#with the example we looked at being about two spies. which was after we had briefly looked at actors in plays

[ghostieblotts]

Today really is the day for applying my pragmatics module to saf, huh

[valenli]

Baldwin IV x Reader

Imagine you meet the king as a foreign princess, and you two are to be wed? But to your surprise. The king is all for it

(warnings: mention of skin disease, stitches, detailed explanations for violent scenes)

(this fic is in no way tied to the real figure, this is only for the movie interpretation. As I do not write for real figures (dead or alive))

For the longest time, I never thought I'd find love a man who was not only a man of God, but would too love me. My mother, after all, was nothing more than a concubine. So I didn't quite have a good example from her nor father who couldn't set his eyes on one. But that all changed when Jerusalem called to many kingdoms, many were there to feel the presence of God, and so was I. I were to travel on my own but it seemed as though father had other plans. Every night that got closer to Jerusalem, whether by ship or horse, I could hear him speak with the advisers and other higher ups of a wedding, mine. I did not wish to get upset just yet, for I prayed heavily that the man I meet is someone with a wise, excellent, and beautiful heart, for faces did not matter once one was in heaven. But on the 7th night, something had happened. While we rested round a campfire in order to rest from the morning heat waves, we heard horses of at least 9 or so men rushing are way, father said these may be pilgrims, and that we need not to worry. But as they came closer it seemed they were none other than knights, dressed in pure white and red cross at the center of the chest. Father got up and waved at them, but a horse man swang his sword straight into his hand, cutting a chunk of skin out. I couldn't hold but the scream I let out as the blood hit my dress, I curled up against my horse when I felt a second horseman strike against my leg, only a cut but it no less hurt. They were ready to strike a final blow but I could see a blue clothed horseman arrive, he stood before us and looked at the white clothed horseman.

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

"do these look like locals, Guy? Have you any clue the harm you have caused against your king?" said the blue clothed horseman

"I have not a clue of what your talking about Tiberias. These people are in the boarders of our enemies, are they not are enemies?" the white clothed horseman who's name seemed to be Guy seemed all smug, or at least arrogant at best, in his answer. He seemed to not care that I had been cut, nor my father who held to his injury.

"these people, Guy, are the bride to be and her father. Had you have asked, they'd already been at the castle discussing matters beyond your small minded arrogance!" the man in blue, Tiberias, seemed familiar to father, as father tried to reach out to him. Soon the white clothed men who hurt us got us up and carried our things, by dawn we were at the castle. What a shame it was nighttime, for the city, and castle, were beautiful. Some physicians stitched my father's injuries and mine, and I were to meet his highness, my groom to be. In the bright morning I headed to his quarters, I felt at ease once opening the door, For it was just him, and me.

---------

Baldwin moved the headwrap away from his face, seeing that my groom to be was masked. I could only wonder why, had he committed a crime? Was he afraid of being spied on? It was common for the women to hide their face before marriage, but I'd never seen a man do it.

"ah, Y/N. You have arrived, I have hoped in one piece, but you were harmed. For which the man who laid hands upon you will be harmed, no doubt in that" he said as he rose up from his chair and gestured for me to follow, we reached the balcony and I looked over at him, then at the city.

"your highness.. It's unnecessary for you to punish him" I said as I turned my head back to the man I stood with, "he did not purposely harm me". I felt the king shake his head and hold my hand, "no, my dear Y/N. But he would have harmed another's life, innocent or not. As a knight, it is his only duty, as demanded by God, to never lay a finger on a innocent". Listening to him speak, it moved something in my heart I had not felt for anyone I had ever known, Yes, I was his soon to be bride, but I couldn't help but feel something. "Y/N. Just as it is the duty of a king to protect his people, it is my duty as your husband to protect you. I promise, even with my condition" he said, I could see his eyes looking away as though he felt ashamed, but of what?

"what condition your highness?" I held his hand more firmly, to which he did not respond, not even a finger moved on his hand

"i am a lepper king, my dear, that is the matter. My body is weak, yes, but I won't let it stop me" he looked back at me. He noticed I held his hand firmly when he looked down at mine, I saw his eyes smile at the sight

"your highness, you love me so even though we have no knowledge of one another, why?"

"for you see Y/N, a marriage is bond between man and woman, a bond of flesh to flesh, it is God's blessing to the people, and if God has blessed me with such a bride as you, Y/N, then who am I to deny it?" he spoke with such a heartfelt tone, I knew in that moment that this was the man of my prayers. I couldn't help but feel tears run down my face. I knew that his condition could bring his end, but I wanted to love him to the day we depart from the earth. I placed my hand on his mask and wanted to lay a kiss on his lips, but he gently stopped me.

"you need to know the lips you lay your kiss upon, as you are my wife, I want you to be sure" He said as he pulled down the mask. A cut through his lips and right cheek was the first thing I saw, his missing nose, and his small blonde hairs coming down from the headwrap. He held my hand as though he asked of what I thought. "my Baldwin.. Your a beautiful man, why you are afraid I can understand, but I love you not for your looks, but the heart" i said as I leaned to him, I felt his lips touch mine. I closed my eyes and placed my hands upon his cheeks, i knew in that moment that all my days of waiting, my prayers, my journeys, were worth having him. We soon left one another's lips

"I love you till the day we part, Baldwin"

"I love you, for everyday I live in your name, Y/N"

[drconstellation]

The Altar of Eccles Cakes

(updated 21 Oct 2023, for Grain Offerings example) (updated 21 Nov 2023, for link to First Temptation)

The mysterious plate of Eccles cakes. Are they really to "calm people down?' And why do they just ...disappear? They must be there for a reason?

Yes, they certainly are. They are just the first course of a fascinating meal on offer in S2.

So far, most of the meta around the Eccles cakes has focused on the meaning of their name. Eccles is an old name for church. We could view it as Aziraphale trying to calm Crowley down. They are also known as "squashed fly cakes." The white outside and the black inside could be seen as a metaphor relating to Gabriel. Or it hints at the Roger the Stunt Fly, that contain Gabriel's memories, flying around the book shop, who's purpose we don't find out about until the end. There is even a link to the 1650 Sorry Dance that Aziraphale mentioned, in that were banned by Oliver Cromwell for being pagan! (Did I get that right? I've not kept the post link.)

[Edit: They also represent the First Temptation as Jesus fasts in the wilderness for 40 days before the Entry into Jerusalem at the start of the Passion narratives, where bread was made from stones.]

Take another look at the blocking in this shot. The dark horse statue, representing Crowley - even wearing his sunglasses! - has the placating plate of Eccles cakes placed before it, in supplication. Yeah, it didn't work this time, but it's the thought that counts. What we have here is Aziraphale making an Sin offering to the altar of Crowley, to ask for atonement in advance for what he has done (taking Gabriel in.)

Once you frame it in that reference, you realize its not the only altar offering made during S2. It also adds a bit more depth to some of the other scenes, where they have all been mentioned already in some way, but it certainly helps to explain the Eccles cakes!

Firstly, we need to mention the main types of altar offering that are made:

Burnt offerings - for general atonement of sins and for expression of devotion to God. It could be a bull, a ram, goat, or a bird in the form of a dove or pigeon. Such as this magnificent example in the Job minisode.

Aziraphale certainly devoted himself to the sin of gluttony on that occasion. (hang on, that didn't come out the right way, did it...?) But he was still devoted to God, despite his nocturnal conversation with Crowley while they waited out the storm in the cellar.

Grain offerings - a voluntary expression of devotion to God. This was grain prepared in different way, but always seasoned, unsweetened and unleavened. Recall at Gomorrah Lot offered to prepare the visiting angels unleavened bread as part of a meal.

Originally when I wrote this post I didn't think I had any Grain offering examples, but a few days later as I was writing my post on The Ineffable Ducks I realized where the missing S2 Grain offering was - in S2E1, when Crowley yells at the Azerbaijani spies in St James Park. The ducks are usually offered bread, which is leavened with yeast, so technically not quite correct, but when you review all the instances of feeding the ducks crumbs or bread crumbs it certainly fits. Unless you are Crowley, and you'd rather have the current state of quiet "frozen peas" between Heaven and Hell. See my Ineffable Ducks post for an elaboration.

Peace offering - This could be cattle, sheep or goat without defect, but the main purpose to was consecrate a meal between two or more parties before God and share that meal in a fellowship of peace and commitment to each other's future prosperity.

You know where we see one of these? At the eldritch ball!

I did see a nice meta about the vol-au-vents recently, mainly about their name, but I don't seem to have saved it, and can't find it again. They are usually filled with chicken (a bird) and the eldritch ball is ostensibly the shopkeepers monthly meeting, after all, where they are there to talk about their mutual prosperity in the future. Just so happens its also an opportunity for Aziraphale to talk to Crowley about their future...oh, and Nina and Maggie's, as well, of course!

Sin offering - atonement or unintentional sin. It would have the elements of a Burnt offering, as well as a Peace offering, but not be shared. These are what the plate of Eccles cakes are, so they were never meant to be eaten. They were an olive branch to Crowley regarding Gabriel, but he turned it down. So they softly and suddenly vanish away, never to be met with again.*

There is one more altar offering that needs to mentioned, another Sin offering. The one Crowley consumed in Elspeth's place in The Resurrectionists minisode in 1832 Edinburgh - the laudanum.

It pretty clear to most observers that Crowley did a good and "kind deed" for Elspeth here, which angered Hell in the process and then he was dragged forcibly downstairs to be duly punished for it. There is a post here from atlas-hope that suggests this is a parallel of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, drinking the cup of God's wrath to absolve Christians of their sins. They point out the laudanum is even poured into a goblet. Crumbs, that's a hefty bit of spiritual lifting, dear demon. What were you thinking, Anthony J. Crowley? It might cast that conversation you had with the carpenter back on the mountain in a new light, or least make us look back twice at it. (Plenty of time for contemplation before S3 arrives...)

Remember, a Sin offering has elements of both a Burnt offering and a Peace offering: a giant Crowley gets Elspeth to promise to devote the rest of her life to being "properly good, not just pretendy good" and the money Aziraphale is forced to donate to her ensures her future prosperity. Sounds like a win-win situation there, Elspeth!

[*OK, if you don't get the ref, its from the Hunting of the Snark. The Snark represents happiness, a most elusive thing to find, and more often than not its a fruitless search, and you find the terrible Boojum instead. During the third verse the Baker recounts the lecture his uncle gives him about how to hunt the Snark, and to be aware of his fate if he is unlucky enough to encounter a Boojum. It kind of fits in with S2, I feel.]

[251-dmr]

The 2-AziraCrow Theory

Maybe I should be calling this my head canon, and not even give it theory status.

But I’ll press on nevertheless. This theory had a seed planted when I saw this quote mentioned at the end of one of Sendarya’s videos in which she mentioned the Theologica Germanica concept of the soul having two halves.

The soul has two eyes When one makes an effort Without the other It shan't get very far, When they help each other They accomplish much. [William of St-Thierry]

Some time later, I began to see the pattern, a theme, that seemed to emphasize the concept of twos.

After noticing these, I started looking for other repeating, seemingly frequent ideas.

These ideas just keep crashing and bouncing and ricocheting around in my head. They just won’t coalesce into anything coherent. My apologies for the chaos and disorganization.

Theme – Two, Half, Split There are references everywhere, in dialog and visually, to “2”s, “halves”, and “splits”. Far too many to list, but examples include putting the lesser demons on half rations; being shown a demon’s split-tongue three different times, Azi & Crowley performing half a miracle each; Shax asking Crowley about the two yellow(!) lights on the boiler; the twin passions of Bildad; Crowley leads the humans out of the bookshop 2x2; even Uriel makes two complete revolutions pacing around Michael in the scene before Sq and Muriel arrive in E1. Honestly, the list is extensive. I suppose, however, that it could be referring to two of any number of things.

Theme – Inside/Outside Again, we have dialog and visuals that emphasize the idea of things being inside or outside, but especially inside. Azi to Crowley in the smitten scene “Why don’t you wait inside? You like to wait inside?” Nina’s “A lot of people in this head…”; And we have so many scenes of someone looking inside or out a window. I have quite a list in another document on my computer.

Theme – Spies This one starts right off with the spy sitting down at the wrong bench, next to Crowley. Shax recruits Crowley to try and find out what’s going on in the Up. Beez recruits Crowley to help find Gabriel, etc. Then there’s Jane Austen, master spy. The three zombies spying on them to get Furfur’s proof and we could even say that those go back to S1E3, 1941, “…half-witted Nazi spies running about London…” And, I also really, really don’t trust Michael. Could they be a spy for hell in heaven? But I don’t have any real evidence for that. Just a distrust of Michael.

Theme – “Bit”s Another word used throughout the season, and maybe even in S1. Well, we definitely have the final S1 scene with Azi saying to Crowley “…if you weren’t, at heart, just a little bit, a good person.” Searching the S2 transcript comes up with ~25-ish uses of the word. Is that a lot? Or normal? I have nothing to compare to it, nor base it on. So although Azi is not Crowley’s “bit on the side”, I thought, maybe Crowley is sometimes Azi’s “bit on the inside”.

Theme – Point Another well-used word throughout the script, appearing ~24 times. This is trickier, though, because “point” can have a number of reasons – the reason or conclusion, indicating direction, or the sharp point, of, say, a pin? I suspect that all are somehow applicable in this season.

But just looking at the last one, it could be a call-back to S1 and how many angels, or demons, can dance on the head of a pin. Where we learn that Crowley can make himself small enough to speed through a telephone wire.

I always vaguely thought Crowley’s line to Mrs Sandwich about whether or not she had her hatpin was a bit of an odd, maybe throw-away line and Mrs Sandwich responds so quickly and charmingly that the line gets passed over. But again, is it a reminder of what angels and demons are capable of? Or does this line mean something else I’m just not aware of?

Theme – Small Crowley Not as fully developed, and maybe not as obvious, but in E1 on the bench, for example, after the spy leaves, we see “normal-sized” Crowley immediately followed by seeing a “small” Crowley in Shax’s compact mirror (and he’s looking out of the mirror, see above) when she arrives. In the resurrection minisode, we see another “small” Crowley, when he’s off his head on laudanum.

Theme – “Invisible” Crowley As far as I’ve gotten to date, there are two definite scenes where I think Crowley is actually inside Azi’s head (or whatever) and not physically there.

First, when they leave GMCoGMD with the Eccles cakes in E1. As soon as they are outside the shop, Azi barely looks at Crowley, and Maggie doesn’t seem to see him, that brief conversation is only between Azi and Maggie. Crowley only “talks” to Azi once they’ve started walking again.

Second, and the bigger one, is in E5 when Azi heads out to solicit the shopkeepers to go to the meeting. Crowley asks “Can I watch?” and just follows Azi around and again, Azi barely looks at him; the shopkeepers appear to act as if they are only talking to one person, and Crowley is completely quiet around them, just hanging around in the background.

I also noticed that in these cases Crowley is on Azi’s right, the opposite of where we usually see him. (Oh, an exception is Mrs Cheng, where he’s on Azi’s left again, and he acknowledges Mrs Cheng when they leave, implying to me that Mrs Cheng can see him.) There could be more instances where we see this behavior, but I haven’t studied every episode yet to look for it.

Theme – S2 posters Just looking at these two for now. Azi and Crowley with one pair of wings, one white one black, behind them. I’ve seen the line “…and they aren’t talking…” I’m not quite convinced yet that they aren't talking. I think it could mean they aren’t talking face-to-face, physically. And I optimistically see their positioning as that they’ve still got each other’s back. Maybe I’m in denial, but I just don’t see the “break-up” as extensive as many seem to.

The other poster is this one of Azi and Crowley, each with the other in their heads/thoughts. Crowley is “seeing” Azi from a memory, from 1941. But Azi is seeing a current Crowley, draped across the bookshop chair. Also, I noted that the [double!] rings that surround them are linked.

My way-out-there idea, then, is that Azi and Crowley have “carved out” space for a duplicate but also somehow real, bookshop (a high-fidelity copy?) within Azi, within his mind, his brain, his soul, I don’t know. And he can enter and leave it as needed. It could also be a copy of Azi’s memories or something.

