mob surrounded Oliver.

Everyone from Sophia's group was back up now except Brooke who was still tipped over in her wheelchair. Ryan quietly went and put it back onto its wheels and the five of them quietly snook off and got away from the situation whilst the rest were distracted. Ryan felt sorry to leave Oliver but the girls convinced him that he deserved it as punishment for what he had done before. The way he'd treated them in the past 8 months.

The mob didn't notice this. But then there was a russle from the bush and soneone was coming out from there. The mob fled except Oliver. Oliver was still crying profusely.

Oliver jumped as someone put a caring arm around him. He looked up terrified to see Bex.

[gastricpierrot]

Title: Breathe fire into me 

Series: Promare

Pairing: GaloLio

Rating: T

Summary:

Lio might have a little crush on the cute barista from the boba shop he visited recently.

Only there's a catch: there's much more to Galo Thymos than what he seems.

Note: role reversal AU, boba barista Galo, archer main Lio 

Also on AO3

[Chapter 1]

Lio Fotia isn’t fearless by any means.  

After all, firefighting is a dangerous job. Fire burns. Fire consumes. Fires do not care. They're destructive, unpredictable. And in the case of Burnish flares, they’re alive.  

It takes courage to put out flames, it takes strategy. It takes many things Lio still doesn’t have and hasn’t learnt.  

It’s been about a year since Lio’s joined the FDPP, immediately assigned to the 3rd unit the moment he’d graduated from the Academy due to them being severely shorthanded at the time. He's braved through countless blazes since then, yet he still finds a slight tremor in his hands whenever he’s on the way to a scene. The sirens of the Rescue Mobile never seemed to stop sounding too loud, too piercing.  

Lio Fotia is afraid of fire. Afraid of what else they might take from him, because he knows they could never take enough.  

“Lio? Lio, are you listening?”  

He takes a sharp breath, pulled out of the lulling haze of siren wails by the Captain’s voice over the intercom. Don’t think. Don't let it register.  

“There’s people trapped in the fiftieth floor with flammable chemicals. Got it,” Lio affirms as he does a brief, habitual last-minute routine check on his Rescue Gear's controls. “I’ll get it over with quick.”

“Be careful,” he hears Ignis say, and he grits his teeth just in time before he’s launched into the air, shot out and up at a speed that sends his stomach plunging all the way down to his feet.  

Lio crashes through the windows of the building’s fiftieth floor, immediately surrounded by a hellscape of Burnish flames. They're hostile as always the moment they sense his presence, forming into massive serpents of purple and turquoise fire –honestly too beautiful to be so destructive—and diving towards him with obvious malice.  

Lio doesn’t have the time to deal with them; the fire could reach the chemicals and cause an explosion any moment. He freezes the serpents barely batting an eye, barreling his way towards where the projection on his Gear’s windshield indicates. He's not too far now. Sweat trickles down his jaw. Five minutes. Give him five minutes.  

He tears off the door of the room where the group of researchers have been taking shelter, not even sparing the breath to yell assurances before he’s ushering them into the rescue container. His pulse pounds in his ears as he waits for the last of them to climb on, fingers gripping his handles tight enough to burn against his palms.  

“Retrieval successful, Captain,” Lio says as he hoists the container up. “Proceeding to retreat.”

“Better hurry up, Lio,” Lucia warns just after Ignis acknowledges his update. “Things aren’t looking too good.”

Lio knows better than to jinx it by wondering what could be worse. He charges right back into the inferno, this time not bothering to even ward off the flame serpents. His Gear can withstand at least this much heat, he’s sure. There's no choice but for it to be so.  

He makes his escape not a second too soon, barely climbing ten floors down when the fiftieth finally erupts, sending entire building quaking violently and in palpable danger of collapsing altogether. Lio near loses his grip for a moment, thrown off balance by the shockwave and the ringing in his ears. He bites his lip hard to reel himself back, using the staticky, frantic voices of his teammates as an anchor.  

“I’m fine,” he assures into his communicator, though he’s yet to be able to properly hear his own voice again. “I’m coming down now.”

And by the universe’s mercy he does manage to eventually make the rest of the way down. He proceeds to transport the researchers a safe distance away where paramedics are on stand-by, hurrying back to the scene right after setting down the container. Lucia’s mentioning about picking up some unusual heat readings over the intercom, then as if on cue, Lio hears more explosions from the distance.  

Static. His other teammates frantically asking if everything’s alright. Ignis coming back online, his sentences choppy from interference.  

Then Lio hears what could only be described as the laughter of hooligans in the background.

Lio heaves an exhausted sigh. Of course they’d have to be there. Mad Burnish has a reputation for loving to gloat as much as they have one for setting random fires, after all. Lio really has his job cut out for him this time.  

“Lucia?” Lio waits until he gets a solid response from her before continuing, “Is Detroit good to go today?”  

“I haven’t had the time to finish fixing the bow’s mechanism,” Lucia says, her words peppered with the rapid clicks of her controls. “You’ll probably have ten shots, max.”

