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tyrantisterror · 4 months

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You seem to have been enjoying Baldur's Gate III a lot. Would you mind giving your thoughts on the individual companions? I'm just curious to see what your take on them is.

Yeah sure! The game's been rotting my brain for months now in part because of its character writing, so I can stand to gush about the companions a bit.

Before we get to the companions individually, I want to talk about them as a group, because one of the things that makes this game so impressive to me is its commitment to its core themes, and that extends to how the companions were crafted as a group. See, each of the core six companions have the following things in common:

The mindflayer tadpole that threatens to turn them into a monster against their will (i.e. the thing that gets them all together on a quest)

A personal history of being abused and exploited by someone they trusted

A Want that comes as a result of their personal history of abuse that is self destructive but understandable given their circumstances

A Need that comes as a result of their personal history of abuse that they have written off or ignored because their past makes them think fulfilling it is impossible

A point in their character arc where they will come into conflict with the player character if the player character tries to advocate for their Need over their Want. If the player values the Want over the Need, the relationship will initially go smoother, but end badly.

The overall theme of Baldur's Gate 3 can be loosely summed up in one of its major recurring songs, I Want to Live, and that's ultimately what each character's arc is a variation of: the desperate desire to live in a world that has been trying to kill your mind, body, and soul to the best of its ability. Got it? Cool, we can talk about the characters now that we've got this established.

Oh, and, uh, this game covers some... HEAVY themes, given that abuse is one of the common denominators between the companions. I'm going to try to be gentle in talking about it, but this will cover some of that subject matter, so this is your warning if you want to avoid that.

Companion 1: Astarion, My Bisexual Awakening

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I'm going to start with the companion I feel is the most talked about/popular/overexposed I suppose, Astarion. I feel like anyone with even the vaguest knowledge of Baldur's Gate 3 probably recognizes Astarion at this point, even if it's just as "that annoying vampire twink I'm sick of seeing." There's already a growing "he's popular so he sucks" movement about Astarion here on tumblr and at the cesspool of hate known as Twitter, because of course there is, he's popular, ergo he must suck.

...

I think Astarion is one of the best written video game characters of all time.

There's this one great tumblr post that summarizes Astarion's role in the narrative really well, with the great punchline of "Astarion is kinda like if they sexualized gollum," which is not only funny but perfectly accurate. I can't really top that, so I'm just going to talk around some of its points a bit, but I highly recommend reading it yourself, it's more concise and well-thought out than whatever this ramble will be.

But, ok, so, "I Want to Live" is our theme, right? Astarion is dead. Dead to begin with, Marley style. He has been killed, at a young age, before his time. Sure, he was brought back to a sort of life, being a vampire and a member of the undead and all, but the life he knew is gone. All the pathos one can mine from being a vampire is played up here, for as Astarion himself notes, he's not even a full fledge vampire, but a vampire spawn - "All of the drawbacks, few of the perks." Worse, as a vampire spawn, he's magically bound to the will of the vampire that turned him - forced to live out his undead life as a slave to a sadistic monster that abused him in every way a person can be abused.

Which is why Astarion is the only companion who's entirely thankful for the mindflayers kidnapping him and implanting a tadpole in his head - because they broke that magic connection to his master, and gave him resistances to many of the stock vampire weaknesses to boot (hungry tadpole doesn't want its meat suit burning in the sun, after all). Astarion's life was so fucked that getting a brain-eating parasite was a unilateral improvement.

But while the magic connection is severed, the psychological affect of the abuse Astarion suffered lingers. His master made him use sex as a lure to bring victims to his lair, and so Astarion still believes that he has to offer people sex to "earn his keep" - that his body is a tool for others to use for their gratification, and if he refuses their desires he puts his life at peril. Astarion hates putting himself out to help other people not only because no one has done that for him during his long undead life, but because doing so puts his life at risk. Astarion is power hungry - his Want is to be as strong, no, stronger than his master, so that way he can never be afraid again. Astarion Wants to be a true vampire.

His need, however, is to find value in the life he has now. He needs people who love him for who he is, not what he can offer, and who will protect him the way he has needed protecting for hundreds of years. His need is to be shown that kindness isn't a weakness, that charity is possible, that power does not have to be gained through selfish and cruel means. You're shown this in the game's approval mechanic - while Astarion will disapprove of you putting yourself out on a limb for others and revealing sensitive information freely, he has a soft spot for whenever you help someone who, like him, is being exploited. Because while he'll protest otherwise, Astarion wants to believe kindness is possible, and that the horrible things he's suffered don't define him. Astarion may believe he's just a tool to serve others' desires, but that doesn't mean he doesn't wish to be more than that.

And I know the cynics among you are like "Oh, ok, so the cute vampire twink has a ludicrously tragic backstory. How is that original or good writing?" Because that's the thing, right? If there's an effeminate, brooding bad boy character that lots of teenage girls like in a piece of media, it HAS to be shallow wangst at its core. Every tumblr sexyman is just Edward Cullen when you cut past the bullshit, right?

Like, I know I'm not going to convince the "Thing popular so thing bad" crowd on Astarion's quality no matter how many words I write, but, like, there is a reason for the hype. Dude's got fucking layers! The different interactions with him you can have, the dimensions you can bring out of him by how you choose to engage with him, all paint this great tapestry of a character who takes the concept of a vampire and explores it to a depth few pieces of media have every plunged to.

And he's fucking funny! Dude's got some of the best lines in the game, and his voice actor didn't just give him a sexy sultry voice, but, like, shades of Tim Curry that make him endearingly weird and goofy and witty as hell while still being very sexy.

And yes, he's a sexy vampire, that's a big point in his favor and what most people are dwelling on. And I'm standing by the sexy part - listen, for the past few years I've been kind of wrestling with whether or not I'm bisexual, and the question was laid to rest the first time this fucker flirted with me in game. My heart raced, my cheeks flushed, I reflexively giggled and went "Whoo!" like a Southern Belle in need of a feinting couch. Every time he's flirted with me since has given me the fucking vapors. Thank you, Astarion, I'm bi for sure now. you solved that fucking riddle pretty decisively.

Let's move on.

Companion 2: Shadowheart, A Fellow Lapsed Catholic

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Shadowheart is a bundle of contradictions. She's got some of the best quips and quickest wits in the game, and she's also a huge fucking dork. She is oozing with confidence about the role she's been assigned to play and is incredibly assertive in group social situations, but on her own she's a mess of insecurities and is constantly plagued with doubts about her worth. She's constantly preaching about the need to be pragmatic and self-focused, but loves it whenever you are kind and generous. Depending on your choices during the tutorial level, she can become the first ride-or-die party member you get, and she's also a miserable pile of secrets who is terrified of you discovering what she really is.

See, Shadowheart is a cleric of Shar, the Goddess of Darkness, which is both in a literal and figurative sense - that is, Shar is the goddess of night and the absence of light, but, like, also the goddess of loss, and sorrow, and hopelessness, and secrets, and lies. The Goddess of Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss, basically. Being raised to follow the goddess has plagues Shadowheart with guilt over the secrets she's had to keep, the cruelties she's had to inflict, and the distance she's kept from all people in her life as a result of the church's creed. If you're a nerd who comes into this game knowing who Shar is, you'd probably be immediately suspicious of Shadowheart when you find out her alleigance, because Shar's basically one of the more prominent evil gods whose followers are always fucking things up for everyone.

However, I did not come into this game knowing that, but I did come into it knowing what's it's like to be raised in a religion that teaches you that many of your natural desires for companionship are wrong and to feel guilt and paranoia over how your every action will be judged, for like Shadowheart, I am also a Catholic.

Shadowheart's Want is to become a Dark Justiciar, which is basically the Sharran equivalent of the Spanish Inquisition, and to fully prove her devotion to Shar's will. The way she talks about Shar is so thickly coded with the way children of abusive parents talk about said parents that's it's legitimately frightening to witness at times. Shadowheart doesn't blame Shar for hurting her, she knows it's her fault for disappointing Shar in the first place.

Shadowheart's Need is to leave the fucking Catholic church. Depending on your choices, she can accomplish this with the help of two moon-worshipping lesbians, at which point she dyes her hair a color that would piss off her parents Shar and proceeds to indulge in a somewhat hedonistic rebellion of self actualization that only a lapsed Catholic can fully comprehend. I love her.

Companion 3: Lae'Zel, The World's Most Loyal Toad

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Ok, so, brief tangent: one of my favorite games of all time is Dragon Age Origins, and it is one of my favorite games of all time in part because it has Morrigan, one of the best characters in all of fantasy fiction, fuck you fight me. Morrigan is a divisive character in the DA fandom because she is notoriously hard to please if you're trying to be a good person - it was so prominent a criticism, in fact, that "Morrigan Disapproves" was put on a fucking t-shirt to play on/monetize the controversy.

But, see, the thing about Morrigan is that she's 1. incredibly complex and 2. designed to challenge your worldview, and to be challenged in turn. Morrigan isn't just an evil bitch, she has a genuine philosophy for why she behaves as coldly as she does, which in part stems from her awful upbringing by her cruel, selfish hermit mother who was trying to shelter her from an even crueller world that would see her in chains just for being a witch. Morrigan has been taught that love is a weakness others will exploit, that kindness is folly, and that everyone is out for themselves. And you need to contradict her on that - getting to know her inevitably involves fighting her on this point, and you proving to her that the cruelty she's been taught is wrong. If you are willing to listen, to argue, to truly understand this character, she grows because of you. It makes her character arc so fucking satisfying, when you get to the end of the game and she realizes that she does love you, she does want to be kind, and that even though she now feels more accutely than ever how love has made her weak, she can't be without it. It's so fucking good.

I bring Morrigan up because almost all the companions in Baldur's Gate 3 are on her level, in part because they are designed like her - to challenge you and be challenged in turn. And none of the core six are more like her than Lae'zel.

Which, sadly, includes the fan backlash part. A lot of fans of the game hate Lae'zel - she's too mean, they say, too hostile, to proud of her strange and callous worldview, too critical of our normal and kind outlook, too difficult to relate to.

These people are cowards.

If Shadowheart is Catholic, then Lae'zel is, like, Christian Reformed. A fundie. She's been training at Githyanki Bible Camp for years to be her lichqueen's perfectly loyal soldier, only to run into this minor snag of being kidnapped by Mindflayers, the ancestral enemies of her people, and infected with a tadpole that will turn her into one of them, the Worst Fate that can become a Githyanki. Luckily, she's read all of her people's Chick Tracts, and knows that if she can get to one of the Githyanki creches, they can use their special machine to pray the tadpole out of her brain and save her.

Lae'zel has drunk the metaphorical kool-aid of her people, but only to a point. See, Githyankis are viciously racist, but Lae'zel is REALLY quick to accept you and most of the other companions (not Shadowheart, though, as like a true Fundie, she cannot stand a Catholic) despite them not being Giths like herself. Yeah, she'll preen and posture about the superiority of her kind a bit, but she sides with you within seconds of meeting you, and from that point on she is ride or die until you give her a good reason to think otherwise. Lae'zel can be mean, stubborn, and arrogant, but she is above all else loyal.

Her Want is to be a perfect Githyanki warrior, earning the respect of her queen and serving her endlessly in the Astral Plane. Of course, when you actually get to that creche she's pointing you towards early in the game, this all falls apart on her, because just like Fundamentalist Christianity, Githyanki culture is little more than a sham designed to uphold an evil and exploitative power structure where the rich drain the life and resources of everyone beneath them and declare it the will of the divine. In this case, that "drain the life" part is explicitly literal, as the Githyanki queen literally devours the life force of any gith that gets even a bit close to rivaling her in power. If Lae'zel tries to follow her dream, it will end with her queen eating her soul.

Lae'zel's Need is to not only break out of her culture's indoctrination, but to find a way to make her life worthwhile on her own terms. It's heartbreaking to witness, honestly, because unlike the other core companions, Lae'zel has no idea what a life outside of her Want looks like. What is she without serving her queen? What the hell does she want? If you've been taught God your queen is all that is good, then how the fuck you you figure out what good is when you realize she's actually evil?

And while she goes through this seriously traumatic existential crisis, she finds the energy to be invested in the struggles of you and your companions. When the other characters are going through The Shit in their respective arcs, Lae'zel is always quick to note that she thinks they are strong and deserve more than they're getting - even Shadowheart, that fucking Catholic!

Because the first word you'd ever use to describe Lae'zel, the one that most succinctly captures who she is, is LOYAL. She fucking rocks, I love her.

Companion 4: Wyll, The Unjustly Underrated

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Almost no one talks about Wyll and it fucking sucks, man. I mean, we all know why (it starts with a Ra and ends in a Cism), but still it fucking blows dude. And yes, I include myself in this, anyone who's followed my blog can tell that Wyll's not the companion I fixate on the most.

But listen, I promise you, if the game let me take along four companions instead of three, Wyll... would be competing with Lae'zel for spot #4, and Lae'zel might win out because she's an angry girl, but... fuck I'm losing the plot.

Wyll is great though! He's severely underrated! He's one of the nicest companions you'll get, first of all, but he's not just a nice guy. Everyone's got layers in this, right? Wyll is nice, but he's also a bit arrogant - a glory hound, really. He's the only companion who's given himself a superhero name, and he routinely uses it. Dude wants to be fuckin' Batman so bad, it's wonderful.

He's also the most actively fucked member of the party. Everyone's got abusers in their past, but Wyll's is the only one who's followed him to your camp. Mizora, the devil he sold his soul too, frequently shows up to give him shitty tasks and shittier punishments, and is one of the most hateful fucking characters I have ever encountered in my life. Like, to put this in perspective: if you know me, you know that I have certain... preferences... when it comes to women. So if there was, say, a demon lady character who's also a bit of a dominatrix, and I fucking hated her guts, you'd probably be a bit surprised given, you know, my preferences.

But the way Mizora treats Wyll? The way she talks about him and to him? It's fucking heinous. She's not fun evil, she's evil evil, and she's got to fucking go.

It kind of reframes Wyll's kindness and cockiness as you experience it, because beneath the showy acts of heroism and the bluster, Wyll is a sad little dog in a burning apartment telling himself "this is fine!" over and over again.

Wyll's Want is to be a hero and make the sacrifice of his soul worth something. He has accepted that there is no redemption for himself, that Mizora preying upon his vulnerability in the past is something he can never recover from, that he cannot be free of her chains, and only hopes to use what time he has to do some good, even if it inevitably comes at the cost of his life.

His Need is to break out of Mizora's control, to wrest his fate back into his own hands, and to prove what has always been true: that he IS the hero he's selling himself as. It's a real Rango arc if you think about it.

Companion 5: Gale, The Friend With the Messiest Fucking Love Life You've Ever Heard Of Goddamn

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Gale... kind of breaks the companion formula, a little bit? Like, for the other five core companions, there is a clear-cut situation where they were abused and exploited by an asshole - Shar exploited Shadowheart, Cazador the master vampire exploited Astarion, Mizora exploits Wyll, etc. Gale's fucked up traumatic relationship is a bit... messier, and harder to untangle, because by his own admission, he was not blameless in it.

Gale is a wizard, and like all good wizards in fiction, he's a bit of a mad scientist. He was so good at wizarding, in fact, that the goddess of magic itself, Mystra, reached out to him, and eventually the two had a little romance. Now, fans have gone back and forth interpreting this, with some saying that Mystra was grooming Gale from childhood and thus is as bad as Cazador/Shar/Mizora/et cetera. I feel that's kind of a bad faith reading of the character, one that's actively ignoring the concept of what an ageless immortal goddess is to try and fit it into a human context.

For nerds who know about the setting, Mystra is NOT an evil goddess like Shar. In fact, she's kind of a vitally important goddess to have around, as Magic is such an integral part of the reality of this setting that not having a god of some sort for it results in an fucking extinction event - which the characters in the game know for a fact because at one point in the past, a mortal wizard killed Mystra and made that extinction event happen. Mystra reformed, as gods do, and eventually things got back to more or less normal, but that doesn't do much for the shitload of people and creatures that died during the period of time where magic was dead.

And that's what ends up souring Gale and Mystra's relationship. Gale, being mortal, felt he had to prove he was Mystra's equal, and so set out to find a source of magical power not unlike that used by the wizard in the past who killed Mystra. And when Mystra saw Gale doing that, she freaked the fuck out because she thought she was going to get killed again - because the wizard who slew her in the past ALSO felt he needed to prove he was equal to a goddess.

Neither character takes the breakup well. Gale feels like fucking shit because he fumbled a literal goddess, and also got a piece of super destructive magic lodged in his chest in the process that's slowly killing him. And Mystra is worried that the super powerful piece of magic lodged in Gale's chest could kill her, and also about the cult using a very similar piece of magic (it's a big plot point for the game I won't go into it this is already too long), and so, in an act of cruel godly pragmatism, she sends D&D Gandalf to tell Gale to use his the magic murder ball in his chest to kill the cult, even though it'll destroy him in the process. "Hi sweetie, please kill yourself on my behalf, k thanx!" basically.

It's... it's a mess.

Gale's Want is to prove he is Mystra's equal by mastering the ancient magic he's found, and either win her back or, better yet, become a god himself and dethrone her. As I said, he's got a bit of a mad scientist in him.

Gale's Need is to move on from this relationship, talk things out with his ex, give her her dvds the ancient magic artifacts back, and move on with his life.

I like Gale. He's got funny lines, he loves his cat, he's a goofy nerd, and while his love life is a mess, his heart is mostly in the right place. He needs some nudges to do the right thing, but he's a good guy deep down, and I always love it when fiction shows a relationship that falls apart not because one person in it was "bad," but because the two people were just not compatible. Yeah, Gale fucked up, but you can understand why he fucked up, and he can understand it too if you help him own up to his mistakes and move forward. Also, he loves his cat, he can't be all bad.

Companion 6: Karlach, the Most Beautiful Woman I've Ever Seen

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Karlach is my favorite companion in this game, which is why I saved her for (sort of) last. And, yes, sure, part of it is because of my aforementioned preferences with women...

she's so goddamn pretty

But it's also because of how she plays with those core themes I've mentioned. Karlach was sold into slavery as a teenager, where her devil master ripped out her heart and replaced it with an engine to turn her into a super-strong gladiator. She's been living in literal Hell for years, fighting every day to survive, and like Astarion she actually views being kidnapped by Mindflayers as a godsend since it freed her from her enslavement.

Unlike Astarion, Karlach doesn't have a long life to look forward to. That engine in her chest can't work properly outside of Hell, and it will eventually break, overheat, and melt her from the inside out. Karlach is the only companion who knows she's going to die soon whether or not the tadpole is taken out - no matter how this adventure ends, she will die.

At least, that's what she's told herself. Karlach's Want is to never return to Literal Hell, no matter what, because she's afraid if she does she will be taken as a slave again, and that there is no hope for a good life if she touches foot on that ground again. Following this want means she WILL die - either by the engine, by her enemies in the mortal plane, or by turning into a mind flayer (because while mind flayers can retain their hosts' memories, they are NOT the same being as their host).

And Karlach is convinced she's ok with this! No, really, she's fine! This is fine! She's got a few days left to live, and she's going to enjoy them! She is unfailingly kind and compassionate, always willing to help others, always cheery and taking the best view of her friends and people in need, a ray of fucking sunshine.

And beneath it all she's terrified and sad. When you get towards the end of the game, and Karlach feels how close the Inevitable End is, she reaches a breaking point where that happy facade snaps and it's... it's gut wrenching, man. It breaks your fucking heart, because as much as she's determined not to risk setting foot in Literal Hell ever again, she really doesn't want to die.

...

Karlach's Need is to go back to Literal Hell long enough to get that engine replaced. Her Need is to find hope, TRUE hope, not just a facade of optimism - a true belief that she can face the worst and come out of it ok, that she can survive, that she is not alone in facing the darkest shit this world can throw at her. Her Need is to find the strength to believe that she can live, even if it's hard, even if it's Hell to get there.

And Karlach is worth it. She is worth Hell.

Companions 7 - 10 Speedrun

I don't have as much to say about the four other companions you can get in the game, mainly because I already love these six so much that trying to take time to get to know four other weirdos who I don't get to recruit until halfway through the game just... like, there's a party limit of four characters and one is me, I can only take three of you along at a time, I'm prioritizing the one's who've been with me since all the goblin shit in Act 1, feel me? The rest of you seem real neat but I've got my nakama all set, we're good.

Halsin is the one I know the most of these four because he helped me at the tail end of the goblin stuff and he seems fine. He's a big nice hippie who turns into a bear and is into polygamy and carving wooden ducks. A lot of people thirst for him, but he's not my type - like I get the appeal but this is a case of Not My Favorite Pennywise Hentai But OK as far as I'm concerned. I like his subplot about restoring balance to the cursed forest, though. Felt like teaming up with Smokey the Bear.

Minthara is the companion that used to require you to kill a shitload of innocent people to recruit, but people found weird work-arounds that involved turning her into a sheep and so the developers sighed and released a patch where you could recruit her without mass murder using only slightly cheesey means. She is Genuinely Evil, but in a complicated way that's still fun from a character perspective. She's also a great comically serious character - i.e. someone who's so serious all the time that they end up being incredibly funny on accident just by their muted reactions to all the weirdness around them. From the clip compilations I've watched on youtube, her romance is basically a Lady Macbeth situation, and that's pretty hot. If it weren't for Karlach, I'd... romance Astarion, but if it weren't for Astarion, I'd... romance Shadowheart, but if it weren't for Shadowheart, I'd... romance Lae'zel, but if it weren't for Lae'zel, I might romance Minthara. Or Wyll. One of the two.

Jaheira is a character from one of the previous Baldur's Gate games, neither of which I've played, so I had no preconceptions or attachments to her going in this game. She basically becomes your surrogate mom as the game goes along, and I mean that as a compliment. She's pretty great and fills a nice emotional niche - I didn't use her that much because, again, I've already got six close friends to rotate out, I'm not going to ditch them for long periods of time to hang out with my MOM, but it was nice having her along for the ride a few times.

Minsc is the OTHER returning character from the previous games, and from what I can tell he's basicall Kronk from The Emperor's New Groove but with a funny accent. I like him, he's fun comic relief, and he throws a hamster at people while telling it to eat their eyes. I don't have a lot to say on Minsc, I just think he's neat.

At some point I might do a followup to this gushing about NPCs from the game, because goddamn the supporting cast is great too. Omeluum, Us, the Emperor, fucking Dame Aylin. Dame Aylin is so goddamn fucking cool, I want to read novels about her adventures, she rocks so hard. All glory to the Nightsong!

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robininthelabyrinth · 4 years

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Nie Mingjue and Wen Ning as conscious fierce corpse buddies

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By everyone’s agreement (except his own), Wen Ning was the sect leader.

Of course, practically speaking, Nie Mingjue actually ran everything; he was the one with the experience in it, after all, and he claimed he was no good at teaching, which was the other thing they generally did.

This was, of course, a blatant lie – the few times he did agree to take on some classes, they were by far the most popular – but Wen Ning had yet to figure out how to get Nie Mingjue to do anything he didn’t want to do, and anyway he really was very good at all the work that went into being sect leader, so it all worked out quite well for everybody in the end.

How they ended up with a sect in the first place, Wen Ning will never know.

The school had been Song Lan’s idea, though; that much was certain. Or, well, Wen Ning supposed it was actually Xiao Xingchen’s idea to start with, or possibly both of them, but Song Lan had been the one to make it an operational proposal and anyway Xiao Xingcheng had been a scattered soul at the time so Wen Ning felt pretty comfortable ascribing the idea to Song Lan.

Xiao Xingchen’s back now.

So was Xue Yang, but that was unfortunately unavoidable – their souls had become so intertwined by the time they’d both died that there was really no bringing one back without the other, much to Song Lan’s annoyance. Out of lack of better options, Xue Yang was currently being kept very firmly under control, even lock and key if it seemed appropriate - he didn’t object as long as it was Xiao Xingchen applying the locks - and they hadn’t entirely decided if he was going to need to be executed for the good of society at some point.

Still, at least for the time being, he was being useful. No one could say that Xue Yang wasn’t a genius when it came to inventing new things, even if he wasn’t as good as Wei Wuxian, and their school was as much about research as it was teaching.