But it’s also someplace Crowley can visit, a place he can go in and out of (like the telephone lines in S1) as needed. I wonder, then, does Crowley in the end “split” himself, so that a “bit” of himself can go up to heaven with Azi? Referring back to Jane Austen, brandy smuggler – is Azi smuggling Crowley into heaven? All season, Azi usually has his hands closed, perhaps to imply he’s carrying and/or hiding something.

With this theory, it gets complicated, though, figuring out which “reality” we’re looking at. The external original(?) world? Azi’s copy in his head? Or a memory? Or none of the above and this is all nonsense.

Multiple sets of memories, possibly getting mixed together, could help account for the inconsistencies in flashbacks, the apparent “continuity errors” in various scenes, the changing POV.

We’ve seen the physical appearance swap. We’ve seen Azi’s physical possession of Madame Tracy in which they could both control the body. What I am considering is neither of those.

This is just a start. I’ll keep working on it unless someone already has some convincing evidence that clearly refutes the idea.

[dorizardthewizard]

Galactik Football season 3 rewatch, eps 4 - 6

Episode 4:

Aww Tia and Thran talking about TV shows, I like seeing more interactions between characters we don't see together that often.

Also Tia looking out for D'jok by getting the video checked! We see her check up on him a couple of times in these episodes, I love their friendship. Here it's like a little reversal of when D'jok was looking out for her when the whole Rocket Netherball thing was going down

Hooooow does Thran's filter program somehow let him see what happened before the explosion?? That's not filtering anything out, it's straight up new footage!

Artegor putting his hand on Aarch's shoulder after D'jok's disappearance... they're such a divorced couple with messy history who still care about each other

Clamp: Without D'jok here, we don't have a captain!

A complete non-issue since D'jok only started being the captain because Rocket left, but he's back now so

THE KINGS, THE LEGENDS!!!

Aw that little moment of the Snow Kids being a little star struck, getting to play against Aarch and Artegor at their prime. Although I still don't know how that works exactly with the holo-trainer and their irl physical fitness but whatever

THEY'RE PLAYING IN PERFECT SYNC AS IF NO TIME HAS PASSED AAAAAAA

Standing all cool as they tell their Snow Kids to take a break and then immediately crumpling with their middle aged bones ajshahaha

Why does Sonny's English dub voice sound so forced now. "It COULD be a TRAP!!"

Aaaaand now D'jok's leaving as well, that was quick

Are they... you know 😳😳😳

No seriously Sonny's delivery just sells this ahahaha

I love team Paradisia's designs btw, very y2k. We've even got Clover from Totally Spies here!

Ok quick rant about the attempts at portraying "girl power":

Honestly idk about D'jok being annoyed they're all girls, this with the Elektra's comment earlier are examples of S3 being more heavy-handed like, “yeah these players are girls, but ACTUALLY that doesn't mean they're not good players!”. Compare this to the previous seasons where we just... had players that were really good and happened to be girls, and no one needed to comment on it? Like, Kernor is the top goal keeper and Lun-Zaera is the best striker for the Wambas, plus Tia was the Snow Kid's biggest weapon in season 1 so I don't think D'jok would immediately dismiss the girls like that. Maybe he would be disconcerted at being the only boy, but still. It's like in the lego n/in/ja/go movie where they were like “she's a GIRL, but she can still be a NINJA!” which has a weird psychological effect of actually enforcing to kids that there is some sort of disparity between men and women, when instead they could just portray her as an equal and let that do the talking, no need to manufacture sexism so you can call it out like “hey, we're so progressive!” (not that you can't have stories with that too, I just don't think it makes as much sense in this situation and shows a different approach than the first two seasons).

Rant over <3

NIKKI-4 IS TALLER THAN D'JOK YASSS

I like Team Paradisia's football outfits but what's the point of the visor?

They kind of have the Cyclops' style of attacking, lmao

D'jok you're such a bitch

Y'know at this point Aarch is like. Wow don't we have contracts with any of these kids? With notice periods?

I feel like S3 could have been more fun if the player switching had been more planned like, mix up the teams! The Snow Kids knew they'd have to get a player from another team but for some reason did not seem willing to let go one of their own, even though logically they would have to?

Artegor: He was bad for the team and we're better off without him!

Ah nice to see Artegor's no chill side still comes out sometimes

GASP! What a twist!

Episode 5:

Ooooh new name for a Ryker's player! Kinda wish it was the blue hair one just to distinguish easier lol

Nihla!! Although apparently Nihlis in secondary material. Not sure if it's clear what their gender is in the og French but I hc that the Shadows fuck around with gender anyway

Ok what, I remember this All Stars game happening but I thought it was later. I thought I skipped an episode for a second there because what, there was no mention of this mixed all stars game before at all??

also TIA SHOULD BE ON A TEAM

Nikki-4 sounds like the actual name Nikifor. heh

Rocket and Tia's H2O t-shirts! iconic nerds

My reaction to the Mice-delight advert breaks are the same reaction I have to any advert break

Ah ok so they were all contacted by other teams lol, in my mind Tia got contacted for the All Stars game but she turned them down because things were tumultuous for the Snow Kids and she wanted to be there for them <3

Also why are they dismayed that everyone's been contacted by other teams, that's kind of the point of this mixed flux tournament, no? It means they're good players!

Micro-Ice only got contacted by a fan club? WRITERS STOP CLOWNING ON MICE AND ONLY USING HIM FOR COMEDIC RELIEF HE IS A REALLY TALENTED PLAYER! Artie back me up

Ah ironic, Rocket can't make the flux jump and he falls, as opposed to season 2 when he saved Tia from a fall with the flux. Now I'm imagining Tia jumping up to save him and carrying him bridal style. It should have happened, writers

Rocket: Yeah I'm okay! Rocket: Actually, I take that back

We love a self-aware king who knows his limits <3

Christ it's just disaster after disaster for the Snow Kids, huh

Callie giving Nork the STINK EYE lol DRAG HIM she at least has some journalistic integrity

D'jok's being such an ass with the way he's talking about the Snow Kids, at least Mei showed there were no hard feelings when she left. What did they do to you, man? I can understand him feeling hurt and needing to get away, but now the show's going back to “D'jok only cares about winning” again. Like sure that could definitely be a front, but the show doesn't really look behind it as far as I remember

YAAAASS LUN-ZEARA

Surprised we didn't start this match with D'jok and Sinedd taunting each other

How dare you use the Pirate's soundtrack and not have a Pirate on the field >:(

YES KERNOR! weird to see her tired out though

The animation 😭😭😭

ooo call back to Netherball with this resonance thing, glad that has consequences. Cool that they show it affecting other players too, Kernor was the Netherball champion before Rocket after all

Does Simbai get dressed in her flux society clothes just to have a zoom call with them?

Ah wish we had more of that all star game

Episode 6:

Oh come on this is just sloppy now, he says the Shadows vs Rykers but that's the Pirates' logo. They got it right on the previous shot as well!

Is Mice practicing confessing to Yuki? I thought they were already dating lmao, surely they're past this

Why is Mark drawn with nipples but Micro-Ice isn't? Wait no he has them too in the next shot, what are the rules here 😂

Ah this scene is a classic. But 🅱lease give Micro-Ice some development that's not just comedic relief, even his stuff with Yuki is played for laughs. What about the fact that his best friend, no, brother, just up and left and shits on the Snow Kids on live TV?

SHARKY THAT. DOES NOT FEEL VERY LEGAL. SEXUAL HARASSMENT, IN FACT.

Kernor enjoying her little treat <3 I love when we get to see tough characters doing mundane things like eating ice cream.

I love this butler guy who hates his job. His wince when Tia says she needs someone to talk to before he reluctantly offers an ear, LOL. An icon.

Awww I'm glad to see Tia and Mei still being good friends. Mei I missed you!

THE SHADOWS WALKING IN UNISON UNDER THE UMBRELLA DSFJKFSSDF I know I shit on the animation but they do try to put in little things like that. They didn't have to animate that, but they did, for us.

Artie and Bennett shenanigans yaaay

Not Ahito and Thran deciding to watch the Shadows match instead of supporting Yuki

It's so fun watching the Rykers with how intimidating they are. Unfortunately my brain has been ruined and I keep getting reminded of something else when I see this gesture

He looks so unbothered 🤣😭😭

Again, what's the point of the Elektra's visor? Their flux looks so cool though

THE SHADOWS PLAYER IS SO TALL COMPARED TO THE CYCLOPS LOL

What position is Mei even playing now

Why didn't Kernor use her flux? Honestly goalkeepers should just use their flux for every save considering they don't have to run around as much

Is it just me or is Ahito not falling asleep as much as before

4-0???!!! NOT A SINGLE GOAL FOR THE RYKERS???!! RUDE!!!

The look Tia gives Lun-Zia, wtf man, this whole jealousy plot is just ridiculous. SHE WOULD NOT FUCKING DO THAT!

Why ya'll being so mean to Mice, dafuq ToT He just got violated by the paparazzi lmao show some sympathy

Sidney's reaction to Kernor sfsdfjksfjk good taste sir

OH NO NOT ZOLEEN

Ooooooo Pirates lore!! So they were already a thing before Sonny, he just took control from Magnus Blade and gave them a PR change

[electrasev5nwrites]

Ninja Daily: Vapors 48

In Which Danzo is Blamed for Something He Didn't Do (for once)

To the layman, the corpses she was examining would appear to be in order. They weren't a pretty sight by any means, but the advanced state of decomposition made sense when the climate and time since death had occurred. They wouldn't have had any eye material left at this point anyways, and most observers wouldn't have been able to tell anything was wrong.

Shizune wasn't 'most observers', however. Much like Sasuke was specializing in disease and pediatrics, and her mentor specialized in chakra enhanced field medicine and poison removal, Shizune had a concentration in diagnosis and analysis of post-mortem specimens, usually in order to glean information about other villages.

To her, the bodies she had examined may as well have been actually speaking to her. There would have been buildup on the eye cavity, and traces of maggot activity in the sockets if the eyes had decayed normally. She respectfully flipped sheets back over Uchiha Mikoto and Fugaku, (two of the very few who hadn't been cremated) and directed an assistant to have them returned. He didn't look particularly pleased, but she didn't care as she tugged off her hairnet and disposable gloves, tossing them straight into the biohazard container.

It was probably for the best that Sasuke hadn't been involved in this, not that he would have been allowed to anyway. It was against policy for staff to be involved in the medical treatment of blood relations if at all possible, including post mortem work. It was just unwise and emotionally compromising.

Being asked to give permission to excavate his parents had probably been traumatizing enough, to be frank. Especially since Tsunade hadn't wanted to explain her suspicions to him unless it was absolutely necessary.

While she had them up, Shizune had taken the opportunity to acquire a genetic sample from both Uchiha. It might be useful to Sasuke in his investigation of the bizarre disease that kept popping up in his family line, which Tsunade had thought might serve as a good consolation if the exercise was for naught. If Kakashi's theory about missing eyes had proven to be incorrect, there would have been no point in worrying him.

Unfortunately, it looked like Kakashi was right, as he was prone to be. Someone had run off with prime examples of the Uchiha bloodline and used them to incite unrest between Konoha and their allies.

What's worse, they had to be someone highly placed in Konoha, either through legitimate means or with spies.

She didn't bother to knock or introduce herself, as she knew that Tsunade-sama should be out of appointments at the time. Sasuke was in the office, and he looked up with an unusual amount of curiosity. 'He must have rushed over after he finished with his patients for the day,' she realized dully. 'I bet he didn't even stop back to his office before coming here to wait for me.' Shizune cringed, but didn't bother suggesting that he should leave. At this point, he should know what was going on. They couldn't ask him to allow her to excavate his parents and then claim it wasn't important.

"Bad news, Tsunade-sama," she said unceremoniously. "Kakashi was right." She ignored the groan that sounded suspiciously like, "That smug bastard," and continued. "Someone…" Her eyes wanted to flicker over to capture Sasuke's reaction, but she contained the twitch. "committed bloodline theft on at least two members of the Uchiha clan, probably a day or two at most after the time of death."

"Fuck," Tsunade muttered, rubbing at that migraine she kept insisting she didn't have. "Just- fuck!"

Sasuke was pale, composed, and hard. But the glitter in his eyes gave away the fact that he was definitely experiencing a strong emotional response. "Do we have any suspects?"

At the clipped tones, Tsunade looked at her younger apprentice with visible sympathy. "Not exactly. It would have had to be someone either in-village with the opportunity to make a move very quickly and the authority to get around security, or…" she trailed off, not certain if it was wise to suggest the opportunity, now that she remembered Sasuke didn't yet know that Itachi had been under orders.

"Or if they knew what was about to happen and had been able to make arrangements beforehand," Sasuke finished quietly, cold with anger.

Shizune exchanged a dry look with her shishou, full of meaning. Tsunade struggled not to make a face. Her elder student was probably right—it was time that Sasuke got the full story. She trusted him, and he was clever enough that he might already be sensing hints that something was wrong about the story he'd been told. If he figured this out on his own, he would never trust them again.

"If that," Tsunade agreed quietly, averting her gaze. She looked downright pained, which to Shizune was as good as an admission that she agreed. "Sasuke… Do you remember what I said, about information that you needed to have but didn't have clearance for?"

"Yes," he bit out, practically vibrating with tension. "But I'm not yet sixteen or a Jounin."

"This… changes things," she muttered. "I think you have to know, now. Uchiha Sasuke, what I am about to impart is an S-level secret. Insensitive use of this information will compromise multiple lives, and possibly the administration of Konoha itself. If you do not feel able to responsibly possess and protect this information, say so now."

She hadn't expected that he would falter. Tsunade knew how block-headedly stubborn her younger apprentice was.

Seeing his faultless bow and murmured promise that he would protect this secret still filled her with pride. He was a good kid.

"Alright, then. ANBU, out of the room, set up a perimeter." A whoosh of black was visible for just an instant, and then the door was shut more securely. Shizune wordlessly traveled the room, activating hidden seals.

Sasuke was looking a bit disturbed at this point, to her expert eye.

"This information," Tsunade began, "was known to only three people before I was informed, as far as I know. One of whom is Shimura Danzo," (Shizune scowled), "one is the Sandaime Hokage, and the last would be Uchiha Itachi."

Now both her apprentices were scowling.

"You're not going to like this," she sighed. "but this story actually begins when the Kyuubi attacked Konoha."

Sasuke's confusion was almost palpable. Normally, Tsunade would have mocked her apprentice for the blankly dumb look on his face. She could hardly blame him for that—the connection was hard to see.

"Apparently, the idiotic masses went looking for scapegoats in the wake of their pain. One of those you know—Naruto. The other…" She paused. "Well, I'm sure you're aware of that old story about how Uchiha Madara could control the bijuu with his Sharingan?"

Sasuke twitched. "That's a children's story," he said flatly.

"Well, it apparently holds equal appeal to small minds of all sorts," Tsunade said dryly. "Because several elements of the conservative faction allied with the nimrods who came up with the connection, and the Uchiha came under suspicion. Danzo, among others, used the opportunity to push sanctions against the Uchiha, who he had apparently never trusted."

He appeared spectacularly unimpressed.

"Obviously, I don't believe that the Uchiha were involved in a brilliant scheme to summon the demon that devastated their home as well," Tsunade said dryly. "But unfortunately, your father wasn't much of a politician, and chose to deal with the idiocy as if it would pass if he just sneered at it long enough."

Shizune face-palmed at the 'accurate but not particularly kind' summation of the situation. Sasuke just shrugged.

"My keen intuition tells me that he overestimated the intelligence of the general populace."

The condescension in the otherwise bland statement was all but palpable. If nothing else, Sasuke had a damn good poker face when he wanted to. Tsunade gave a sideways smile devoid of humor, and added, "Unfortunately for all involved, he also underestimated their competence. He chose to cope with the political difficulties by removing them from power."