“Apart from that?” Lio arrives and assesses the situation. Mad Burnish are circling around the Rescue Mobiles on their bikes, hooting and jeering and generally making a ruckus and obstructing extinguishing efforts while outnumbering Lio’s teammates three to one. They’re too fast for Lucia to handle with the Mobile’s artillery and for Ignis to land effective shots with his gun. Varys, Remi and Aina are nowhere to be seen on ground; they’re still occupied with trying to control the fire above.  

“Shouldn’t have a problem,” Lucia affirms, and Lio’s cranking the lever to shift his Gear into Detroit mode.  

Mechanisms slide and click into place with flawless transition upon activation of the suit’s alternate form, shifting its center of gravity and losing redundant pieces as it takes a sleeker, lighter appearance more suitable for combat. Lio then reaches behind the back of his Gear, detaching the rod there which he then flips a switch to have it morph into the form of a large bow.  

Lio gets into position, and draws.  

It's stiffer than usual, he notices at once as the built-in arrows respond to his motion and take shape. Lucia’s estimates are rarely ever wrong; he’s going to need to make every shot here count.  

He takes aim, and releases the first arrow.  

It soars through the air and instantly encases a Mad Burnish member in a large bloom of ice upon contact. Lio’s notching the next one while the rest are still trying to process what’s happened, successfully freezing another in place before the finally spot him.  

Lio braces himself, seeing them exchanging signs to rally.

Then all at once, they’re charging straight towards him.  

Lio manages to pick off one more Burnish before he decides they’re getting too close. He presses another button and changes his grip on his bow, moving into another stance as his weapon shifts to next resemble a sword. He spends a second to analyze their positions and movements, then with a sharp breath, he rushes to engage them.

He enters a daze as he always does when close combat, letting his body and instincts take over as he maneuvers through and around his opponents. Slash, duck, parry. Lio’s received a number of questions and comments about the way he fights over his months on duty, but truthfully, he’s never really figured out how to respond to them. He just does what feels right, what feels the most effective.  

When he comes to this time, all six Mad Burnish members are encased in blocks of ice. Lio’s slightly out of breath as he checks his Gear’s condition out of habit, hoping he hadn’t accidentally overdone it again. There are some gashes on the armor plating, the usual singed spots from Burnish fire—but everything else seems good enough. His weapon is still holding up as well.  

Lio turns toward the blaze in the building; it seems that his teammates have also been making good progress with that. Ignis tells him good work, and Lio’s just about to take his hands off his controls to work the knots out of his shoulders when he feels an impact against his Gear.  

Whatever hit him detonates a split second after contact, sending him staggering sideways and almost toppling onto the pavement.

Lio grits his teeth, finding his footing again by almost the sheer force of will. Red warnings blink across his windshield, and Lio sprains to see a part of his suit’s left shoulder burnt and falling into pieces.  

And then flame serpents, even larger than those Lio had faced earlier, dive in out of seemingly nowhere to collect the frozen Burnish into their jaws. A series of slow claps follows, and Lio’s turning and notching an arrow the second he overcomes his surprise, gaze following the length of the flames until he reaches their source.  

Another Burnish seems to have just exited the building, waltzing out casually as his serpents retrieved his brethren. Lio squints, barely making out details from the distance between them, only seeing that he dons a ragged black vest unbuttoned, black pants, and the horned visor helmet signifying a Mad Burnish leader.  

Not again,  Lio nearly groans because Burning Rescue had just apprehended the previous leaders some months back and the stress and exhaustion from that alone had taken probably a few years off his lifespan.  

In contrast, the Burnish sure sounds like he’s having fun.  

“Whewwww, you sure made that seem easy!” he whistles, voice distorted by his helmet yet somehow carrying enough for Lio to hear him clearly. “But sorry, hotshot, looks like it’s time for us to—hey!”  

He's interrupted by a sudden bloom of ice near his feet. Lio clicks his tongue. His trajectory was just a little off—it must be the unusual stiffness of his bow that’s messing with him.

“At least let people finish talking!” the Burnish protests, to which Lio doesn’t even bother answering. He notches another arrow, pulling taut as he recalibrates him aim with the help of Lucia’s adjustments. This time, he will not miss.  

He doesn’t. It would’ve once again landed right on target, if only it wasn’t intercepted by a wall of fire, far hotter than what their ice are designed to handle. Lio barely has the chance to think when the Burnish bursts out from behind the flames riding a bike he manifested, cranking it to obnoxious levels of noise as he charges towards Lio.  

Lio prepares to intercept, prepares to be out-sped and still somehow deal with it because what else is he supposed to do —until the entire left arm of his Gear falls apart, and he flinches.  

The Burnish speed right past him in a blazing trail of fire, hollering victory cheers as he makes his escape.  

Lio fumes, immediately moving to give chase.  

“Lio, stop!”  

And he’s halted in his tracks upon a stern order from Ignis. Let them be, the fire has priority, he’s told in a tone leaving no room for arguments. And Lio knows the Captain’s right. He's getting too worked up, he's losing rationality. He clenches his fists, forces the roar of blood in his ears to subside.  