After all, demonic cultivation was pretty new. There was a lot out there to discover.

A lot out there to teach.

It wasn’t like not having anyone around to teach them stopped there from being demonic cultivators in the first decade or so after Wei Wuxian’s death, especially given how easily it could be picked up. Unfortunately, most of them weren’t very good at it, and there were pitfalls for any cultivation path, much less such a dangerous one, reviled by the whole world.

Song Lan, who’d picked up the basics during the time that he’d been controlled by Xue Yang, had argued that it was cruel to allow people to pick it up out of desperation and to charge ahead with no guidance – that without a firm hand to show them the way, most people would end up getting corrupted, or just mess something up and end up in a qi deviation.

(Nie Mingjue was understandably a bit sensitive about those, so that was the argument that had worked on him. Wen Ning, for his part, was a little bit bitter about everyone, and hadn’t much cared what happened ot them, but on the other hand what else did he have to do?)

So they’d started the school.

Only about a quarter of their disciples so far were there willingly – most of the others were dropped off by Jiang Cheng, who had some trouble dropping his habits of finding them wherever they were, and everyone agreed that their school was a better place for them than his dungeons – but the number was steadily growing as their reputation got out there.

Their reputation as teachers, that is. Everyone knew about the other thing.

The whole…fierce corpses thing.

Hard to avoid everyone knowing, what with Wen Ning, the Ghost General, being the sect leader.

Obviously in a perfect universe, Wei Wuxian would be the one in charge – of the school, of the sect they formed to support the school, of the whole demonic cultivation path that he invented – but he was busy in Gusu doing…something.

Mostly his husband.

At least he came by to visit on a regular basis?

Though actually now that Wen Ning thought about it, he didn’t actually like the times when Wei Wuxian and Xue Yang would get drunk together and came up with new ideas – it’d been Nie Mingjue who’d figured out how to restore a sense of taste to a fierce corpse, though he refused to divulge where he got the idea or how he’d come up with it but no one really cared to pry too much because it worked – because the ideas were invariably fascinating, innovative, and uniformly awful.

Also, Wei Wuxian visiting usually meant that Wen Ning needed to sit with Lan Wangji all night to make sure he didn’t accidentally liberate any of their staff, usually in the guise of keeping him company, and he knew the man didn’t like him. He always had a look of a man sucking a lemon whenever he visited.

…maybe that was just the name of their sect that he object to.

In their defense, neither Wen Ning, Nie Mingjue, nor Song Lan were especially creative people, Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang hadn’t yet been revived, little A-Qing hadn’t yet been reincarnated nor revived her memories – they’d just picked the most straightforward name they could think of.

And, well, they were all gui. What was wrong with calling it the Gui Sect?

Sometimes Wen Ning thought that Lan Wangji was unnecessarily judgy.

“What are you brooding about?” a voice interrupted his thoughts, and Wen Ning looked up with a smile.

“Sect business,” he lied, and Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes at him, clearly not believing him for a moment.

“What about sect business? The trade disputes?”

Wen Ning frowned. “We have trade disputes?!” He hadn’t even heard about – oh, no, Nie Mingjue was laughing. “We don’t have trade disputes.”

“We’re supported by all four of the Great Sects, between Wei Wuxian at Gusu, Jin Ling at Lanling, Jiang Cheng – as a favor to the former two – in Yunmeng, and last but not least my brother. Who’s going to start a trade dispute with us?”

That was comforting. Sort of comforting?

“Are we bullying people with our resources?” he asked, worrying his lower lip with his teeth.

“Of course we are,” Nie Mingjue said, sounding satisfied. Ugh, sect leaders. Somehow – with some admittedly fairly major variations in style – they were all the same, always looking for an advantage for their sects.

Wait, he’s a sect leader now. Does that mean he’s like that?

No, he’s a terrible sect leader, which means he’s exempt. A bit like Nie Huaisang had been all those years, as the Head-shaker…on second thought, that was part of a giant plot that had in fact ended with the Nie sect ascendant above all the others – the Jin sect in tatters, the Jiang sect isolated as always, the Lan sect putting all their attention on having to corral Wei Wuxian – so maybe it wasn’t the best comparison.

Ugh. Why is this Wen Ning’s life?

“Stop thinking about running away to be a rogue cultivator again, it’s much too late for that,” Nie Mingjue advised him, not unkindly. Wen Ning hadn’t even said anything. “Besides, you like teaching juniors. Even delinquent juniors.”

“They’re mostly not delinquents anymore,” Wen Ning objected. It was really amazing how being forced to attend a class taught by Xue Yang was enough to drive most young people far away from the mere idea of being a delinquent again lest they risk turning into him – and to help identify the remaining ones that needed to be kept under very close supervision. “Speaking of teaching, when are you taking another class? Your training sessions with Baxia don’t count.”

“From the number of people watching, they should.”

“It still doesn’t count,” Wen Ning said firmly, even if it really probably should – watching Nie Mingjue, a fierce corpse, working seamlessly with a spiritual weapon specifically designed to eradicate fierce corpses was truly a fascinating sight.

Of course, most people were more fascinated by the fact that Nie Mingjue usually did his training shirtless – including Wei Wuxian, irritatingly enough, though interestingly Lan Wangji, who was usually the first one at the vinegar jar, didn’t seem to object – but nothing much could be done about that.

(Fierce corpses did not need to worry about the heat, or sweat, or any of the usual motivations for going shirtless, but Nie Mingjue claimed it was a psychological need based on years of habit-building. For anyone else, Wen Ning would think that they were vain and secretly enjoying the attention, but with Nie Mingjue…it probably really was just habit.)

“Fine,” Nie Mingjue said. “Give me one of the basic seminars; I’ll do that. Not one of the musical ones.”

Wen Ning had learned by now that there was no point in smothering smiles – after all, he was a sect leader, and no one had the right to criticize or yell at him for smiling too much or for taking too much attention to himself.

Take that, Wen Chao.

“No,” he said. “I haven’t forgotten that you’re nearly tone-deaf.”

“At least one of you hasn’t.”

“Xiao Xingchen means well,” Wen Ning said, even though honestly by this point it was pretty clear he was just forcing Nie Mingjue to try out new and increasingly exotic instruments for his own (and everyone else’s) amusement. “It’s a little funny.”

Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes again, looking long-suffering, but he had a pretty good sense of humor about these things.

Also, if he was ever actually upset about something, Nie Huaisang would have fixed it.

No one would have enjoyed Nie Huaisang fixing things, but he would still have fixed it. He always fixed things that affected his brother.

(Example number one: Jin Guangyao, his eventual demise, and everything that happened after that.)

“I actually came here to give you news,” Nie Mingjue said. “Would you like to hear it?”

Wen Ning had politely requested – a little desperately – that Nie Mingjue check first. The other man had a way of just saying things without any consideration for the anxiety of the person he was talking to, with things like “we’ve misplaced a student” or “don’t worry it wasn’t a student we actually liked” or “Xue Yang is on the loose and he’s summoned something again” or, one memorable instance, “Baxia decided to summon a dozen of her close friends and family and they may or may not be attacking the staff rooms, but honestly she’s having so much fun that I don’t really feel like stopping her, thought you should know.”

Wen Ning took a deep breath that he didn’t need, firmed up his emotional resiliency, braced himself, and said, “Yes.”

“A-Qing thinks she found your sister’s reincarnation,” Nie Mingjue said, and the air shot out of Wen Ning’s lungs as if he’d been punched. “You know that she’s been sensitive to these things ever since her rebirth, we did some investigating, and we’re pretty sure. How would you like us to handle it?”

Wen Ning scrubbed his face. “I – have no idea. I thought her spirit was still haunting the place where her ashes were?”

“Just one of her souls, and the new body is one short. They’ll have to be reunited eventually or else she’ll suffer the physical effects of missing a soul, but there’s a way to do it that maximizes the chances of her recovering her memory from her previous life and a way to do it to minimize it.”

Wen Ning put his head down on his desk. “I…I don’t know. Our life was pretty awful, so maybe she’d be better off not remembering? But I also want my jiejie back…I hate decisions. Why did I become a sect leader again?”

“We told you that you didn’t have a choice and you lacked the spine to resist.”

“…thanks.”

Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Sometimes I really do wonder what you did in a previous life to deserve this one.”

Ouch. “Thanks.”

“Anytime,” Nie Mingjue said. “Come out and spar with me, it’ll help you think it over.”

“I don’t have time to think about anything else while we spar, though…?”

“Exactly.”

“…do I get a choice about this?”

“No. Get a move on.”

Wen Ning let himself be dragged over to the training fields. “You do remember I’m sect leader, right?”

“So is my brother,” Nie Mingjue pointed out and – fair.

“Your brother is one of the most terrifying people in the cultivation world.”

“And he still lets me boss him around. What’s your point?”

…fair.

“No point,” Wen Ning said, and waved to some of their more promising students, who immediately perked up at the thought of getting to watch them spar. “No point at all.”

In the end, he thought, his life hadn’t turned out that badly after all.

#mdzs #wen ning #nie mingjue #my fic #my fics #Anonymous

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romanceboys · 4 years

Text

(interview) w korea september issue 2020 — reptile

1. i was surprised to learn that this is your 13th year since debut. within a company, the years almost reflect the experience of a vice department head. that’s right. though there are things i’m seeing for the first time at this point, i think there’s a lot that has remained the same. shall i tell you something funny? early in the year, i transformed into my debut appearance from when i was 16 with a bowl haircut and had my picture taken. i put it up on instagram and as i watched my fans briefly mistake it for an old picture, i thought to myself ‘well at least my face hasn’t aged much yet.’ haha. 2. today, i get to meet one of the personalities i’ve been very curious about personally. how should i put it, you seem like a person who possesses a perfect narrative. oh my, thank you. 3. maturing steadily after debuting with shinee in middle school, you broke away from your image as the group’s youngest and instead donned the clothes of a solo musician. all 5 of your solo albums have been recorded as hits. now you are a member of superm that has gone global. even a narrative within a coming-of-age novel could not be as sturdy as this. when i look back on my life, i find it quite fascinating. i entered the company at the age of 13, and this year i turned 28. i’ve lived half of my life as a singer, i realise this when i think ‘i’ve run along the same path for a long time’. i think... i’ve been very greedy. it was through this greed that i was able to debut in a team called shinee, and consequently receive solo plans. once, producer lee sooman told me to bring him a recording of any pop song. wondering ‘what’s going on?’ i prepared for it and submitted, and soon after my solo album was released. thinking back, it must’ve been a test. i felt a sense of accomplishment in these things. that too very deeply, of course luck was on my side too. 4. a methodical company like sm couldn’t have proposed a solo career so lightly. there were a couple of tell-tale signs as far as i could tell. my singing parts were little during debut. after all taemin had the image of the one in charge of dancing. then my parts started to increase gradually, this could’ve been one of the signs. back in the day i used to stay back in the practice room till dawn. the employees working late would see me and the word probably went around. they must have felt sorry for me. a skinny boy practising by himself till dawn (laughs). 5. were you the type to stay back later than the rest in the practice room? i would go to the practice room as soon as we wrapped up our schedule. i’d practice till sunrise then return to the dorm and prepare for the next schedule immediately, i spent a long time doing this. 6. it was at the time of ‘sherlock’ in 2012 that your stage presence started to shine in shinee’s stages. thereafter, it seemed that you enjoyed your time on stage thoroughly. when did you begin to realise that only you were in command of your own stage? there were a couple of times... sherlock was one of them. sherlock was an album that came out when i was 20, right after becoming an adult, it was then my attitude towards performance changed. in those days i challenged myself to ‘not to do what was expected/fixed.’ usually our gestures at certain sections of the song are fixed beforehand, from sherlock onwards however i tried my hand at different things without reserve. it was my way of approaching the audience with sincerity, and my way of improving in the future. back then i would notice variations (in my performance) everyday when i monitored myself. 7. frankly, isn’t it difficult for someone to have made such a prominent leap? i think it might have been because of the long hiatus before sherlock. i was able to prepare well so my growth was likely more obvious when i stood on stage after a long time. how should i put it, my members were very stimulating for me. since the hyungs aren’t ordinary people (laughs). this is something i’m confident about, even if you say that most of the shinee members are main vocalists, none of us is inferior to the other, everyone is so talented. with these thoughts verbatim ‘i must survive in here,’ ‘i need to finish what i started,’ i practiced. i couldn’t not have made the leap with such stimulation and not to mention my greedy nature (laughs). spending time together with the members made me realise that we started to resemble each other in some aspects, thanks to them i was able to broaden my perspective and become aware of my undiscovered talents. 8. the prologue single ‘2 kids’ of your third album ‘never gonna dance again’ released in august. as i was listening to the song, i suddenly became curious about the lyricist and looked them up. my impression was that the language of the lyrics was raw and honest. the lyricist turned out to be you. my intention was to include everyday, colloquial speech. i’ve written poetic and abstract lyrics before, but while working on ‘2 kids’ i wanted the listeners to easily grasp the emotions at once. since i’ve released many songs like ‘danger’ with vivid concepts and sensual performances, i expected there to be some distance between me and the public. i found that i shouldn’t stray too far. in any case, i’m a pop singer. i thought to myself let’s meet the public halfway, and the result was the lyrics for ‘2 kids.’ it’s the brightest of all my title tracks (laughs). 9. i find two interesting points here. first, you are completely aware of your identity as a pop singer, second, to do that you work hard to keep close to the public. of course there are times when it doesn’t work out (laughs). for instance, when we’re deciding on the title track for a shinee album, my opinions always diverge from the members’. after listening to our fourth album title track ‘view,’ i said ‘no way, it can never be this!’ (laughs). what i’m after is, how shall i put it... there is a side to me that wants to experience things profoundly. for example, if i were to express love, instead of depicting it one-dimensionally, i’d prefer to do it maniacally. i like taking it one step further to appear twisted. 10. that’s amusing. it’s probably because i’ve seen your easy-going appearance on tv a lot, i would have never guessed for you to approach things ‘deeply’. profound people tend to be like that. ‘multi’ people are able to do several things at once, i can’t do that. i have to dig into things deeply at a time. that’s why when my members and i receive the same schedule notice, i’m the only one who always forgets it (laughs). 11. oho, this makes me curious about your taste in pop culture. i really like the british drama <black mirror>. i get hooked on the unusual. like mind-boggling things? i used to watch movies that weren’t popular because such movies are less likely to repeat contents that have already been consumed. but then i slowly began to enjoy light films as well. these days i leave a movie running in the background while i do other things. back when i would look for an independent film or thriller of my liking, i’d get extremely exhausted after watching it. they require so much focus that they sap my energy. 12. we were talking about lyrics but somehow ended up here (laughs). if you were given the opportunity to write lyrics again, what kind of story do you want the lyrics to convey? i like philosophical lyrics. for instance, a song called ‘soldier’ from my solo album deals with religious content, it varies from time to time of course but well if i were to write again... i think about this a lot these days. i want to change myself, i want to shake off my image uptil now and be reborn again. 13. why is that? i want a colour that is more concentrated and unique. as if i'm debuting again, i want to show something completely new that i had not before. 14. but aren’t your comebacks always novel? a musician like you who does diverse and experimental concepts is rare. is that so? sure the concepts are always new but... these days i think about how i want to change myself as a person from the very inside. instead of putting a facade on display, i have a thirst for wanting to show a more humane, genuine appearance. all humans experience moments of weakness and dysfunction. i think these moments definitely hold some beauty in them. the moment a person breaks down. it’s the only way one can get up and overcome difficulties again, i believe showing these sides of me, all of me, unabashedly is a path i need to walk as an artist now. 15. honestly, i’m excited for your third album because i heard this album reflects your ideas the most. what aspects of the production were different this time? firstly, i personally cast and liaised with the music video director. i thought it was important to work with the director one-on-one by keeping mediators to a minimum. through several meetings we mulled over every single thing like concept, outfit, hair and makeup. i offered my opinions too: ‘because i’m thinking of leaving a connecting link in the prologue, since there are two albums that would release following ‘2 kids,’ i want to drop certain keywords in the music video.’ fans usually call this a ‘bait’ (laughs). 16. the choreography stood out the most in the ‘2 kids’ music video. you weren’t simply moving to the rhythm, rather weren’t you moving your body guided by emotions? actually there were barely any plans to include dancing scenes. but i thought you never know so i quickly prepared a choreography the day before i left for paris. initially, i had a ‘dramatised’ (borrowing elements from drama) choreography in mind, but the director was expecting something modern. in the end, we expressed it well with a choreography that the director and i came up with after finding the perfect common ground. 17. personally i think a dramatised choreography would have been quite alright because ‘2 kids’ is a universal love song. i told the director i wanted to look miserable and pathetic through and through, like falling into a bottomless pit, wrecked, to be found waking up in the middle of the street, that would do too. why did i want to be that wrecked? i don’t know. there’s just a lot that exists within me. and i might have wanted to express that.... 18. with your first solo mini album <ace> you proved your grit as a solo musician to the public, and i believe your second album <move> reified your colour. i think taemin is a musician who doesn’t need to prove himself anymore. having reached this status, you’re releasing your next album <never gonna dance again>. did you ever think that this album could be it? rather, i hope that this album can be my ‘turning point.’ just as how it was during sherlock, i hope this time it changes my identity completely, as an individual and as a performer. people might like this album or find it mediocre, but i try not to care about these things now. 19. were you the type to stress over feedback? yes. because there are many people who are uncomfortable with change. but then i realised we’d never be able to free ourselves from within if we continued to be tied down. so now i’m trying to notice these things less. 20. have you ever had this thought? that looking back, the experimental has always revolved around you. as i said before, i think there is a lot of something within me (laughs). people have recognized that, there’s a lot i want to do. there is a greed for wanting to be different from others. it’s not that i want to ‘appear’ different but truly be different. 21. do you think there is an aspect of you that others can’t follow? i can’t seem to figure it out. i’m looking for it. however, my satisfaction level with myself tends to be low. and it’s something that has been guiding me till now. 22. what helps you recharge the most? i like lower-body bathing so much (laughs). as soon as i get into the bath, i automatically end up going ‘euu’ ‘aah.’ i soak my body completely, light up a scented candle, then let my body warm up like this. 23. while watching your vlog-like youtube content taem-log, i wondered ‘does he have an affinity for household goods?’ since the camera often captured your surroundings, i noticed pretty glasses and a colourful coffee machine adorning your cupboard. not at all. my mother did all of that (laughs). she’d say ‘this would suit taemin~’ then set it up prettily for display on the shelves. sometimes i do think i’d like to furnish my house with antiques if i were to move in the future. this is a bit funny but i find the houses in old horror movies so pretty. 24. i saw a bottle of moët & chandon in your refrigerator, is champagne your regular choice of alcohol? i rarely drink. i usually receive gifted alcohol quite a lot, it all goes to my father (laughs). my mother brought the moët & chandon and left it in there. i asked her to leave a pretty bottle in there at least for decoration purposes, so she probably brought it just for that? (laughs). 25. what kind of a person is 28-year-old taemin? i sort of want to set things ablaze. i want to put up a spectacular finale of the opening act. 26. how do you want to be remembered as a musician? as a great person. i say this knowing it sounds a bit grandiose but it’s my mission. 27. i can see it. the bigger you become the larger the impact you can have on society. i will become that person. so that many people can hear the message i want to convey.

translated by romanceboys — take out with full credit (source)

#shinee #taemin #p:taemin #w korea magazine september issue 2020 #interview #translations #e:never gonna dance again #enjoy!

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sanstropfremir · 3 years

Text

ok this took way longer than i expected because i got sidetracked looking at paintings and reading poetry and just admiring the mv, but it's finally finished!! let's talk about

higher

✨

i'm going to draw your attention to a few things.

firstly, these verses from rime of the ancient mariner by samuel taylor coleridge, published 1834:

The harbour-bay was clear as glass,

So smoothly it was strewn!

And on the bay the moonlight lay,

And the shadow of the Moon.

The rock shone bright, the kirk no less,

That stands above the rock:

The moonlight steeped in silentness

The steady weathercock.

And the bay was white with silent light,

Till rising from the same,

Full many shapes, that shadows were,

In crimson colours came.

A little distance from the prow

Those crimson shadows were:

I turned my eyes upon the deck—

Oh, Christ! what saw I there!

Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat,

And, by the holy rood!

A man all light, a seraph-man,

On every corse there stood.

This seraph-band, each waved his hand:

It was a heavenly sight!

They stood as signals to the land,

Each one a lovely light;

This seraph-band, each waved his hand,

No voice did they impart—

No voice; but oh! the silence sank

Like music on my heart.

secondly, this ivan aivazovsky painting, chaos (the creation), c. 1841:

and thirdly, the memorial of percy shelley, who drowned in a boating accident at age 29, in 1822:

there's a common conflation between the romantic and the pastoral in the general cultural consensus because the pastoral a) has been around as an art term longer than romantic, and b) romanticism does use some similar imagery. but there is a key difference: the pastoral is specfically an idealization of 'the simple shepherding life,' often for high class and urban audiences who have no conception of the details of this life includes. one of the more famous examples is christopher marlowe's a passionate shepherd to his love, published in 1599:

Come live with me and be my love,

And we will all the pleasures prove,

That Valleys, groves, hills, and fields,

Woods, or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon the Rocks,

Seeing the Shepherds feed their flocks,

By shallow Rivers to whose falls

Melodious birds sing Madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of Roses

And a thousand fragrant posies,

A cap of flowers, and a kirtle

Embroidered all with leaves of Myrtle;

A gown made of the finest wool

Which from our pretty Lambs we pull;

Fair lined slippers for the cold,

With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw and Ivy buds,

With Coral clasps and Amber studs:

And if these pleasures may thee move,

Come live with me, and be my love.

The Shepherds’ Swains shall dance and sing

For thy delight each May-morning:

If these delights thy mind may move,

Then live with me, and be my love.

whereas romanticism is a more pointedly specific movement that was active from around 1800 to 1850, primarily focused on intense emotion and catharsis as the primary experiential output of an artwork. which most prominently manifested in a deep fascination and glorification of the natural environment and historical nostalgia. the movement sprung from the german sturm und drang (literally storm and drive/stress) period of the late 1760s to early 1780s, which was a direct reaction to rationalism and enlightenment. romanticism had similar impulses; it was also a revival of medievalism and a reaction against the looming urban sprawl and mechanization of the industrial revolution. a typical romantic poem from one of the originators of the english movment william wordsworth, composed upon westminster bridge, september 3, 1802, originally published 1807:

Earth has not any thing to show more fair:

Dull would he be of soul who could pass by

A sight so touching in its majesty:

This City now doth, like a garment, wear

The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,

Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie

Open unto the fields, and to the sky;

All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.

Never did sun more beautifully steep

In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;

Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!