At his blank expression, she rolled her eyes. "Tsunade-sama means that he was advocating overthrowing the Hokage and the Council and taking control of Konoha's administration," Shizune explained gently. Sasuke wavered for a moment, and then sat down with a thump on the couch.

'Me too, buddy,' Shizune sympathized silently. Damn if the kid didn't look like he needed a hug at the moment.

"I assume they were successful," Sasuke drawled, sarcasm as easy to spot at the tremors in his hands.

'He's burying it deep.' Shizune did her best not to twitch in irritation. Sometimes, the emotionally removed act got old.

"Yes, well, they might have had a brilliant opportunity to fight and possibly die against the combined capabilities of the rest of Konoha's military, if it weren't for the fact that someone tattled." Tsunade flexed a foot under the table. She'd been sitting so long that her legs were cramping up, but now probably wouldn't be the time to announce a break and go for a walk. "The Sandaime planned to diffuse the situation with diplomacy. His council disagreed, covertly supporting Shimura Danzo who coerced an ANBU captain into acting as his spy… and putting down the rebellion by killing every man, woman, and child affiliated with the Uchiha. That agent, tricked into believing the order came from the Hokage, accepted the mission because rejecting it would have meant someone else would have taken it, and everyone really would have died," she finished quietly.

Then she watched a young man's world break apart.

"So…"

Sasuke's voice broke, and his pulse jumped in his throat. Shizune shifted uncomfortably, considering doing something about the fact that he appeared to be near hyperventilation.

"So Itachi was acting on orders."

He swallowed.

"Not the Hokage's orders. Danzo's."

"Yes," Tsunade said quietly. "Or so I was told after I became Hokage. Itachi is currently acting as our spy in a group of S class criminals who want to rule the Elemental Nations." She was visibly sympathetic, but there was only so much she could do.

Shizune shuddered, roughly wiping tears off her cheeks. 'I've never seen Sasuke cry before.' He didn't seem to be aware of the water rolling down his face, or the fact that his hands were trembling. She closed her eyes, feeling sick. The information had been bad enough without witnessing how it affected the only living Uchiha who hadn't known.

He didn't even try to resist when she quietly sank down into the cushion beside him and wrapped an arm around his shoulders, curling his head onto her chest.

Sasuke cleared his throat. His voice was deceptively steady when he asked, "So when are we going after Danzo?"

"As soon as we can pin an unrelated crime on him," Tsunade said gently. "If he's taken to trial for what he did to the Uchiha, Itachi would be exposed as a fraud and probably killed. However, we do have an angle. Many years ago, the Sandaime discovered that he had a private force among the ANBU, and ordered him to disband it. But we don't think that he did. Unfortunately, proving it requires that we get hold of one of those soldiers alive and get around the seal placed on their tongues that renders them incapable of speaking."

"How did you know to look?" Sasuke demanded. "What did Kakashi have to do with anything?"

Tsunade blinked, but easily adapted to the subject change. "He and his team discovered that the supposed Kage of Sound was being controlled by a genjutsu so powerful that Kakashi didn't see how it could have been cast by anyone but a Sharingan user specializing in it. He had worked with Itachi in past, and didn't believe Itachi was capable of such a thing." She snorted. "Even if he was capable of it, I think you can see why I didn't think he had any motivation to set Konoha and Sand against each other. Or set Konoha against the Fire Daimyo, depending on how much information was meant to get out," she added, just to be thorough, although that outcome made less sense to her.

"Of course, now that we lay it all out that way…" Shizune scowled and involuntarily tightened her grip on her kohai. "It sounds like Danzo had the opportunity to commit the bloodline theft we discovered today."

"And he opposed the alliance with Sand," Tsunade breathed. "That…"

"That fucker," Sasuke hissed, choking on tears.

It wasn't a bad summary, Tsunade thought. That fucker indeed.

Shoulders held high with more effort than usual, Sasuke stalked back to the hospital to safely deposit the samples Shizune had taken for him. He carefully did not think about the fact that he was carrying genetic material from both of his parents. They were samples, that was all.

Out of sheer force of habit, he stopped by reception on his way in to see if there had been any changes in status for his patients. There hadn't, but there was a note from last shift's secretary. He eyed it wearily, unfolding it to find that Aiko had apparently stopped by in the last morning.

A brief glance out the window reminded him that it was almost six at night. Surely she had figured by now that he had been busy. But, still… maybe it was something important. Either way, it would be a distraction.

Right now, he didn't want to think. He just felt sick, like he might shake and fall apart if one more nerve was pressed the wrong way.

He had been wrong. He had been lied to, and he had been a gullible fool. Sasuke had even noted that Itachi's claim that he had killed the family to test his abilities had made no sense. The story that Tsunade had shared… it made a lot of sense.

That meant that years of his life had been wasted. All the bile and effort spent hating a certain man- no, Itachi, hating Itachi, the only loyal Uchiha he'd known- had been less than a waste.

The worst part was just how easily he could accept that his father might have done such a thing to protect his clan's future and welfare.

'But that means… mother, too?'

Could she have- would she have turned against the village? Mother had been loyal… but had she been more loyal to her family than to the village?

'Yes,' he registered dully. There wasn't really doubt to be had.

And that would explain why she didn't appear to have fought Itachi when he came to kill her and father last. They knew his choice, and chose to stand down once it became clear that their plan had failed. She wouldn't have fought her own child.

Sasuke blinked, and realized that his hands had been moving without his consent. His feet, too—he was in the lab, and labeling his two samples. On another day, the lapse in attention would have been alarming, but he couldn't be bothered to care.

What was he going to do?

The bloodstains on the compound that he had seen every day for years as a reminder of why he needed to harden his heart and kill aniki. The habit caused him literal pain when he thought of it now. He had been so wrong, so stupid for so many years. He had lived with the blood of traitors in his home and hated the one living person who loved him enough to accept the monstrous mission to kill their clan.

Sasuke had hated his brother as a traitor for years… but he felt a hypocrite now when he thought of re-evaluating that judgment. It was just impossible to redirect his hate to the real traitors. His father had just been trying to advocate for his family's rights. The path he had chosen was wrong, but things could have been worked out. It could have, if it weren't for Danzo.

His feet led him across town, but not in the direction of the Uchiha compound. Sasuke paused outside the Uzumaki's door without announcing his presence for a moment, torn. Why had he come here? He couldn't tell Aiko what was going on. Even if he did, what could she do about it? Nothing. His old teammate could do nothing.

Sasuke turned away.

Aiko had been standing in the path to the house, looking at him curiously. Then she blinked, concern crossing her face. "Sasuke?" Then she seemed to comprehend something. "Oh! I'm so sorry, did you come because I stopped by the hospital earlier?" Before he could muster up a reply, she was moving on, pushing past him to open the door. "I just wanted to see if you'd like to get lunch, but obviously that didn't work out. Would you like to come in? It's a little cold to lurk out here."

Was it? He hadn't noticed.

Sasuke had only been in this house twice before, and briefly both times. That hadn't stopped someone from getting him his own pair of house slippers. His brow furrowed at just how damn odd that was—how many visitors did they have? There were a downright shocking amount of shoes in the genkan—but he didn't bother to ask.

He didn't need to, as Aiko glanced over at him when she tossed him the slippers. "Karin thinks communal shoes are gross," she said, as if that explained everything.

It was best not to spend too much time thinking about Karin. He often got the unsettling feeling that she was undressing him with her eyes when he saw her. Considering her best friend was a Hyuuga… there was a decent possibility that she really did know what was under his clothing. He'd had creepy stalkers before, but that concept was a new and disturbing one.

"I see," he replied quietly, digging his toes into the soft material. He rather preferred the more traditional ones, but Sasuke had been raised with better manners than to criticize a gift.

"Tea?"

He didn't bother to reply, knowing perfectly well that she was already making it. Aiko was a creature of habit. At a time like this, that was something of a comfort. With a clatter, he pulled back a wooden chair and settled in at the kitchen table. His old senpai –she wasn't really anymore, he really shouldn't still refer to her that way—glanced over at him, then pulled down two blue teacups with a light bump against the counter.

"Long day, huh? Want to talk about it?" She didn't seem bothered when he shook his head. "I see. Did you see Fukiko today?" Aiko gave one of her impartial little smiles at his nod. "Ah. How was she?"

Now that he'd been presented with a question he couldn't answer via sign language (without resorting to actual hand signals), Sasuke drummed his fingers on the tabletop. Sharp eyes caught the uncharacteristic fidget, which he didn't find annoying coming from her. She was always that way—always looking. "She's doing well," he answered finally.

It was true. The symptoms were easily treatable, and she was actually feeling much better than she had been in past. He had yet to make any real progress on the actual disease she had—hell, it hadn't even been named outside of the lab assigned number. That felt like a personal failure, even though it was his first major case and only been worked on for a few months.

"I'm glad to hear it."

She actually did sound glad. That was one of the things he liked about her. It wasn't always obvious, but she cared in her own awkward way. It was a little easier to deal with than Naruto's very verbal method of expressing concern.

"Yeah." He muttered. The teapot's shrill call disrupted the temporary calm that had fallen over his mind, and Sasuke jolted. Aiko stood to retrieve it, but his mind was miles away.

How had he so easily forgotten what he had been worrying about? He had much more important things to think about than tea. What was wrong with him?

Brow furrowed, Aiko whipped around when she sensed that something was wrong. A nerve in her lower eyelid twitched. "Are you serious?" she whined, glaring at the mailbox sitting in Sasuke's chair. 'Why can't that boy use the door?'

She had to groan. He must have been desperate to escape… and getting really good at the replacement technique. She didn't know if she could rip up an object secured at the end of a curb outside the house to switch with. Impressive show of skill aside, it was going to be a pain in the ass to fix.

'God, why is everyone I know so weird,' she grouched, setting the kettle back down with a clatter and moving to lift the mailbox. It was hard to know if Sasuke could be fairly judged as being as much of a looney as the Yamanaka she'd escaped from earlier that day, but at the moment... Well. It didn't look good for him, that was all.

Several Days Later

"So, you want to remake the seven swordsman of the Mist," Mei mused. It wasn't really a question, so Suigetsu just nodded and attempted to look sincere.

It wasn't his most natural look.

To be fair, he wasn't feeling the emotion at the moment. It had been surprisingly easy to get re-accepted into Mist for an audience asking for reinstatement. Their forces were depleted, and apparently it had been a relatively common occurrence as bloodline users who had fled the purges returned when they found out the new Mizukage was a bloodline user herself. He had used that ready excuse and the fact that he didn't think anyone was around who would know that he had left for other reasons, like the fact that Mist was a shithole and the seven swordsmen had become a refuge for corrupt assholes.

He didn't really give a rat's ass about this Kage one way or the other. She was probably going to fuck things up as badly as Yagura had eventually. But she was weak and sentimental enough to give another poor, mistreated bloodline user a personal audience and reinstatement back into the active forces.

For now, he would play along. The training he had been given as a future member of the legendary swordsman group was a valuable commodity, and so this bitch was likely to help him acquire at least one sword so she could use him. Since they were allies with Konoha, she would have information about what the hell had happened to Zabuza's sword, and possibly information on the others.

Suigetsu gave the Mizukage's two bodyguards a toothy smile on his way out, twisting the fabric of his new headband between his fingers. The old one was impassive, but the twitchy fuck with the large sword couldn't meet his eyes.

That was fine. As soon as he had everything else he could get out of them, he would kill that brat and take the sword he so cavalierly hauled around. Suigetsu had much more right to it.

When the door shut behind the newest Mist Chuunin, Mei snorted. "What an idiot," she drawled, crossing her legs and ruffling her hair contemplatively. But even idiots could be useful.

"You don't trust him?" Chojuro inquired cautiously.

Ao gave him a spectacularly condescending look. "Why else do you think she didn't tell him we already have that sword?" His tone clearly added, 'idiot', at the end of the phrase. The younger man flushed. Just about no one knew that Mist had Zabuza's sword, so the ruse was unlikely to be discovered any time soon. In the meantime, they could use the brat.

"Now, now, be nice, boys," Mei chided lazily. She let her lips curl into a catlike smile, but didn't deign to comment.

Frankly, the boy's poorly hidden preoccupation with the little girl who had technically killed Zabuza was amusing. As part of the deal for borrowing the girl's abilities, Mei had been required to covertly release the information that she'd cashed in Zabuza's bounty. Konoha couldn't do it themselves without the ruse being obvious, but Mei had managed to get the information onto the girl's bounty without letting the idiots who set the bounty know the information was a purposeful attempt to make the girl seem like an unappealing target. Unless Rock raised their set bounty, no one would probably come after the girl now. It just wasn't worth the trouble to tangle with a kunoichi who could kill Momochi Zabuza for such a small sum.

Mei knew perfectly well that even if the girl had technically landed the killing blow, it had to have been a hilarious fluke of some kind. The girl might one day be that kind of shinobi, but she sure wasn't yet.

'But I was told not to let anyone know she's being over-exaggerated,' Mei thought with an innocent flutter of her eyelashes, as if she'd been telling the lie out loud.

She had to get her kicks somewhere, anyway.

Anachronistic Omake- Since people apparently miss Naruto.

"You can't have my wallet," Naruto dead-panned, holding it out of Jiraiya's reach. There was no possible good reason for a full-grown man to want to hold onto a kid's money.

The old dude spouted some crap about shinobi temptations and prohibitions or something, but he just concentrated on giving his best 'unimpressed' stare. It was his go-to tool when he didn't actually have a clever response. It was better than shrieking ineffectually. He would never be as clever with his words as Aiko was, but at least he could make his words count when he did use them.

Speaking of which…

He tried a logical approach. "If those prohibitions are so important for shinobi to be able to resist, then I need to be able to cope with them on my own. Earlier, with the Rasengan, you said that being my teacher meant that you would give me the tools to figure out my own problems and not that you would guide me through them. By that admission, you should be letting me struggle with the prohibitions on my own instead of protecting me from them."

Jiraiya stared for a moment, and then he started laughing. "You're brighter than I thought kid, but not bright enough." He held up a frog-shaped wallet, winked, and then scarpered off.

If he wondered why Naruto wasn't chasing him, he didn't let on.

"Idiot," Naruto muttered, digging out his real wallet. It probably looked a bit lewd, since he'd stuffed it in his pants, but that was just about the only way he could think of to keep the pervert's paws off of it. He'd been with Jiraiya long enough to know he wasn't the man's type. A passing man clapped his hands over his preteen daughter's eyes and sent him a nasty glare.

'Why's he so mad? She's giggling. Obviously she doesn't care,' he thought. He didn't reply, just gave the man a big, wide apologetic grin.

For some strange reason, he turned red and hustled away even faster.

Naruto shrugged. Whatever.

[writersblockedx]

Protector of the Party: Chapter 8

Chapter Eight: Gone

PAIRING - Steve Harrington x Reader BASED OFF - 1x08 WARNINGS - Mentions of violence and mental illness WORDS - 3.6K

A/n - Again very sorry that this has had to be posted a day later.

Series Masterlist Masterlist

Hopper hadn't allowed Y/n to go with him in the rescue of the kids. Herself, Nancy, Joyce and Johnathan were all told to stay and to just sit until he returned. Y/n, unsurprisingly, hated every moment of it.

While Johnathan sat between his mother and Nancy, Y/n was pacing around what was left of the Wheeler house. She avoided the Christmas lights, and the bits of wall as the girl thought. She trusted Hopper, but for him to go up against the lab, who had millions of spies dotted around and even a helicopter in the sky? It was a risk. A risk big enough for Y/n to panic. A lot.

The headlights which flashed across the front room curtains acted as water thrown onto the fire which was Y/n's worry. The three behind her pulled themselves from the couch as Y/n led the way to the porch. They lurked in the doorway for a moment before the truck stopped. The headlights turned off and each of the kids, and Hopper, jumped out of the car. "Mike!" Exclaimed Nancy from behind Y/n, pushing passing the girl gently to grasp her brother. "Oh my God Mike."