He glares toward the direction where Mad Burnish had disappeared to for just a moment more, then spitting a curse, he turns around and heads to help finish up their job for the day.  

xXx

“How’s that feeling?”  

Lio draws an arrow from his bow, trying to gauge the extent of improvement Lucia’s service had made on it. It feels much easier to use than the last time even in its down-sized mode; the string fiber more flexible, the overall weight of the bow more stable in his hands.  

“Like it’s new,” Lio marvels, eternally impressed by Lucia’s mechanical skills. Lucia smiles wryly and crosses her arms.  

“Good. You’re gonna have to be relying only on that for a while,” she says, then gesturing to Lio’s Gear behind her in the garage. “We won’t be able to do much with Detroit until the new parts arrive.”

“It’ll do,” Lio assures; his specialty has always been the bow and arrow from the start, anyway. “Thanks, Lucia.”

“Anytime,” Lucia says, slipping her goggles back over her eyes before turning to saunter off. “Now back to work!”

“Aina’s asked me to go with her to get some bubble tea later,” Lio calls after her, remembering at the nick of time. “What would you like?”

Lucia responds to just get her whatever, and knowing she’s now already too distracted to pay him attention any longer, Lio hurries off in search for Aina.  

It’s Aina’s idea to check out the new shop that’s recently opened just down the block from the station, thinking it could be a nice treat for the team after that hell of a fire they had to put out two days ago. The higher-ups had a lot to say about them failing to capture the new Mad Burnish boss as well, and while none of them has outwardly voiced their complaints about it, Lio knows everyone’s high-strung. Arsonist Burnish always pose more danger when they’re in groups; they become more daring, fearless. Even more so if they have a charismatic leader to head the way. It'll be the start of another manhunt for the new Boss.

Lio has never quite understood the point of Mad Burnish setting all those whimsical fires. They’re only giving the rest of the Burnish people a bad reputation, further feeding the stereotype that they are inherently dangerous just because they have the ability to control flames while the majority do not. Sure, perhaps setting things aflame does create a sense of unexplainable satisfaction, but is doing it at such a destructive scale really worth possibly endangering the rest of your people in the long run?  

“What did Lucia say she’d want?” Aina asks once Lio’s caught up to her and they’re setting out on their way to the shop. Lio shrugs as he trudges on, taking a moment to enjoy the mundane tranquility around him; the feel of the late morning sunlight on his skin, the sounds of traffic along the road. It’s not every day that he gets to talk casual strolls in the middle of a shift like this.  

“She says anything’s fine.” Lio tears his gaze away from the puppy going out on a walk with its owner just passing them to look at Aina while he speaks. “We could just get her one of their signatures?”

“Can’t go wrong with that, she likes anything as long as they’re sweet anyways,” Aina agrees with a little snicker. “What about you, Lio? Any preference in mind?”  

“I’m not really in the mood for anything too rich so maybe I'll just get some fruit tea,” Lio says, then halting in his steps at the sight that greets him. “That’s, uh, if we even get to order at all..?”

Aina follows his gaze towards the line of people spanning three shop lots from their targeted bubble tea place, and lets out a groan. Lio understands her disappointment; he was really looking forward to sipping on something cold and sweet and refreshing, too. Still, they should’ve expected this, the craze never really had signs of going away even after all this while. The place is probably also having some sort of opening promotion, so of course people would be scrambling to have a try for themselves over the weekend.

“Maybe we should just go to another place,” Aina suggests, already looking around to see what alternatives they have. Lio agrees, not quite wanting to return empty handed after all their anticipation. He fishes out his phone and does a quick search, knowing there’s sure to be some other shop nearby. They seem to be everywhere regardless of competition.  

He eventually finds one with decent reviews located just a little further down the street, past the first junction. Aina, with no better ideas in mind, easily goes along with it.  

So they make their way there, and to their relief, finds it with a more reasonable queue despite most of the tables inside being occupied. Lio goes over the menu with Aina as they get in line, trying to decide on what to get. Lio’s going for the peach tea, Aina’s getting the matcha latte, and since the rest of the team can’t really be bothered as long as it’s Aina’s treat, they’ll just get them each the signature brown sugar milk tea.  

Aina receives a call while they’re later waiting for their order to be prepared, and Lio soon finds himself scrolling through his phone alone while she leaves to answer it outside where it’s a little quieter. With just a couple of other customers with singular orders ahead of theirs, it doesn’t take long until Lio’s number is beeped through the prompter and he’s stepping out to collect the drinks.  

“Oh, you’re part of the FDPP?”  

Lio glances up at the crew member, not even sure if he’d actually been spoken to because it’s so unexpected. His attention is immediately drawn to the blue hair first, shaved on the sides and spiked in a way that’s almost comical yet strangely suiting the person it belongs to. Lio’s gaze then travels a little further down to see the staff’s face and um.  

Okay. He's kind of...  

Cute.