The river glideth at his own sweet will:

Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;

And all that mighty heart is lying still!

this romantic fascination with nature was underpinned by the philosophy of the sublime, generally agreed to be first treatised by edmund burke in 1756, the theory was also written about by kant and hegel. in the simplest of terms, the sublime is a quality of greatness beyond calculation, imitation, and human comprehension. the sublime is twofold; the greatness of the ocean is beautiful, but its power is also terrifying, and the experience of the sublime is to feel those two at once. to be in awe and also to be horrified of its ability to sink ships and drown a life in a tempermental change of tide.

let's take a quick detour to talk about

clothing

in the present day we have become much more lax thanks to the aesthetic movement in the late nineteenth century, but back in the early victorian period there are still highly structured rules about when and what clothing one can wear in public. and the clothing itself is also highly structured. anyone with a passing understanding of the victorian era knows about the whole flashing of the ankle thing and corsets galore, and it is true that the general day to day garments cover a lot of area. for men in particular, this manifests in no less than three layers in public at all times: shirt, waistcoat, and suit jacket, with a coat or mantle overtop in colder temperatures. this also includes a variation of a neck tie (depending on what year), hat, gloves, and any other decided upon accessories (this can also include a corset and other padded structural underpinnings). an important tangent to mention here is that this is the uniform of the upper classes, although the rules do apply to the lower classes if they wanted to appear 'sophisticated.' the working man's uniform was also shirt, waistcoat, trousers, but the difference here is in the textiles themselves; the colours tended to be much more drab, with less complicated patterns. obviously due to the price fabric itself, but also due to the labour of laundry. an indicator of class here is the white shirt itself and its pristine implications. (there is a longer conversation here about the invention of neckties and detachable collars and cuffs, but that's for another day). the silhouettes are very important to note here in the higher mv, as they are directly referential to the 'romantic poet' archetype of loose shirt and tight pants that we see in popular culture. but as i've just said, the reality is that men of the era were not dressed like this out in public. this look is essentially underwear; the implications are salacious. so where did this come from? well, we can blame it mostly on lord byron, who by all accounts was the first western 'rockstar.' notoriously called 'mad, bad and dangerous to know' by lady caroline lamb (a married women he publically had an affair with), byron was openly bisexual and deeply hedonistic with a lot of questionable habits, but his poetry was so popular that he was known to have women following him in the street and gathering in large quanities to see him at salons. and this was close to three decades before lizstomania. his close friends and contemporaries included percy and mary shelley, with whom he lived with abroad in italy for some time (this living arrangement resulted in the writing of both frankenstein and john polidori's the vampyre). byron's reputation was so eclipsing that the image of the lush poet lazing in his undergarments has become its own genre of romantic, slightly removed from the movement byron was writing in. it's also worth it to point out that there are no official portraits of byron dressed like this from the time. the visual assumption is somewhat apochryphal. now let's get into some specifics. a.c.e is not unfamiliar to this silhouette; as previously mentioned in this post i wrote about their styling, the boxy loose upper and fitted lower is their general mode for their styling because of its emphasis on legs. cactus was the most extreme example of this, and to prove my point, this specific silhouette is extremely common in classical ballet:

1. vaslav nijinsky, giselle, 1911 2. nehemiah kish, george balanchine's ballo della regina, 2011/12

higher fits very neatly into this same category: we have an emphasis on the legs through tightly fitted garments and also through light reflective textile, as well as a secondary emphasis on arm and shoulder movements with looser fit shirts. plus, the shirts are made from fabrics that have good drape and flow, and mimic the visual effects of water:

there are also several instances of scale patterning and wetlook hair styles, further elabourating on the siren theme. and the jewelry is the same, purposefully cut clear stones for oceanic sparkle or pearls, the gem directly born from water, as highlighting accents to specific parts of the body - namely eyes, hands, and torso:

the body jewelry also serves a double purpose in addition to being sparkly; it gives a semblance of shape to their torsos so their movements aren't totally lost in the shroud of their shirts, and it also invokes some of that salacious element that us as a modern audience doesn't necessarily perceive in the same way when we see a man wearing only a shirt. all of these points are especially prominent in the stage costuming. concerning the veils, these are an aesthetic choice following the theme of depicting water without actually using water. the song has a very breathless quality to it, and the lyrics directly make reference to water and breathlessness, so it only makes sense to have a physical manifestation of struggling to breathe.

now let's talk about

mise-en-scène

unlike most kpop mvs, I would argue that higher is not a spectacle in what we normally see spectacle to be. the overwhelming visual saturation of goblin (and the goblin remix) is more in line with what we expect, but how do you follow that, top it? the answer is that you don't. you aim for something with a completely different feel, which is exact what they did with higher.

the performing arts did not escape romanticism. the very start of the movement, sturm und drang, is actually named from a specific play written by friedrich maximilian klinger that premiered in 1777. the plays of the brief period are characterized by extreme and passionate emotions, and were siblings to one of the most famous genres of theatre, the melodrama. meant to appeal directly to the emotions of the audience using sensationalist plots and stock characters, the melodrama was the predominent form of entertainment in victorian england and gradually developed a specific form of its own. in this period we also start to see the development of 'stagecraft' into the recognizable form that it takes today. footlights, limelight/spotlighting, the separation of house and stage lighting, fly galleries, elevator platform mechanics, and the first (purported) western use of rear projection are all innovations of the late 18th and 19th centuries, as melodramas were known to have very intricate and spectacular stagings. and to go along with these stagecraft mechanics we see the rise in designated stage crews, which were predominantly off-duty sailors looking to make money. the rope systems that made up the fly galleries were very similar to that on ships, and much of the terminology and supersitions crossed over: this is the origin of the term 'rigging' being used for suspending set elements, and also the origin of the 'don't whistle in a theatre' superstition. as sailors communicated with whistle patterns on ships, the same system was adopted for changing scenery, and therefore whistling a random pattern could potentially drop a setpiece on an unsuspecting victim.

so with all this backstory out of the way, what is the very first full location we see? a stage, complete with forced perspective via the painted fabric legs (the side panels) and borders (the wavy upper panels). we even have a flat painted backdrop with a projection screen and hanging overhead lamps. there's also a second interior set, a desk in what looks to be a study of some kind. bit self explanatory on this one, taking the poet notion on the nose.

the locations have a bit of an obtuse arc, but it's there when you look for it. it starts interior spaces, where the ideas of sublime attempted to be recreated for the viewer. then it moves to transitory spaces; portions of nature isolated from a whole environment, interjections of human architecture into natural spaces:

(the white hut structure in the greenhouse is reminiscent of a skene (literally hut/tent), which is the structure at the back of the stage in ancient greek theatre used for the actors to change their masks and costumes. it was originally temporary, but slowly transformed into permanent stage architecture)

and then finally outdoors, into the sublime itself:

jwm turner, crossing the bridge, 1815

lastly,

lighting

there's a very clear lighting pattern here, primarily in light and dark. the base colour story is fairly simple complementary pairs; there's a lot of purple/red and green, and blue and yellow/amber, with everything relatively on the same tonal level. there are deliberate interjections of heavily saturated red for specific effect. there are also, most notably, a 'dark' version of all the sets. obviously as a reference to the eclipse that we see in the mv and in the concept photo series, but also as a reference to that darker undercurrent of the sublime, the upsetting, the uncanny, and the terrifying:

And the bay was white with silent light/Till rising from the same/Full many shapes, that shadows were/In crimson colours came.

#a.c.e #ace w #kpop analysis #group analysis #me - a staunch defender of kpop as valid spectacle: actually this one is a melodrama its meant to hit different #this essay is otherwise known as the quickest and dirtiest history of romanticism ever #i really should have pointed out that when i say romantic i mean romantic with a capital r #that probably would clear up some confusion but i have an aesthetic to maintain do not @ me #this is potentially the most pretentious thing i have ever written i am so sorry if this makes no sense #some of these connections are so tenuous who let me have opinions on the internet #did i write this as an excuse to look at the percy shelley memorial because i am obsessed with it as a piece of art? maybe #anyways read tom stoppard's arcadia if you want to know more about that #you should read all this with the caveat that the sublime and romanticism need to be deconstructed through a postcolonialist lens #because these theories are super colonialist about 'unclaimed untameable natural spaces'#when in reality most natural spaces are specifically architected by indigenous peoples in order to preserve and coexist with the ecosystem #this is may be more obviously applicable to american subliminal painting than european but it still applies #since the british were notoriously good at fucking up every kind of expedition ever #because of their lack of respect for literally anything and everything #and their inability to listen to anyone other than another white british person #see: history of the northwest passage #im a bad theorist and not caught up so i didnt get that deep into it because counter to the wordcount #i am not trying to write another dissertation #this is not as well researched as it could be but also im not reading burke and kant again #also yes byron the shelleys and polidori did just bang out the foundations for all of science fiction and romantic vampire mythology #in like three days because the all got bored during a storm and want to try and 'outscare' each other #also by 1840 like every prominent romantic poet was dead either from their own stupidity or tuberculosis #with the exception of wordsworth that motherfucker started the movement and then outlived it #text

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thepriceofbeingaroseisloneliness · 4 years

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KAORU&TOSHIYA INTERVIEW BURRN!! OCTOBER 2020 2/2

‘Ochita koto no aru sora’ was released as the band’s first digital single ever. In the middle of what it seems to be nightmarish situation in which they can’t predict at all what’s lies ahead, what are the hopes and emotions that these 5 people put into this song?

Text by You Masuda “We are in a difficult position, aren’t we? How long should we wait? For example, if this situation continues next year, I feel like it’s going to be complicated for us.”

Notes before reading: This is the second part of the Kaoru and Toshiya interview done by You Masuda for BURRN!! October 2020 Issue released last September 4th. You can read the first part here.

You can support and get the magazine at Amazon Japan or CDJapan.

Feel free to correct me if you spot any mistake or any confusing parts. ------ (1st part here) -Once the video (‘The World of Mercy) is completed, it will become a big thing as well. However, since that song should have closed the flow of the 'The insulated world' in the first place, if it appears again in the future, it is possible that the flow becomes odd for some reason. K: That’s right. Originally, we were planning to complete the feeling of the album at Pia Arena. But actually, that’s not possible. Although we have to use this video for future activities, we have to think about what kind of presentation should be done for it. The song itself is a thing of the past, we can’t simply go like “we are publishing it (the video) for the people just because we made a clip”, it’s not interesting anymore. The heat of the enthusiasm has cool down a little. -In the meantime, the next single and its consequent video are coming out. But whatever the future is, you are about to start producing your next album. Is the idea/concept already there? K: Well, little by little. Currently I don’t feel like we have many songs yet. From this month (August), we are supposed to start marking songs properly. -For example ’The World of Mercy’, will it be part of the next album? K: No, it won’t be included. After all, this song is the conclusion of ‘The insulated World'’. -In terms of discography, it will be a bit independent from the next album. T: I think it’s like that. In that sense, it will be like 'Ain't afraid to die'. (Note: This song is a single released in 2001 to conclude the flow from 'Macabre’ and is not included in any of the original albums.) K: Well, that's fine, right? Probably we won’t need it for the next album (laughs) -No, of course, I'd be happy if there were as many new songs as possible. It’s not like I’m not convinced that this song won’t be included in the next album but, whatever happens in the future with your live activities, from a creative perspective is it ok to think that flow from the album (The Insulated World) is over with this song? K: Of course. However, I think there will be also some flow similar to this song. That's because 'The World of Mercy 'is simply closer in time than 'The Insulated World'. But well, I don't know what will happen (laughs) -As we discussed earlier, there was also a sense of continuity in the lyrics. In recent years one of the most remarkable things that’s being said is that “there is no correct answer”, “A lie could be also the truth for a person” or something like “It may be true if you keep believing in it, even if you suspect that it may be wrong”. I felt some sense of contradiction. So, at the end of the two nights in Yokohama, I felt like you were hinting at something with the line “Ill feelings will continue coming”, a variation on the lyrics of “Sustain the Untruth”. K: That’s simply because it was the last song at the end of the show, like creating the image of playing it with the audience while the lights were on (Note: they used live footage for this song at the broadcasting). It was just this song because it wasn’t included the day before. However, when it comes to lyrics, there are moments that you can think about it in that way. -A two-night performance that was supposed to end leaving such an aftertaste. But without closing the previous flow, “Ochita koto ga aru no sora” comes into the world and goes on. I'm looking forward to it while I was imagining how is it going to be. A concrete thing about this single again is that you have had Brian Gardner as mastering engineer for some time, right? This might be the first time you have teamed up with Josh Wilbur, who was in charge of mixing this time. Does this mean that it was the right timing to do it? K: That's right. He is very popular, so we never had a chance to work with him. It seemed possible this time, so we decided to ask him for the first time. Well, he is quite of a “on my own way" type of person. Like, he plays with the sound as he feels. The first time he sent us back what he created, we were like “what the hell is this?” (laughs) -You really didn’t see that coming, right? K: That’s right. Even if the song was processed just a little, at first there were parts that it was like “what?” “this can’t be good” (laughs). After all, as he is a person who also does pop music, don’t you have a tendency to try to do such things? -In short, in these times, processing like that is a way to create an upgraded form (of the song) K: Actually, I don’t know if I would say that it is an “upgraded” form. Somehow, it’s like he doesn’t want to leave it as it is. -He is simply not someone that just says, “I will make it sound good”. K: That’s right. T: Yes. Maybe he is someone who wants to leave a mark in the sounds he makes. I guess he is that type of person. But when I heard the sound that came back from the first mix he did, I thought it was "interesting". It was too different from our previous approach, but it was interesting from an objective point of view. However, at first, we sent him a provisional mix made here in Japan, telling him we wanted it to sound “like that”. Usually, the song would be sent back with that feeling (as we requested). As it came back with a completely different direction, it was like a shoot and I was struck by it. I was a bit surprised. -You don't know what kind of person he was until you actually try to team with him. K: Yes. At first, we thought it would take him some time to do it. But as he is a person working in many things, as we told him the appropriate things, we thought he would do it properly. Actually, he sent it back to us quickly. So, when it comes to that, if we told him “please do this thing here”, he sent it back (done) soon. -In short, at first, he may not be the type of person that at the time of sending it back to you, sends you something “safe”. It’s like he doesn’t want to do it in a safe way. K: That might be true. But at first the sound of the band itself was strongly metal. -Do you mean more than what it was? K: Yes. Like the drums…. the drums were much sloppier than the final version ones. I feel like I overlooked his intentions a bit. -However, if you are in a situation where you can work by exchanging data, even if the returned idea is not what you were looking for, you will realize "Oh, can turn out like this?" Even if it's not the correct answer for you right now, it may be a hint for someday. K: Certainly, there were moments like that. However, although it is exciting in itself, we had a strong consciousness that we were actually doing it, so I didn’t expect that much (laughs) Wanting to do it “more like this” comes out first. However, if I listen to it again later, I think that the “Oh, I see” feeling will come out. "No, we don't know that yet. It's just a song that was completed as a single. It starts from here though” Kaoru -It must have been meaningful to you to know what kind of work he would do. You said “he is a person working in many things” but he turned out to be a person that doesn’t do everything in a smooth/safe way. K: Yes. On the contrary, there are some people who won’t take the song to the extend that you want even if you can see the answer (final result) from the beginning and tell them “how about this?”. In that sense, I guess he was well suited for the task. -It’s hard to point out the specific difference from your usual sound but, after all, something feels different. K:That's right. Moreover, somehow isn’t the existence of the song itself already big? I thought it would be difficult to put it out like that, so I thought it was he someone who would do it.

- You can hear Kyo’s mid-range singing very well. The lyrics of those parts also come up clearly.

K: Yes. But that doesn’t mean that some sound is being cut off there. Everything is coming out in a really clean way. That’s why I feel like he (Josh Wilbur) is a person who knows how to produce all kind of sounds.

-Yes. If you look at the works he has done in the past, it's not just heavy rock, it's very diverse in musical terms. (Note: The list of artists he has worked with includes not only LAMB OF GOD, MEGADETH, TRIVIUM, but also P!Nk and Faith Hill.) DIR EN GREY has had many opportunities to work with several engineers this way, but for the future….

K: We want to continue working with him. If he tried with the single and it worked out well, the next step would be the album. I wish we could find someone who would like to work with us on the next album, but I'm not sure if he will take care of it. It’s depends on what we will do in the future until we find someone like him who can do it.

- If all goes well in the future, I think you should be able to tell us about the next album you are already picturing in your imagination in a few months. Do you think the production schedule wouldn’t have changed in the first place, even if this first domestic tour or the two-night performance in Yokohama were held as scheduled?

K: That's right.

-In other words, do you mean that you will be absorbed in production the album this year?

K: That’s right. Well, as a matter of fact, I feel that we can do nothing but to move in a different way under this situation. At least, isn’t it hard to think about doing new lives? If there were more live shows that have already been scheduled, we would think about what to do with them. In our case, we cancelled the tour, didn't we? For the time being, there are venues where the postponement is still on hold and there are other venues that are actually still booked. But, well, in the current situation, the question is if new lives should be announced at those places (that are booked).

- At the same time, even if there is a not officially announced live schedule, it does not necessarily mean you should do it in the way you originally thought.

K: Yes. So, in the end it's likely that it will be postponed again and if that happens, I think we should hold the venue again sometime next year There are a lot of things to think about, and in fact, all we talk about now is how we're going to move.

- Actually right now, is there anything left to announce after the two-night performance at Pia Arena?

K: That’s it. There is nothing that can be announced now.

- Even if you make a release schedule, the situation will be different depending if you can play lives or not. Of course, if you have a situation in which you can play lives as before, you'll want to do it as soon as possible, but we are waiting for that to be possible….

K: We are in a difficult position, aren’t we? How long should we wait? For example, if this situation continues next year, I feel like it’s going to be complicated for us. We can't wait forever, but we can't force it ourselves. So, I can only say that it depends on the situation. For example, you're planning a tour in winter right now. Normally, we would have to announce it soon, right? But in the current situation, that is not possible. If we decide and announce it right away, we will sell the ticket according to the guidelines* at that moment, but actually no matter when you restart doing lives, I don't think we can announce it with the minimum time in advance, and I think the guideline itself will change in the future if we announce it with months in advance. To sell the tickets according to the guidelines at that time, you would have to do (the lives) in a short span of time, like a month later.

*Japan's guidelines for events (concerts, sports events...) are measures to prevent the spread of Corona virus. These measures limits the venue capacity and advocate for social distancing among other things. However, the guidelines is not legally enforced.

-For example, in the future, in a seated venue, you can only perform if there is an interval (empty seats) between attendees, and in such a situation, the picture that comes to your mind when you imagine a live will be different. In that case, I guess that it’s hard that this fits the way of doing lives that you have been trying to do until now.

K: That's right.

T: I think everyone has no choice but to explore the options. Of course, the idea of playing lives normally should still be there, but I think we should explore other ideas as well. That's why…...there are many unclear parts, but the current situation is that it cannot be clarified. As this happens, I think there is no choice but to think about the possibilities in both directions. So, if we can do something interesting, I think we should do it, and if we can play lives in a safe environment…. the guideline may change again, but of course I want to do it right away.

-I hope the situation where we can enjoy live performances as before will return, and I hope you will be able to do what you were trying to do this year in a similar way in the future. When that time comes, it will be an upgraded form.

K: Of course. In fact, we are always thinking about a year ahead, no, even more…Of course, there are plans that we will keep. However, we are not sure if these things can be done as we planned. But well, we work on the premise that we can do it, and if we can't do, there will a right time for it.

-When the right time comes, you may have to do all at the same time, what you originally thought you would do and the things that you were putting aside too.

K: Yes, that too (laughs)

T: That can be tough, though.

-As soon as the touring ban is lifted, and each band restarts their live activities at once….

T: That's a difficult thing, isn't it?

K: That’s why….it might the same from the audience’s perspective but, it also depends on how much the people around the artist and live staff can resist. I want them to endure this situation until somehow, we can play live without worrying about it. What should we do so they can endure it? The hardest thing would be that they weren’t there when we can play lives again. That's why…. I hope everyone can survive this situation somehow.

My conversation with these two people ends here. I don't know how the situation will change in the future. Optimism is dangerous, but we don't have to imagine the worst. In this phase,I am grateful that the new song was released at the promised time, and I would like to get ready for the right time to come without giving up hope. However, we can’t do anything about it, just long for it.

#dir en grey #kaoru #toshiya #interview #translation #toshiyatranslations #Burnn!#You Masuda

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doomtodivide · 3 years

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Imagining The Future: Bastille's New Era Analysis

Hello all! The following is taken from the first of my new era update posts on r/Bastillecult. I highly reccomend reading all the posts on there!

Last time I had a few solid guesses with the whole Goosebumps EP transition period, so I figured I would try my luck with this new era. I've broken everything down into a few categories that should hopefully flesh out a sketch of possibilities

Aesthetic: The new logo has a very sleek design. This complete change in aesthetics is very noticable. Bad Blood was filled with literature references, a cozy and nerdy looking dan, and more earthy looking tones. Wild World focused on nihilism, movie references, and an all too realistic dystopian city aesthetic. Doom Days focused on escapism, partying, fucking, and a red and home-y vibes. The lack of color and the clean and sleek look points towards it being a more future oriented era.

Triangle: For a deeper background, I highly recommend reading u/casperwyomingrex 'spost.

The WW era triangle and this new triangle are technically called deltas. While I am by no means a geometry person, I’ve been told by a few math nerds that these triangles are technically not possible in certain plains and spaces, making them impossible. While it is likely that Bastille just needed to explore just slightly outside the normal definition of a triangle to match this aesthetic, the impossible triangle t-shirts hint that there is significance to having “impossible” triangles. This hints that there may be more in common between the WW Era and the Future Era, ie. a dystopian society.

Dystopia: Bastille created an entire dystopian corporation for WW. I remember them saying somewhere they hated the promo and touring process for this album, leading them to switch up the process for DD and the Goosebumps EP. With the record label change and covid shaking up the world, this opens up the opportunity for them to have a redo with this era, especially considering it is a fan favorite era. Many people have pointed out that hint has a vibe similar to black mirror, a sci-fi dystopian show, which would fully support a sci-fi dystopian aesthetic era.

Sound: Though the clip is only 8 seconds long, it gives us some hints about the new era. Bastille once again uses synths for sound, creating a reference to Sci Fi sound effects. The clip mirrors the effect of oscillators to create things like laser sound effects, teleportation, warping, and other “space” noises. I find the juxtaposition of Sci-fi interesting; it was most popular in the early 1900s, meaning Bastille is referencing the past, yet it focuses on the future, which in the lense of Sci-fi, would mean the 2000s and beyond.

In the lens of broadcasting, short interludes are used throughout advertising to the point where many people don’t even think about this. A lot of them are used to hook us in and signify a certain company or thing. In advertisements they are used to signify the company’s presence and to worm the product into our brain. In casinos they are used as a dopamine reward. News stations use them to signify the station. This especially could be relevant in a dystopian society. I’m mentioning this because the clip doesn’t sound full enough to be a song, rather an intro to a news station segment. I find this especially notable considering WW had a news anchor. Looking back, a few videos from wild world could hold significance. This video

has a sci-fi esc clip in the intro.

In Previous Context: In the context of ReOrchestrated, Bastille is no longer letting imposter syndrome or shitty opinions stop them from what they want to do. Meaning they are going full force into the future. There's one specific time during the ReOrch doc where the boys talk about how ReOrch made them realize they could try new shit, even if management thinks it will fail. Dan has spoken in a few interviews now about being excited about collabing (and mentioning relinquishing control to others in the ReOrch doc), a few artists have come forward about working with Dan. While it’s unlikely that every collab we’ve theorized about will go through, Dan Wilson and Ryan Tedder seem to be confirmed in the roster based off of their interviews

When considering the past, a lot of previous songs focus on nostalgia; for example, in Fake it “We can never go back / We can only do our best to recreate.” Post ReOrch and DD, Bastille has worked up enough confidence to push into making their own future, one unlimited by nostalgia and fear.

In the Context of the Goosebumps EP, Inception and Vanilla Sky are both referenced. Both of these movies mark the first time* (to my knowledge

) that futuristic sci-fi has been referenced in Bastille. There is significant overlap with dreaming and time travel, something that could definitely be applied to this era. While it could be coincidental, Bastille has been quite purposeful with using references to add to the era’s aesthetic (see Aesthetic section). Referencing them during a transition period points towards both the literal future (new era) and a new aesthetic.

*Cosmos: War of the Planets and twilight zone have both been referenced but fall into a different category of sci-fi than Vanilla Sky and Inception

In Regards to Distraction Tactics Space Week and WW, alot of it holds very similar aesthetics. This video

from WW also holds a similar aesthetic. Considering DT is linked through space and WW is linked through dystopian this might MIGHT be related.

Hints: It wouldn’t be a new Era without Dan “Soon” Smith teasing us a bit, so here are a few highlights. In this interview

, Dan says “I want to tell you but I can’t! We just want to reflect on the future…” The No Bad Days tweet and the #ToTheSky post likely plays a part in the new era, but the 8 second clip does not have any immediate hints. The art installation in the #ToTheSky post originally caught my interest when it was posted. James Turrel, the artist that created the installation, uses light as a medium to create art. The installation, called the Space That Sees, is described as an “allegory of light that we generate from inside and light that comes from outside: the emergence into space where light comes forth as in a dream." While I have no fucking clue how to interprete this allegory, I imagine space, light, and dreaming will become key players in the new era. A few other notable works of his are the Raethro Pink and Alta Pink, both of which are pinkish purplish white triangles light projections surrounded by inky blackness. The use of Bastille’s triangle logo and a flash of light purple light means there are likely deep ties between the new era and James Turrel’s creations; furthermore, he also acquired a dormant cinder cone volcano to turn into an a museum/observatory using light apertures to observe the solar system, adding further ties to the space and light themes.