Y/n followed a similar action as Dustin got out from the car. Though, unlike Mike, Dustin actually met her in the middle. "You are so fucking stupid, you know that?" She said as she daren't even loosen her grip around the curly haired boy, scared that if she did, she'd loose him forever.

But, as Dustin wiggled, Y/n pulled and stood from the ground she had been kneeling against to reach Dustin's height. Her eyes soon landed on a small, shaven-hair, girl. The same one Dustin had once named was Mike's cousin and then, after admitting to his lie, came out about the girl being called El. "Is that my dress?" Nancy asked from next to Mike.

Y/n glanced between the younger girl and her friend, no words following. So Y/n put her hand out as an offering, "You're El, right?" She presumed.

The girl looked between the hand and Y/n's expression, hesitant in making any movement at all. So she looked to Mike. "She's the one I told you about." He spoke with a smile that seemed to bring comfort to El. "The protector of the party."

And with that, El stared back at the hand and she shook it.

Everyone returned back inside the house. They wasted no time as they found their seats back on the couch, the kids crouched on the floor as they started explaining...everything. How they knew all of it completely had Y/n puzzled. They called it the upside down. That was where Will and Barb were trapped, that was where this creature, or what the kids were calling the Demogorgon, had come from.

Mike had started to draw a picture to help depict his explanation of this upside side. He lined the paper first, before doodling a small person and then a dot of some kind. "Okay, so in this example, we're the acrobat. Will and Barbara, and that monster, they're this flea." Mike guided his words with the tip of his pen as he pointed between the stick figure and the dot. "And this is the Upside Down, where Will is hiding." Her heart stung at the thought of Will in this place, whatever it was, stuck there with this creature. Mike dropped the paper and pen before continuing, "Mr Clarke said the only way we get there is through a rip in time and space." Sounded easy enough.

Y/n's brows raised as she listen to Mike like a fish on a hook. "The same Mr Clarke who teaches middle school science." She thought was right to point out.

Dustin sat up from the side of Mike, "We think he was talking about a gate." He added with his toothless grin.

"That we tracked to Hawkins lab-" Informed Lucas.

"-With our compasses." Dustin continued as if the two were fighting over who was to say which part.

But as they realised the expressions that stared back at them, they realised there was more explanation needed. Y/n, however, despite her stereotype, still a nerd, was following completely. Enough, in fact, she finished Dustin's words for him. "The gate would have such a strong electromagnetic field that it changed the compasses direction." She realised, checking with Dustin for confirmation. Who, luckily for her, nodded.

Johnathan leaned into Y/n's side, "How do you know that?" He asked.

"Physics. Last year." She told him before watching the boy lean back and question whether he had actually ever paid much attention.

From the chair across from everyone, Hopper finally voiced his thoughts. "Is this gate underground?" His expression was stern as he glared right at El.

Y/n felt her brows narrow as she clocked onto what Hopper was questioning. While she didn't remember it well, she could recall the slit in the wall that had been glowing, littered in sludge that made the girl shiver just at the thought of it. "Yes." Said El.

Y/n glanced between Hopper and the younger girl. "Next to the large water tank?" She pressed.

She nodded, "Yes." That was the gate. The gate to the upside down. Her and Hopper had been face to face with it.

Dustin, suddenly concerned for the safety of his cousin, sat upright as he attempted to gage what had just happened. "How- how do you know that?"

Y/n looked to Hopper, pleading for him to answer. Instead, Mike's voice came, "Because they've seen it."

Now, Dustin only looked to the girl. His shook his head as his mouth fell agape, utterly flabbergasted. "You- You've seen it." He reiterated in disbelief. "How the hell have you seen it!"

Y/n gestured her hand for Dustin to calm - not that it did much. "I will tell you later. What matters now, is finding Will and Barb."

"Is there any way that you could talk to Will? That you could reach him in this..." Joyce questioned as her stuttering tone trailed off, pupils on El.

"Upside down." She finished for her.

"Yeah. Upside down."

El did nothing but nod, causing Nancy to lean forward, as her hands cupped one another. "And my friend Barbra? Can you find her too?" Another nod.

A thought rose in Y/n's mind that she debated on speaking aloud. Her eyes glanced to Hopper who was still looking at Eleven in curiosity. And, so, the girl gave into her thoughts. "My mum, she was at the lab too." As she started, El's expression faded, as if just the mention of the lab was so daunting to her. "I don't think she's there anymore. Maybe she's in the upside down too." She glanced over to Nancy before back to El. "Here, I have a photo of her-" Y/n rushed, rummaging through her jacket pockets, dragging out the wrinkled picture of her mother and passing it to El. "Here. Do you know where she is?"

El stared at the picture. She stared for a while. Long enough to make Y/n nervous. As the girl looked up, shook her head, Y/n felt this overwhelming distortedness that she couldn't quite place. "No." El said and the other girl felt like her whole body urged her to run from this situation. El passed the photo back over, barely able to make eye contact with Y/n. "Sorry." She paused. "Gone. Bad men."

Gone.

Y/n didn't have to question much further. The word rung around her mind. The image, the memory of her mother flooding through her mind, knowing that was all she had. There was no more, now. She was gone - as El had put it, because of the bad men.

The girl wobbled as she stood from the couch, tears falling from her pupils as she attempted to leave the situation. She couldn't be in front of Nancy Wheeler, or the whole party, or even Joyce, crying like she knew she going to do. So she fled. "Excuse me." She had muttered, rushing down the hallway as her body shook and the girl fought to catch her breath.

Y/n got into Johnathan's room just in time. She shut the door behind her and let her back fall against the wood, sliding down as her knees became weak. Her cheeks were stained in tears as her voice whimpered through it. Her mind tried to fight off the idea of death, the concept of knowing that her mother wasn't coming back, that Y/n would never hear her voice again, or feel her touch, that she was gone, it felt like something she'd never be able to accept.

A gentle knock came from the wood of the door. "Y/n," Hopper's voice was soft compared to how they usually spoke to one another.

The girl felt as if her back were like bricks, that maybe they would never move. But as Hopper knocked once more, she shuffled along, her back now leaning against the end of Johnathan's bed. It didn't take long before the door swung open and Hopper walked in. He closed the door behind him, taking the space next to Y/n on the floor.

Silence followed.

Hopper wasn't sure what to say. He'd been here before: the day he took Y/n's mother away from her and to the hospital where she was trapped. Then, he hadn't said anything to the younger girl, and he regretted it. "I'm sorry." That's what came out first. "We- I should have realised what this lab was doing well before now, okay? I never should have lost sight of your mum's case and I'm sorry I did." He paused, looking at the girl who couldn't break her gaze from the carpet. "But we have a chance now, to tear this lab to the ground."

She finally glanced back at him. "I just want to tell her-" Her voice was shaky as she thought to speak her piece. "I want to tell her everything I didn't." And with that, the tears flooded though. While Y/n knew her mum wasn't at the mental capacity to understand much now, she still wished she had sat at her bedside, and told her things. Told her about how school went, the boy she was crushing on and the stupid joke her little cousin Dustin had made on the drive home.

"I know." Said Jim as they glance to one another before Hopper took her into his arms, letting her tears stain his jacket as she cried. "I promise you, I will get everything the lab has on your mothers case, okay?" Y/n nodded as a response. "We just need to get through this first."

Y/n retracted from the man as she wiped her tears. "How are we doing this?" Was probably a good question to be asking.

Hopper gestured to what was waiting behind the closed door. "That's what they're planning." He informed. And so Y/n stood finally, balancing on her heels as she faced the door. "You don't have to do this, you know, kid." He told her. But still, she walked out, and joined the rest of the group who were huddled around the kitchen table.

She wasn't sure what she had missed. But all eyes fell to her. She took a sharp inhale as she made sure to hold the tears that sat in her waterline. "Tell me you have a plan." Y/n said and it seemed they all relaxed, knowing that she was okay.

And so the kids started to explain. Everything. From El attempting to gain contact, to now, their plan of creating a sensory deprivation tank for the girl. That way, she would be able to successfully contact Will. Which was why they had the paddling pool and were about to leave for the middle school. It seemed like a stupid, stupid plan when it was over simplified, but it was the only plan they had. So Y/n agreed to it.

She joined Hopper in the truck as he drove the way towards the school that was abandoned at this time of night. She sat in the passengers seat as she had done millions of times before. But, what was new to her, was the hoard of bickering kids that squabbled behind them. Y/n could tell in a glance, Hopper was biting down his tongue.

Y/n hadn't let go of the photo of her mother since El passed it her back. And she even felt guilty when she looked away from it, facing Hopper as his eyes starred at the empty road in front of them. "You know what I've realised this past week?" The girl started, shoving the photo gently back into her jacket pocket.

Hopper hummed in response, giving a glare to this kids through the rear view mirror that they were too distracted to catch. "That I'm good at it."

The man peeked over at her, "Good at what?"

She shrugged, "Finding things out, I guess." She paused as she thought on her next words. "Maybe made me think of doing something like an apprenticeship at the station in the Summer." She slyly slipped in with a smirk gliding across her lips.

Hopper had never laughed so loudly - especially considering current context. "You? At- At the station?"

"What is so funny about that?" Y/n groaned like the angsty teenager she was.

"Oh, I don't know, your criminal record might be a good reason why this is so funny." He spoke thought a chuckle.

"I'm sure you could pull a few strings!"

Hopper calmed a little as he finally looked to her with a genuine expression. "Since when did you want to become a cop?" He questioned.

She shook her head lightly, "Not a cop. More like, detective stuff." She admitted, thoughts that had been floating around her head since she leant over Hopper's shoulder that day in the library, leading her to where she was now. The way that once over-dramatic conspiracy theory had unravelled, had Y/n completely mesmerised when she thought back on it. It was incredible just thinking how they had gotten here. To be able to do that as a job, it had certainly peaked her interest.

The man sighed as he realised the seriousness of this request. "I'll see what I can do." He finalized, watching as a grin tugged at her lips.

"Thank you."

Hopper stopped for a moment. He couldn't recall a time she had ever actually thanked him. Even when he had rescued her from what could have been an arrest, or probably worse and could have gained herself a court case, no thank you. But, for some reason, she thanked him for a job offer he may or may not even be able to provide.

Hopper was soon pulling into the Middle school, swerving between two spaces before stopping the engine. And everyone returned to their allocated people. Johnathan went with Hopper to acquire the ice, Nancy with Mike to gather the hose, Dustin and Lucas (while Y/n pointed out against such) were requested to set up the kiddie pool. And Y/n was paired with Joyce to prepare young El for what she had done many times before.

Y/n located an empty classroom, switched on the lights and collected a few chairs to sit around. Joyce had brought duck tape to create the darkness required for El to enter this 'state'. Whatever that meant. The women wrapped it around a pair of large goggles to effectively get that pitch black sight. How El did this, as young as she was, was a concern for another time.

"This will keep it dark for you, just like your bathtub." Joyce assured, though she seemed uncertain in calling it a bathtub. This was all a very new concept for everyone to grasp. "You're a very brave girl, you know that, don't you?" She added when El hadn't given a reply.

She glanced to Joyce and then to Y/n. The other girl nodded as a way to reinstate Joyce's words before gently placing her palm over El's hand, a small smile glistening over her lips. "You are incredible for doing this. Putting yourself in danger to save people you've never known before." She said.

Joyce then placed her own hand on top of the one Y/n had let fall to El's. She smiled too. "Thank you." She paused for a moment. "Listen, we are going to be there with you the whole time, right?" Joyce glanced to Y/n who nodded, assuring her words once again. "And if it every gets too scary...in that place, just let me know okay?"

El listened to the words deeply before responding, "Yes."

"Ready?" Y/n questioned as she straighten her back, puffing out her chest with a glint in her eye which bred hopefulness.

El reciprocated her movements. "Ready."

And so Y/n led the way towards the gym that she hadn't step foot in since she left for High School. At that moment in time, the kids and Nancy were filling up the pool. Lucas yelling, "Warmer!" and, "Colder!" Every few seconds before it reached the perfect temperature. Then Johnathan and Jim began slicing open the bags of salt and letting it pour into the pool. They didn't stop until Dustin's egg floated above the water. Then it was perfect. And then El could climb into the pool.

Joyce held her hand from the right side and Y/n held the other, guiding the young girl into the pool until she gained her balance. She slowly crouched down before floating onto her back. As if in a instinct, the flights flickered. And they didn't stop. Each of them searched their surroundings before the flights burst and darkness covered the gym.

Y/n couldn't make out what El was feeling as she floated in the make-shift pool. All she knew was that, somehow, this would lead them to Will.

It took a few moments before the lights began to flicker once again. "What's going on?" Asked Nancy who was looking around the room as if it were going to answer her.

"I don't know." Mike responded as his eye stayed glued to El.

A sense of nerves kicked in to Nancy. She leant forward over the pool, "Is Barb okay?" She questioned as if El were in any kind of state to tell her right now. "Is she okay?" The girl repeated, her voice raising, a glint of pain weaved through her tone.

A long second passed before there came an answer, in a whisper. "Gone." Said El. One word that, while it came for a young girl, echoed through the whole gym and sent shivers down all spines. "Gone. Gone. Gone." She kept going and even she was frightened by it.

Joyce reached out her hands as to soothe the younger girl. "It's okay, it's okay." She calmed as El's words faded. "It's okay, we're right here, honey." She assured. And soon, El's movements slowed and she panting nearly as much as she had been prior.

And not long after, the girl spoke once again. "Castle Byers."

Everyone looked to one another.

"Will?" El called.

She had found him.

Joyce almost leaped forwards into the pool just at the mention of her son. "You tell him-" She paused as to conjure up the right words. "You tell him I'm coming."

Y/n could only watch the young girl. The girl who had been in the same lab as her mother. Who could find places that seemed nothing more than fiction. It made her question if what Y/n's mother had been saying, about being able to enter minds and to mould thoughts, maybe that wasn't the bullshit everyone had called it out to be. I mean, if that lab had really taken her from the hospital, they must have wanted something from her.

The static crackling behind Y/n dragged her from her thoughts. And, for a second, she thought she had been dreaming when a, "Hurry." Was sounded through the static of the walkie. But as she looked to everyone; they had all too heard it.

Will was alive. He was safe.

Joyce leaned over once again, "Listen, you tell Will, you tell him to stay where he is." She instructed. "We're coming, okay? We're coming."

Eleven jolted out from the water, throwing off the duck taped goggles. Joyce held the girl tightly as to calm her as her breath became uneven. No one dared to move. Not yet. Everyone needed to let what had just happened sink in.

But, there was a sense of haste that followed. If Barb was gone, then maybe Will was next and maybe they didn't have long. Truly, they knew nothing, but it was best to move now than not at all. So, not long after, they started to disband.

Y/n took El into a towel as to get her body temp back up again. Then, she guided her to the bleaches where the girl sat, comforted by Y/n's arms and the rest of the party sat around her. Y/n watched from afar as Johnathan, Nancy, Hopper and Joyce discussed their next moves. She couldn't quite tell the tone of the conversation. Only that they all seemed to follow Hopper when he stormed off. The girl thought about following them, but the tight grip El held on her, stopped that from happening.

But, when it had been ten minutes and there was still no sign of them, Y/n's concerns raised. "Look after her." She ordered the boys before wondering out of the gym.

And just outside, Nancy and Johnathan were gathering their things as they stood from the floor. No sign of Hopper or Joyce. "Where's your mum? And Hopper?" She questioned.

Nancy and Johnathan shared an expression which made Y/n nervous. "They went to find Will." Johnathan finally dropped.

Her brows narrowed and she glanced between the pair, "And what are you two doing?"

There was a longer paused. This time, Johnathan looked to Nancy to answer.

"We're going to kill it."

--

Taglist - @fanficfanatic204 @neverylee @myheartonthemove @satsuri3su @gobringmemyfood @yourpalheapass @andraimeide @notanordinaryprincess95 (Let me know whether you would like to be added or removed)

Chapter Nine (Monster Hunting) to be published Wednesday 8pm BST

[butwhatifidothis]

So if it is MEANT to be a villain route...Why are the villanous actions NEVER ADDRESSED by ANY of the characters outside of "Huh. I wonder if there was a better way to do this."