“I’m sorry?” Lio manages, just in case he really hadn’t heard right or something. Get it together, Lio Fotia.

“Your jacket,” the guy repeats with a vague indicative motion, eyes bright with curiosity, “you’re part of the FDPP?”

“Ah,” Lio’s suddenly a little too aware that he might’ve been staring and almost frantically averts his gaze. “Yeah, our HQ’s just down the block.”

Wait, did he really need to say that, though? Oof.  

“Cool, cool!” Then as Lio dares to risk one final glance at him, he sees him offering him an encouraging grin. “Thanks for all your hard work!”  

Lio can’t help but offer a slight smile in return, a little touched by the sudden appreciation. “Thank you.”

And as they’re on the way back to the station, Lio catches himself lowkey hoping that the drinks would taste good enough for him to have an excuse to return.  

[inawickedlittletown]

314 Some Thoughts

(This is 1,600 words omg...but I guess I had a lot to say. Under the cut for spoilers.)

Heist episode. I am here for it. And I hope we get another heist episode next season because the writers know how to write a good heist and Ocean’s 9-1-1 is an episode I enjoyed a lot last season. The set up for the episode was just on point from the stylistic choices made at the beginning of the episode so that we learn their names to how well planned everything is and how the idea of taking control of the 9-1-1 call center just makes sense in terms of the real crime — the art heist. I just loved that. 

The set up for the roles each of the “bad guys” is taking is also not only interesting but looking back a misdirect in the role of Tiffany to the whole operation. Also the whole bit with the security guard, Jake, since we the audience don’t know that he’s involved. In fact, we think he’s dead for a moment. 

Maddie managing to send Chimney an SOS in saying “I love you, Howie” from last episode and sending the ball rolling is still impressive writing to me. When things get tied together within storytelling — that does things to me. Chimney immediately finding it odd and trying not only to call her back but also to call 9-1-1 before making the decision to call Buck in the end — I loved that entire sequence. In general there has been so much work put into prior episodes to set up this one from the whole bit with Maddie and Chim to what happened to Josh and they’ve done an amazing job pulling it off. 

Also it’s 8am, where was Buck coming from? Because since we know that this episode takes place the morning after the dinner Chim and Maddie had then we know that Chimney wasn’t working which to me means that Buck likely wasn’t working either. So Buck was either out somewhere all night (insert side-eye), or he was out somewhere super early in the morning looking like that because Buck in regular clothes — that also does things to me. Actually...it kinda looks like he was just fetching his mail and Oli said on twitter Buck was getting home from work. 

While we don’t see it, we know that Buck tries to call Maddie. No answer. Tries to call Josh. No answer. I love that Buck does have Josh’s number at all. It’s also interesting that Buck and Chim while worried don’t know what to do or even if they should be worried. They just both know that something is up and yet there is no real urgency between them because as Chim says she’s at the call center. What could possibly have happened there? Oh, if only you knew. 

At the call center we have the whole hostage situation escalate. We see the epi pen when they’re collecting everyone’s things and they oh so obviously show it so early on because it will come back into play. It’s subtle enough and yet another instance of good writing by showing the weapon and then putting it aside until it’s needed. 

This episode is all about this crazy situation and how it goes down both within dispatch but also about how those outside it figure out that something is going on. Both aspects of it make the episode have a certain intensity, it uses dramatic irony in a way that has us wanting the characters to have all the info that we do. 

One of the very impressive things about this episode is how the people working at dispatch never actually give up and that they try their hardest to use their skills and their knowledge to figure out the situation and find a way to get help. From how they figure out what area of LA they don’t want dispatch to send anyone to, to how much information they are taking in from what they overhear Greg and the others saying. Not once do they give up even. 

Josh thinking quickly on his feet and sending Athena to Chimney’s apartment despite the fact that he’s also dealing with Greg there and memories of what he’d just gone through because of Greg — I just love that so much. I also really appreciate that Josh not only knows Chimney’s address but also Athena arriving there and not already knowing that it’s Chimney’s place brings them all that closer to figuring out what’s happening. Chimney keeping Buck on the phone but then just hanging up on him while he goes off with Athena, did either of you expect for Buck to just stay out of it? 

Also prior to Athena arriving, Chimney was 100% ready to go out to dispatch himself and I’m sure Buck would have joined too. 

I saw a bit of talk about confusion about Buck showing up right where Athena and Chim were but he knew where they were going so it all made sense for him to show up and spot her car and just get in front of her to get her attention. I also don’t think either Chim or Buck were thinking about calling anyone else at that moment. I saw a bit of complaints about Buck not reaching out to Eddie because why wouldn’t he but I see it as perfectly reasonable because there is no time for any of that and because Athena also tells them in not so many words not to. She doesn’t even necessarily want Buck there. Buck has more things to worry about than trying to call Eddie or Bobby or Hen or really anyone else when they can’t do anything to resolve the situation. 