Meaning: "You Don't Predict The Future. You Imagine It" I have purposely not used predict in this analysis so I don’t jinx this era. I’ve found a few variations of this saying (You Can’t Predict The Future. But You Can Create It), but all of them seem to point towards creating the future instead of guessing. I imagine not many of my predictions of this era will not be accurate because I am not the one imagining it. I feel like this might also point towards being conscious about what you want out of the future instead of merely guessing where the tides will take you. This could also be like that one story of a kid's drawings turning into real creatures because of the kid imagining it. I feel like “future” and “imagine” point deeply towards sci-fi because of the creative inventions that will take us there. This could also connect to the theory that the survivin’ coin is linked to A.A., and this statement being a motto to help someone escape addiction. Personally, I feel like this clip is the beginning of some sci-fi choose your own adventure video game, but that's my own opinion.

My Personal Crazy Conclusion: It wouldn’t be a post from me without me shooting out some crazy theories. A Light Cult Utopia. That's right. It would be the opposite of WW, meaning it would be new territory for Bastille and it would break a mold (ReOrch doc). It would also give Dan the ability to be more positive then he has been in the past, while also allowing for his normal cynical undertones. Bastille is purposeful with their references, meaning the Jonestown reference in DD might have a bit more purpose behind it. The lighter colors used in the clip would point to happiness. Considering utopias are “imagined” it would fit the phrase in the clip. Sci-fi would also fit into this as being imagined. Considering there are a few space references, I imagine that humans have imagined perfect spacecraft, further fitting sci-fi and a utopian society. Also, Dan collabed with Future Utopia on the track “What’s In A Name?” That's right, what’s in a name? The name being Future Utopia? An entire new era being the name? That right cultists, Dan ”Soon” Smith snuck this under our noses the entire time that bastard.

Summary Statement: This new era will likely bring collabs from an entirely new approach. A Sci-fi dystopian (or utopian) world, one focused on dreaming, light, and space will likely be the aesthetic for this era.

Loose ends: I am only one human, meaning I physically could not rewatch Inception and Vanilla Sky while also researching James Turrel, so there might be a few things I missed in my brief look at them. If anyone would like to read 1984 by George Orwell through the whole dystopian thing, there might be a few connections there.

Based on some things I’ve heard from a little birdy, expect some big non-album projects that tie in with this era and other things….

Special thanks to u/0verjoyed and @ ja9zimm on twitter

#bastille band #bastille #bastillecult #dan smith #kyle simmons #chris woody wood #will farquarson #long post

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carewyncromwell · 4 years

Photo

*wiggles in delight* Okay, okay, you know it’s the POTC AU again. X3

Last part is here -- whole tag is here -- Lavender’s Blue is a folk song that dates back to the 17th century, but I used a more modern version in the link because it’s honestly the prettiest one I could find -- Leave Her Johnny is a traditional sea shanty, pinpointing it as being from the 18th/19th century, even though I haven’t been able to find a concrete date of when the original version was actually written anywhere, but whatever, who cares -- the myth of Orion and Artemis has several variations, but I just used one of the most popular ones because it fits the narrative -- I love my dear @cursebreakerfarrier and her girl Jules’s relationship with my precious boi Bill so much --

And that’s it! Let’s get right to it!! Eeeee~!!! *goes off and fangirls some more*

x~x~x~x

When it comes to dividing loot, one of the central tenants of the Pirate Code set down by the pirates Morgan and Bartholomew -- as well as every other specialized code set by individual pirate captains -- was the idea of everyone getting their fair share of whatever treasure they managed to plunder, with the Captain being awarded ownership of any ships. Thus everyone in the Tower Raven’s fleet as well as the Artemis’s crew was entitled to an equal share of the treasure the Revenge’s crew had stored away on Isle de Muerta the last fifteen years. It took a while to divvy up everyone’s shares, but even with how many people there were, everyone ended up with a respectable share, all the same. Both Jacob and Orion also quickly abdicated their possible claims to the Revenge to Carewyn -- a rather generous offer to some minds, considering it was the fastest galleon on the seven seas, but Carewyn could thoroughly understood why Jacob would want no part of it. If nothing else, he already had a rather impressive fleet, and the Revenge had the same bad memories for her as it did him.

It wasn’t long after the treasure was parsed into equal shares and the Tower Raven’s fleet departed that Bill pulled Jules aside.

“It looks like our little adventure is over,” he said with a faintly wry smile.

“...So it is,” said Jules.

She wasn’t smiling. She tried, but she just couldn’t shake the feeling that Bill was worried about something. Her wary expression made Bill turn a bit more serious too.

“You know Charlie and I won’t be able to return to Port Royal,” he said softly. “Your father could likely pull some strings to keep you from being punished, especially if you claimed we forced you, but...”

“I would never claim that and you know it,” Jules cut him off, her tone very reproachful.

Bill’s brown eyes crinkled up with fondness.

“...I know. That’s why I feel a little better telling you this.”

Taking her hand, he then slowly lowered himself onto one knee. Somewhere behind him, Bill could hear a quickly suppressed gasp of delight from Carewyn, and it made him grin around his scarlet cheeks up at Jules, whose face was also alight with surprise and a darkening flush.

“Juliette Farrier -- you are, without question, the most amazing and wonderful woman I have ever met in my life. You’re braver than a lioness and you never let anything stand in your way, no matter what the squalls. In the words of Psalm 143:8, ‘show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life’ -- ”

His entire face was a brilliant ruby red by this point. He bit his lip briefly, only for his mouth to spread into an even broader smile as he tried to hold in a laugh.

“ -- so...if you could accept a pirate as your husband, over a merchant or even a man of the Church...I swear to stand by your side and love you all my days.”

Jules was visibly overwhelmed. Her face flushed and her eyes flooding with tears, she found herself starting to laugh. Then she flung herself down onto Bill, grabbing hold of him around the neck and cradling his head and shoulders.

“Yes -- yes, of course I will!”

The wedding between Juliette Farrier and William Weasley was a very informal, rushed sort of affair. Since there was no church that would’ve married them and Bill couldn’t do it himself, they held it aboard the Artemis with Orion -- being Captain -- officiating the ceremony. Charlie and Carewyn scrounged through the loot remaining in the cave at Isle de Muerta to find a handsome coat made out of brown leather, a navy blue tricorn hat, a well-shined pair of boots, a rather pretty-looking off-white dress, a gold tiara, and a translucent muslin apron. Carewyn was able to cut the apron into a make-shift veil that she then helped Jules secure in her hair with the tiara.

Orion’s version of a wedding ceremony was distinctly not traditional. Rather than quoting scripture, he made a rather bizarre analogy to beavers. To his credit, it did eventually come around to the idea that they mate for life and they build their own home out of nothing together out of whatever’s available to them, which Carewyn thought was actually rather sweet.

Once the vows were read and the bride and groom shared their first kiss as husband and wife, the crew threw a makeshift wedding party on board the Artemis, with Carewyn singing a song for Bill and Jules’s first dance.

“Lavender's blue, dilly, dilly, lavender's green When I am king, dilly, dilly, you shall be queen: Who told you so, dilly, dilly, who told you so? 'Twas my own heart, dilly, dilly, that told me so.”

Once the dance was over, Carewyn couldn’t stop herself from throwing her arms around both of them, hugging them both with all of her strength. Soon Charlie had thrown himself into the huddle too, and the four were all clinging to each other, crying and smiling all the while.

“Jules,” Carewyn said seriously, “I want you, Bill, and Charlie to take the Revenge.”

The three all looked taken aback.

“What?” said Charlie.

“It’s the fastest galleon in the entire ocean, and easily the most feared pirate ship as well,” she explained, her eyes trailing from Charlie to Bill to Jules. “It may need some fixing -- I daresay it’d be a good idea to actually patch up those leaks with more than just magic, and I figure you’ll want to christen it with a new name...but...”

Her blue eyes drifted down to Jules’s shoulder.

“...If you must be considered criminals, with no chance of reprieve...then I don’t want the Navy to ever, ever catch you. I want you on a vessel so strong and so fast...that I can never catch up to you again.”

Bill, Charlie and Jules all stared at Carewyn, their eyes filling up with emotion seeing how strong of a face Carewyn was trying to put on, despite the pain she no doubt felt. Then Jules secured her arm more tightly around Carewyn’s shoulders, resting her forehead beside her friend’s affectionately.

“And if you must stay behind...then I want you to know that we’ll always...always come for you, Carey.”

Charlie nodded, resting his own head on Carewyn’s shoulder as he squeezed her shoulder. “Always.”

Bill’s eyes were streaming with tears. He seemed too overcome by his emotions to speak, so instead he brought up a hand and smoothed some hair out of his best friend’s face, placing a soft kiss to the crown of her head. Carewyn trailed a hand through his hair to comfort him.

“Look...after Percy for us?” Bill murmured in her ear, his voice choked with tears.

Carewyn blinked back her tears as best she could. “Of course.”

Not long later, Captain Jules Weasley boarded the newly christened Revolution with her First Mate and husband Bill and her Quartermaster and brother-in-law Charlie, and the three set off for Tortuga. Orion and the crew of the Artemis had arranged to meet them there and help them with ship repairs, since it would likely only take a scooner like the Artemis an extra day to reach Tortuga after dropping Carewyn off on an island frequented by rum runners, rescued, and returned to the Navy.

The next few days aboard the Artemis was rather more relaxed than on the voyage to Isle de Muerta. Everyone was in pretty good spirits thanks to the significant pay-out, so the nights were spent on deck drinking lots of rum and singing old pirate favorites like Spanish Ladies and Yo Ho A Pirate’s Life for Me. (That last one Carewyn was even able to coax Orion onto his feet and dance with her for, and the rather drunk crew was absolutely beside themselves with laughter, seeing the broad smile and dark flush on their tipsy captain’s face.)

On the last night of their voyage, however, as the sun went down, Orion did not join the festivities. The crew wasn’t too perturbed by it, as he apparently often stayed off to the side rather than get as active as he had that previous night. Despite this, though, McNully still lifted himself up into the rigging and paid Orion a visit at the helm while the rest of the crew drank and sang down below.

“Penny for your thoughts, Orion?” he asked amusedly.

Orion glanced up at McNully serenely. “Oh, merely...meditating on what would’ve happened, had the Scorpion not appeared.”

“The Scorpion?” repeated McNully, as he cocked an eyebrow.

Orion nodded up at the sky, to a certain cluster of stars.

“The Scorpion -- Scorpio. I wonder what would have happened if Apollo had not sent him to sting the heel of the hunter Orion -- what might have been his fate, then.”

McNully glanced from the constellation to down at Orion, frowning slightly.

“Well...he would’ve kept hunting with Artemis, I suppose,” he said slowly, “like he did before.”

“Yes...but would he have been able to do that ad infinitum? Would they have been able to hunt together, side by side, for the rest of Orion’s life, until he’d lived to a ripe old age? Or, like it’s said happened to the goddess Calypso...would it be too difficult for a goddess and a mere man to walk the same path for more than a short while...when the paths set before them are destined to diverge?”

Orion’s voice was very detached, but McNully knew him well enough that he could hear the quiet intensity in his voice. This thought exercise of his had been more than simple meditation, this McNully was sure of.

The First Mate considered Orion for a moment, contemplating his answer.

“...Well...I suppose that’s something Artemis and Orion would’ve probably had to plot out themselves, if it’d come to that. Reckon those sorts of things are always a 50-50 thing, no matter who the players are.”

Orion glanced at McNully out the side of his eye. “‘Those sorts of things?’”

“Yeah -- heart-related things. In the story you’re talking about, Orion was the only man Artemis ever loved, right?”

Orion’s dark eyes flickered down to the crew below. “...Aye.”

“Well, love kind of involves communication, so I’ve heard,” said McNully amusedly, “and while I’m no expert in love, I do pride myself on my communication skills. And from where I stand, I’d say that it’s up to those people to decide whether what they’ve got is more important than what ‘path’ they’re meant for or not. And unless there’s action on one or both people’s parts, there’s a 99.5% chance that both them and everyone around them will be left wondering forever what could’ve been.”

Orion didn’t answer. McNully followed his gaze down to the newly redressed Commodore Carewyn on the deck, who was leading the rest of the crew in a sea shanty.

“Oh, the wind was foul and the sea ran high... Leave her, Johnny, leave her! She shipped it green and none went by, And it's time for us to leave her.

Leave her, Johnny, leave her! Oh, leave her, Johnny, leave her! For the voyage is long and the winds don't blow, And it's time for us to leave her.”

Orion’s eyes narrowed ever-so-slightly, darkening with an emotion that McNully couldn’t place -- then, rather swiftly, he turned and headed for the stairs that led down to the main deck.

“I’ll take the first watch in the crow’s nest, McNully,” he said levelly. “Please see that the crew finishes up soon, so that we can start our nightly rounds.”

“...Aye, aye, Captain.”

The crew didn’t pay mind to the Captain walking past them on his way to the crow’s nest, but Carewyn couldn’t help but notice that he avoided any of their eyes.

Not long after, the crew all started getting ready to go to sleep down below in their makeshift cots and hammocks. Carewyn, however, was too disconcerted by Orion’s behavior and couldn’t help but approach McNully. When she did, he merely shrugged and told her not to worry -- Orion liked to go up to the crow’s nest alone to meditate, and it didn’t always mean he was in a bad mood. All the same, Carewyn decided to stay on deck and take the watch with Orion.

McNully considered her for a moment, before he finally added an aside to her.

“While he’s meditating, there’s only about a 45% chance he’ll talk to you. But...keep in mind that there’s only about a 25% chance that he’d talk to me. ...I reckon those are odds worth chancing.”

And so Carewyn made her way up into the crow’s nest. She found Orion there, resting his arms on the railing of the crow’s nest with his eyes closed and head bowed.

She settled herself next to him, resting her arms on the railing beside his. At first she was reluctant to speak, considering how clearly focused he was despite his eyes being closed. Then, at last, the Commodore finally brushed her newly retied ponytail over her shoulder and settled on asking him.

“...Would you prefer me to not say anything, while we watch together?”

Orion was quiet for a moment. Then, without opening his eyes, he murmured, “...You could sing something.”

Carewyn smiled slightly. “All right. Any requests?”

“‘A Maid in Bedlam.’”

It hadn’t taken him long to come up with it. Carewyn’s smile spread a bit, before she looked out at the sea and sang it for him.

“Just as she sat there weeping, her love, he came on land. Then, hearing she was in Bedlam, he ran straight out of hand -- He flew into her snow-white arms, and thus replied he: ‘I love my love because I know my love loves me.’

She said, ‘My love, don't frighten me, are you my love or no?’ ‘Oh yes, my dearest Nancy, I am your love, also. I have returned to make amends for all your injury... I love my love because I know my love loves me.’

So now these two are married, and happy may they be, Like turtle doves together, in love and unity.

All pretty maids, with patience wait, that have got loves at sea -- I love my love because I know...my love...loves...me."

A ghost of a smile had settled into the corners of Orion’s lips as he listened. When Carewyn finally finished, he opened his eyes and looked out at the horizon.

“Did you sing that song, while you were on the Revenge?” he murmured.

Carewyn looked at him in surprise.

“...How did you know?”

“A mermaid was singing the song around our ship one night while we were bound for Isle de Muerta. She said she’d learned the song from a maid locked in the brig of a pirate ship.”

Carewyn’s eyes softened in understanding. She looked back out at the sea too, her expression becoming a little more serious.

“...While I was on the Revenge,” she said softly, “I...well, I wasn’t myself, at points. I was scared, and angry...and that night...”

Her eyes darkened.

“...That night...was the worst of all of them. I don’t even know how I fell asleep. But I did, and...sure enough...there you were.”

Orion looked up, startled. Carewyn’s lips were spread in something of a bittersweet smile even though her gaze was still on the sea.

“I said you appeared in my dreams at random, but I don’t think that’s wholly true,” she admitted. “You wouldn’t appear whenever I felt cheerful or excited. Instead you always seemed to appear...whenever I was drowning. Whenever I was in a dark place...hopeless and useless. Whenever I most felt...like I deserved to be alone.”

It was strange saying any of this aloud. It made Carewyn feel oddly fragile and vulnerable. With a swallow, she put on the bravest smile she could as she forced herself to meet Orion’s eyes.

“...I guess...whenever I end up in that place...remembering when I was able to help you...it helps, somehow. It...orients me, like a compass. It helps me remember how much better I feel about myself, knowing that I can take care of others.”

Orion stared at Carewyn, his mouth slightly open as his eyes searched her expression. They rippled with an intense emotion, but Carewyn couldn’t quite place it -- was it empathy? Pain? Longing? Relief?

His kohl-lined eyes drifted down to his belt. Then, carefully, he detached his little black-lidded compass from his belt and held it up in both hands so she could see it.

“Would you like to hear the tale of how I first acquired this compass?” he asked.

Carewyn looked down at it curiously and nodded.

“It was a gift,” said Orion. “A gift from a king, who was captured by an enemy kingdom and then sold into slavery. He ended up on a ship owned by the East India Trading Company, bound for the Caribbean...a ship I’d joined as a cabin boy. I was fourteen, going under the name ‘Smith,’ as it was the only name I’d been given at the time, besides ‘boy.’

“Not long after the ship set sail, I overheard the king planning a slave revolt against the sailors on board -- and I had to make a choice. 1, I could report what I heard to the captain...or 2, I could say nothing. Instead I picked a third option -- I helped him. I left his manacles a little too loose that night and told him where he could safely maroon the sailors who didn’t want to stay. So when the revolt happened...the king dropped off the entire crew except me. I agreed to stay long enough to help him sail home, since he and his people didn’t have any experience sailing a British ship. The king named me his First Mate and asked me to call him by his given name...Amari.”

Carewyn's eyes widened in amazement. Orion smiled gently at the look on her face and nodded, before his expression grew much more serious again.

“It wasn’t long after, however, that Cutler Beckett -- the man who owned the slave ship -- sent pirate hunters out to retrieve his ‘stolen cargo.’ On our way back to the Ivory Coast, we were locked in a sea battle, and Amari was mortally injured. As he lay on the deck, he made me promise to take his family home...and once I did...he gave me his compass. I used it to safely sail us away from the pirate hunters and drop the crew off close to home, before I took the next ship out of Africa, which plopped me down in the Caribbean.

“When I landed in Port Royal, however, news had already reached the Navy positioned there of my ‘theft of Company property.’ I was immediately locked in irons, branded, and set to be hanged the following morning. I barely remember now how I managed to shake off the soldiers escorting me to the jail, but sure enough, I did...”

Orion’s dark eyes softened slightly -- he reached out to take both of Carewyn’s hand and place the compass gently in her hands, his own hands cupping around hers so that she’d hold it.

“...And, as fate would have it...ran straight into you.”

Carewyn’s wide blue eyes ran over his face in disbelief.

She’d heard so many bizarre tales of the infamous Orion Amari and his exploits, but she couldn’t for the life of her remember having heard anything about how he became a pirate in the first place. And to hear now that it was all because he’d helped a ship full of slaves return home...to keep a promise he’d made to someone he’d clearly respected...

She’d known Orion was a good man -- but she realized that before that moment, she’d had no concept just how good.

Her eyes softened upon the compass in their joined hands.

“...It’s no wonder you’ve kept it even after it broke, then,” she said gently. “It’s truly very special.”

Orion’s dark eyes rippled over her face. “Aye...but it’s never been broken, however much it hasn’t worked for me, recently.”

Carewyn blinked in confusion.

“My compass does not point North -- nor has it ever done so,” he explained. “Instead...it points to whatever you want most in this world. If you wished to find treasure, it would point you to it. If you wished to escape, it would point you to safety. If you wished to sail homeward ...it would point the way.”

Carewyn glanced down at the compass and then back up at Orion’s face, feeling a bit skeptical despite herself. The pirate captain’s mouth spread in an amused smile.

“You don’t believe me?” he asked.

“I didn’t say that,” said Carewyn primly. “It’s just...hard to believe...”

She once again looked down at the compass and then back up at him.

“...Is that really true?”

Orion’s eyes twinkled. “Every word.”

Carewyn considered him for a moment carefully, her eyes scanning his face as she thought this over.

“...So I suppose the reason it’s not working for you...is you don’t know what you want?”

Orion’s face grew a lot more solemn.

“On the contrary,” he said softly. “It’s more...that my heart is so focused on one thing...it’s made it so the compass, in my hands, will point nowhere else. Ever since you escaped the Artemis...it’s been locked in place.”

His hands adjusted on top of hers holding his compass, his thumbs resting on the sides of her wrists.

Carewyn’s gaze fell down to their joined hands -- then, her eyes slowly widening, she looked back up at Orion.

“...When you came to Port Royal...”

Orion inclined his head. “The compass was pointing me there.”

“And...Isle de Muerta...”

“I only found because the compass was pointing me there, too.”

Orion’s voice was still as level as ever, but he suddenly looked quite a bit paler. Something in the back of his calm, serene eyes seemed oddly tentative -- insecure.

Carewyn stared at him, hardly daring to believe it. If she was understanding Orion correctly, then...the thing his compass had been pointing toward...

...was her.

Her heart had swelled to a seemingly impossibly large size in her chest, almost painfully so. It made Carewyn unsure of what even to say or do -- she couldn’t contain her emotions, and was forced to cover her face in both hands, cutting herself off as she struggled to regain her composure.

At long last, she took a breath.

“‘She said...‘my love, don’t frighten me...are you...my love, or no?’”

Orion straightened up visibly as she slid her hands from her face, beaming up at him with perhaps the most emotional, most beautiful smile he’d ever seen on her face.

“‘...Oh yes, my dear Orion...I am your love, also.’”

#potc au #au #pirates of the caribbean #carewyn cromwell #orion amari #bill weasley #jules farrier #charlie weasley #murphy mcnully #my art #my fanficiton #my writing #GAAAAAHHHHH SO MUCH FLUFF MY HEART #and yeah of course since we'll be doing more plot we won't be stopping on this fluff like I'd planned before I decided to integrate it #and yeah of course that means that we will actually have to address how the hell these two can be a couple #when they know their paths are diametrically opposed #but hey developing relationships can be fun!#just because you reach that coveted 'i love you' stage doesn't mean the ship has to devolve into bickering and suspicion #there's a lot more plot you can do <3 #but yes I had so much fun drawing jules and bill my heart!!#jules's dress is based on elizabeth's wedding dress from the second movie #bill's look is largely based on will's outfit from the second movie but with a tricorn hat and a different color scheme #sorry to leave you on a cliffhanger of sorts but this thing is getting long and next part we'll have to get back to the plot #sorry :<

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bananaofswifts · 3 years

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Your guide to the singer-songwriter’s surprise follow-up to Folklore.

CARL WILSON

When everything’s clicking for Taylor Swift, the risk is that she’s going to push it too far and overtax the public appetite. On “Mirrorball” from Folklore, she sings, with admirable self-knowledge, “I’ve never been a natural/ All I do is try, try, try.” So when I woke up yesterday to the news that at midnight she was going to repeat the trick she pulled off with Folklore in July—surprise-releasing an album of moody pop-folk songs remote-recorded in quarantine with Aaron Dessner of the National as well as her longtime producer Jack Antonoff—I was apprehensive. Would she trip back into the pattern of overexposure and backlash that happened between 1989 and Reputation?

Listening to the new Evermore, though, that doesn’t feel like such a threat. A better parallel might be to the “Side B” albums that Carly Rae Jepsen put out after both Emotion and Dedicated, springing simply out of the artist’s and her fans’ mutual enthusiasm. Or, closer to Swift’s own impulses here, publishing an author’s book of short stories soon after a successful novel. Lockdown has been a huge challenge for musicians in general, but it liberated Swift from the near-perpetual touring and publicity grind she’s been on since she was a teen, and from her sense of obligation to turn out music that revs up stadium crowds and radio programmers. Swift has always seemed most herself as the precociously talented songwriter; the pop-star side is where her try-hard, A-student awkwardness surfaces most. Quarantine came as a stretch of time to focus mainly on her maturing craft (she turns 31 on Sunday), to workshop and to woodshed. When Evermore was announced, she said that she and her collaborators—clearly mostly Dessner, who co-writes and/or co-produces all but one of these 15 songs—simply didn’t want to stop writing after Folklore.