Why did they have Rhea go insane and torch a city? Why make potray Rhea as a villain when you could potray her as the hero whos genuinely trying to do good? Why have a majority of the characters still be able to be recruited regardless of if it makes sense? Why have the ending narration mostly be possible? WHY have Edelgard succeed and somehow turn her tyranny into a society that "ensures a free and independent society fot all."

If it's REALLY a villain route, why is there not a single character ending mentioning things like rebellions and conflict? Hell, the ending narration shows not a hint of villainy and potrays its ending as heroic.

"Embracing her newfound power, Edelgard could at last set about destroying Fódlan's entrenched system of nobility and rebuild a world free from the tyranny of Crests and status."

Again, if it was TRULY meant to be the villain route, it would have been POTRAYED as such. Instead of a villain route, we got "A route where one of the villains is made the protagonist and her views and villainous actions are never questioned OR addressed and outside of the conquest and starting the war, everyone is mostly happy."

Alright so this is going to seem like a nonserious answer, but I'm 100% serious when posting this image as part of a genuine answer to this question:

On CF, your actions are never addressed because of ignorance. On the surface, your actions seem like they've helped Fodlan, but as soon as the player looks any deeper it starts to become evident that something isn't right.

If Edelgard made a free and independent society for all, why are the people spied on in Hubert's ending with Dorothea? Why are rebellions secretly being put down in his ending with Shamir? That's not free, in a general sense or from specifically tyranny. That's a direct contradiction from two of the characters that can only be played on CF, and this is only found on CF.

Rhea is portrayed as a villain because she is Nabatean, and Edelgard hates Nabateans, and you are playing a route that emphasizes her ideals - which include wiping out all of the inhuman, bestial, vile, cruel Nabateans that have been plaguing humanity’s world. Rhea goes insane on CF because unlike all of the other routes, where the player and the lord never go out of their way to trample and spit on their enemies' trauma, that's what you are doing the entire time you play CF to Rhea - for months once Byleth returns, and that’s being extremely generous and not counting the entire war. You help drive Rhea and the other Nabateans away from their homes when taking over Garreg Mach - like Nemesis did to Rhea after the Red Canyon Massacre! You're helping someone try to kill off the rest of her people - like Nemesis did at Zanado! You're trying to kill Rhea with the Sword of the Creator, her mother's mutilated corpse - like Nemesis did! You're doing so with the descendent of Wilheim - spitting on the legacy of the one human Rhea could trust during the War of Heroes! You're literally recreating the single worst moment of Rhea's life, all so that you can help the one who views her as less than human.

Portraying Rhea as "the hero who's genuinely trying to do good" goes against Edelgard's viewpoint of all Nabateans being evil, and you're never meant to question Edelgard or make her change her beliefs. You as the player are actively discouraged from talking back to Edelgard, as she will noticeably get upset whenever you do - many times you will even lose support points with her, and this is especially bad for specifically Edelgard because you have to get to a certain support level with her to enter her route, with you having less chapters to do so because she won't talk to you until after Byleth achieves the Sword of the Creator in Chapter 4.

Look at how Rhea, Dimitri, and Claude are portrayed on CF. Rhea and Dimitri are demonized, while Claude is given some leeway from Edelgard. Now notice who of the three of them always speak their minds over Edelgard's villainy to her face, and which of the three of them bends to Edelgard's view of them as the bad guy. Dimitri and Rhea never allow themselves to bend to Edelgard - they call her out and call her actions evil. Claude, on the other hand, will remove himself from Fodlan and then afterwards make himself out to be a bad guy whom Edelgard managed to take down. He puffs up her ego, and he gets to live, while the two that don't must die. Edelgard is the one always out for the kill, and only by submitting to her is anyone allowed to live - which, I don’t think needs to be said, isn’t very heroic of her.

I've had my fair share of complaints over the characters that can be recruited over to CF, but even with those complaints... look at how those characters behave on CF. None of them are Felix levels of negative character development, but they all act noticeably worse on CF vs how they are on the other routes. To name some notable examples: Ignatz goes from wanting to paint Garreg Mach as it stood five years before to preserve its beauty to wanting to paint the violent downfall of the Alliance, Lysithea wants to abandon House Ordelia, which is in direct contrast to her core character motivation, Ingrid is willing to throw away her lifelong dream of being a knight of Faerghus, which she herself says is her spitting on her dead betrothed’s dreams, Leonie works with Jeralt’s killers, etc. etc.. And mind, CF is the route that locks out the most units - there's the obvious ones like Dedue and Gilbert who were already route exclusive, but then there's Seteth and Flayn, Catherine, Cyril, and Hilda. CF is the only route to have even non-exclusive units be completely unavailable no matter what.

Edelgard doesn't make a society that is "free," like I said above - having a secret police monitor the people's actions, or is ready to put down anyone who tries to rise up against her, is literally the opposite of free. Edelgard can and will ban plays she doesn't like - not free. Edelgard only allows state-sanctioned religion, if she does allow it - not free.

CF is a route that wants to make the player believe the lie that you're not the villain, because you are playing from the perspective of someone who herself doesn't think she's the villain, but like. Look at what you're doing. You're invading two countries for the express, explicit purpose of taking them over and making them your own. You're working with someone who's been trying to reunite Fodlan back under Adrestia as early as the prologue when she tried to have Dimitri and Claude assassinated. You're helping TWS. Your Imperial presence makes Church people flee - which, given that Edelgard wants Rhea and those involved with the Church dead, I don't blame them. You're working with someone who is starving her people so that she can carry on with her war.

CF lies to the player - Edelgard lies, constantly. She says she's willing to let Rhea live, but literally the scene before she says she seeks to fuckin' Exodia Rhea. She lies about Arianrhod. She lies - or is flat-out wrong, which isn't much better - about the Church hoarding wealth and about the Church splitting up the Empire. She lies about not knowing about TWS pre-ts. She helps spread the lie of Duscur being the ones who killed Lambert. She lied about not knowing where Flayn was when she was kidnapped. She lies to her people by making them believe she’s making the orders during the war, not Byleth. There's a student who doubts all of what Edelgard says right before the timeskip happens and who isn't sure about his decision to stay, and then there’s a man who calls Edelgard “a tricksy one” on the last explore section for lying about attacking the Kingdom capitol. She’s wrong about the history of Nemesis and Seiros, calling Nemesis killing all of Rhea’s family a “simple dispute.” She lies to her people about an entire war against a group who just a little bit ago were her allies. Lies and ignorance are staple points to CF as a route, it’s baked into it, so the idea of the CF going “oh no you totally are the good guys” literally as the city burns down around the players doesn’t come from nowhere.

And like... the ending narration “shows not a hint of villainy?” Um.

Her stepping on the flags of the Alliance and Church? Her recreating a painting of Napoleon - that little known imperialist - down to the hand of justice? Her denouncing gods constantly and then being ushered in by a statue with heavy resemblance to Nike, Goddess of victory? Hubert plotting away from the sight of the rejoicing people? Yeah, there’s a lot of hints to villainy.

Again, CF isn’t “portrayed” as a villain route because it’s you falling for the lies of Edelgard. You have a wool over your eyes. You accept everything Edelgard says as fact, even when she actively contradicts herself - sometimes as radically as in back-to-back scenes. You view yourself as a savior to humanity, even when you plunge it into darkness. You don’t think you’re the villain, so your actions aren’t going to be put in an explicitly villainous light - at least, not by anyone on your side.

This post showcases the difference between non-recruited characters fighting non-CF!Byleth vs CF!Byleth. Characters are mostly saddened by having to fight Byleth in the former, while they are mostly betrayed on CF. Byleth is very clearly seen as being wrong for having sided with Edelgard on CF by the non-recruited characters - Edelgard’s actions may not be directly criticized (save for by Dimitri and a few others), but it makes no sense for these characters to be this shocked and betrayed by Byleth siding with her if her actions were so good. Leonie deadass calls you a traitor to Jeralt, Ingrid says that you are not fit to rule Fodlan specifically for siding with Edelgard and the Empire after all she and they have done, and Dimitri questions you as to why you chose Edelgard and her “savage, bloody path,” just to name a few notable examples. You, as the player, are being criticized for siding with Edelgard. You say that the villainous actions are “NEVER ADDRESSED by ANY of the characters,” but what else are these reactions but characters addressing your villainous actions?

And like... “a route where one of the villains is the protagonist” bro that’s a villain route. Like. I’m not trying to be mean, but I am genuinely confused as to what you were trying to get at here.

Like. In a vacuum? I might can get the idea of CF not being a villain route a little better, were it the only route available (though even that is a very big stretch). But you have three whole other routes where there’s no conquest, there’s no working with TWS, there’s no using Demonic Beasts, there’s no killing/exiling the remaining (immediately known) Nabateans, there’s no continuous and long-standing lies that never get outed, the lords never stay flat out wrong about the events of the game, non-recruited characters aren’t shooting Byleth up the ass with accusations of being a traitorous lemming who’d follow Edelgard off a cliff... and they achieve peace. Those endings, with Dimitri Claude and “Rhea” (SS ain’t really her route even though it should’ve been but ye), lack the following in any of their endings:

Censorship

Spying on the people

Constantly putting down rebels in secret

State-sanctioned religion

(mind, this last one is in direct contradiction to CF’s ending narration that says that Church is destroyed)

None of this happens on AM, VW, and SS. They all have peaceful endings. They all have Fodlan see the light of dawn, and that is never contradicted in their endings. CF is the only route to have all of these things happen in it - I think that’s enough for it to be considered a villain route lol

[elletromil]

Arguments

Based on that tweet

Arguments

Witnessing an argument between a couple is always one of two things.

Either unbelievably awkward for everyone within earshot or highly entertaining.

Thankfully, with Harry and Merlin, it’s usually the latter.

Some of it has to do with how low-stakes their arguments are and the fact that they are obviously aware that they are being absolutely ridiculous. But a lot more has to do with the way that even when they are throwing insults at each other, it sounds like the fondest of pet names.

Tilde can’t even say when the discussion about which restaurant to go to once Eggsy finally joins them at the shop devolved into how Harry is apparently a madman for the way he’s chosen to arrange the spice rack back at home.

She’s a tad distracted from Harry’s comeback by Eggsy sitting down next to her right after he pressed a kiss to the top of her hair, but it apparently has to do with Merlin never bringing his cups down from the office.

“They decided to give you a show before dinner?”

“Mmhm. You were taking too long coming back. Had to do something to pass the time.”

There’s no reproach in her voice, but Eggsy still looks like he’s going to apologize, as if somehow London’s traffic is his fault. Tilde kisses him before he can utter a word.

She’s very pleased when she leans back and he’s left with only a besotted look on his face.

They settle more comfortably on the sofa, Tilde snuggling into Eggsy’s side with a pleased sigh, in no hurry to call the attention of their friends on Eggsy’s arrival. They might both be super-spies (Eggsy’s teasing words, not hers), but sometimes they get too engrossed in their own little world to notice anything else but each other.

It’s sickeningly cute.

“Yeah well, go back to your ex then!” Merlin huffs before turning his back on Harry, arms crossed.

Tilde stifle a giggle, amused by the rare sight of Merlin leaning into his well-hidden dramatic side.

Harry sighs deeply, pinching the bridge of his nose, but still looking at Merlin like the man is the most precious thing in the world.

“Hamish… We’ve been married for twenty years now, can’t you let that one go already?”

“No,” comes the immediate answer, as if this is a well-worn part of their arguing. It probably is.

Harry’s pout is lost on Merlin, who still has his back turned on him. He rolls his eyes at Merlin’s continued petulance, finally noticing Eggsy and greeting with a dimpled smile before returning his attention on Merlin.

He seems to have been inspired by their example, because the next thing he does is walk up to Merlin and embrace him from behind. If it hadn’t been already, it would now be quite clear that the whole argument is a sham from how Merlin leans into him without hesitation, all but melting against Harry’s chest.

Whatever they say after that is in hushed whispers that Tilde doesn’t try to understand after she spots Harry pressing a light kiss right under Merlin’s ear.

“I want to argue like them when we’re older.”

Eggsy snorts, but she feels him nodding and she knows he understands what she means. That she wants their future arguments to just be another way to express their love to each other.

“You won’t be able to tell me to go back to my ex though. We’ve already established that Zoe doesn’t count because we were fifteen.”

There’s a different name on the tip of her tongue, but she doesn’t let it past her lips. They’ve talked about the Clara situation extensively before they even mentioned getting married once they reunited after Poppygeddon and that’s not something she ever wants to come between them again. And anyway, if Zoe doesn’t count, Clara certainly can’t qualify as an ex-anything either.

“You could though,” she says instead, making them both laugh, because she’s complained enough about her exes that the idea of her ever going back to either of them is truly ridiculous.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Eggsy replies primly, but the effect is rather lost by how he kisses her cheek sweetly.

She turns her head just enough so that their lips meet.

They lose track of time after that, definitely for a bit too long if Merlin’s groan about how they really ought to get a room if they’re to slobber all over each other is anything to go by.

Not that he has any ground to stand on. The number of times she’s walked in on him and Harry in various states of undress outside of their bedroom far exceeds the number of fingers and toes she possesses.

Which means she has no qualms in kissing Eggsy for a bit longer and just making a rude gesture in Merlin’s general direction.

The man survived a mine, he can definitely deal with a bit of public display of affection.

[onceupona-chaos]

SJM setting up a forbidden romance

(And why I think ACOSF was written to set up Elriel)

This is my interpretation and obviously an Elriel post. So if that's not your cup of tea, be warned.

I made this post to basically organize my thoughts and then I decided to post it (lol). Here I talk why I think Elriel will be endgame based on my perspective that SJM already set up a lot of things that point to Elriel and a forbidden romance.

ACOSF is the first book of a new trilogy, which means SJM wrote it with an overarching plot in mind that we began to know in ACOSF. So whatever happens in ACOTAR5 is a direct consequence of the events in ACOSF.

For example, SJM won't kill Koschei and write another plot. She made her decisions when she was writing ACOSF and the overarching plot already started to be established.

I already made a post talking about the plot. I think Elain is the only character that can move the plot forward, because she's Made, therefore she can find the fourth trove and she has a connection with Koschei, which combined with how little we know about her and her powers makes her the perfect main character. But here I want to talk a little about how Sarah wrote ACOSF preparing Elain's character in terms of romance and how she set up a future forbidden romance.

At this point, it is canon that Elain is Azriel's secret, I'm not going to talk too much about, because you can check this amazing post here.

SJM structured the first book of the new trilogy around the ideia that something is deeply tormenting Azriel to the point he can't sleep and then we find out he has a secret. The bonus chapter made it canon: his secret is Elain, so there's no going back from that.

Just from the book, we know that there's something wrong with Elain and, whatever it is, she is hiding it.

Elain had already departed with Feyre, claiming she had to be up with the dawn to tend to an elderly faerie’s garden. Cassian didn’t exactly know why he suspected this wasn’t true. There had been some tightness in Elain’s face as she’d said it.

Alright, so the regular reader knows something is up with these two characters. (That alone is already a reason for the next book be about them, but moving on)

But when ACOSF is read with the perspective of a future forbidden romance in mind, we understand precisely why SJM needed us to know some very specific information.

Azriel's personality traits

SJM highlighted specific personality traits of our bat boy:

Az had a vicious competitive streak. It wasn’t boastful and arrogant, the way Cassian knew he himself was prone to be, or possessive and terrifying like Amren’s. No, it was quiet and cruel and utterly lethal. Cassian had lost track of how many games they’d played over the centuries, with one of them certain of a win, only for Az to reveal some master strategy. Or how many games had been reduced to only Rhys and Az left standing, battling it out over cards or chess until the middle of the night, when Cassian and Mor had given up and started drinking.

Sarah made a show to tell the reader the fact that Azriel is competitive, so she needs us to remember that.

That whole scene had one job: to emphasize that Azriel is competitive and strategist.