In the meanwhile, the situation at dispatch gets worse because as far as Greg knows, Tiffany is screwing up by taking too long and then there’s also Terri making an attempt to pull the fire alarm and Josh being brave and saving him. Not only is that happening, but the heist team is falling apart and they’re turning on each other and don’t even know that really they’re all being played all along anyway. 

The truly scary moment was seeing Athena walk into dispatch and how absolutely close to being shot she was. But then Sue steps up and saves her and not just that, she manages to pass on yet another message. Code 77 - ambush - proceed with caution. It’s the last thing they needed to finally be able to say that something was truly going on. Next they take Athena’s car off of the GPS system. And then all the rest of the police, RA units, firetrucks all go off of GPS and they are ready to go. Obviously this makes the heist team suspicious, but that also sort of breaks them apart further. 

Linda is the real MVP because she’s the one that pretends to have an allergic reaction. Greg somehow believes her and doesn’t even see it coming when Maddie stabs him with the epi pen instead. And then dispatch takes the building back and it is amazing that they manage it But Sue shooting at Foster. Loved the strength of that. But then we have Josh facing the possible death of the guy that tricked him and beat him up and then took him and the rest of dispatch as hostages and he jumps in to give him CPR because it’s the right thing to do but also because he wants Greg to suffer in prison and face his crimes. Of course, Greg is somehow the one that tells the police everything. 

I admit that I did find it a bit strange that Buck wasn’t standing with Chimney when Maddie came out. However, I didn’t find it strange that he hung back and let Chimney and Maddie have the moment. It also reads like closure to everything we had in the previous episode between them and to me it felt important to show how much Maddie has come to rely on Chim. She doesn’t really need Buck...she has Chimney. 

Throughout the whole thing one thing that was consistent was Buck’s belief that Maddie would be okay and that she could handle herself. He and Chim are worried but even when Chimney and Athena are headed over to dispatch, it’s Buck that tries to tell them that they can’t give themselves away. I think this shows so much growth in Buck — the lack of running into things without much of a plan other than a need to go. And we already know that Chimney is level headed despite his worry. They’re letting Athena handle it and I think they both realize that Athena and the others can handle it and will be doing their best to get everyone out alive.

In the end we get a recap of everything that happened. I love that this is split between Athena and her family and then Buck, Maddie, Chim, and Josh. This would have been the perfect moment to insert Albert into the episode and maybe Eddie and Hen as well. After all, we get a tiny bit of Bobby. But instead we really focus on the full story of the heist and we find out about Jake and Tiffany and how poor Josh got involved in the whole mess. 

Overall, this was an enjoyable episode. It was a bit of fun and I think it absolutely fits into the show. It is a bit stand alone other than the Madney stuff and yet that works within the context of the show since it takes place in the course of a day. I know the lack of development for anything other than Madney frustrates a few people but I absolutely enjoyed it and I can’t wait to see what we are in store for next week with Eddie Begins. 

Honorable mention to how the bad guy named Oliver was “the muscle” because that entirely felt like they were calling Oli out. 

-

My Meta/Reviews Masterpost

[muffinrecord]

Hey I have a question sorry if its too much but for the pick your own 4 star ticket which girls would you recommend from each element (best water/earth/light/dark/fire girls.) You dont have to answer obviously but I was just wondering which ones are the best options in your opinion

9/3/21: THIS IS AN OLD POST. DO NOT TAKE THESE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR CURRENT MAGIRECO PLS

Sure! These are my recommendations, so take them with a grain of salt– I wouldn’t call myself an expert here. Also, in my opinion the best character to get will always be your favorite one, and not necessarily the most optimal one. 

Additionally, the most optimal choice might not be a new character, but a character you already have. More memoria slots are king in this game.

With all of this said, I’m going to say this: when considering PVE, the best two girls to get will be either Madoka Kaname or Mami Tomoe. Both of them are the best picks due to their cheese strategies, but even outside of that they can both carry you hard into content. I’d say that Madoka wins over Mami slightly due to her element and mp connect/magia, but they’re both excellent choices if you’re looking for a character to improve your game play. They will also always be good to list in your support because of said cheese strats. However, neither of them are a good choice for pvp.

Lastly, feel free to check out these following ranking guides:

Gamepress: PVP Mirrors 5-star Rankings

Gamepress: PVE 5-star Rankings

Fandom Wiki: PVP Magical Girl Tier List Note: will contain JP Spoilers

Tier lists can be sort of iffy, but I think they’re very valuable to pay attention to, even just to read their reasonings– this goes for mirrors stuff too. The Fandom Wiki rates Madoka very low, but its explanation also sheds light on how she can be good for PVE. So if you’re looking for more nuance, take some time and look through them. 

ANYWAYS:

Light

Available Characters: Madoka Kaname, Kokoro Awane

For PVE, Madoka is much better than Kokoro. Using only two Madokas on a team is a cheese strat commonly called the Double Doka, and it’s amazing for chewing through hard challenge modes– essentially you connect to a Madoka on each turn so they’re always healing each other, gaining MP, and then later on, effectively using magias every turn. 