This record further emphasizes her leap away from autobiography into songs that are either pure fictions or else lyrically symbolic in ways that don’t act as romans à clef. On Folklore, that came with the thrill of a breakthrough. Here, she fine-tunes the approach, with the result that Evermore feels like an anthology, with less of an integrated emotional throughline. But that it doesn’t feel as significant as Folklore is also its virtue. Lowered stakes offer permission to play around, to joke, to give fewer fucks—and this album definitely has the best swearing in Swift’s entire oeuvre.

Because it’s nearly all Dessner overseeing production and arrangements, there isn’t the stylistic variety that Antonoff’s greater presence brought to Folklore. However, Swift and Dessner seem to have realized that the maximalist-minimalism that dominated Folklore, with layers upon layers of restrained instrumental lines for the sake of atmosphere, was too much of a good thing. There are more breaks in the ambience on Evermore, the way there was with Folklore’s “Betty,” the countryish song that was among many listener’s favorites. But there are still moments that hazard misty lugubriousness, and perhaps with reduced reward.

Overall, people who loved Folklore will at least like Evermore too, and the minority of Swift appreciators who disapproved may even warm up to more of the sounds here. I considered doing a track-by-track comparison between the two albums, but that seemed a smidgen pathological. Instead, here is a blatantly premature Day 1 rundown of the new songs as I hear them.

A pleasant yet forgettable starting place, “Willow” has mild “tropical house” accents that recall Ed Sheeran songs of yesteryear, as well as the prolix mixed metaphors Swift can be prone to when she’s not telling a linear story. But not too severely. I like the invitation to a prospective lover to “wreck my plans.” I’m less sure why “I come back stronger than a ’90s trend” belongs in this particular song, though it’s witty. “Willow” is more fun as a video (a direct sequel to Folklore’s “Cardigan” video) than as a lead track, but I’m not mad at it here either.

Written with “William Bowery”—the pseudonym of Swift’s boyfriend Joe Alwyn, as she’s recently confirmed—this is the first of the full story songs on Evermore, in this case a woman describing having walked away from her partner on the night he planned to propose. The music is a little floaty and non-propulsive, but the tale is well painted, with Swift’s protagonist willingly taking the blame for her beau’s heartbreak and shrugging off the fury of his family and friends—“she would have made such a lovely bride/ too bad she’s fucked in the head.” Swift sticks to her most habitual vocal cadences, but not much here goes to waste. Except, that is, for the title phrase, which doesn’t feel like it adds anything substantial. (Unless the protagonist was drunk?) I do love the little throwaway piano filigree Dessner plays as a tag on the end.

This is the sole track Antonoff co-wrote and produced, and it’s where a subdued take on the spirit of 1989-style pop resurges with necessary energy. Swift is singing about having a crush on someone who’s too attractive, too in-demand, and relishing the fantasy but also enjoying passing it up. It includes some prime Swiftian details, like, “With my Eagles t-shirt hanging from your door,” or, “At dinner parties I call you out on your contrarian shit.” The line about this thirst trap’s “hair falling into place like dominos” I find much harder to picture.

This is where I really snapped to attention. After a few earlier attempts, Swift has finally written her great Christmas song, one to stand alongside “New Year’s Day” in her holiday canon. And it’s especially a great one for 2020, full of things none of us ought to do this year—go home to visit our parents, hook up with an ex, spend the weekend in their bedroom and their truck, then break their hearts again when we leave. But it’s done with sincere yuletide affection to “the only soul who can tell which smiles I’m faking,” and “the warmest bed I’ve ever known.” All the better, we get to revisit these characters later on the album.

On first listen, I found this one of the draggiest Dressner compositions on the record. Swift locates a specific emotional state recognizably and poignantly in this song about a woman trapped (or, she wonders, maybe not trapped?) in a relationship with an emotionally withholding, unappreciative man. But the static keyboard chord patterns and the wandering melody that might be meant to evoke a sense of disappointment and numbness risk yielding numbing and disappointing music. Still, it’s growing on me.

Featuring two members of Haim—and featuring a character named after one of them, Este—“No Body, No Crime” is a straight-up contemporary country song, specifically a twist on and tribute to the wronged-woman vengeance songs that were so popular more than a decade ago, and even more specifically “Before He Cheats,” the 2006 smash by Carrie Underwood, of which it’s a near musical clone, just downshifted a few gears. Swift’s intricate variation on the model is that the singer of the song isn’t wreaking revenge on her own husband, but on her best friend’s husband, and framing the husband’s mistress for the murder. It’s delicious, except that Swift commits the capital offence of underusing the Haim sisters purely as background singers, aside from one spoken interjection from Danielle.

This one has some of the same issues as “Tolerate It,” in that it lags too much for too long, but I did find more to focus on musically here. Lyrically and vocally, it gets the mixed emotions of a relatively amicable divorce awfully damned right, if I may speak from painfully direct experience.

This is the song sung from the POV of the small-town lover that the ambitious L.A. actress from “Tis the Damn Season”—Dorothea, it turns out—has left behind in, it turns out, Tupelo. Probably some years past that Xmas tryst, when the old flame finally has made it. “A tiny screen’s the only place I see you now,” he sings, but adds that she’s welcome back anytime: “If you’re ever tired of being known/ For who you know/ You know that you’ll always know me.” It’s produced and arranged with a welcome lack of fuss. Swift hauls out her old high-school-romance-songs vocal tone to reminisce about “skipping the prom/ just to piss off your mom,” very much in the vein of Folklore’s teen-love-triangle trilogy.

A duet with Dessner’s baritone-voiced bandmate in the National, Matt Berninger, “Coney Island” suffers from the most convoluted lyrics on Evermore (which, I wonder unkindly, might be what brought Berninger to mind?). The refrain “I’m on a beach on Coney Island, wondering where did my baby go” is a terrific tribute to classic pop, but then Swift rhymes it with “the bright lights, the merry go,” as if that’s a serviceable shorthand for merry-go-round, and says “sorry for not making you my centerfold,” as if that’s somehow a desirable relationship outcome. The comparison of the bygone affair to “the mall before the internet/ It was the one place to be” is clever but not exactly moving, and Berninger’s lines are worse. Dessner’s droning arrangement does not come to the rescue.

This song is also overrun with metaphors but mostly in an enticing, thematically fitting way, full of good Swiftian dark-fairytale grist. It’s fun to puzzle out gradually the secret that all the images are concealing—an engaged woman being drawn into a clandestine affair. And there are several very good “goddamns.”

The lyrical conceit here is great, about two gold-digging con artists whose lives of scamming are undone by their falling in love. It reminded me of the 1931 pre-Code rom-com Blonde Crazy, in which James Cagney and Joan Blondell act out a very similar storyline. And I mostly like the song, but I can’t help thinking it would come alive more if the music sounded anything like what these self-declared “cowboys” and “villains” might sing. It’s massively melancholy for the story, and Swift needs a far more winningly roguish duet partner than the snoozy Marcus Mumford. It does draw a charge from a couple of fine guitar solos, which I think are played by Justin Vernon (aka Bon Iver, who will return shortly).

The drum machine comes as a refreshing novelty at this point. And while this song is mostly standard Taylor Swift torrents of romantic-conflict wordplay (full of golden gates and pedestals and dropping her swords and breaking her high heel, etc.), the pleasure comes in hearing her look back at all that and shrugging, “Long story short, it was a bad ti-i-ime,” “long story short, it was the wrong guy-uy-uy,” and finally, “long story short, I survived.” She passes along some counsel I’m sure she wishes she’d had back in the days of Reputation: “I wanna tell you not to get lost in these petty things/ Your nemeses will defeat themselves.” It’s a fairly slight song but an earned valedictory address.

Swift fan lore has it that she always sequences the real emotional bombshell as Track 5, but here it is at 13, her lucky number. It’s sung to her grandmother, Marjorie Finlay, who died when Swift was in her early teens, and it manages to be utterly personal—down to the sample of Marjorie singing opera on the outro—and simultaneously utterly evocative to anyone who’s been through such grief. The bridge, full of vivid memories and fierce regrets, is the clincher.

This electroacoustic kiss-off song, loaded up with at least a fistful of gecs if not a full 100 by Dessner and co-producers BJ Burton and James McAlister, seems to be, lyrically, one of Swift’s somewhat tedious public airings of some music-industry grudge (on which, in case you don’t get it, she does not want “closure”), but, sonically, it’s a real ear-cleaner at this point on Evermore. Why she seems to shift into a quasi-British accent for fragments of it is anyone’s guess. But I’m tickled by the line, “I’m fine with my spite and my tears and my beers and my candles.”

I’m torn about the vague imagery and vague music of the first few verses of the album’s final, title track. But when Vernon, in full multitracked upper-register Bon Iver mode, kicks in for the duet in the middle, there’s a jolt of urgency that lands the redemptive ending—whether it’s about a crisis in love or the collective crisis of the pandemic or perhaps a bit of both—and satisfyingly rounds off the album.

#taylor-swift #pop #rock #country-music

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thatmultifandomhoe · 5 years

Text

Strawberry Cream and BBQ - 22

Pairing: Hybrid Hoseok and Human Reader

Overview: Your best friend knows she can count on you for anything, so when she asks you to watch her hybrid while she’s gone for a study abroad trip for four months, you can’t say no. But when these four months are over, things have changed in a way no one expected.

Word Count: 7,484 (holy fuck y’all)

Genre: Hybrid AU, Fluff, Future smut, Angst, Best friends to Lovers

Warning: Angst and Fluff for this week y’all.

Master List

Sneak Peak - Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5 - Part 6 - Part 7 - Part 8 - Part 9 - Part 10 - Part 11 - Part 12 - Part 13 - Part 14 - Part 15 - Part 16 - Part 17 - Part 18 - Part 19 - Part 20 - Part 21 - Part 22 - Part 23 - Part 24 - Part 25 (Final) - Move in Day: A SC&BBQ Drabble

©thatmultifandomhoe Do not repost, translate, or use my stories without permission.

Sipping your coffee, you followed Johnny as he led the way to the library. It was taking longer than expected. Apparently, your ferret hybrid friend was more popular than you realized, having to stop so he could have a brief conversation with each person who came up to say hi and catch up.

“I don’t even know this many people,” you whined after he had stopped yet again to talk to someone.

Johnny shrugged, holding the library door open for you. “What can I say? The people love me.”

You snorted. When he narrowed his gaze at you, you took another sip of coffee and pretended to be interested in the DVD’s that were in the bookcase next to you.

“Anyways,” quickly turning on his heel, he headed towards the Stacks, his footsteps echoing in the empty stairwell. “Thanks for coming with me. I swear this research paper is going to kill me.”

“You’re not allowed to die on me until the semester’s over.”

That got a chuckle out of him. “Will do. By the way. How’s Hoseok?”

Raising an eyebrow, it was your turn to lead Johnny, showing him the way to the hybrid section. He had recruited you for this sole purpose, along with allowing him to bounce ideas off of you and to keep him company.

“He’s good.” Making a left and going up another staircase, you waved your hand to the bookcases that were specifically about hybrids. “He has work today, and then he’s staying late for practice. His solo in the show is coming up and he’s still honing in certain moves, so I’m bringing dinner to him tonight.”

“Aww,” Johnny ruffled your hair as he walked around you, his gaze immediately searching for the books he wanted. “The two of you are so cute, already acting like a mated couple.”

His play on words made you laugh as you walked further, setting your purse and coffee down on a table that was nearby and claiming it. “I wonder why that is,” you joked, tying your hair up into a ponytail, making the mate mark visible.

“Looks like it’s all healed now.” He handed you a stack of books he was holding and without being asked, you brought them over to the table for him. Out of habit, you reached up to gently rub the mark, softly smiling now that it didn’t hurt to the touch.

“I know. I was kinda getting worried. It just seemed like it was taking so long to heal.”

“Well he did bite you,” Johnny explained, snickering as you smacked his arm once he joined you at the table, setting another pile down. “Again, it’s different for everyone receiving the mark. Nobody has the same body type, and since you’re not a hybrid, your body heals at a slower rate than ours would.”

Your eyebrows furrowed in confusion, and it wasn’t until Johnny glanced up at that he continued to explain. “Since our DNA is combined with that of an animal, we heal a little faster than humans. It’s nothing special though. It’s not like if I were to get a cut on my leg that it’d be gone in an hour.”

“Oh, so not like the werewolves from Twilight then?”

Johnny pressed his lips together, staring down at the book he had open, his head shaking as he made a tsking sound. “Damn Twilight for ruining our hybrid lives.” Looking up for a moment however, he grinned “Why don’t you go ahead and try telling that joke to Hoseok? He is a dog hybrid after all.”

You giggled, reaching over the table for your coffee again. “Nah, my friend Namjoon is a wolf hybrid. I’ll tell them both that.”

The ferret erupted into laughter, nose scrunching up as he leaned back against his chair. “They’ll be hardcore judging you.”

“But their reactions will be worth it,” you pointed out, stealing another sip of coffee before hunkering down into helping him. “So, what are you planning for this paper?”

Hoseok whistled as he walked down the hall to where the front offices were. A week or so ago, an email went around to the dance instructors asking if anyone would be interested in teaching an extra hip hop dance class. It was an afternoon shift and was one of the many free classes that the Dance Studio offered. He wasn’t sure how many kids were planning on showing up – the email mentioned anywhere from ten to twenty – but he knew from past experiences that wasn’t always the case. More often than not, a majority of the kids didn’t show up for fear of being judged, whether it was because they couldn’t afford the class when there would usually be a fee, or because they were hybrids.

Walking into the air-conditioned office, he smiled at his coworkers as he passed, a mixture of humans and hybrids. The class itself didn’t start for another hour, which meant that he had free time to check his emails and eat a snack or two before getting ready to teach. All that time he spent attending the classes the Dance Studio offered, he never once thought he’d be on the other side as an instructor. As much as he owed his life to you and Sue, dancing was his first love.

The way he was able to close his eyes and feel the way his body connected to the music and moved on its own. He loved that while everyone heard the lyrics of the song playing, he heard something else. He heard the emotions, the desperation, the love, the empathy, and he was able to physically portray the story he was being told in a way for others to see. Then when the audience cheered him on, the roaring of the crowd and their applause, well…that’s how he knew he did it right.

He loved every second of it.

“Have you offered him some water?”

Blinking, Hoseok frowned as he turned in the swivel chair to face Jennie. She was a newly hired office assistant and this was only her third week at the Dance Studio. With a file in her hand, she nodded to Carrie, the other office assistant that sat next to her.

“He said he didn’t want one.”

“Who’s this?” Hoseok gently asked, not wanting to be rude about interrupting them.

Jennie just glanced at Hoseok, then pointed out the window to the hallway leading to the front door. Following her finger, his eyes landed on a kid. He was sitting on one of the black chairs with a green backpack held to his chest, staring at the door.

“He’s been there for over an hour,” Jennie said. “He said he was waiting for someone to pick him up.”

Pressing his lips together, he crossed his arms across his chest. The kid had on a red beanie, so the girls weren’t able to realize what he was. But as Hoseok took a deep breath, he could smell it.

He was a hybrid.

The longer he watched, the more he noticed. Every time someone walked by, his grip on his bag would tighten and as the hallway grew loud with the sound and chatter and sudden laughter, he would flinch. His shirt had dirt stains on it and he was willing to bet that the fabric was thin to the touch.

A pang hit his heart as he stood, exiting out of his emails at the same time. His sudden movements surprised the girls, but he waved away their question. “I’ll be back.” He told him, feet already moving towards the door. “I’m gonna walk him home.”

“You know him?” Carrie asked.

Hoseok shook his head. “No, but I know where he lives. Seen him around a few times.”

That was a lie. It was however, enough for Jennie and Carrie to accept his answer without that sympathetic look in their eyes. He made a short detour to his locker, retrieving his keys and wallet while grabbing a few Cliff bars and water bottles along the way.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust his coworkers, but he remembered back when he first started coming to the studio. In fact, he had heard more conversations that started with:

“That’s Hoseok. He lives at the shelter, but he’s here more often than not. If you have any questions and don’t know who to ask or where to go, ask him. He knows where everything is and all the regulations.”

Or some variation of that. There was always that mention of him living at the shelter. He came to the Dance Studio to forget that he didn’t have a place to call home, not to be reminded of it.

Double checking to make sure he had everything, he made his way back out to the hallway entrance, not surprised to see that the kid was still sitting there. The closer he got, the easier it was to notice the small lumps underneath his beanie that concealed his ears. “Hey bud,” Hoseok gently spoke, slowly crouching down in front of him so as to not scare him.

The kid flinched as he stared at Hoseok, his small hands clutching the backpack to his chest. He didn’t look to be much older than ten. If he was even that.

Hoseok wet his lips, offering the kid a smile. “It’s alright. I’m Hoseok, one of the instructors here. What’s your name?” He patiently waited for him to answer, not minding that he was staring at Hoseok’s ears or glancing down at his tail. These were the very things that set them apart from the rest of society, but to each other, it made them equals.

“Samson,” the child softly spoke, his arms relaxing around his backpack as his nose scrunched up for a brief moment.

“Well Samson,” Hoseok repeated, smiling at him. “Do you like to dance?”

Samson nodded, briefly looking down at the floor. “I’m not that good at it.”

Tilting his head, Hoseok sniffed, finally catching a feline scent coming from Samson. “Now don’t say that. I bet you’re really good at dancing.”

He shrugged his tiny shoulders, reaching down to play with a loose string coming from the side of his jeans. The beanie he wore started to slide back, revealing blond hair and when he looked back up, his eyes were a deep blue that reminded Hoseok of the ocean.

“Did someone say you weren’t good at dancing?”

Samson’s bottom lip trembled long enough before he pressed his lips together for Hoseok to figure out on his own. His mind went in multiple directions, trying to figure out if it had been another student and what classes had been offered this morning that Samson could have gone to.

Reaching a hand out, he wiped away the tear that fell down Samson’s cheek. “Hey, it’s okay buddy. Did an instructor tell that to you?”

Despite flinching when Hoseok first arrived, Samson leaned into his hand, the hybrid instincts in him taking control. Even though they were different hybrid breeds, Samson was still a child who needed reassuring. “N-no.”

“Was it another kid taking the class with you?” Hoseok gently prodded, noticing how Samson wasn’t as guarded. With another nod from him, he sighed. The Dance Studio didn’t usually have issues with bullying, normally when working with kids they tended to be more understanding and opening to people and hybrids, but there was always a handful that would come in and they would have to have discussions with the classes about bullying.

“She told me only girls can do ballet.”

Pulled from his thoughts, he was surprised that Samson volunteered this information without having to be asked. Ballet though, that did make a little sense. “Well she’s wrong. Boys can do ballet if they want. You know, one of my best friends has been studying ballet since he was really young. He’s branched off into contemporary dancing, but he started with ballet.”

With a little sniff, Samson leaned off of Hoseok’s palm, reaching up to rub at his eyes. “Really?”

“Yeah, Jimin loves to dance. He sometimes stops in when he can and joins in on a class or teaches one.” Getting an idea, Hoseok smiled at the kid. A part of him wanted to reach up and ruffle his hair – he was an adorable child – but he figured Samson was wearing the beanie to hide his ears. “How about this? I can talk to my friend and see if he can come in sometime and help you out. Does that sound like a good idea?”

His blue eyes widened at Hoseok’s suggestion, almost as if no one had ever promised him such a thing before. Like no one had made him a promise, ever.

“But-” Hoseok quickly added, pointing a finger at Samson. “You gotta promise me that the next time someone tells you that you can’t dance, that you won’t listen to them. You shouldn’t stop doing something that you love just because of someone else’s opinion. Okay?”

There was a hint of hesitance in his eyes, but as he stared at Hoseok, Samson found himself nodding with a soft ‘okay,’ and a smile. Maybe it was because Hoseok was a hybrid like himself that he was relaxing, nowhere near as tense like he had been when he first sat down an hour ago.

The front door to the Dance Studio opened again, a stream of sunlight entering the hallway and covering Samson and Hoseok in the light before it closed shut, a group of people walking and chatting towards the locker rooms. It reminded Hoseok of why he originally come over in the first place.

“Samson, do you want me to walk you back to where you’re staying?” He purposely avoided the word home. He wasn’t one hundred percent positive, but he was pretty certain that Samson lived at one of the Adoption Centers. He was too young to be living in the Homeless Center, and Hoseok hoped that he’d never have to live there. That was a life he never wished on anyone, hybrid or human.

He didn’t respond right away. Instead, his small hands clutched at his backpack again as he looked down, prolonging his answer. It was a sight that made Hoseok’s heart crack. He was just a child who deserved much more than this society was giving him. He shouldn’t be living in a place that held so much uncertainty, but in a home filled with love.

Finally, he looked up with hopeful eyes. “Can you carry me? Please?”

Hoseok pressed his lips together to suppress the wave of emotions that wanted to overcome him, not just for his benefit, but for Samson’s. The sadness would have been too much for him to handle. “You bet I can. And before I forget, these are for you.” He held up the Cliff bars that he had almost forgotten about and the water bottles, handing them to Samson.

He watched as the child put them in his bag, and while he did so, Hoseok was able to see in the backpack. Extra clothes, a blanket, and a stuffed teddy bear lay packed away. Just enough to fill the bag but not too heavy that he couldn’t carry it. Please don’t let him live at the Homeless Center, he thought to himself. He’s just a kid.

Once zipped back up, Hoseok had Samson wrap his arms around his neck and as he stood, Samson wrapped his legs around his torso allowing Hobi to hold him tightly. He ignored the whispered conversations that the employees were having about the two of them, instead simply focusing on getting the kid in his arms back to where he was staying.

“So, Samson,” Hobi quietly asked after they were outside. “Do you always hide your tail and ears?”

The little boy had his head resting on Hoseok’s shoulder, tired from the dancing he had done earlier, only now just feeling it since he was relaxed and felt safe enough in Hoseok’s arms to do so. “Yeah. People always stare when they see them. Kids always tug on them too.”

Hoseok winced in sympathy, remembering all to well the tugs he had suffered through growing up. Carly may not have tugged on his tail, but the friends she had over tended to do whatever they pleased to do. Back then, his cries had fallen on deaf ears. “I used to hide my tail and ears too,” he murmured, gently rubbing Samson’s back.

Stopping at the cross walk, he leaned his body weight on his left foot as he pressed the button. The weather was finally warming up and everyone was walking in shorts and tee-shirts, gleefully abandoning the winter jackets for the brief moment. It was just one freak heat wave before the temperatures went back down again.

“Really?”

“Really. For a long time, I was scared. Being a hybrid nowadays isn’t like how it was when I was a kid.”

The light turned red as a white walking figure appeared on the light post across the street, but Hoseok still looked both ways to make sure that there weren’t any speedsters before walking across the street. “It wasn’t until three years ago that I got adopted. She’s really nice and took me in when no one else would look twice at me, and because of her, I was able to meet my mate.”

Samson squirmed and Hoseok tightened his grip on the boy until they were safely back on the sidewalk. He had shifted so that he was no longer resting his head on Hoseok’s shoulder, but straightening up so he could look up the older hybrid. “Mates are real?”

The question was so pure and innocent, that it had Hoseok chuckling. “Yes Samson, mates are real.” Glancing up, he could see the Adoption Center from down the street. With a nod towards the building, Hobi pointed at it so Samson would see what he was gesturing to. “Is that where you’re staying buddy?”

Samson barely glanced at the Adoption Center before quietly nodding, resting his head back down on Hobi’s shoulder as a very soft, cat like mewl came from him. Only ten feet away from where they were standing was an empty street bench. The area wasn’t crowded with foot traffic, so making a change in his plans, Hoseok settled down on the bench and moved the little boy onto his lap.

There was a sniffle as he curled against Hoseok’s torso. Despite the situation they were in, Hoseok couldn’t help it when he smiled. Samson was very much like a little kitten. Hugging him, he gently kissed the top of his head, and waited. What Samson didn’t know, was that the Adoption Center that he was staying at, was the last one that Hoseok had lived in before he decided he had enough. If his memory served him right, it was a fairly decent place with nice people working there. He had simply been at the end of his rope.