Now, if Azriel is giving up on Elain and moving on to another character, why bother to let the reader know he doesn't give up easily? If he is going to just give up on the only female that is making him get over his five hundred years passion, why bother to write a scene where he spares with Cassian only to tell the reader that?

Mostly important, why tell the reader that in countless times, Azriel seemed to be loosing, but he turned things around and won?

He's a strategist. Don't forget he planned his strategy for the snowball fight for a year.

“It seems you’ve forgotten how much of spying is waiting for the right moment. People don’t engage in their evil deeds when it’s convenient to you.”

Cassian rolled his eyes. “I stopped spying because it bored me to death. I don’t know how you put up with this all the time.”

“It suits me.” Azriel didn’t halt his sharpening, though shadows gathered around his feet.

When I read this for the first time, I honestly hadn't understood the meaning of the shadows gathering around his feet and it clearly had a deeper meaning.

But reading again, SJM used Cassian's character to emphasize that Azriel waits for the right moment all the time. Not only when he is spying. Being patient, calculating, persistent are arguably Azriel's strongest personality traits, at least the ones that are highlighted in ACOSF. Sarah is letting us know Azriel plays the long game and doesn't give up.

Every information SJM is giving us regarding Azriel (and Elain, more on her later) is essencial for a forbidden romance story. If you know what's going on with these characters, all pieces of information just... click together.

Elain's personality traits

This is a bit more complicated, mostly because Elain is passing through an inner change, which means being prepared for her arc.

However, SJM compared Elain to Azriel in ACOSF:

“Elain was the only one who guessed. She caught me vomiting two mornings in a row.” She nodded toward Azriel. “I think she’s got you beat for secret-keeping.”

We already know from ACOMAF that Elain is good at secret-keeping. But here SJM not only reminded us that, but she compared Elain to Azriel in secret-keeping, emphasizing both of them are probably the best in secrecy among the IC.

Remember: these two characters are clearly hiding something in ACSF. It's not a coincidence that SJM compared them in this case.

She scanned Elain from head to toe, wondering if she’d been taking lessons in stealth either from Azriel or the two half-wraiths she called friend.

SJM compared Elain's abilities to Azriel's (and his spies) not once, but twice. And if you take into consideration the previous books, it's not the first time she compares these two characters.

Both of them showed defiant behavior

Defiant: refusing to obey authority

Elain:

“What happened.”

When Rhys spoke like that, it was more of a command than a question.

Elain waved a hand in dismissal before flinging open the veranda doors and striding into the open air.

And of course, he have that fight with Nesta. Nesta isn't exactly authority, but she was described as "Elain's guardian", which means their relationship was at least a little hierarchical.

Azriel:

“No,” Feyre and Rhys said at the same time, in the same breath.

Azriel’s eyes shuttered. “I wasn’t asking for permission.”

“We take no risks,” Feyre said, voice flat with command. “Pull all your spies out.”

“Like hell I will.”

Honestly, is this the guy people are thinking that's going to give up on Elain because of Rhy???????

SJM deliberately let us know about them getting over their previous LI

I've seen a lot o people arguing that "they can't be endgame, because the first couple never is".

But... are we forgetting that they were in love with two different people before?

When Elain met Azriel she was deeply in love with Graysen, and he was still into Mor. The readers didn't even know about Mor sexuality then.

Until ACOFAS, we can see that both of them are not entirely over their LI yet.

Elain:

“I don’t want a mate. I don’t want a male.”

She wanted a human man.

Azriel:

Azriel choked on what I could have sworn was a laugh, his normally shadowed face lighting up as Mor bustled in.

Az, to his credit, gave Mor a smile of thanks, a blush creeping over his cheeks, his hazel eyes fixed on her. I looked away at the heat, the yearning that filled them.

However, we get to see that they are slowly getting closer. Azriel shows he's uncomfortable in spying on Lucien, Elain's throat bobbs at the sight of him, he seeks her out to wish happy Solstice, she gives him a present, they stay up past three in the morning talking and on and on.

Months go by. We already knew they are getting closer and then we have this:

Elain:

She knew Elain had given her maidenhead to Graysen a month before they’d been turned Fae. Elain had been glowing the next morning.

Elain cocked her head. Didn’t dissolve into the crying mess she usually became when Graysen came up.

Elain was glowing: she was in love, happy. She loved Graysen. And now she is getting over him. Not only that: SJM made sure to tell us she has had sex before (and enjoyed very much lol). Elain is clearly being prepared for her arc in terms of character development, plot and romance.

And Azriel:

Mor no longer sat beside Cassian, draped herself over him, and Azriel … those longing glances toward her had become few and far between. As if he’d given up. After five hundred years, he’d somehow given up.

Few and far between. It's a process for both of them to move on. At first they were friendly and then it became something more.

Azriel didn't wake up one day, realized that his brothers were mated to Elain's sisters and went: WAIT A MINUTE I WANT ONE. I would argue he showed interest in Elain since their first meet, just like Cassian showed interest in Nesta. However, Nesta and Cassian weren't in love for anyone else, differently from Elain and Azriel.

Also, Elain and Azriel are very much quieter in comparison, so... it makes sense that they needed more time to get closer and be romantic interested in each other.

But again: why bother to tell us both of them are moving on from their previous LI? Why tell us Azriel doesn't give up easily? Why tell us they are both good at keeping secrets and are hiding something?

SJM knew exactly what she was doing.

[notsuchacleverboyq]

Weird Theory

My brain always comes out with strange thoughts.

Because I'm a person whose attention lasts less than any of Bond's love interests and I tend to zone out frequently. I have a lot of time to think, in conclusion.

I guess I don't need to add anything else.

So, I was thinking about these two.

Yep, Vesper and Q.

But what has this to do with anything?

Look at them. Just look at them.

One of the first things I thought after watching Casino Royale and Skyfall, in a close period of time, was how much Vesper reminded me of Q and viceversa.

It would honestly be really bizarre if I was the only one who got this feeling about them.

Now, imagine Q without glasses, or simply search for a picture of Ben, and look at them again.

You'll notice that both:

Have really dark hair;

Have light eyes (I don't actually know if they're green, blue or grey);

They're both cute af.

Second thing: their personalities.

We know that Bond and Vesper literally used to annoy eachother with sarcastic jokes and other things for the majority of the time.

Same thing happened with Q. And I think he might actually be worse.

Vesper and Q are both sarcastic assholes whose relationship with Bond is basically joking about eachother in a really mean way with an absolute professionalism.

They aren't just assholes: they have style.

Also, they aren't dangerous. At least they don't look like they are. But if even if they could get dangerous, that's not what they do, they aren't spies like Bond.

So, here's the thing.

I started making up this theory about why we ship 00Q so bad.

Vesper and Q are basically the gender swapped version of eachother. I think you got that by now.

And I think we ship 00Q so bad because Q reminds us of Vesper and we unconsciously know that Bond has the same feeling about all of this.

I know this might be really boring and foregone, maybe we all think the same, but I still want you to follow my reasoning.

Just think about this: at first Bond doesn't really notices this resemblance, but after their first conversation and Q's sarcastic jokes, he notices that he has met another sneering brunet.

That's why he smiles, in the end, when they first meet.

This resemblance is also what gives us that 00Q chemistry they seem to have from the first instant. They basically get along really well.

Because Bond is a sarcastic asshole in his own way: he constantly crosses the line between being sassy and being an asshole and only someone who can do that too can deal with him.

Vesper and Q actually can think and talk like he does. In fact, they're two of the few elects who know how to act around 007.

M, for example, doesn't get along really well with Bond. Both Mallory and Olivia had a totally different approach, which didn't really work.

But I don't actually think that Q and Vesper are Bond's type. I'm not even sure he has a specific type.

Why do I say this?

Because of Madeleine.

Madeleine Swann was something completely different.

Firstly, she doesn't look like Vesper nor Q and she acts differently from them.

For example, at first she literally hates Bond and behaves stubbornly and aggressively towards him, instead of playing his game.

That's not something that really works.

She obviously had fair reasons to act like that, but even after getting along with Bond, she still acts like she's got her full guard on.

If Vesper and Q are smooth and sarcastic, Madeleine is more defensive. Which is different from making up mean jokes.

The fact is this: Madeleine comes from Bond's same environment. Her father took part into Spectre's business and Bond is a spy. They aren't that different.

While this could be a cute thing and a better way for them to get along, it's actually a disvantage.

Why?

Because if they're the same, they're both mistrustful, broken and defensive.

At first it seems a good idea, but if they've both got their guard on there's no one who can put it down.

Vesper had to do with spies and that stuff, but she wasn't a spy herself, she also got really scared from all that was happening in that hotel.

She wasn't like Bond and we know that.

That's why I think she really got along with 007: aside being a difficult woman to hit on, which I think is a thing Bond likes, she was actually able to pull his guard down.

Think about the shower scene.

Yep, this one.

Seeing Bond acting like that it's not really an usual thing.

Now, I'm not saying that Bond's love interest to be the right one must heal him, it would actually be impossible. I'm just saying that it needs to be something really different from what he's used to.

Vesper was actually a safe place and we notice it because Bond is comfortable around her. Same with Q.

In both cases, there's chemistry, given by their continuous jokes that actually sound pretty flirty sometimes.

The only thing similar to this that we got with Madeleine was this scene:

- You shouldn't stare -

- And you shouldn't look like that -

Nothing else.

Thinking about it, whenever Bond is comfortable, it usually becomes a battle with jokes: Vesper, Q, Moneypenny, Kincade...

SARCASM EVERYWHERE

I didn't notice the same with Madeleine.

I'm really sorry, I don't know why I ended up talking this much about Madeleine. Even if it actually worked for proving my point.

So, we ship 00Q so much because they have the same chemistry that there was between Vesper and Bond. Even thought 00Q isn't romantically canon.

It works and I'm waiting for the producers to notice it too.

Also, Q is designed to be Bond's antithesis. Which reconnects to the previous argument about 007 and Madeleine being not that different.

Look at them.

Let's start with how they appear:

Bond: he's wearing a suit, it might not be a proper one but it's still a suit, and somehow everything matches. Hair strategically short. He looks scary and robust as always;

Q: he tried to look like he's wearing a suit (I like to think Moneypenny made him change clothes last-minute), but actually those checkered trousers don't match the jacket and he's wearing that coat that I can't decide whether it is a raincoat or a parka. His hair are less strategic than Bond's one and are more or less curly. He wears glasses, which only make him look younger than he actually is, and he's thin.

In resume, Bond comes from a military world and you can actually see it, while Q is more or less a normal citizen.

Y'all, it was made on purpose.

The second point of all of this, which is a consequence of the first, is that they come from different environments.

I'm sorry I couldn't find a better image.

Now, let's analyze this.

Bond: *007 mode: successfully turned on* he's wearing a proper suit this time, he's even got a bow tie. Hair always strategically short and he looks as scary as always;

Vesper: she doesn't actually dress like that, in fact it was Bond's suggestion. Also, it's clear that she prefers her hair collected (she keeps them loose only in this scene and right before she dies). While you can clearly see a killer mode in Bond's eyes, she look rather nervous and unsure. She always wears that layer necklace, which is a thing a person like Bond would never do because it makes someone an easily identifiable target.

In conclusion, Vesper clearly comes from a different environment, exactly like Q.

Vesper and Q don't belong in the violence and distress Bond is used to, despite Q working for the MI6. That's another reason why we ship 00Q: we apparently like the contrast between a dangerous and innocent looking character.

Summing up this incredibly long and shitty post (which, at least, has got ✨pictures✨), we ship 00Q because of all of the resemblances between Vesper and Q and because Q is a cinnamon roll.

We're also convinced that Bond as well knows how much they are similar.

I'm so sorry, people: this post was just a late night kind of freak out, so it might make absolutely no sense sometimes. But this has just gone too far to actually delete the post and it is really clever in some parts.

[thedeviljudges]

For today’s ‘i really, really love kang yohan’ post, we’re gonna be develing into a little bit of emotional intelligence and the fact that Yohan both possesses it while simultaneously doesn’t, lmao.

Yohan is portrayed as a hunter and a shark. He’s said this himself in his own words. He’s read up on dynamics of humans and instincts and basis himself off of a monster for a couple of different reasons, but the main one being the fact that people believed him to be as such instead of coming down to his level as a child to understand him.

This by far, means Yohan was emotionally neglected (physically too, but that’s, in some ways, addressed in my other meta post) by parental figures in his life except for the nanny, possibly, on occasion, and isaac - but even then, we know it must’ve only been to a certain extent. On top of that, yohan’s only true witness to emotions is through those people in the house, and needless to say, one of them was off the walls abusive.

It’s why we get scenes like the choking one because when Yohan is angry, guess how he’s learned to express that? It’s physical, but it ties in emotionally. Yohan lashes out the only way he knows how, but this is also an indicator that he’s lied about being a monster. Why? Because people with extreme reactions to emotionally charged questions (like your associate judge accusing you of killing your brother, for example) can often mean that it’s more than just a sensitive topic; it actually matters to that person. At this point, gaon does not know isaac’s story, but we later learn yohan’s version of the fire, and it’s slowly revealed through Elijah, specifically, just how much family is a tough topic for Yohan.

And fortunately, gaon sees right through yohan’s bullshit when he calls him out about how he should be a victim, not a monster. Which opens up the door to us understanding why Yohan does what he does and says what he says even more because it’s revealed through that conversation that these are specific words Yohan has heard before. So not only has he been emotionally stunted as a child by way of abuse, he’s had so many people in his life look at him as a callous monster. And when that happens, don’t you start to believe it? Don’t you lose a little bit of your humanity and become the very thing people say you are?

However, this is also yohan’s strength in the world he lives in, especially with the intent to seek revenge for Isaac. He can put his emotions aside and think clearly, even in situations that should rile him up. You can actually see him get… amused when someone tries to put him in a corner. Yohan doesn’t rely on emotions because it’s logic, rational and strategy that gets him every single checkmate. It’s what’s got him to the point he’s at now. It’s how he’s able to push gaon into seeing reason because if you look at things from the perspective of philosophy and science (by way of human nature), it becomes easier to see a path and a plan so very clearly to whatever outcome you’re wanting.

The issue that comes into play circles back around with family. Because Yohan did not grow up in a healthy environment, he doesn’t know what family actually means and what dynamic it should look like. The past several years he’s spent with Elijah, he’s lived it logically because it means keeping her safe without taking into consideration the fact that Elijah is not like himself and did not grow up in the same environment he did. Only, Yohan also has a habit of not telling anyone his plans, and that’s where the miscommunication starts. How is Elijah to know why Yohan keeps her away from the world? It’s revealed she’s been kidnapped twice, but does Elijah truly understand yohan’s perspective? No, she’s a teenager, and gaon was right about it not being fair to keep her locked away.

But I digress. Here you have a man with a plan with repressed emotions and then enter one kim gaon, and he’s asked for trouble. One of the reasons Yohan, I believe, has kept gaon around is because he defies the typical. He challenges Yohan, not in an act of dominance, but out of another way of thinking, and that’s a big difference. Things might go over gaon’s head, and he’s not always right, but he’s looking at all perspectives, even if they’re wrong. Multiple times Yohan has been surprised by gaon’s way of thinking. That’s intriguing and it’s different.

Which lead to situations where gaon’s confronting Yohan about himself, holding up a mirror and asking him if that’s truly who he is or if it’s someone he’s trying to be, if he’s listening to what other people have told him or if he’s actually listening to himself. Which is kind of ironic with Yohan only being able to trust himself, but he can’t even do that, can he? He lies to himself in order not to face what he truly feels. And that’s because it’s filled with pain, and Yohan doesn’t have time for that.

But there is also a reason why a lot of his progress takes place in his house and away from the world because a home is meant for vulnerability and while Yohan and Elijah haven’t had that in a while, Yohan didn’t take into account gaon’s ability to see things differently. Yohan saw gaon’s mind for his plan and for the overarching plot to oust the rich, but what he did not consider is how that would translate into his personal life. Which is hilarious because Yohan is the one that brought gaon into his home in the first place and ultimately ended up with a surprise of a man who’s clearly moved in because Yohan never tells him he has to leave.