Even outside of that, Madoka is a great unit in any magia-focused team, due to her aforementioned connect. Her magia/doppel doesn’t just give the team more MP, but it also provides defense, which can help against boss fights. 

Kokoro is a tank, and fairly good, but in my opinion tanks need at the very least two slots to actually do their intended job (and also the two memoria). Compared to Madoka though, for pve Kokoro just isn’t as versatile or useful enough.

For PVP, Kokoro is better than Madoka, but this is mostly because Madoka is fucking terrible in PVP and you should never use her there.

Dark

Available Characters: Kirika Kure, Ren Isuzu, Tsukuyo Amane

Personally, for PVE I’d say that Ren is better than Kirika or Tsukuyo. However, this answer is a little more nuanced than the answer to the light question, and ultimately I’d split it between Ren and Kirika. Tsukuyo is basically a much worse version than Momoko.

Ren is a really great unit with a weird connect (and magia) that makes her have a myriad of uses and allows for a little more depth in gameplay. Her weaknesses include really low health and defense (although this is also a strength, see her magia) so you’ll need to protect her. However she has great attack stats and is a very solid choice for dark element damage. Her connect makes a puella combo sort of difficult, but it can help you ignore evades (very useful in mirrors) and also attack a boss up to five separate times while providing an evade itself. Her magia does more damage with the less health she has, which can be great for difficult bosses. All in all, she’s an excellent unit worth having and using that you’ll probably want to have eventually anyways. 

So, Kirika. She’s the best tank in the game, period, but she’s also a tank. Unless you have multiple slots on her, you’re probably better off using someone else. Additionally, tanks aren’t always needed in PVE; they’re amazing in hard challenges but you can go by without them in more casual content, whereas a character like Ren (or even Tsukuyo) can be useful in almost every situation. For PVP she’s fucking amazing and can tank the hits and keep going while also providing blast discs.

And then… Tsukuyo. Tsukuyo is a charge gorilla, which is already not that great. She’s best used with her sister Tsukasa, but even then… eh. Yeah…

Water

Available Characters: Rena Minami, Konoha Shizumi, Sayaka Miki, Mayu Kozue

I answered this in an earlier ask, seen here. But TLDR: I think Konoha and Rena are your best options for PVE. Rena is more specialized and can help you with magia teams, and Konoha is more versatile and can fit in virtually any team.

Sayaka is a good tank, but she’s still a tank so she needs a few slots to be good. Mayu is sort of like Madoka but worse and also blue.

Forest

Available Characters: Mami Tomoe, Alina Gray, Mito Aino

Mami is, in my opinion, the best option of the three for PVE. However there is still nuance allowed for here. For PVP, I would recommend Alina, but Mito is also amazing if you can slot her a few times. 

Mami has the benefit of double Mami cheese strats, where you use only two Mamis and trade off their connects off of every turn, layering the enemy with binds so they can’t ever attack you. This is really useful for challenge fights (unless the team has a resistance to bind…) and can help carry you. Even without that, her damage is amazing and her connect is still useful as fuck. She’s fragile though and her magia makes her even more fragile than normal.

Alina Grey is a great dps and has a solid connect. She’s a great PVP choice, but you’ll have to be careful with her connect’s chance at stun. I don’t think she can carry you as hard in challenge modes like Mami can, but she’s still an excellent choice and you’ll probably want her at some point.

Mito functions as an interesting sort of tank– she’s balanced type, so she brings more damage to the table than most tanks, and her tanking revolves around evade and taunt. Y’all know how I feel about tanks at this point, so I think she needs a few slots to actually fulfill her purpose, but she’s a solid choice and also just flat-out adorable.

Flame

Available Characters: Momoko Togame, Kyoko Sakura, Karin Misono, Himika Mao

For PVP, the clear answer is Kyoko. For PVE… the clear answer is probably Kyoko, but there is a bit of nuance here.

Kyoko is a blast gorilla (3 blast discs) with great stats, so she’s great for both pvp and pve. You know those events where you have a limited number of turns to kill waves of enemies? Perfect choice right here. She’ll mop up fights quickly and effectively. PVP, which is all about blast, is where she really shines, although you have to be a little more careful with all the water girls around.

Karin Misono is an accele gorilla (3 accele discs) and a support type with an excellent connect. She’s not my first choice for fire– If you’re looking for damage, I think Kyoko is much better, and there are other fire accele girls out there (Rika for example), but Karin still fills a good niche. Do not play her in mirrors unless you want to help others with easy wins.

Momoko Togame is well known as a meme spook, but she’s not as bad as others say. Yes, she is a wretched charge gorilla (3 charge discs) but her connect is goddamn amazing and useful. Charge can be pretty bad but it can have it’s uses outside of pvp. She also can fufill a tank role depending on memoria used, but still do decent damage, making her versatile.

Himika… Well, she’s a tank with VERY low attack. We all know the drill with tanks now, right? She does have a really good connect that can increase blast damage while also keeping your character alive, so she’s decent! However. There is one thing you might want to consider with Himika… Her personal memoria has a passive ability TO INCREASE YOUR CC DROP PERCENTAGE. If you’re like me and you’re constantly CC broke then this is clearly the best character in the history of characters released, ever. Her outfit is ugly.