“Do you wanna know why I dance?”

It was a random question to pose to a child, but it was the first thing that came to mind. Apparently, that worked, because Samson was looking up at Hoseok with watery eyes. He gently wiped away the tears with his thumb. There were multiple reasons why, but he always remembered the main reason he started dancing in the first place.

“Because it made me feel like I was in control.” Leaning back against the bench, he set Samson’s backpack next to his thigh. “I got sent to multiple Adoption Centers growing up. I was always moving around, and the people, and hybrids, weren’t always nice to me. But when I danced however, it felt like I was the one making the choices and not someone else who thought they knew what was best for me. It eventually led me to meeting people who enjoyed dancing too, and they understood what it was like to randomly bust a move when the right song came one the radio. Dancing is ultimately, what gave me my first family. They weren’t people who decided that I was the right fit for them, but they were people who made me feel like I belonged, and I wanted to be with them. Does that make sense to you Samson?”

Hoseok wasn’t sure how much of this conversation Samson would remember, or even understand despite his attempt to make it simple. But if he had someone tell him something like that – or anything along those lines – when he was younger, it would have made sleeping along in the bedrooms at the Adoption Center a little easier. It would have hurt a little less all those times when families would come looking for a hybrid to adopt but walked right by him.

The fabric of Samson’s jeans bunched up as he leaned forward, bringing his backpack into his lap. Eyebrows scrunching together, he carefully unzipped the backpack, but to Hoseok’s surprise, he didn’t take anything out. Instead he slid the beanie off his head to reveal two small blond and orange cat ears. They twitched after being cooped up in that hat, flicking in every which direction to capture the sounds of people walking, the fluctuation of voices, and beeping of cell phones.

It wasn’t until the beanie was in his bag and was zipped up again that Samson looked at Hoseok. “There’s a guy and girl in dance,” he softly spoke. “And they’re nice to me. They like the Avengers too.”

Giggling, Hoseok hugged Samson to his chest and kissed the top of his head with a scratch at the base of his cat ears; the vibrations of Samson’s purr going through both of their bodies. “That’s good Samson, that’s really good buddy. Next time you come to the Dance Studio, just ask for me and I’ll come visit if I’m not teaching. We can hangout during breaks, and you can bring your friends if you want too.”

After a few more well-deserved scratches, Hoseok gathered Samson on his hip once more and slung the backpack over his shoulder, heading towards the Adoption Center. Upon entering, Hoseok was hit with memories that he hadn’t been expecting. It was exactly like he had last seen it.

The walls were painted a light sky blue as white shelves with trinkets and collars for hybrids lined the walls, organized by specific breed of hybrid. The counter was in the right-hand corner with the register. Behind it, a grandmotherly woman sat on a stool with a clip board in hand as she filled out paperwork. He knew that to the doorway on the left led to the rooms that the hybrids lived in, and from there if he went straight and made a right, he’d be in the common area.

“Samson, wasn’t Angie supposed to pick you up?” The grandmotherly woman raised an eyebrow as she stood up, surprised to see the child being carried in by another hybrid.

Samson simply shrugged, his arms tightening around Hoseok’s shoulders for a brief moment. “I don’t know, Carrie brought me there, Mrs. Gilly.”

Mrs. Gilly sighed, sparing a glance at Hoseok. It wasn’t until then that she really looked at him. There was something different about him, a nagging feeling in the back of her mind, but she could have sworn that she recognized him. Hybrids were always coming in and out of the Adoption Center, so it was possible that he may have stayed there, but it was more than that.

Hoseok however, remembered Mrs. Gilly. Her curly grey hair was now straightened and pulled up into a bun on the back of her head, a pair of pencils stuck in to hold it together. Wire framed glasses sat on top of her head, and a coat of red lipstick was painted on her lips. If he got any closer, he’d be able to smell the all too familiar baby powder that was her scent. He was never sure if that was just Mrs. Gilly’s natural scent, or the scent that all old people acquired after turning sixty. She had been one of the few bright memories that he was able to recall from his moving around in the Adoption Centers.

“It’s alright Mrs. Gilly,” Hoseok intervened, not wanting Samson to get into any trouble. “He had been waiting for someone to pick him up, but our staff noticed that he had already been waiting over an hour, so I volunteered to bring him back.”

His voice struck a chord with Mrs. Gilly. She knew that voice, but back then, there had been such resentment lacing his voice. Reaching for her glasses – it took a couple pats above her head before she was able to locate them – Mrs. Gilly slid them back on, and blinked.

“Hoseok? Is that you?” Placing her hand on her chest, Mrs. Gilly smiled as she stepped closer to the counter.

It was his turn to smile, nodding as he moved next to the counter to set Samson’s backpack down. “It’s me, Mrs. Gilly. How have you been?”

“Still doing the same job even though I should have retired about ten years ago,” Mrs. Gilly joked.

Hoseok laughed. Any tension that had been there when entering the Adoption Center slipped out of his shoulders. “You kidding? If you left, this place would never be the same.”

Mrs. Gilly raised an eyebrow, taking a moment to look at Samson before meeting Hoseok’s. “Samson, why don’t you go to your room? You look tired hun.”

Samson, not catching the look that she had given Hoseok, nodded in agreement. He was tired, there was no doubt about that, and taking a nap didn’t sound like a bad idea. With one last hug to Hoseok, and then one to Mrs. Gilly, Hobi lowered him to the ground and handed him his backpack, watching him fondly waddle through the doorway before finally disappearing from sight.

“How did you get him to take that beanie off?” Mrs. Gilly figured that he had something to do with it. “He never goes outside without it on.”

She hasn’t changed a bit, he thought, licking his lips as he scratched the base of his dog ear. With a shrug, he smiled. “Just that I had once been in a similar situation, and that he shouldn’t be ashamed of who he is.”

Mrs. Gilly, a woman who had a heart of gold, gently patted his hand. “Just like how you needed someone to tell you that?”

If there was anything that he knew about Mrs. Gilly, it was that she was always straight to the point, and somehow, she always knew more than what was being said. Crossing his arms, his smile softened as his gaze went back to the doorway. He wondered if his feet would automatically recall the path to his old room that he used to share with the other hybrids at the time. “Honestly, if I hadn’t of left, I don’t think I’d be where I am today.” Without missing a beat, his thoughts wandered back to Strawberry, Sue, his friends and coworkers at the Dance Studio.

He didn’t see it, but Mrs. Gilly was smiling at him. It was obvious that a good life followed Hoseok. Maybe not right away, but it came to him eventually. There wasn’t that resentment in his tone anymore, and if she was seeing correctly, there was a glow around him that came from happiness and love.

Straightening up, Hoseok looked back at her, prepared to ask about Samson, when something caught his eye. There was a rack of brightly colored pamphlets on the wall behind her with bold print. One advertised adopting a hybrid, another for fostering. There were multiple ones for what to do when your hybrid is going through heat or expecting and various other things, but one in particular caught his eye. It was a simple green pamphlet, but what it was advertising made his breath catch in his throat.

What Happens When Your Hybrid Finds Their Mate?

“Uh, Mrs. Gilly? Can I um…can I see that pamphlet? The green one.” He didn’t usually stutter, but his mind raced with all the possibilities, and with everything that had been happening lately, this could very much have an affect on his life with Strawberry and Sue.

Looking over her shoulder, Mrs. Gilly gave him a curious look, but retrieved them pamphlet for him. “For you or for a friend?”

“For my mate and I,” he answered, opening up the pamphlet. “She’s human.”

The pamphlet was broken up into equal sections. The first explained what a mate was to the hybrid and what was expected to happen. The second went on to discuss what would happen if the owner was the mate to the hybrid, but the third…the third was exactly what he was looking for.

What Happens When Your Hybrid Mates with a Human or Another Hybrid?

It is common for hybrids to mate with fellow hybrids, but hybrids can also take humans as their mates.

There are TWO paths that you can take with your hybrid.

The First path, also known as The Mate Act, states the following:

As the owner, you are agreeing to become a guardian to the hybrid.

The hybrid will carry documentation stating who his owner was, but is mated to their mate and lives with them.

The hybrid and their mate are (in the hybrid world) married, so they will be considered a married couple, especially if the mate bears the mate mark.

Any future decisions will be made between the hybrid and their mate.

Paperwork for The Mate Act can be picked up at the Courthouse, doctor’s offices that specialize in hybrids, Adoption Centers, and Homeless Centers for Hybrids.

Signatures from the owner, hybrid, and the mate are required for the paperwork to be processed and can be returned to the Courthouse between the hours 9am-5pm during the week.

The Second path, while not ideal and is for only extreme cases where the owner believes the hybrid will be in danger, is known as The Hybrid Owner Act which states the following:

The owner remains as an owner and retains their rights to the hybrid.

As the owner, you are agreeing to limited contact between the hybrid and their mate.

The hybrid will not live their mate, but will instead continue living with the owner even if the mate bears the mate mark.

The exception to this is when the hybrid is experiencing their heat.

Any future decisions will continue being made by the owner.

If this path is decided, after a period of time for discussion and thinking over, paperwork for the Hybrid Owner Act can be picked up at the Courthouse, doctor’s offices that specialize in hybrids, Adoption Centers, and Homeless Centers for Hybrids.

Signatures from only the owner and hybrid are required for the paperwork. If the circumstances are extreme, only the owner’s signature will be required to be processed and can be returned to the Courthouse between the hours 9am-5pm during the week.

Hope had been building up in his chest when he first started reading, for once it seemed like the law was on the side for hybrids. There was actually a chance for him and Strawberry. The further he read however, it felt like a sledgehammer was hitting his body at every angle possible. As much as he wanted to have faith in Sue, to trust that she would be understanding and accepting, he was afraid that with the option of the Hybrid Owner Act, she would take him away without listening.

Without thinking, he slammed his fist into the counter, eyes squeezing shut in an attempt to calm down as his tail repeatedly hit the back of his leg in anxiety.

Mrs. Gilly jumped at the slam, deciding that it was best if she remained quiet for a moment and letting Hoseok have the chance to think. With that in mind, she opened the drawer underneath the register, shifting through the many packets of paperwork the Adoption Center was required to have on hand. It only took a few seconds to locate the one she wanted, and without speaking, set it next to his hand.

“You know,” Mrs. Gilly softly spoke. “Even though we’re required to have all copies of each form, I always tell people that we’ve run out of the Hybrid Owner Act. There’s no reason for an owner to have that much control.”

Hoseok blinked, seeing the paperwork for the Mate Act sitting in front of him. “She already has my mate mark,” he whispered, his voice cracking as he ran a hand through his hair in a weak attempt to collect himself. “Strawberry…she’s my entire world. I love her, and she loves me.”

Mrs. Gilly, who tried to keep her emotions together for the sake of the hybrids, felt her own eyes water up as she watched that sliver of hope being ripped away from Hoseok. She didn’t know the specifics, but it was obvious from his reaction, that things weren’t exactly perfect at the moment between his owner and mate.

Giving his hand a squeeze, she waited for him to look at her. For a brief moment, it was like she was seeing the old Hoseok. The one who had run away from the Adoption Center all those years ago because he felt unwanted, and wasn’t meant to be loved. “Then you fight for her Hoseok,” she firmly told him. “You fight for your mate, and you never stop.”

An earbud was in each ear playing your favorite song as you entered the Dance Studio that night, carrying a reusable bag in each hand. One held the lasagna that you had finished making for dinner, the other carried the salad, sodas and dishware.

It was around eight, the building was empty as your footsteps echoed in the almost quiet hallway. The music that you had been playing wasn’t very loud, the earbuds were noise canceling but you were still able to hear the music that Hoseok had pulsating in just the hallway.

Carefully removing the ear buds, your footsteps fell on deaf ears as you entered the room without bothering to knock. As enhanced as his hearing was, there was no possible way that even he heard you knocking with the music as loud as it was. Unlike the last time you came with dinner, this time there was a table against the mirrorless wall and two desk chairs.

Hoseok was still dancing as you set the bags down. The lasagna was plenty hot enough to sit out as he finished practicing for the upcoming show. There were only two months left. The music he had playing was unfamiliar, and it was only when you focused on trying to understand the lyrics that you realized it wasn’t even in English, or his typical rap music. It was catchy and you found yourself nodding along anyway, finishing up with the setting the table and tossing the bags under the table as your hips swayed to the beat.

While you were preoccupied, Hoseok was grinning while he watched you dancing in the mirror, trying his hardest to suppress his laughter. He never liked telling anyone that they couldn’t dance – he literally told Samson to never let anyone say he couldn’t dance – but watching you in the mirror, he knew there was no dancing ability running through your blood. Although, his eyes lowered until they solely focused on your hips. You did have a little rhythm going on there.

The song was nearing its end but he hit replay with the remote, smirking when you didn’t notice what he’d done. From the way you were moving your body like the music was controlling your soul, it was obvious that you weren’t expecting him to sneak up behind you. But when you were moving like you were, how could he not?

Only a few steps behind you, he reached out, pulling you against his body by your hips. You jumped at his sudden presence, but he felt you quickly relax, melting against his chest at his touch.

“Shorty give me whip-whiplash,” Hoseok sang into your ear, laughing when you weakly slapped him.

You didn’t turn around. Instead you kept dancing, not caring that the professional was probably hard core judging you and decided to keep going. The song was catchy as hell. Plus, why wouldn’t you want to grind against your mate?

His groan didn’t go unnoticed when you purposely moved like that against his crotch, his grip tightening on your hips as he buried his face against your neck to nibble the mark.

A spark of heat ignited inside at the touch of his lips, your eyes closing as you leaned even more against him. Every time Hoseok touched you, it felt like you were experiencing summer for the first time, feeling the way the sun kissed your skin and made you feel alive. If this was what it was like now, you could only imagine how it would be five, ten, hell, thirty years from now.

The song slowly came to an end, dragging the two of you out of the music haze that you welcomed, bodies coming to a halt until the only thing to be heard in the room was heavy breathing. Breathlessly giggling, you finally turned around to kiss Hoseok, his arms wrapping around you as the two of you shared brief, but multiple, kisses. The only reason you stopped kissing him was because of your smiles that broke almost every one.

“Well hello to you too,” Hoseok teased, stealing one last kiss.

“Come on,” taking his hand, you pushed him in the direction of his chair and sat down in your own, cracking open a can of Coke. “Let’s eat before you decide to give me a dance lesson.”

He scrunched up his nose and shook his head, eyes scanning the food that you spent the last hour or two putting together. “I don’t know baby; I think you may be a little too far gone for lessons. You do know how to move your hips though, and I was very impressed with your show.” His lips curled into his signature heart smile, the same one that sent your heart racing as he held his hand out for your plate to scoop a piece of lasagna onto.

“Shut up,” you shyly spoke, the large smile on your face saying otherwise as you filled a bowl with salad before passing that over to him. The whole scene, while filled with sexualized energy only seconds ago, was still intimate. Intimate in that having a late homemade dinner at Hoseok’s work felt like normal. Like Johnny had pointed out earlier in the Stacks, it reminded you of married life.

You never wanted this feeling to end.

Sensing content and happiness coming from you, Hoseok relaxed even more knowing you weren’t stress or worried in some shape or form. He wanted that to last before he told you the news he discovered. The pamphlet in his front pocket suddenly feeling like a million bricks were sitting on his thigh as he ate. However, that was a fleeting thought.

“Any stories from work today?” You innocently asked. You shifted in your seat, bringing your left leg up onto the chair so your elbow was on your knee as you worked on your salad. He usually saved a few stories about the kids that he taught, whether they were his regular kids or new ones that came in for a specific class, or came in for the first time to dance in general. Plus, after being cooped up in the Stacks with Johnny for the majority of the day, you were curious how his day had gone.

Well, there was a kid, and there was a story, but he wasn’t sure how you’d react to the ending. Pushing around a tomato, Hoseok sighed, leaning against the wall when he finally looked up at you. There was no prolonging the happiness that you were radiating. Reaching into his jeans pocket, he pulled out the folded pamphlet and opened it to the side that pertained to the two of you, setting it next to your plate. “I went to the last Adoption Center that I had stayed at earlier today,” he softly spoke, watching as you took it with curious eyes. “They’re called, The Mate Act, and The Hybrid Owner Act.”

You tilted your head and glanced back up at Hoseok before looking at it. The font was large enough to scan the top part in seconds, gasping as you looked back at him. “Hobi…this…this means that-”

“That Sue would no longer be my owner but my guardian, and I wouldn’t have to live with her.” He softly interrupted. He leaned forward and slid your hand between his palms, a gentle smile making his lips curl up at the corners. “It means that we can live together, that we can move if we decide to, have the traditional wedding like I know you’ve always wanted, and even start a family of our own. That is, if we can take The Mate Act.”

“If we can? Why wouldn’t we take it?”

It was the perfect option for the two of you. This Act guaranteed a future with Hoseok, why wouldn’t you take it?

“Because we need Sue’s signature. But Sue doesn’t need your signature for The Owner Act, and if she decides to take that one, she doesn’t need mine either.”

Blinking in confusion, you watched as Hoseok’s smile slipped until it completely disappeared. In your excitement you had skipped over the second half of the pamphlet, which included The Hybrid Owner Act. Your grip slackened on Hoseok’s hands as you read, and reread, even reading it a third time to see if this was real.

“The Hybrid Owner Act doesn’t apply to us,” you argued, holding the paper up with your free hand. As much as Sue seemed to be acting unlike herself, she wouldn’t…at least you hoped, she wouldn’t go so far to the extreme to cut off contact between you and Hoseok.

Hoseok swallowed the lump in his throat, looking away from you and at the food set out. You had worked so hard to make dinner and bring it to the Dance Studio, working around his practice schedule and understanding how much the annual show meant to him.

“I just want to be prepared,” he answered, his voice strained when he looked back up, revealing how watery his eyes had gotten. “Baby…Strawberry, I don’t know what Sue is going to do. I don’t know if she’ll be pissed or happy, and I am hoping, god I am hoping, that she’ll be understanding. Neither paperwork needs to be signed right away – if need be, we can wait so she can adjust – but if for some reason she picks The Hybrid Owner Act…”

Wetting his lips, he raised your hand to kiss your knuckles repeatedly. He absolutely hated having to have a backup plan for if the worst happened. But all he could think about was what Mrs. Gilly told him back at the Adoption Center. “We’re gonna get a lawyer, and we’ll fight. We’ll fight and if we have to, we’ll fight to have you become my new owner, so that we can be together. But this is only as a last case scenario. Trust me Strawberry, I’m really hoping that we’re only overthinking everything and she’ll understand and be happy for us.”

Your grip tightened in Hoseok’s hold for a second before releasing it. His eyebrows raised at your actions, but when you stood and made your way around the table, he shifted in his seat and opened his arms as you sat on his lap. With a gentle kiss to his forehead, your fingers slipped through his hair to gently scratch the base of his ears. The sensation had him as a puddle at your touch, coming to rest his head on your chest while hugging you. For the first time since your relationship started, you were the one comforting Hoseok, and not the other way around.

“I’m going to fight for us Strawberry,” Hoseok promised, taking your hand to kiss your palm. “I will always, fight for us.”

To say that you weren’t scared was an absolute lie. But as you held Hoseok, you pushed back the tears and focused on him, on being there and reassuring him. “I know babe,” you murmured instead, leaning your cheek against his head. “I know you will.”

It warmed your heart to hear him say that, but you were hoping that it would never come down to that.

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morganas-pendragons · 4 years

Text

Nova | O.K.

a long awaited part 2 to this fic

summary: you are nova, and your attention has been caught by the bright eyed jedi in the crowd of seventy-nines. the one who seems to act like you’re not real.

also known as the one where ahsoka gets involved

tagging: @obiorbenkenobi // @anakinsahsoka // @dressed-up-heartbreak // @kaminobiwan // @lunaxspxll // @karasong (you really need to tell me which blog to tag for these now considering you have SEVEN!!!!)

tag list is open!

***

Previously...

You eye the scarlet curtains in front of you as the clone - who had introduced himself to you as Marshall Commander Cody from the 212th Attack Battalion - steps up onto the stage to give the formal introduction for the galaxies most popular entertainer.

Nova.

You still don’t know where the name came from or who gave it to you. It’s fitting though. You’re not just a normal lounge singer. From the moment you learned how to project your voice.. your siren song has lured men from all over to you. You just never cared enough to pay attention to them.

Not until now. Not until him.

“Ladies and gentleman and variations thereupon.. vod.. From this galaxy on Alderaan itself, may I present to you our entertainment for the evening, Nova!”

You slip into your mask of confidence as the curtains part and a single spotlight from the catwalk flares to life and nearly blinds you. No concern is shown. You’re in your natural state right here, on this stage, with a microphone in your hand and the world at your fingertips.

“This is a mans world.... This is a mans world...”

You don’t dare move off of the stage. Not yet, but that figure in the dark robes who watches you so intently that you can feel the burn of his gaze from across the room is the one your eyes keep flickering to.

“This is a mans world, it wouldn’t be nothing, without a woman, or a girl...”

His gaze sweeps up and down your form. Ah. Well.. you had your stylist pick this outfit for exactly that reason and part your hair to your specific specifications because of the effect it often has on your crowd. It’s not just your voice that’s beautiful. It’s all of you. Confidence has never really been something you’ve struggled with because you’ve known your value from the minute you were old enough to comprehend it.

But there’s just something about that auburn hair.. and those eyes... you wonder what he is currently thinking about you.

That’s what propels you to leave your safe spot downstage. The young Togruta who’s sitting beside him gasps and starts tugging incessantly on his robes, blue eyes wide as she keeps pointing at you and whispering something that makes the auburn haired man frightened. He must’ve realized you’re coming right in his direction.

“You see man made the cars, to take us over the road... man made the train to carry the heavy load... made made electric light to take us out of the dark-”

He flips his hood up and turns away almost as if that’ll deter you. It only bolsters your resolve. He’s not getting away so easily.

Your companionable spotlight stops in front of his table.

“This is a mans world... This is a mans world..”

Curious to see his handsome features up close, you wind your fingers around the hood of his cloak and very slowly move it down his shoulders. Your shock is noticeable once you really see the ruggedly handsome features of the one in front of you, and he seems to be equally as stunned because of how close he is to one with such a reputation as yours.

As if he isn’t the best commander in the entire GAR.

“And it’d be nothing...” His eyes flicker down to the high slit in your dress as you place your leg on the vacant chair beside him. You hook a finger under his jaw, determined to keep his attention, chin tilted high as you drink him in. What a sight he is. And the cloak only helped. “Without a woman or a girl..”

Maker.

The way that high notes resonates is enough to shatter the glass and make the whole room fall silent around you. Chest heaving and eyes narrowed underneath the darkness that falls with the dimming of the spotlight, you are on display for the Jedi to see.

And he sees, alright. You watch his tongue peek out to wet his lips. The way his hands are clasped, desperate to ease the way they shake, and the general way he trembles in the proximity of a woman like yourself makes you wonder if he’s ever experienced this before.

That’s all you think about on your way back to the stage. Not the clones and the way they erupt in a roar that makes your ears ring, or your manager backstage who is smiling so widely you think his cheeks will probably hurt later. No. You’re thinking about that Jedi.

It’s not long after you’re preparing to leave that the young Togruta bursts into your dressing room. How she got past your security detail, you have no idea, but you have to applaud her on her creativity. She’s just small enough to fit in the air duct above your mirror.

“Nova! Wait. I have a proposition for you.” She pants, and you’re so entertained by the fact that she went through all the effort to get in here you can’t even be mad that she did. “My name is Ahsoka Tano. I’m the granddaughter of the man you made swoon during your performance. His name is Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan. What a fitting name.

“And what can I do for you, Ahsoka Tano?” You ask.

“Did you see the way he was looking at you?” She asks urgently. “Because I’ve never seen him look at anybody else that way, and kriff- He was so nervous!” You cross your legs at the ankles and watch the young girl as she continues, absently twirling your hair as you do so. “And the way you looked at him? I think you both caught each others attention.”

“He definitely caught mine.” The words are out before you can stop them. “But I thought you Jedi were celibate? Meaning.. y’know.. against sex.”

It’s not like you didn’t have the thought of what he looked like beneath the robes.