So, that’s where things begin to unravel. Gaon tests Yohan’s patience and emotions in ways he hasn’t been tested. Again, gaon’s held up the mirror and asked him to consider looking deeper for the actual truth instead of the façade Yohan lets himself believe is real. Gaon is also one of the only other people in yohan’s life that has actually considered yohan’s feelings and, in turn, elijah’s. gaon is also a man of righteousness and it makes sense that he’s not afraid to share parts of himself if it means it’s doing something good.

We see this particularly with Elijah, telling her about his parents, not reprimanding her over her murder plot, lmao. gaon grew up in an emotionally healthy, and most likely, happy household where he could express himself without feeling like a burden. He has patience and kindness imbedded into his being.

So with that dynamic of being in a home where people are not on display in front of the world, with gaon’s ability to emotionally connect with people, and finding out the looming secrets of the kang household, it becomes rife with opportunity to peel back those layers and expose them for what they are and talk about it and instead of hiding it away in the shadows. Gaon gives them all space to have those emotions, and while he prods and he asks questions, it’s generally in the form of a gentle reminder that other perspectives exists than the ones that are within those four walls. Gaon doesn’t get angry necessarily, and he apologizes when he’s wrong. His straightforwardness and heart-on-his-sleeve demeanor actually works in his favor, albeit a bit misguided at times.

And with all of this, it’s how Yohan slowly begins to open up. Gaon might be accusatory from his distrust of Yohan, but it’s from a place of curiosity and determination to understand, ultimately, rather than a motive of punishment. I think gaon connecting with Elijah is also the icing on the cake and driving motivator that yohan made a good choice in keeping gaon around because Yohan notices the change in his niece and how much happier she is. Gaon’s directly pointed fingers at Yohan and he’s spied on him, but he’s also confronted Yohan about what he’s done head on without taking justice into his own hands. So with those two things combined (helping elijah and wanting understanding), and even yohan’s determination to get gaon on his side, means that level of trust has slowly, but surely, grown into something much more than Yohan ever thought it could be.

Because again, Yohan did not think about the intricacies of living with other people at home and how well you get to know them by merely existing under the same roof. Gaon learns little things about Yohan and doesn’t use them to his advantage or as a slight – maybe in the beginning with the spying, if we want to give him any credit at all for that. Gaon sees a problem and tries to fix it – just like he sees a problem with the world and with corruption and uses the justice system to fix it.

With all of that understanding and poking and prodding, gaon learns how much Yohan cares for Isaac and for Elijah and validates those emotions while still giving Yohan a slap on the wrist for how he’s expressed that care. He learns of yohan’s abuse and confirmed and supported the idea of being a victim and how that’s okay, that Yohan needs to learn to accept it for himself in order to truly heal. He’s berated Yohan for not showing more kindness to Elijah, the only family he has left and just how important that bond is, after discovering what Elijah means to Yohan.

And that’s given Yohan agency with his own emotions. He’s cried over the memory of his father abusing him and wishing he could’ve stopped it. He’s admitted that he hates when gaon looks at him like he’s a monster, and he definitely hates it when gaon makes assumptions and dives in head first without actually thinking things through. But that is also an advantage of Yohan: understanding someone emotionally because it means that Yohan has learned so much about gaon and the way he thinks that when in episode 9 he tells gaon about how he reminds him of Isaac with his assumptions, it comes from a place of discussion rather than anger. He’s realized the way to get through to gaon is through talking and physically showing gaon how he thinks (the prison reveal). Granted, he’s been doing this with gaon since the beginning, but it’s become even more pertinent now.

The thing is, Yohan has recognized gaon’s kindness at this point. He’s witnessed it in his misguided understanding of the justice system. But what’s truly interesting is that Yohan understands gaon’s kindness, but he still doesn’t understand the world’s. Yohan has a very different perspective of what kindness looks like because it’s not actual kindness but motivation and ulterior motives. Kindness to Yohan is power play – it’s people using others by any means necessary to get a leg up. It’s self-serving for their own benefit and not for others.

Which is also how that first seed of trust is planted with gaon – when he saved the little girl and the bus driver. And how more seeds are trusted by way of gaon doing what gaon does best – provoking Yohan with different thoughts, especially when it comes to family.

But this also applies to yohan’s understanding and hypocrisy when it comes to Elijah and kindness. At this point and by episode 9, Yohan has accepted gaon’s kindness. He’s let it in, lets Elijah indulge in it because he’s noticed that their home is happier – by way of making gaon come back because Elijah missed him. Yohan believes Elijah naïve for trusting others who show her any ounce of kindness, but the thing is, Yohan has come to trust gaon. He’s witnessed the kindness and the understanding, and yet it’s much easier to continue believing that it’s actually a cruel and ugly thing, especially in the wake of Elijah getting hurt, and that’s his default method of coping. Kindness got Elijah hurt and in trouble. It’s what makes you weak.

And if there is one thing we know about Yohan is that he’s anything but weak, but it’s another lie. Kindness did not get Yohan anywhere in life. Kindness got his brother murdered and his family taken away from him.

But the saving grace from that way of thinking? Gaon, yet again, telling Yohan why he’s wrong. Gaon tells Yohan every human needs someone to rely on as long as they’re human, and I think that was certainly a pain point of remembrance in how Yohan had no one but Isaac and then no one after. only this time, a point is made by way of Elijah because she only has Yohan now and she, unlike what Yohan convinces himself he doesn’t need, actually wants to experience human nature – that innate thing kang Yohan has so desperately read about and studied without taking into consideration that the carnal desires of humanity don’t always outweigh the good found within.

And isn’t that just a little bit ironic how someone so capable of understanding the human psyche cannot simply recognize kindness when it’s so freely given? If he weren’t the skeptic and the hypocrite, maybe he’d see what’s right before his eyes, and maybe he’d see just how far he’s come in allowing someone to see parts of himself he’d always been led to believe didn’t matter.

Kang Yohan is a complex character, but he has so much room for growth, and it’s exciting witnessing that in baby steps – and that’s all because he couldn’t tell his doe-eyed associate judge no. sucks for Yohan, I guess; getting himself into a mess he cannot get himself out of, an issue of his own doing and one we very clearly have seen he doesn’t want to rectify, lmao.

also one more thing..... that dinner scene in ep 9 is also a true testament of what can be done with just a little provocation because there you have yohan realizeing what a happy home can look like if he just tries to be more vulnerable and that it actually, in fact, does matter.

[g-on-ef]

Hey I was wondering if you're still a fan of Helluva Boss and what you thought of the latest episode?

@megashadowdragon asked: have you watched helluva boss episode 6 which came out today ( if you were unaware) what are your thoughts

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It warms my heart to know you guys ask for my opinion ^^ now let's get down to business

WARNING THIS REVIEW WILL BE A NEGATIVE ONE WIT A HINT OF POSITIVITY THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS ON THE EPISODE YOU DONT HAVE TO AGREE WIT THEM BUT DONT WASTE MY TIME WIT YOUR NEED TO ATTACK ME FOR HAVING THOUGHTS OF MY OWN YOU HAVE BEEN WARN

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To answer both questions yes I still watch Helluva Boss however after their latest episode I think I will just stick to writing fanfiction about Blitz and Striker as well as stick to whatever content the fandom creates.

This episode if Imma be honest with you guys was not worth the wait, hell I was literally tempted to leave the episode as it just didn’t have my attention as the others.

The episode had some decent moments where I was chuckling a little but other than that I wasn’t that into it, to be honest the bad out weigh the good. 

Also I wanna add that a while ago I wrote how Vivzipop and her crew did not know how to handle complex characters or complex scenes and I was right, this show and their crew do not know how to handle mature topics without reducing them into a joke but we are getting ahead of ourselves so let’s start with the pros, the cons, and everything in between.

Let’s start of with the pros,

Loona knowing when Blitz was being serious was a nice touch, it showed that even if Loona acts like she doesn’t care about Blitz she actually pays attention to him and knows when he is being serious and when he is joking around.

Moxxie was the true MVP his interaction with the agents had me smiling as well enjoying his moments.

Blitz protecting Moxxie

STRIKER !!!! I am a simp for this imp and I’ll take whatever crumbs I can get to see him ^^

Verosika, Fitzorallia, love them, love them 

And that’s it...to be honest that’s it...like other than that that’s basically all that I like from that episode...

Now let’s get into the rest of this episode...

Okay was anyone other than me confused as to why they decided now was a good time to introduce the agents so late in the game?

Like at this point I am convinced that Vivizie and her crew are just winging it.

The agents were literally thrown in the show and it felt outta the blue, like I said it feels like Vivizie and her crew don’t know what they are doing and are just throwing things together like they could’ve given us hints that the agents were watching them, or give us a hint that they were being spied on, it didn’t even have to be big it could have just been small.

An example would be from my favorite book series Cirque Du Freak, in the first book Mr. Crepsely (a main character in the book) mentions something small that will become huge in later books, it was small but allowed the reader to be curious it gave the reader that something big was coming and we should be prepared.

Like I said it was a small hint but I left me curious and wanting to read more to find out more about what is going on.

Helluva boss didn’t do that it just threw this new idea and new characters without giving the others to grow.

If they gave us a hint that they were being watched it wouldn’t have felt like that idea came outta nowhere.

Also was I the only one that was uncomfortable with the way Blitz kept making jokes about the agent’s dead mom? I’m sorry but that was just wrong on soooo many levels.

Also with the truth serum thing...why did they use it if they weren’t even gonna get answers like again this came outta nowhere because the truth serum was supposed to make them speak the truth not look like they were tripping on acid. On less I missed something please let me now if I did.

Also to be honest the whole confession thing was once again treated like a joke, especially when Blitz asked Moxxie why he let Millie peg him, ummm...an emotional scene like that shouldn’t have jokes of any kind surrounding it, especially when it was supposed to be a heartfull moment.

Now Blitz ... okay Blitz and his vision was a little decent but I also didn’t like it.  A lot of people had their speculation especially with the Stolas scene but the more I look at it the more I see it as a bittersweet moment.

Revealing that he was afraid of intamacy wasn’t that big of a surprised since we already knew that like it was nice for conformation.

Okay now onto the Sto*itz moment in the song ... like I said this was bittersweet moment,

People interpet the scene as how Blitz is afraid to love Stolas others saw it as Blitz was still chained to Stolas and would only be free if he and Stolas talk it out and another mentioned how he was forever chained to Stolas and how toxic the relationship between the two is.

Honestly I viewed it as how Blitz will be forever trapped in situations like this were he is to afraid to love someone or love himself and unless he comes to terms with his own demons he’ll forever be trapped in an endless cycle of pain and misery.

Now onto why I think that that Vivizie and her crew can’t handle mature themes.

Two characters have just had a revelation about their relationship with one another and instead of being honest with each other it gets turned into a joke...again...

Moxxie told Blitz what he felt and Blitz told him he treats him like shit cause its tough love...da freak ??? You just had a moment where you realized you pushed everyone away because you were afraid to be alone so you rather push everyone away so you have an excuse to let them leave and instead of admitting to that you just tell Moxxie it was all tough love.

Not to mentioned that you’re giving compliments and than tell him your done because your out of compliments...again you had a huge revelation and instead of giving the characters time to digest what they went through you just toss it to the side. 

Another thing that pissed me off was how right after a huge moment you throw in a fight scene...I...why...just why ???

You had an emotional scene (that had no build up) but than throw it to the side for a fight scene that shouldn’t have been added at all.

Like the minute Millie and Loona saved them they should’ve opened up a portal and take them away not waste time on fighting only for them to get caught in the end.

Like I literally feel like they wasted all that time on animation than on writing and planning what they wanted from this.

Like again they had an emotional connection/scene and threw it to the side for some fight scenes which was a disappointment because had Loona and Millie saved them  and take them home Blitz could’ve had some major character development and the four of them could have a heartfelt scene admitting everything that bothers them and help them get closer. 

Nope, they decided to just throw a fight scene why I don’t know but it bothers me how they just tossed an emotional scene for some action scenes.

So yeah I am not happy with how that was handle at all.

Let’s also get to the Loona and Millie scenes...Millie crying for Moxxie once again made no sense as we never seen Millie care for Moxxie, hell she cares more for Blitz than Moxxie which is fucked up.

Hell when Moxxie was being critizied by her parents she didn’t do much to defend him hell Sally Mae was more honest with him than Millie.

Honestly Millie feels like she is being written by twenty different people who don’t know what they want from her.

And Loona, Loona could seriously be written outta the episode and nothing would changed.

Also they truly refused to let their characters grow seriously Moxxie was still treated like shit by Blitz in the end so yeah no character growth at all.

And now onto the last scene with Stolas and Blitz ... holy shit man Imma be honest with you guys Stolas asking for sex after saving them feels fucked up, to me it felt like the only reasons he saved the imps is so that he doesn’t get in trouble and for Blitz to reward him for saving them.

Again they could’ve had Stolas saving them and they could have had a heart to heart moment nope we had to toss all that emotional build up (if one can call it that) and toss it to the side for cheap jokes and a horny owl.

needless to say I was beyond disappointed with this episode and with the way they handle the “saddest” scene in the episode I am scared to see how they will handle the other scenes.

AGAIN I honestly don’t see why this episode took so long and I feel like Vivzie and her crew are more focus on the animation than anything else which sucks because this show has so much potential and it is being thrown to the side for pretty designs and shipping moments. 

Anywhore that’s my thought on this show let me know what you guys think ^^

~GoNEF out ^^

[bonesbuckleup]

anonymous asked: would you be willing to talk more about what you mean when you say the fire nation/azula probably didn't know what to do with sokka? I'm curious.

Something went weird with the original answer so I’m reposting as a text post vs. an answer.

OKAY SO what I mean is imagine this: You’re a powerhouse war-mongering nation bent (ha) on taking over the world. The main thing in your path is the Avatar, who is leading you on a wild goose chase around the world. He’s trying to learn all the elements, and your enemies are hellbent (haha) on helping him. You’ve got spies all over. You’ve got intel. You’ve got a good idea of how and where the Avatar travels, even if you can’t pin him down directly.

(Got long-ish, throwing in a cut)

So it makes sense to you that he travels with a waterbender, since he needs to learn waterbending. And since he started in the south, it makes sense that she’s not terribly adept at her craft yet despite being the one to teach the Avatar, and it makes sense she becomes more of a threat after they starting moving south again from the North Pole. But you have entire prisons designed to keep waterbenders in. You’ve fought them before. You can do it again.

And it makes sense that they pick up an earthbender, because the Avatar needs to learn earthbending. It probably doesn’t take you long to figure out she’s a Beifong, especially when she starts flashing credentials to get into Ba Sing Se and whatnot. You know her parents are looking for her. But. You also know messing with the Beifongs is to poke a sleeping bear, one that might be more trouble than it’s worth to deal with. Besides. Like the waterbender, you know what to do if you manage to capture this earthbender. You can keep her locked up. And maybe that gets iffier with the rumors of metalbending but there’s always wood.

And then there’s...this other guy.

Who is clearly also Water Tribe, and who has been traveling with the Avatar since he first reappeared, and who is not a bender. I think if you’re the Fire Nation, you’re assuming (not entirely correctly) that the Gaang knows what they’re doing, which means this guy must serve some purpose. I think pretty early on, you’d assume he’s their handler--which, you know, Sokka’s the idea guy, so that’s not wildly off-base. But you don’t really know who he is or where he came from. You don’t know what kind of training (maybe he’s a spy? maybe he’s a really good fighter or something? (which is a hilarious concept when you consider book 1 Sokka who is just out here doing his best)) the Water Tribe and/or Earth Kingdom got this guy before sending him off to keep the Avatar in line, which makes him the wildcard in this whole thing. Especially once the invasion during the eclipse happens and he’s leading the charge.