—-

Okay, I think that’s good :’) Hopefully this helps! Sorry that this was so long, but I wanted to explain my reasoning for each unit to help with making your own decision and not just my ranking– you also have to consider your list of girls and what you’re missing/what you need. For example, Madoka is great, but if you have a ton of accele girls and no blast ones, maybe Kyoko is better. ECT

[loopy777]

following up on your wastly superios republic city, how would you rewrite asami's role in this new city, the city related plot, and her relationship with korra?(i cannot imagine you'dd want to keep the terrible love trialngle for this story). do you think opening their relationship on a romantic note with clear attraction from the start or have it develop more slowly over the course of the first book would better?

I don’t usually talk much about Asami here on Tumblr because I have lots of criticisms of her character and Korrasami, and this site enables such things to be passed along out of context and co-opted for agenda-driven bashing. I don’t think Asami or Korrasami are any worse than any of LoK’s other failures, and at least it’s bad writing for a good cause. Unlike Iroh II, who's just bad writing. Heyo!

Also, I’ve mainly been thinking about Book Air with all my talk of Republic City, but discussing the development of the dynamic between Korra and Asami is going to take us beyond that, and so outside of Republic City.

So let’s see how much I can answer this question without stepping over my self-imposed line.

First of all, I would introduce Asami independently of Mako, and you’re right, I wouldn’t bother with a love triangle. I don’t like that LoK ended on a romantic moment for either Book Air's climax or the finale finale, because the whole first episode is completely devoid of romantic matters or potential suitors. It’s one thing for AtLA, where Katara provides the opening narration and Aang’s crush on her is established at their first meeting; their getting together is the culmination of their respective coming-of-age arcs, which is why Book Fire stretches Kataang out so much and so nonsensically.

Korra's journey is never really about romance. It’s about seeing the world and making connections; Tenzin, her guide into the wider world, is the one who narrates the opening to her story. So I’d expect her final scene to be about all the friends she’d made and her place in the world, not a single romance and a vacation to the Spirit World. But Korra’s main character arc is over by the end of Book Spirits, anyway, so I can understand just ripping off AtLA for something feel-good. Also, considering the limitations in what could be shown, I guess they wanted as many parallels to AtLA as possible to make sure everyone got that Korra and Asami are romantic.

So, with the benefit of hindsight and the goal of endgame Korrasami, we can introduce Asami earlier to give her proper prominence. In the first episode, while careening through the city, Korra encounters Asami. There is no blushing or giggling or anything when Korra and Asami meet, because that's not how Korra or Asami react to attraction. I'm thinking we can replace the whole thing with the hobo and the illegal fishing, since that material can be covered later; perhaps Asami buys Korra food when she sees Korra has no money? But before they can exchange names, something happens that sends them off on a short adventure, and then they get separated.

In episode 2, instead of encountering Mako and Bolin while trying to break out of Air Island to see Probending, Korra encounters Asami again. Asami is likewise sneaking out to see Probending, and she’s a parallel to Korra in that she’s a victim of social isolation. Asami recognized Korra, gives a shout, and they exchange names and bond as fellow probender-geeks. Once that’s done, the girls somehow wind up meeting Mako and Bolin, Korra gets the chance to join the team, etc. Asami would help convince Mako to let Korra play. The end result is Korra with a big group of friends, no romantic hints about anyone (other than maybe Bolin having the hots for her, a situation that will be temporary), and an explicit connection between Korra starting to ‘get’ Airbending and the perspectives offered by her new friends. Perhaps Mako or Bolin shout some advice that gets the circle-walking to click for her, or it could be another thing for Asami to do.

This would be explicit foreshadowing for the Book Air finale, where Korra uses Airbending for the first time to defeat Amon. But instead of Mako being the one in danger, it’s all Korra’s friends, and the scene would be set up as an explicit parallel to the one in the second episode. Korra achieves freedom through her connections, people who show her new sides of herself and the world.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. For most of Book Air, I think Asami and Korra can be partners in discovering Republic City. The Bending Brothers can introduce them to some new element, and the girls react to it in similar but disparate ways. Asami can sometimes be a bit of a snob, while Korra can be more into getting dirty or eating nasty food or belching or whatever. But they still do get moments of going to a dance hall together, getting pulled into street racing together, helping each other chase the corruption out of Probending, etc. Still, a little distance comes between the two, as Korra starts to see herself connecting better with the boys, especially Bolin. If we want to deal with Bolin trying to woo Korra and it not working out, this is the place to do it.

However, rather than romance and a love triangle, the main conflict between Korra’s Krew is Asami being courted by the Equalists. As I said in my other post, rather than the Equalists kicking things off with criminal activity and a direct confrontation with Korra, I’d like them to be a running subplot that only explodes at the end of the season. I think Asami could be a good viewpoint character into that, as she starts to learn and hear about the Equalists- and it will eventually be revealed that Hiroshi has been setting this up for her, to manipulate her. Remember, in my vision, he’s the one who got Amon to adopt the rhetoric of saving the oppressed by eliminating Benders.