“We are celibate.. well.. most of us. The Code advises against attachment. Not against sex.” She corrects. “But either way, my Master and I both saw the way you two gravitated towards each other and wondered if you’d be willing to do it again. Just in a bit of a different setting.”

You lean forward, curiosity piqued.

“I’m listening.”

“You and Master Kenobi, in a side room here at Seventy Nines, a private show.” Her lekku twitch in anticipation as Ahsoka bent her head to meet your eyes. “Are you in?”

You extend your hand. This is going to be the best decision you’ve ever made.

“I’m in.”

You and a Jedi, in a darkened room, for a private show. Alone.

What could possibly go wrong?

#Obi-Wan Kenobi x Reader #Obi-Wan x Reader #Star Wars imagines #Star Wars oneshots

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thebarefootking · 4 years

Text

Eye Contact

Sometimes I look back on memories of what seemed at the time to be the happiest, most cherished times of my childhood, only to realise in retrospect that I was, in fact, miserable for nearly their entire duration. The starkest example of this phenomenon is that of the numerous trips I made with my Southern Baptist church youth group. Over the course of each year of my adolescence, we traveled to camps and conventions (and one time even to New Orleans, on a mission trip to 'convert the Catholics'). Each event was one I anticipated (and sometimes prepared for) for months.

The most frequent and reliable destination for our travels was a church camp a few hours away. Once in the summer and once in the winter, we made our way there for 4-7 days of sermons, prayer, and camp activities. Our group was assigned one cabin each for the girls and boys (or, occasionally, the girls got one of the 'new cabins', which were more like hotel rooms, with aircon but no bunk beds, and halfway across the campgrounds from pretty much everything of relevance. Bleh.), as well as a color and a meal hour. I'm not sure why, but we were almost always assigned yellow and green (with the accompanying later meal hour), as opposed to the much prettier and time-convenient colors of purple and blue, which I only recall getting once in around nine camp stays.

And so we would go, walking around camp with our yellow arm bands (meant to deter non-campers from sneaking a quick meal, they said, failing to grasp any irony in denying meals to the stranger at a Christian institution), doing camp things and singing camp songs.

One of the songs that still gets stuck in my head to this day was part of a camp game the campers played called 'Big Booty'. Being rather shy (read: terminally embarrassed due to rejection sensitive dysphoria) and also dreadful at rhythm games (no doubt due to lack of practice in childhood, stemming from the same), I mostly watched rather than actually engage in the play. Still, the song was catchy as hell, and could be heard from up to hundreds of feet away at nearly any point when the campers had free time. To play, all players stood in a circle and were assigned a number, counting clockwise from the position of the game's leader, who was referred to as 'Big Booty'. The goal of the game was to move up the ranks and become Big Booty, or, in another variation, to be the last one eliminated by messing up the rhythm.

The game started with a rhythmic chant: "Big Booty! Big Booty, oh, yeah! Big Booty, Big Booty, Big Booty!" All players slapped their thighs in rhythm with the chant, and throughout the whole game, to keep time.

At this point, the game was on. Big Booty would begin play by stating their own designation (Big Booty), and the designation of any other player of their choice (for example, Number Four). The designated player would then state their own designation and then the designation of yet another player. Play would be passed around in this manner until someone failed to say their part in the correct rhythm, at which point the one who failed was moved to the place in the circle with the highest number designation (with all other numbers reassigned as needed), or, in the other version, eliminated from play. It sounded a lot like this:

"Big Booty! Big Booty, oh, yeah! Big Booty, Big Booty, Big Booty!"

"Big Booty, Number Four!"

"Number Four, Number Eight!"

"Number Eight, Number Two!"

"Number Two, Big Booty!"

"Big Booty, Number Six!"

And so on.

God, now it's stuck in my head. Dammit.

In retrospect, this was how I spent a good portion of my camping time regardless of the activity at hand; I was a watcher, not a doer. And when I did, I most often did alone.

Not that I necessarily wanted to be alone. Awkward, adolescent, and very, very autistic, I had no idea 'How to Win Friends and Influence People', as the book says. My thought, logical as it seemed at the time, was that if I told people what I was doing, and then went and did it, they might follow along out of interest. And it seemed to me afterwards quite strange that no one was as interested in these activities as I was.

Of course, I didn't know to take into account the eccentricity of activities such as off-road blackberry picking in the eyes of kids who had mostly grown up in the city, and who later would express doubt that such edible berries even existed. To them, I was a quirky loner; to me, I was desperate and lonely.

Well, no, that's not right. At the time, I didn't even acknowledge that I was lonely, though I spent most every moment at camp attempting to remedy that loneliness. I was just delightfully weird, that was all. That was all.

Even cabin time rarely made for good bonding moments, queer as I knew myself to be. The other girls could playfully flirt with one another, knowing they meant only jest. They could touch each other (they knew how to touch each other) in a friendly way, and not have it misconstrued.

They could touch each other in weird ways. Some of the girls liked to exchange affection (and show off, I guess?) by licking one another's eyeballs in turn. I could only dream of aspiring to that kind of kinship.

No, I didn't touch the other girls. Not until the later years, when one of my close friends finally started coming to camp with me, and then we mostly hit one another, as was our wont. (Incidentally, this behavior never stopped everyone at school from assuming we were a couple. Go figure.)

The closest I ever got to making a friend at camp was making a friend that would later become an enemy. We'll call her Max.

Max was a later addition to the group, not a full time youth-grouper, but one who sometimes made it for trips. She had been brought into the fold by the most popular of popular boys in our group, who she attended school with (and who I had lusted after in my heart since before I even joined the church, possibly before I even knew what lust was).

Max was weird. She read The Lord of the Rings during sermons, instead of taking notes. She talked about Catholicism. She was goth.

She also, as I found out one Winter Retreat, wrote M-rated (and higher!) Rocky Horror Picture Show fanfic.

It would be a startling understatement to say that, at this point in my life, I was painfully naive. I had only recently discovered masturbation and the horrible spiritual agony it left in its wake. I was sure God was pissed because I was abusing the shower head every morning, and REALLY pissed that I sometimes thought of girls while I did. I didn't dare look at or read pornography. That stuff was addictive and homewrecking.

But... I did quite like Max.

We struck up a fledgling friendship as I tried to make her comfortable on one of her first trips with our group. It was the right thing to do. I certainly wasn't doing it because she was attractive and quirky.

And so, upon learning that I was a writer as well, she sought my opinions on some of her writing one evening, as we settled in our cabin.

"It's the least explicit one I have right now that doesn't require knowledge of the canon," Max said, kindly taking my foibles into account. "No sex or anything. Although she is naked. And there's… some… other stuff? Referenced. But not, y'know, explicitly."

Well. As long as it isn't explicit, I figured.

And that, my friends, was my first encounter with the idea of BDSM.

I was fucking shook.

While I already had, and had had since early childhood, a predilection for and interest in sadomasochism and power play, only at that moment did the spark go off in my head that connected these things to sexual arousal. It was like lightning. Things finally made sense!

But they were bad things. I didn't know what to do with that! I sputtered a bit, pointed out a couple of grammatical and syntactic errors, and told her it was good. I don't think she ever found out how dramatically she affected my life with those few crumpled pages torn from a composition book.

Of course, only a day or two later, I couldn't stand the bitch. She told some of my secrets to the guy I had a crush on (basically immediately after I told her?), and the two came up with a plan to use them against me, for no reason I could see but to be mean. My fault for trusting someone I barely knew, but she just had that vibe around her, y'know? And, as I said, I didn't know what I was doing.

Sometimes, I'm pretty sure I still don't. But damn if I didn’t learn a thing or two from her, including that that guy was a dick.

#a year of writing #02142020 #long post #actuallyautistic #this one took a while

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averygim · 5 years

Text

hello all. you can call me cal or jeepers, which is my discord name and i think is funny tbh, but i mostly go by cal. my pronouns are they/them and ‘m in the est timezone. i’m a bit late to the game but i’m still v excited to introduce my child avery to ya’ll. below is a whole mass of text that’ll help you get to know this mess of a child. uwu it’s easiest to reach me on discord at jeepers creepers #5103, but i also try and respond as quick as i can to tumblr ims so it’s really whatever you prefer !!

basics

name: avery gim job: baker at peau d’amour age: twenty-five gender: cismale pronouns: he/him sexuality: grey-asexual / panromantic birthday: february 6th zodiac: aquarius personality type: advocate | infj pinterest board: HERE

aesthetic

the haunting sound of a piano in a memory you can’t quite reach

a warm summer night spent watching fireflies dance among the trees

a bite of a fresh peach that leaves your mouth sticky and sweet

theme song: the 7th sense by nct u

hatred that will not go away and dreams that torture me the clock laughs at me, it does not give a single error i’m a mess, I don’t even know myself, my future is colored darkly i’m struggling, coloring this night even blacker in the irregularity that’s hard to understand there’s a story that’s deeply hidden eyes are being opened through this song your dreams are being read it’s being awakened from a deep sleep my seventh sense

positive & negative

affable ( adj ) : friendly, good-natured, or easy to talk to.

languid ( adj ) : (of a person, manner, or gesture) displaying or having a disinclination for physical exertion or effort; slow and relaxed.

versatile ( adj ) : able to adapt or be adapted to many different functions or activities.

candid ( adj ) : truthful and straightforward; frank.

then

it begins when he’s four years old - this obsession in him. his parents couldn’t have expected that sending their son to piano lessons we enact such a wild passion in their small, quiet boy. it was hard to pick out at first. often, they would pick their child up from his lesson to find his small chubby cheeks stained with tears. his parents assumed he was simply being stubborn about learning the instrument. they would see the kids dragged to the lessons bemoaning their distaste to it to their parents and would tell each other “our boy is simply quiet with his dislike for it. he has never been a talker.” and would keep taking him week after week. the piano teacher couldn’t enlighten them to what was going through their child’s mind in terms of why he seemed to work himself up into such a state. she explained to them that he seemed attentive whenever she would teach him and it was only until he started to practice on his own that the tears would begin. neither parties could get a word out of the child though he often seemed to calm fairly quickly post lesson, spending the car ride home pressing his small fingers into his thighs as though there was an invisible piano etched into his skin. at one point, his parents seemed to give in a bit to their uncertainty of how their child was doing, offering to take him out of the lessons. the aggressive shake of the four years old’s head and high squeaky voice insisting “ no, no !! “ was quite the surprise. it wasn’t until a year later, when he began to find his voice that he admitted to his piano teacher that he just loved piano so much, he couldn’t stop himself from crying whenever he got to play. the teacher passed this along to the parents with much amusement and relief.

the passion the young boy had for the instrument didn’t falter over the years, even as his peers turned to other extracurriculars and sports rather than the piano. his parents opted to get him a keyboard to set up in his room on his seventh birthday, still wary about how long he would remain content with the lessons. they had never enjoyed the instrument with such conviction when they were forced to take lessons growing up. it was, at least, comforting to know that their quiet child still enjoyed spending time doing kid things, such as playing outside, playing pretend and colouring. he even showed an interest in baking, which he often did with his grandmother, much to the disbelief of his father. still, he was a good child and despite the wariness his father had of allowing him to indulge in his more feminine hobbies ( he was very much stuck in the throws of toxic masculinity ), his mother and grandparents supported him fully in whatever he wanted to do. so during the week, he would go to his piano lessons and play with the neighbourhood kids outside. then, on the weekends, he would spend time with his mother’s parents, often baking some sort of treat with his grandmother and listening to his grandfather tell tall tales of his own childhood.

as he got older, his skill in piano progressed more and more. between his lessons and the studious way he practiced, he ended up participating in a variation of different concerts. by the time he reached his early teens, he was playing with the adult orchestra with nine years of lessons and experience under his belt. it was an astounding thing- to hear him play. it was as if this lazy, beautiful human was gifted with talent from the gods, but he wasn’t. he worked for his ability. countless hours pressing fingers into plastic keys. perhaps that is why, for his sixteenth birthday, his grandparents and parents pulled together the money to buy him a grand piano. it was then, upon walking into the home to find the piano gracing the room that used to be the den of their house, that he discovered he hadn’t quite outgrown his habit of crying when overwhelmed with emotion.

between creating compositions, practicing, baking with his grandma, and the hell that was high school, he didn’t have much time for anything else. he didn’t mind. he was content with his work, both with the piano and at school. he had a tendency to overwork himself within the confines of his piano room and bedroom between the two. this led to him developing a bad reputation of being a lazy and privileged individual who got away with sleeping in class. his peers saw him as someone favoured by teachers, when in truth it was simply because he’d had multiple discussions previously with them about being awake in class. many of them had agreed to let it slide so long as his grades were maintained. it was a necessary thing to seek as if his parents found out they would no doubt put restrictions on how he was working.

despite the peer isolation, which later led to a fair amount of social awkwardness on his part, he seemed to get along great with those he went up against in competitions. perhaps it was their shared love or enjoyment of the instrument. regardless, he created a group of friends outside of the school scene and, despite many of them being older than him, he was respected and treated much better than others his age treated him.

the summer post high school graduation saw him doing something no one could have predicted ( aside from his grandfather who swears up and down that he saw this coming since he was seven years old ). he set out on a tour of major cities, performing alone on a stage with simply a piano, a mask, and a single spotlight. see, in the latter years of his teens, he really blew up thanks to the internet. he became known under a moniker the he’d used on his youtube channel, which he would post videos of his personal compositions and covers of songs on. it led to some artists and producers reaching out collaborate, which, in turn, increased his popularity.

( car accident tw ) life was good for five years. he got to do what he loved and loved what he did. of course, all good things must come to an end, even if that good thing felt like it is your entire life. at twenty three, the now grown quiet boy got into a car accident. a drunk driver hit the car his mother was driving with him in the passenger seat. his mother survived with a few bruised ribs and a broken arm while he came out of it with severe head trauma. head trauma that, out of all things, resulted in hearing loss. the cochlea and hearing nerves in his inner ears were damaged to the point that it sounded like a hush fell over the world. it was a difficult reality to swallow.

( depression tw ) it was a loss like no other. he could no longer hear his piano. he could no longer get lost in the world his music created. depression hit him heavy and hard, dragging him under in a suffocating hold. seventeen years. he’d been playing piano for seventeen years and now that ability was severely disabled. he withdrew, cutting ties with almost all of his friends who were apart of the music world. his parents didn’t know what to do with their quiet child who seemed to become deathly silent after the accident. the whole family had signed up in solidarity to learn asl alongside him. the only ones who seemed to muster out any sort of reactions or responses from him were his grandparents who struggled to learn the new way of communicating. he tried hearing aids in addition, however, the damaged required a more intensive solution. cochlear implants. he refused despite the struggle he still faced with the hearing aids. his family tried to get him to go through with the surgery, however he was an adult and it was his decision to make. so he continued to allow himself to waste away in the distorted world around him. his father responded to his state with anger, while his mother grieved and worried over him from afar. his grandparents were around as much as they could be, reaching out with patient hands. it would take two years for him to reach back.

twenty-four and feeling stuck, exhausted, and just down right sick, the quiet boy finally inched out of the shell the accident had left him in. it starts with therapy, then medication, and ends with stepping into the kitchen with his grandmother again. his piano remained untouched, gathering dust in his home behind a locked door. no one brought it up, not yet, and instead slow steps were eventually taken. he spoke for the first time post asl and hearing aids to his mother. his voice raspy and barely there from disuse. he couldn’t hear himself, but his mother had burst into tears as his grandparents smiled at each other with watery eyes. it was progress. slow progress, but they were glad that he was finally taking steps forward.

it was five months after his twenty-fourth birthday that he decided to undergo the cochlear implant surgery. he held no hope for what he’d be able to do with the upgrade. he didn’t allow himself to think of the abandoned piano or the possibility of getting back into music. no, instead, he simply kept his eyes forward as though the past no longer existed. instead, he spent his time baking with his grandmother, helping with the small business she’d started when he was in middle school. the surgery was a success, but the quiet man did not cry when he was finally able to hear with more clarity. there were no tears of overwhelming happiness, instead he’d simply smiled at his mother when she asked if he could hear her and said yes.

it took him six months to decide he needed to move. despite his family still living in the area he grew up in, he needed to get away. he wanted out of the city and eventually settled on moving to beauhart, a place suggested by one of the few friends he kept in touch with post-accident. the official transition happened three months ago where he moved out of the apartment he bought for himself at twenty and into his own home. it was a bit large for just himself and his mother worried that he would fall back into bad habits, but he loved the old styled place. it had a front porch and was painted a gentle yellow. the front was filled with a garden of flowers and bushes that wrapped around to the fence that encased the backyard. his father hated it, but his grandparents had approved when they first saw it, having travelled with his mother to help with the unpacking once everything had arrived. it held more warmth than his apartment had. perhaps it was because he was going to be living in it full time or the character / personality the house itself had. regardless, he felt settled for the first time in almost two years. no one mentioned the grand piano that had been placed in the third bedroom of the house.

three months post move found him working at the local bakery. the early mornings were tough, but the consistency was enjoyable for him. it helped, significantly, with his mental health. he promised his mother to call at least twice a week and his grandmother almost every other day to gossip. despite his awkwardness with social cues and languid nature, he managed to make connections with other residents. things seemed to be looking up, though there still remained that empty part of him and a door unopened.

extras

he is, for all intents and purposes, socially an idiot. he can’t pick up verbal cues up very well and often chooses to ignore them even if they are glaringly obvious. some kind find this incredibly annoying or be endeared by it. usually it’s the former, though avery has never minded. he has no desire to be liked by everyone and is more than happy to continue going by the beat of his own drum.

definitely often produces the wrong first impressions, especially with his looks. he takes care of himself, has been instilled with the habit, especially after how rough his twenty-third and fourth year was. so it’s not often he goes out looking like the drowned rat he enjoys being at home. it’s part of his routine that has helped him stay on track mentally.

definitely a momma’s boy, but would literally do anything for his grandparents. he is planning on having them visiting him as soon as he manages to get his guest room furnished and decorated.

if he wants to avoid something, he ignores it. it’s a terrible coping habit that manifests in small instances and larger situations. it’s very childish in many ways, but his therapist has yet to be able to break him out of it.

is looking into adopting an animal, but is torn between what sort of animal. he has been looking at the humane society, but has yet been able to decide.

he is very indecisive about the smallest of things, but somehow manages to be able to make the bigger and more important decisions ???

has a very weird and varied taste in music.

learned korean from his grandparents when he was younger but primarily speaks english or asl.

often moves around his house without his hearing aids and keeps things quiet. a book nerd post accident. his favourite thing to do is spend the day on his porch swing reading.

he has been thinking of taking online business courses to learn more about running/owning his own business. he hasn’t mentioned it to anyone, not is planning to, but when he thinks about the future he’s wondering if owning his own bakery could be a possible option.

honestly a sleepy boy even though he has a perfectly reasonable sleep schedule ???

doesn’t know how to flirt. doesn’t even know how to hold a conversation with someone he has a crush on. is very awkward with them.

likes to try and make wacky things (baking wise) when bored then try and make you try it without any forewarning.

is actually pretty good at making elaborate cakes and frosting designs. does cake commissions on the side for birthdays, in fact.

gets lost really easily. its been three months and he still sometimes forgets where to turn when driving home.

will steal your pet if you leave him alone with them ( not literally ).

is terrible at texting and is the type of person to call you to have a conversation. this is mostly because he’s too lazy to text.

enjoys memes and quotes them sarcastically, sometimes when it’s definitely not appropriate.

has a habit of staring without meaning too. this could either be off into space or actually at someone. he doesn’t necessarily mean to do it. at times it’s a case of dissociation and others it’s simply him having no common sense and/or is blatant day dreaming.

will not ride as a passenger in a car. he’s been able to drive again post implants but the trauma of the accident has caused him a real fear of being someone else’s passenger.

sometimes, without him realizing it, he’ll mime playing the piano. the habit of pressing his fingers into invisible keys too engrained to erase. he attempts to avoid music a lot, especially classical. it’s somewhat impossible to do at work and outside of his home. at times, he gives in to his desire to try and hear it the way he used to and will blast the music until he can feel the base thrumming in his veins. it’s as detoxing as it is frustrating. as much as he can hear, it will never be like it used to be for him.

if you read all of this i applaud you. tell me your favourite colour, animal, and/or food and then we can plot C:<

#stories.intro

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magic-owl · 5 years

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i wish these had numbers to not take up room but alas: what is your absolute favorite ship? what’s a ship you like that most people don’t? what is the most underrated ship, in your opinion? (choose any of your fave pairings for the following bc I'm curious about all your faves) rate [pairing] from 1-10 and explain why. what’s your favorite headcanon of [pairing]? what’s your favorite canon moment of [pairing]? favorite AU ideas for [pairing]? what song(s) remind you of [pairing]?

Thank you my dear! You are my Star Wars Friend so I’ll keep it SW focused (if you wanted to ask this to solely find out what else I liked BESIDES SW sorry lol just let me know and I can redo it). This got long because turns out I have a lot to say about my ships so answers under the cut!!! xD

Absolute favorite ship: This one’s kinda hard but I’m gonna have to go with Obi Wan/Anakin! I also like them a lot as a trio with Padmé, but overall I gotta say these two are just my faves? Why? Because they are such a M E S S and gosh I just love them so much. Ppl say they don’t like each other very much but come on, have you watched the TCW, have you watched RotS, they’re the greatest team there ever was, they’re constantly fretting and worrying about each other, they’re always teasing (the constant banter omg boys pls) at each other and hyping the other up and believing in each other and Ahsoka literally calls them her adoptive guardians in the Ahsoka novel, that’s how much of a family they were and ugh they’re just so married. And they’re such a TRAGEDY and it breaks my heart and it’s delicious to watch because in the final fight it’s just heartbreaking betrayal because through it all they love each other so much and that’s WHY they’re so furious with each other because to them it feels like the ultimate betrayal. Even after (when after everything, Obi Wan still loved Anakin too much to kill him himself) they’re constantly on the other’s mind, and ugh the pain hurts but in such a good way, and how in the end Anakin did the right thing and Obi Wan was RIGHT THERE to help guide him back to the light in spirit and now they can rest happily together for eternity (with some spare stressing about, ya know, Kylo Ren and the impending return of Sidious, but never mind all that). and on top of that, it’s my fave because I also absolutely love their relationship platonically as well, as much as I LIKE to see them together, it’s not necessary for me because they have such an enjoyable dynamic. *coughs* Sorry, so yea, they’re my disaster faves! 😅

A ship I like that most people don’t: See above lol. I get aspects of the Obikin ship can be problematic in the whole power dynamic and age difference thing, but I’ve only ever shipped it after Anakin was knighted as an adult when there’s literally not a problem with it (it was weird for me because I watched the prequels totally out of order. I actually saw the TCW cartoon FIRST and then I saw RotS and then I didn’t watch the first two for a while after that because I was a fool and listened to prequel bashers who said the first two weren’t good, so when I started shipping them as adults that was all I saw them as). To be honest, for the most part the PT fandom is done with the drama since ya know, like a good half of the SW general fandom still hates us, so no one’s really vocal about not liking it and our shipping community is mostly left to ourselves, but every once in a while I’ll come across a joke post/fanart of the two and OP will be all snarky in the notes like “tag as a ship and I’ll come after you with my spiked bat” (someone’s exact words btw) and it’s like ok jeez, do not interact then, was minding my own business dude...

My most underrated ship: Hmmmm....... Gonna have to go between Luke/Ezra and Satine/Padmé. Skybridger I understand since they’ve literally never met in canon, but come ON, they’d get along like a house on fire and argh they should have met, it would be great. I honestly don’t get why Pads and Satine aren’t more of a thing (THEY DON’T EVEN HAVE AN OFFICIAL SHIPNAME ;_; ) cuz c’mon they’re the subtler explosive yin to Obi and Ani’s wildfire yang. They get along great and work together really well, and they both seem to have a type. I am doing them a little better in my new OT4 fic, and I hope ppl like it!!! Ya know what, I’m also gonna add Kaeden (cute girl from the Ahsoka novel!) and Ahsoka because even if a lot of ppl actually ship them, they hardly have any content and neED MORE DANGIT THEY WERE SO CUTE!!!!!!!