Anyway, so I think the Fire Nation probably spent a lot of time trying to crack who Sokka is, even though the real answer is pretty simple and that all Sokka truly is is tired. But I really do think that it’d be Azula who gets really into trying to solve the riddle. Because, like, here’s the thing. We don’t see a lot of Ozai on screen, but he seems to equate bending ability with power and surrounds himself with above-average benders. This is one of the main places Azula actively deviates from his example, because her most trusted confidants are Mai and Ty Lee, two non-benders. She not only acknowledges that their lack of reliance on an element makes them better fighters, but counts on it and anticipates it. They’ve had to get more creative without bending, fighting with knives and pressure points. They’re her wildcards. It makes sense, both in a strategic sense and with Azula’s character, that she’d try to figure out the boy who spends his time keeping pace with the world’s most formidable benders.

And I don’t really have any back up for this, except for one tiny little thing. As best I can recall, and excluding Zuko for obvious reasons, Azula doesn’t call the Gaang by their names. She calls Aang Avatar and Katara peasant. There’s one single exception to this. During the invasion, down in the tunnels, when she narrows in on the one person trying to keep the plan in motion, knowing that if she can get him the others will fall in turn: So, Sokka’s your name, right?

[abraxos-is-toothless]

Summer Lovin’ (Lucien x Tarquin)

Hello all!

This fic is something new, and will be in multiple parts, updated as and when I finish the next part. It is a Lucien x Tarquin fic. I know what you’re think but I had this thought about them because everyone writes crackships, but then I told @tswaney17 and the two of us fell in love with the idea. She is to thank for this spiral.

I’m using my general ACOTAR tag list for this, but you do not have to read it. Also do let me know if you would like to be kept out of the tags for this in the future. (The title is just something for now because I honestly haven’t decided something yet😂)

~~~~~~

Lucien’s life had been chaotic lately, but still, he hadn't quite expected this to happen, of all things.

Elain had finally said she didn't want this bond between them. He knew it was going to happen and he couldn't exactly blame her. Having it related to a traumatic experience wasn't going to be something positive, and no matter what the Cauldron thought of them matching each other, accepting the bond wouldn't have made them happy. She had the Spymaster for that, and Lucien was grateful to see how much she’d healed since seeing her as skin and bones in the library of the House of Wind. Azriel helped her and loved her; it wasn’t something predestined or whatever other shit people liked to talk about. They had chosen it for themselves, and Lucien couldn’t fault them for being happy.

Then came one of the biggest bombshells of his life.

Beron was not his father.

Though he had found out several months ago, it was still fresh in his mind, as though it were yesterday that he had been told.

Lucien still didn’t understand what he was doing in the River House. Rhysand had turned up in the human lands this morning to get him. When he’d asked why, the bastard just smiled at him. Lucien had honestly thought that the male might have been taking him to his death. But then he winnowed them into an office, Feyre sitting in the window, little Nyx in her arms and a content smile on her face. Now it was a few hours later, Nesta had been and gone, collecting her nephew for his nap, and still, he didn’t know why they had brought him here.

“Are you going to tell me what is going on now, or do I have to wait several more hours?” Rhys was just smiling from where he sat on his chair, wings hidden and humming, making Lucien roll his eyes. Feyre came to sit next to her mate, giving him a reprimanding look. She gave Lucien a soft smile.

“Just a little longer, I promise.” Feyre had barely even finished the sentence when there was a knock on the door. “There we go.” She stood, smoothing the skirts of her dress before walking towards the door, trailing light fingers over Rhys’ shoulder as she went. When she pulled the door open, Lucien could honestly say he was shocked to see that it was Helion on the other side, led by Cassian.

“Your guest, dearest sister. Please, take him.” Helion let out a low chuckle behind the general. He placed a hand over his heart, faking pain when Cassian turned to look at him.

“You wound me. Why so hasty to get rid of me?”

“If you keep looking at time the way you are, I will not be held responsible for what Nesta does to you in a jealous rage.” Helion’s retort was cut off when the female in question shouted from somewhere else in the house.

“You can take him! He’s been a pesky annoyance as of late.” Cassian disappeared then, grumbling about how she didn’t mean that, he was never annoying and Nesta was madly in love with him. Which was true,-the madly in love part, not Cassian not being annoying- anyone could see it. Lucien would never tell her about the doe eyed look she got though. He valued actually being alive.

Helion laughed again, bending down to kiss Feyre on one cheek and then the other.

“Feyre, you look as lovely as you always do. Motherhood suits you.”

“That I agree with entirely.” Rhys said as his mate welcomed the newcomer into the room, closing the door gently behind them.

“I’ve told you Rhysand, no more babes until Nyx is older.” The male nodded in agreement, though Lucien thought they were going to be having this discussion a lot in the near future. She smacked him over the back of the head when he smirked, before sitting once more. He had a feeling they were talking to each other in secret again. “Have you made it so no one can hear us?” She asked when they were all settled. Helion now sat in the chair next to him, giving him a nod, Feyre sitting on the arm of Rhysand’s seat. The High Lord of the Night Court gave a dip of his head. “Warded the moment you closed the door, my love.”

“Good. Now, onto what we brought the both of you here for.”

Helion crossed an ankle over the other knee, hands linked where they rested in his lap. The High Lord of Day was dressed in a mix of gold and black. Gold fabric covered his body. One side of his chest left bare, clothing pinned at the other, flowing down his body, belted at the skirt. It was embroidered around the hem with reds and greens, and it seemed to shimmer like glitter under moonlight. Sandals wrapped around the dark skin of his calves. “Forgive me for asking, but why such secrecy? Can you not trust your own family?”

Lucien didn’t understand why they were being so careful all of a sudden, either. Any time he’d been in here, discussing all the problems they were still trying to overcome from the war with Hybern, they’d never stopped the others inside the house from being able to hear too. Rhys tilted his head slightly to the side. “The information will leave this room when you do, and you will do with it as you see fit.”

Lucien spoke then, frustrated. “You brought me here hours ago, told me absolutely nothing on why I had to come. Just tell us what’s going on.” Rhys raised a dark brow at him, but said nothing, so he turned to Feyre. She sighed, wringing her hands together before stopping herself. It was one of her nervous traits, and nervous traits accompanied by serious conversations never boded well.

“Back when we were trying to get the High Lords to work together, to help us against Hybern, you told us a story about Lucien’s mother, Helion.”

“Yes, I did.” Lucien hadn’t known that. But he supposed looking for Myriam and Drakon meant he wasn’t privy to a lot of information. There were things from the time he was gone that he was still learning about.

“Including the affair that you had.” Lucien sucked in a sharp breath, slowly looking at the male seated beside him. Beron was not nice to his mother, he knew that. But the man had spies everywhere, always had. He would have had to have known about his mother being with Helion. And if he knew, he would have had her killed for it.

“But my mother lives. My father wouldn’t have allowed her to live after he’d found out. And trust me he knows, he always knows when his family isn’t doing exactly what he wants them to.” Beron would have wanted to set an example, a vicious one at that. He showed that with what happened to Jessminda. Thinking of her only made Lucien think fondly of their good memories together now. He was no longer attacked by grief and self hatred, though waves of sadness would come and go. On the bad days, the storm in his head made them rough and dangerous, but those were few and far between.

Feyre started to look uncomfortable, causing Rhys to continue. “To have killed her, would have caused a scandal. He was younger then, and it wouldn’t have done him any good.”

Lucien still didn’t understand and it was starting to piss him off. His fire tempted its boundaries, flames growing hotter and higher in his frustration. It felt as if it were boiling his blood, heating his skin. He pushed it down into the depths where it belonged. “The only scandal is that she wasn’t faithful. The gods know he fucking hasn’t been. But then again it was always ‘do as I say and not as I do’ with him anyway.” Feyre simply shook her head at him. He opened his mouth to say something, to say how pointless this meeting was if they weren’t going to get to the point, when Helion suddenly sucked in a sharp breath from beside him. Lucien startled slightly.

“Mother above.” He breathed. “He can’t be. No, you’re lying, I don’t believe you.” Helion just stared at Lucien when he turned to him, amber eyes wide, mouth partly open.

“I’m not lying, Helion. I figured it out that day, and I’ve also had his mother confirm, but do not ask me how. You can see why Beron hated him the most now.” Lucien was severely done with them taking but still not explaining anything to him.

“Confirm what! What are you fucking talking about?” Rhysand looked at him, not even phased by his outburst.

“Beron is not your father, Lucien.” No. No. They were lying. When he looked at Feyre, when he looked at his friend, she gave him a small nod. He looked back at the male beside him, the male who seemed to be shocked into silence by the situation.

As if Lucien’s life couldn’t get anymore fucked.

It had been months since that day. Feyre told them again that she wouldn’t say how she’d been in contact with his mother, and Lucien didn’t want her to tell him anything anyway, no matter how much he wished to find out so he could see how she was. To talk to her himself. It would put her at risk, and Lucien wouldn’t allow that. And he knew now that Helion wouldn’t either. His father. The High Lord of Day was his father. Lucien was the sole heir to the Day Court. Helion had been nothing but welcoming in the time sincerely but he never pushed. Said that it didn’t have to mean anything, if it wasn’t what he wanted. Lucien had been a little confused with his wants at first, but had decided that he wanted them to acknowledge it. Wanted them to get to know each other.

Helion asked him a few weeks ago to stay with him. They didn’t have to be in the same building, that Lucien could stay wherever he liked in the Day Court, but he did want him to stay. Lucien had found he couldn’t refuse. Jurian and Vassa had been angry with him, saying that he was just abandoning them, that clearly he’d only used them. He had tried to explain that he’d just found the one who had actually fathered him. That he wanted them to have some kind of relationship, something that was robbed from the both of them. The two wouldn’t hear it, and told him to leave. So he went. They had each been closer to each other than they ever had with Lucien anyway.

That was how he was here now, standing in the garden of the small townhouse his father had found for him, the male in question standing across from him. Helion was standing in the early morning rays, arms at his sides, golden crown absent and spouting words Lucien never thought he’d hear in his life. “You want to do what?” Lucien said, still wondering if this was something that was actually happening. Helion sighed, rubbing both hands over his face for a moment, before pulling them away.

“I know that it’s not even been that long since we’ve found out the truth. And I know I don’t have the right to ask anything of you, but I think this could be the biggest step towards allying the courts together.” Lucien could see the frustration on his face, knowing that he struggled to ask this.

“You want me to marry the High Lord of Summer?”

“Yes.”

“Does he know that you want to do this?” Helion moved closer to him a little.

“I proposed a marriage alliance to Tarquin, but I didn’t say who. He agreed after a lengthy discussion, but only if who I chose wanted it. You know I haven’t formally announced that you are my son yet, and this would mean I’d have to.” Lucien folded his arms across his chest, suddenly self conscious.

“And you don’t want to announce it?”

“No.” Lucien stopped, hands tightening where they rested on his biceps. Helion, suddenly realising what he’d said, scrambled to backtrack. “Gods, I meant yes. Yes I want to tell them all I have a son. I just weren’t sure if you were ready for that.” His father let out an unsteady breath, meeting Lucien’s eyes for a second before looking away, only two repeat that over and over. “You don’t have to do this, but having my son marrying into another court makes the alliance stronger than if I were to pick out anyone else.” Lucien understood. And he understood wanting all of the courts to get along. It would mean they could truly live in peace, something they had all hoped for.

“I’ll do it.” Helion’s head shot up, disbelief written across his face.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“I really thought you were going to say no, probably yell at me or something.” Lucien’s brows furrowed, a red lock of hair falling in front of his face.

“Why would I do that?” Helion sighed, almost exasperated. Though Lucien noticed he didn’t hold tension in his shoulders anymore, seemed more relaxed and at ease now that Lucien had answered him.

“Because I didn’t want you to think I was using you. Also, I didn’t even ask. Do you like males? That should have been a question right? I mean, I just assumed, I shouldn’t have.” His father was rambling, and Lucien chuckled.

“Yes, I like males. And Tarquin is a good male, a good High Lord. It might not end in love but, I might get a friendship out of it.” Lucien smiled, a full grin, teeth showing. It was something he realised he hadn’t done in a long, long time. Suddenly the breath was sucked out of him, and strong arms wrapped around his body. It took a moment, but Lucien returned the gesture, hugging him back. Helion was taller than him, and nearly pulled him off of his feet.

“I’m sorry. Sorry for asking. I should have found another way.”

“It’s alright. I think this might be good for me. I had Tamlin and we both know how that ended. I didn’t fit, at the Night Court, not like they do. And Jurian and Vassa...well, I told you what happened. Maybe I’ll find a home with Tarquin.” Helion pulled back, holding his shoulders, a soft smile on his face.

“You may not think it, but you fit here. I never got to be there before, and part of me is glad because the not knowing kept you and your mother safe, but I’m here now. I want to be your father.”

“Thank you.” They decided to continue walking through the garden then. Mostly in companionable silence, occasionally asking the odd question here and there. Lucien was getting lost in his own thoughts. He wondered whether Tarquin would be okay that it was Lucien he was marrying. If they’d be able to make some kind of happy life together. The few times he’d seen him before, Lucien could admit he was attracted to him. It was easy to make conversation with Tarquin, to find common interests. There was the chance it would never turn romantic and Lucien would be okay with that, but at least he’d have a companion to live his life with.

Maybe this was his chance to get his own happy ending.

~~~~~~

Well there it is. The beginning. You’ll see Tarquin next time I promise but I just wanted to give you something to see if you were going to like the story or not. Please be respectful, I’m tired of the ship wars. I want this to be a safe place for me to post the ideas that I have.

Tags: @myfriendscallmeraba  @thesirenwashere @elrielllll  @stars-falling @silver-flames @1islessthan3books @bamchickawowow @empress-ofbloodshed @sleeping-and-books @tswaney17 @awkward-avocado-s @courtofjurdan @junkiejosten10 @mu-si-ca-l @agem10 @harmonyindark245 @tanaquilpriscilla @starrynightsbooks @maastrash  @elriel4life @illyriangarbage @b00kworm @thewayshedreamed @rhyswhitethorn @22emmmmmm @mimianyy @stop-breathing-its-annoying

[apenitentialprayer]

Confession: I'm confused why taking holy communion in the hand is considered bad. Aren't we supposed to position our hands like a throne to receive it? Is it because most people don't do that? Or something else?

(Disclaimer: Unless it's TLM, to which I've only gone four times, I always receive in the hand) Although it seems to be a huge deal in some online circles, I don't think I've met more than a handful of people in-person who actually have a problem with it. In fact, it's the normative practice where I live. So I wouldn't worry about it too much. But... to give the other side's viewpoint, I usually see one of three arguments about why one should receive on the tongue. First, it's the longstanding tradition of the Latin Rite. If you go to a Tridentine Mass, for example, receiving on the tongue is the only method of taking the Eucharist. This only changed with the Second Vatican Council, which both revised current practice and revived older traditions. Although taking in the hand is one of those older traditions, Vatican II's allowance of the practice is sometimes seen as an artificial reinstatement of something that had organically disappeared from the tradition. Second, there is an argument that only consecrated hands should be allowed to touch the Eucharist. Laypersons' hands are not consecrated, ergo reception in the hand should not be a thing. I think Thomas Aquinas articulated this argument in the Summa Theologia (just looked; you can read his argument here). I actually don't have anything to say that could dispute this argument. I simply don't have an answer. Third, receiving on the tongue limits the potential for irreverent handling of the Eucharist. You're less likely to drop it, tourists in popular basilicas are less likely to take it home as a souvenir, the reception of the Eucharist by the hand of someone else is a power symbol of its being a gift and of your own submission to that Giver (God), etc. Of course, you can still be irreverent even while receiving on the tongue; there was an incident a few years back where two reporters from a Muslim majority country spied on a Mass, spitting the Eucharist out afterwards and taking pictures to prove that they did not apostasize. Caused quite an uproar. So, not quite fool-proof after all. All this being said... the Magisterium says its okay to receive in the hand. And as far as I'm concerned, that's all that really matters, isn't it? The bishops say it's okay, my community does it, I was taught to do it that way. No matter which of the two methods you decide to receive the Eucharist with, just know that if you're receiving it with the reverence due to Christ, you're in the clear.