It starts with Asami thinking it’s silly, then she starts to acknowledge that they have some good points even if they’re wrong about being against all Benders. Perhaps Asami explains to Korra about some of the good points, and Korra is skeptical but admits that the Bender gangs are a problem. I think this should come to a head in a similar manner to the cartoon when Hiroshi comes under some kind of suspicion. Instead of getting tangled in the love triangle, Mako and Bolin side with Korra right away, and Asami starts to wonder if the Benders really are oppressing her. She knows she’s sheltered and naive, and Hiroshi puts into her head that Korra and the Bending Brothers have been taking advantage of her sweetness and wealth. Asami's been paying for all their adventures, after all, and the others seem closer to each other than to her.

It still ends with Hiroshi’s villainy being revealed, and Asami siding with good guys over him. But here, it’s about Asami siding with her friends, rather than just Mako. This is all still without romance, but it’s laying the seeds.

Things continue on from there, and the only major change I feel the need to call out is that the team doesn’t split up for the final battle. They’re all together, and as I said, Korra has to save all her friends with Airbending. And there's no Iroh II, because he's just boring pointless fan-service who detracts from the other characters.

For Book Spirits, I’d toss out Asami’s whole subplot. I used to have an epic post on ASN (which I saved) describing how it doesn’t make any sense whatsoever, but you can just take my word on it for now. If we do something similar to my Spiritual Eco-Terrorist Unalaq idea, then we can turn Asami’s part of bringing Korra back away from extremism into a parallel of Korra convincing Asami to turn against the Equalists. This book also sees a minimizing of Mako and Bolin, since part of the story is going to take place outside of Republic City. Asami has more reason to leave, so she emerges as Korra’s strongest friend in this book. Bolin could still get mixed up Varrick, if we want to do that subplot, but we’re completely skipping the whole thing of Varrick trying to steal Asami’s company. It's just filler, and the themes of Book Spirits deserve more focus.

Instead, we say that Asami has been steadily rebuilding up Sato Industries in the background of Book Spirits, so she’s in a position to leave it running when she goes with Korra on the Airbender Recruitment Tour. Again, I’m thinking we leave Mako and Bolin behind. Or, if Bolin went off with Varrick at the end of Book Spirits, as I suggested in that Unalaq post, either just Mako is left behind or else he goes with the girls to try to get over his brother being gone. They support him during his loss, and he maybe develops a real bond with Jinora’s future boyfriend, Whatshisname, rather than that subplot being unceremoniously dropped. Eventually, Bolin and Varrick would come back into the story, although maybe not until Book Balance.

Also, Book Change is where we start to have Korra and Asami blushing at each other and making surprising vows of devotion to each other. As Korra explores romance, in parallel to Jinora, we could get some advice from Tenzin and maybe even discussion of how Aang changed the nature of Air Nomad culture by accepting the idea of family units. At the end, when Korra is injured and Asami practically proposes marriage, it won’t come out of left field; it will feel like a culmination. And Korra gives an explicit refusal, our cliffhanger for that subplot.

Hm, perhaps we can also properly introduce Kuvira while we’re here? She can join the Krew as an ally and friend, and part of what has Asami starting to think about Korra as something more than a friend is that Kuvira is explicitly trying to seduce Korra for fun. That might be amusing. Or it could be stupid. It is a love triangle, after all. It's easy enough to cut if we can't make it work, even if the voice actresses have already recorded their lines.

Anyway, as we launch into our final season, Korra starts to recover to find that the Metalbending chick who was (maybe) trying to seduce her is now leading an imperialist conquest of the Earth Kingdom, and also a new Amon is back in Republic City trying to bring down the government. This new Amon is a creation of Kuvira, to give her an excuse to invade the United Republic as a pacifying force. Korra and Asami have to bring down Amon II, and then also Kuvira. It’s very tragic that they have to beat up their former friend, but not too tragic because it turns out that Kuvira is a real jerk.

Timing-wise, as I mentioned in my Hiroshi post, he dies saving Asami from Amon II. This happens before the final battle, so we get to see Asami mourning for a bit as she and Korra go after Kuvira in a new sub-arc. She emerges ready to confess her love to Korra. They get together, and then Korra rallies all her friends and allies across the world to defeat Kuvira and restore freedom to the galaxy. The end sees Korra and Asami together, as romantic partners, amidst all their friends. The End. Huzzah!

Hopefully, that showed how a functional Korrasami arc could be done that makes good use of their characters and frees them from the really janky storytelling that plagues most of LoK. Most of the problem is that LoK seemed intent on giving Asami something separate to do, rather than properly integrating her into things. For all that the storytellers claim to like Asami and Korrasami, it's stunning how little of either -- even in terms of friendship -- there is to the plots and story arcs.

Ah, but there's the line. I shall now back off, rather than crossing it. Yay for me.