Gonna go with Obikin for all the following ones cuz I haven’t had the chance to gush about my boys in a while and you’ve opened Pandora’s box

Rate them from 1-10: 10, plus a hundred more points because I love them, then subtract that hundred again cuz Anakin is an gotdang idiot who ruined it and now they both make me cry. My scoring reasons are that they make me feel all the emotions and I love them Ever So Much and argh.

Fave headcanon: Oh boy, I’ve got a couple actually!

Whenever they’re talking/arguing over the phone, they’re always subconsciously mirroring each other’s actions even when they can’t see what the other is doing. It’s kinda creepy because you’ll hear yelling and it’ll look like one of them’s talking to an invisible person in front of them when it’s actually each other.

There has been multiple instances of them both getting injured in battle because they were distracted watching the other be a total badass (not that either will admit it)

Neither of them are morning people. AT ALL. Obi Wan actually has self-discipline and is able to get up with an alarm and crankily drag them both up, but both are almost impossible to deal with until they’ve had caffeine in them, and it’s been established that unless you want to risk murder, neither of them talks in the morning until caffeine has been provided.

There has been many, many cases of accidentally taking the other’s robe and not realizing it but thinking to themselves that said robe feels more comforting than usual today.

A mutually drunken arm wrestling match absolutely turned into a mutually drunken makeout once. Neither can remember it, and they wonder why some of the clones have been acting funny all week.

Half of the Temple thinks they’re already dating.

Ok I’ll stop it here

Fave Canon Moment: Ughhh, this is HARD. I really like the “any closer and you’d be kissing it” line in TCW, basically any moment in TCW when one of them refers to Ahsoka as “OUR padawan”, the extra long stares and unnecessary touches they give each other in TCW, the elevator scene in RotS movie (THE NOVEL MAKES IT A MILLION TIMES BETTER), also in RotS the way Anakin is half-ready to straight up fight Palpatine when he suggests leaving Obi Wan behind to die, the RotS “No loose wire jokes” bit, the RotS “Roger. Roger.” bit (OKAY JUST THE WHOLE FIRST HALF OF THIS RIDICULOUS MOVIE), the way Vader built his big stupid castle where they had their breakup, the way he’s constantly mentioning Obi Wan when the convo wasn’t even about him, seeing them together again at the end of RotJ (whoops you asked for one, you get MANY SCENES)

Fave AU ideas: Again, there’s a couple!

Superpower AU: Can’t decide whether I’d put this in canon or modern. Most powers in this AU are stolen from inspired by X-Men, DC, and other popular media, so I’m torn between Anakin having Jean Grey/Dark Phoenix style powers while Obi Wan had a variation on Rogue’s with additional energy manipulation. OR it would be a thing where Anakin could commune with the dead a la Klaus from Umbrella Academy while Obes had sort of Avatar-style wind/flight powers. (Both are relevant for different plots).

Sith AU: I know these are far from unpopular in the SW fandom, but the way I’d do it would be to try and write two stories at once, update one every other week so one update a week total. The stories would what would happen if either of them became the Sith Apprentice after the events of Episode 1, and how their dynamic would be during Ep 2 and The Clone Wars with one of them on the other side. It’s funny because the way I’ve plotted it, the Sith!Ani fic would have very big Good Omens vibes, while the Sith!Obi one would have very strong Under the Red Hood vibes, so two VERY different dynamics going on xD

WWII Spies: This is one I 100% plan to write someday, even tho it is a very long time from now. It’s basically following Anakin as an American naval pilot who got injured in a crash and discharged. He still wants to serve and eventually his talent gets him into the intelligence end of the war and sent to Europe where he meets Ben, who’s been working with British intelligence since it broke out, and sparks fly. I’m kind of cheating here cuz as of now this is an Obianidala story, not just Obikin, but it’s one I’m very excited for

Phantom of the Opera AU: This idea I had when I realized that Anakin as Vader is kinda a Lot like the Phantom, but he’s also a Lot like Christine too. So it turned into Anakin as a talented ballet dancer getting preyed on by Palpatine!Phantom (there is NO romance there, Palpy is a total creep and will be treated as such) with Obi Wan as a combination of Raoul and Madame Gery and I have a bunch of ideas and idk if it’s gonna be an actual thing, but I want it to.

Shapeshifter AU: Canon, not very complicated but they can all shift into animals. Obi Wan is a kind of cougar panther cat with a fluffy ginger tail, and Anakin is a big grumpy black Krayt Dragon with a stump for a front leg.

Not A Jedi!AU: One in canon in which set like the Sith!AU, two different stories exploring how their dynamic would be if one of them wasn’t found by the Order. As of now, I’ve got Anakin as the warrior pirate prince of Tatooine, after having grown up and staged a slave rebellion, then promptly put his mother on the throne, and Obi Wan’s there to negotiate something during TCW and things happen. For the Obi Wan one, he’s a political journalist and war correspondent who keeps on running into Anakin’s assignments and popping up where he’s stationed and Anakin has to keep this idiot from getting himself killed/stop asking me annoying questions that criticize the Jedi and the government.

Dark!AU: A kind of morbid canon divergent fic where Padmé dies early and unexpectedly (Palps didn’t plan it). Anakin goes off the rails and Obi Wan agrees to go with him on a murder vengeance roadtrip to try and keep him from Falling or the Sith from getting to him. He kinda fails and they both Fall in a way and it ends with them hunting down Sidious’ players one by one. I’m not entirely sure I want to continue with this tho because it plays strongly on the Fridged Woman trope, which I can’t stand. I’d have to figure out how to give Padmé some sort of active role after her death...

Songs to describe them: There’s a couple (I could have very well gone cranky but I decided to do (mostly) serious))(also my music taste kinda stinks)

Icarus— Bastille

Anna Sun— WALK THE MOON

Animal I Have Become— Acoustic cover by Vitamin String Quartet (original by Three Days Grace) (seriously y’all listen it’s sooooo gooooood)

Warriors— Imagine Dragons

My Demons— STARSET

Ignorance— Paramore

Set Fire to the Rain— Adele

Stubborn Love— The Lumineers

How to Save A Life— The Fray (yes i am aware it is stereotypical angst song leave me Alone it FITS)

Viva la Vida— Coldplay (tbh this fits like the entire PT but I liked it)

Raised by Wolves— U2 (another more PT-centric, but this one works dangit)

Bonus Broadway Song! : Confrontation from Les Miserables (now that ya think of it, that would be a pretty good AU too.....)

Bonus Broadway Song! : The Tango Maureen from Rent (I always imagined this one as Obi Wan and Padmé about Anakin, but it would be about something other than cheating cuz canon has established Anakin views cheating as a worse crime than murder, so yea)

Bonus Broadway Song! : Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better (aight this one’s mostly a joke but come ON don’t tell me that’s not completely them xD)

#owl gets an ask #long post #wolf-skins

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douxreviews · 5 years

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Cloak and Dagger - ‘B-Sides’ Review

"To Tyrone. My best friend. My port in the storm. My hero."

Oh, Cloak and Dagger, I apologize for ever criticizing your love of the theatrical framing device. It paid off with interest this week.

'B-Sides' picks up a visual metaphor from a few episodes back by continuing to represent the personal experiences of our characters as sides of a record. By placing the record on a turntable, you 'experience' the relevant moments of that character's life as recorded there.

This is just a wonderful conceit, and I'm glad that it's back again this week. Clearly we're intended to wonder whose gloved hands are playing the records, but I was so entranced by the elegance of the visual device that I wasn't really that concerned about that particular question. On some level I suspect I was expecting it would turn out to be Tandy herself, ruminating over all the 'could have been' possibilities of her life.

Because, really, that's what we've been conditioned to expect from this sort of format. We spend an episode looking at one or several 'what if' situations, before returning to the status quo as it was beforehand and continuing on with whatever the season long plot is next week. It's a nice way of exploring a character, it can be useful as part of a character's story arc as it lends itself to self-revelation, and most importantly it's super popular with the cast, as it allows them to play different variations on their established characters and do things that that character would never otherwise be allowed to do. Anyone who thinks that 'Superstar' wasn't Danny Strong's favorite episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to film is kidding themselves.

Now, I've gone on record as not being a big fan of 'what if' storylines. Usually they're nothing but a huge pause button that keeps the story from progressing, and it's hard to get invested in them when you know that nothing that happens in the alternate universe can possibly have any consequences. I struggle even to get through 'The Wish,' and that gave us evil, lesbian Willow. What saves this episode from feeling like that was the way that they managed to marry in the reveal of Andre as the real villain while raising a thousand other questions about what's been happening, then somehow taking me in with the exact same last second rug pull that wasn't even particularly fresh when they did it on Angel fifteen years ago.

What I'm really saying, I suppose, is that from an objective perspective a plot summary of this episode would read, 'Tandy takes an ambulance ride to a motel.' In reality a lot more happened than that. What really happened this week is that we found out that Andre was also caught up in same Roxxon explosion that gave Ty and Tandy their powers. While Tandy got 'hope' and Ty got 'fear,' Andre got 'despair.' When looked at in that light, what we're seeing is exactly the same sort of power usage that we've seen Tandy and Ty use to 'go into' the hope/fear of whoever they're using their power on at that moment. The one thing added is that Andre isn't just going into his victims' despair, he's actively increasing it in his victims, because he needs to feed on the despair of others in order to stop the pain of his migraines.

I should note, I'm not a migraine sufferer myself, but I have enough friends who are that I have no trouble believing that someone would readily take that deal if it made the migraines stop.

Two things worth noting at this point. Excellent job of the show in giving us a completely abhorrent, and yet understandable and sympathetic villain. Andre has clearly made peace with what he's doing, and the fact that he helps nine out of ten women that come to him for help, only eating that tenth one, seems to keep the scales nicely balanced as far as he's concerned. Also, even more excellent job by the show in remembering that Tandy was guilty of this exact same thing during her lowest points last year, and not letting her off the hook for it. I'd been a little concerned that they'd given her a free pass on that one.

So we have three despair visions for Tandy this week, each symbolized by an LP played by Andre in the dark dimension. 'Perfect Life,' 'Fractured Family,' and 'All Alone' are the listed titles of the LPs in question. I highly recommend pausing the screen on the albums to read the track lists written on them, because they're a nice piece of prop detail work and tell interesting little stories in and of themselves.

Each of the three 'elseworlds,' for lack of a better term, attempt to break Tandy down into giving into despair, first through the idea of losing her idea of perfect happiness, then when that doesn't work through forcing her to confront inevitable catastrophe, and then finally through attacking her sense of isolation and loneliness. When none of these work, Andre/Despair realizes what's been fairly obvious to the outside observer from the get go; i.e. that Tandy is never going to be taken down by attacks on her sense of self because her sense of self just doesn't rely in any way on feeling positive about herself. That's just not who she is. Once Andre gets that, he makes the obvious play of forcing her to live through the loss of Tyrone, simultaneously tricking the viewer into thinking that that's what's really happening through the tried and true 'Aha, I've escaped from your twisted dreamscape and defeated you in the real world, oh, no, never mind this is still inside the dreamscape and I've lost now' trick.

Once Andre tries this tactic Tandy gives in almost instantly, as anyone who's been watching could have told him she would. And with that her body arrives at the Viking Motel, which is apparently the final destination for the kidnapped girls. Do all the girls have to have their hope violently removed before they arrive at the Viking? We don't know. But apparently it was necessary in Tandy's case. What's going to happen to her inside? We don't know, but now that she's given into despair it can't be anything positive. Do all of Andre's victims have to be women? No, that's probably just implicit sexism on either the part of Andre or the show. Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and say it's Andre.

I'm a big fan of answers that just leave you with more questions. Bring on the next episode, please.

Bits and Pieces:

-- In Tandy's perfect world, she's a ballet dancer with the Met, Ty's a cop, Connors is redeemed, Billy is alive, and even Duane is living his best life. It's strongly implied that Billy and Duane are a couple now, which was a sweet touch. If all of the 'perfect world' stuff was taken from what Tandy would want, then Tandy is a much bigger romantic than we previously knew.

-- What's the relationship between Andre's record store of despair and Ty's dark dimension? Because the record store we see here was clearly in Ty's dark dimension a couple episodes ago. Are they linked somehow? Is Andre... ahem... inside Ty?

-- The use of 'Sweet by and by' as the linking song in each alternate reality was used to nice effect when they used playing it as the reveal that the scene of Ty being shot wasn't real.

-- It's always nice to see Liam again, even schlubby everyman alternate universe Liam.

-- There's a really well done moment when Tandy is in the stolen car with Ty and begins hearing the ambulance sirens bleeding through into the fantasy and she starts chanting 'it isn't real' over and over again. It's a nicely judged moment, because of course she's talking about the siren noise which is actually real while trying to stay focused in the stolen car, which isn't. It's a small detail but I like a show that rewards closer attention to the little things.

-- I can't say how happy I was that in Tandy's perfect world, Ty was still dating Evita. Perfection, to her, did not involve acquiring Ty as a romantic partner. She was perfectly happy with them being dear friends. That was refreshing.

-- The effect of the record changing every time it was flipped over was just neat.

-- I'm happier than I can say that the resurgence of vinyl as a medium means that the kids of today can recognize that static popping sound of an LP that's run to the end. It's just such a useful sound cue.

-- In the perfect world illusion, all the framed pictures in the stairwell are of a veve I didn't recognize. I thought at first it was Andre's and that he must be a Loa or an avatar of some sort, but apparently he isn't. I'm sure that they'll tell us at some point.

-- There is a recurring Marvel villain called D'Spayre, who's sort of a demon/anthropological personification of elemental forces sort of thing. I couldn't tell you if he's ever encountered Cloak and Dagger in the comics, but Andre doesn't seem to be related to him other than the coincidence of the name. I could, as always, be wrong.

-- My one real criticism of this episode is the problem you almost always get in alternate reality stories. In order to get across what's different in the universe in as short a time as possible, the dialogue becomes ridiculously expository. 'Well, Tandy, as you know the Roxxon explosion didn't happen when we thought it was going to and therefore your father has left town to go to Silicon Valley, leaving me to open a small transient hotel and get this cybernetic leg.' I get why they have to do it, but it takes me right out of the drama.

Quotes:

Mr. Bowen: "Okay, fine, can we hook him up with some tickets to your ballerina-ing? Ballerama? Dance Battle?"

Ty: "Evita spilled some champagne on me. Might have had a little too much." Tandy: "I knew I liked her."

Ty: "One day, long ago, I saved your life. But every day since you’ve been saving mine."

Mina: "Yeah, I’m not explaining myself to structural engineering Barbie."

Liam: "That’s OK. Birds are people too."

Tandy: "Drive!" Ty: "Uh.. no, crazy white girl."

Andre: "Not misery, Despair. There’s a subtle but distinct difference."

Tandy: "Then I was wrong. I have one person." Andre: "I came to that same conclusion."

I really loved this episode, and I can't wait to see where this is going. Three and a half out of four crappy alternate realities.

Mikey Heinrich is, among other things, a freelance writer, volunteer firefighter, and roughly 78% water.

#Cloak and Dagger #Tandy Bowen #Tyrone Johnson #Marvel #MCU #Cloak and Dagger Reviews #Doux Reviews #TV Reviews

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bluewatsons · 5 years

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Neil O’Connor, Anti-Hero - Life, Love and Death in Gainsbourg’s L’Homme à Tête de Chou (1976), Conference: Serge G. An International Conference on Serge Gainsbourg, Sorbonne University: Paris

Abstract

This paper explores Serge Gainsbourg’s 1976 album L’Homme à Tête de Chou (1976). The concept album allowed Gainsbourg to explore, transverse and peruses the anti-hero. The albums musical imagery provides to us a collection of mini tome’s that revolves around madness, murder, sex, infidelity and ultimately, death. These themes are, and would become, central too much of Gainsbourg’s lyrical palate, but take a much sinister route on this album. The album took Gainsbourg on a deeply personal quest for expression - to the darker side of baroque pop music. This paper presents the background and setting for the album, followed by both a thematic and compositional analysis of the albums title track Flash Forward and Lunatic Asylum and ultimately examines the albums identity Gainsbourg’s use of tone and timbre to map the anti-heros adventures and mishaps in life, love and death.

I. Background - Rebellion & Modernity

Popular music is intimately embedded in mechanisms of power and ideology. In Noise, a political economy of music, Jacques Attali’s addresses, something that Adorno refuses to do, is to regard popular music vehicle for transforming society;

‘Music is a credible metaphor of the real. It is neither an autonomous activity nor an automatic indicator of the economic infrastructure... Undoubtedly music is a play of mirrors in which every activity is reflected, defined, recorded and distorted. If we look at one mirror, we see only an image of another. But at times a complex mirror game yields a vision this is rich, because unexpected and prophetic’ [1].

This ‘metaphor of the real’ lies in poplar’s music reliance mass reproduction and the stockpiling of commodities. The construction of musical identity within musical expression can be perceived as a form of ritual in that, as Simon Frith points out in Performing Rites, ‘it describes one’s place in a dramatized pattern of relationships’ [1]. In France, like elsewhere, the locale where popular music’s difference is shaped has of course been intensely variable, ranging from the ‘imagined village of tradition, through seedy café and variety hall, the cabaret of nostalgia and regret, the political theatre of national and proletarian anthem, to transatlantic images of modernization and rebellion, in jazz and hip hop’ [2]. During the 1970s, popular music expression and ideology was shaped by the changing mainstreams in American musical styles. Funk, soul and electronic music, via disco, were now becoming part of the ever-changing mainstream. Youth culture during the 1970’s was rooted between the rural-urban split, the degree of educational qualification and the socio- professional status of individuals.

Two musical forms – the copains and two auteurs within the chanson tradition, shaped part of Gainsbourg’s identity: Léo Ferré and George Brassens. Johnny Hallyday created a new cultural form that imagined their social relationship based on camaraderie and equality. This identity failed and ignored to identity the divisions in French society. Ferré and Brassens were more successful. Both expressed resistance to the bourgeois, the Catholic Church and the French state. Ferré’s Les Rupins [The well-off] (1960), examines the empty values of consumerism and questions the French republics ideals, considering them as having lost of meaning. Ultimately, they laid the foundations for future musical anarchists, establishing non-conformity identities on margins of social and cultural fringes.

II. Thematic Analysis

Conceptually, Gainsbourg had already broken the mold with Historie de Melody Nelson in 1971. Gainsbourg created an album that’s focus was narration and that of the narrator, the musical contact seems merely as a supporting act at times. Popular music expression and identity politics are inherently linked, linked to the social and cultural trends of the time. Musicologist Phillip Tagg defines this as:

In this sense, a most effective way of comprehending identity is by disconnecting it from an essence and perceiving it as a dramatic effect rather than an authentic core [2].

The sculpture, The Man with the Cabbage Head, by Claude Lalanne, sat in the courtyard of Gainsbourg’s Parisian home. Gainsbourg’s obsession with the immoral anti-hero dances and exists, in some degree, within most of his discography. It’s only on L’Homme à Tête de Chou (1976) that this obsession truly comes to life. The tail, of Marilou, is of a girl the narrator falls in love with. The ensuing album goes on to describe their love affair and untimely, the death of Marilou, a death that leads to the narrators decline into madness. Not only are the lyrical and musical elements convey this macabre love story but also so does the cover itself. It portrays the darker elements hidden within the grooves. The opening title, of the albums name, begins with Gainsbourg stating that:

‘I am the man with the cabbage head, half vegetable, half guy’ [3].

The confession begins. The opening tracks lyrical theme is almost like a police statement report; how he fell for Marilou, that fateful day in Mac’s Men’s Hairdressers, where he first met the ‘bitch of a shampoo girl’. The narrator continues to open up an inner dialogue. He is at the ‘bottom of his depths’, lost everything to her, including his mind and his job – at ‘cabbage leaf’ – slang for either money (he was a banker) or a newspaperman. It points more so towards the printed matter, as a more reveling line comes as ‘where scandals equal beefsteak’, indicating that he was indeed, a tabloid man. This job allowed him to spend his money aimlessly, for the entertainment of this femme fatale – ‘I was finished, fucked, checked mate in the eyes of Marilou’ [4]. In the end, he is ‘stuck on a beach in Malibu’ or indeed, in the within the beaches of an approaching insanity.

Flash Forward sees the protagonist reach towards the beginnings of lunacy – he catches Marilou in sexual encounter with some rock musicians. The accompanying music allows this encounter to unfold, crashing and bashing about, following the narrator as he lurks towards his lovers misbehaving:

I move forward in the black-

Out and my kodak

Impresses onto the sensitive

Plaques of my brain the vision of a bordel

I feel my cardiac rate

Go briskly to mach

Two tic tac tic tac

Like from an electroshock

He sees this and wonders, is he paranoid? Surely not as he reminds himself that all that he does, all that he sees, will be stored in memory and will come back as flashbacks, until he croaks.

Lunatic Asylum, the albums epilogue, revolves around a trance like didgeridoo motif, like call to the wild, to the insane. In the previous song, Meurtre à l’extincteur, the act of murder had been committed – Marilou’s life ends, her head beaten in with a fire extinguisher, battered under white foam.

Here in the psychiatric ward, he wonders, ponders, on the ‘scrambled messages’:

The little Playboy rabbit gnaws my plant skull

Shoe shine boy

Oh Marilou little cabbage

That rolled me between his fingers like corporal

Sucked me like a kittty

The anti-hero is born; bewildered, deluded, a misfit. His head now truly turned to cabbage, punished and exiled in mental hell. Its sense of morality is cinematic or as Sylvie Simmons in Serge Gainsbourg – A Fistful Gitanes refers to the album as:

Menacing, atmospheric and marvellously mad, part Dostoevsky, part Kafka, part film noir, quite surreal [6].

The albums song cycles are masterfully put together. For the next section of the analysis, the same three songs are discussed, compositionally. Gone is the grandeur used in Historie de Melody Nelson, instead, its musical palate is a wide and varied as the lead characters state of mind. In such, the shifting styles of the album (rock, jazz, country and Caribbean) help define the wild variations of life itself.

III. Compositional Analysis

An intra-musical framework has been implemented in this case to decompose the compositional design and musical organization of L’Homme à Tête de Chou. This process has been referenced and adapted from Stan Hawkin’s Setting the Pop Score and involves examining the following:

Formal Properties: the sections within the song’s overall structure that supports the general progression;

Recording and Production Techniques: manifested in the mix, which is responsible for shaping the compositional design;

Textures and Timbre: colors and patterns that arise from vocal and instrumental gestures within the arrangement and finally;

Rhythmic Syntax: the recurring groupings and metric patterns that communicate ‘beat and groove’ [7]. –

Formal Properties

Formally, Gainsbourg decided that a selection of genres would sufficed toward the many states of mental conditions that our anti-hero goes through; ecstasy, bliss, ignorance, remorse. The song structures are somewhat uncoordinated, stemming from somewhat shorter pop song standard duration – the titles average at 2 minutes 30 (Opening Title) while others act as narrative interludes, barely achieving time to talk or discuss out their content as in Transit a Marilou. Meurtre a L’Marilou, the albums shortest title at 47 seconds, allows Marilou’s death not to linger on; it’s short, sweet, and abrupt. Variations sur Marilou is the album longest title and structurally, the most interesting, as a motif is repeated, built upon and only develops toward its crest seven minutes in. The album concludes with Lunatic Asylum, the most diverse and experimental composition, likes its theme, its formal structure is intense and confessional but in some ways progresses towards a sense of optimism.

Recording and Production Techniques

Shifting production styles are used to map the different scenarios the anti-hero finds himself within. Perhaps not as important as structural or thematic ideas contained with the album, the recording and production techniques utilized in any album can help define its ethereal nature and ambience, what lies beyond theme and aesthetical concept. Recorded at Mercury Studios in London and Paris, English rock themes are played out of the last time, but the production sees Serge for the first time, a reggae song. The production sees an extensive use of synthesizers for the first time. Alan Hawkshaw and Serge carried out arrangements. Hawkshaw had previously worked for KPM in the UK who wrote music for television and film. His arrangements can be heard on songs like Flash Forward in that they employ similar sounds to early radiophonic electronic music. The soft rock and production touches on Aeroplanes make this a standout song. A more common production technique on the album is its little or no cymbal usage – toms and snare drums help propel, like the clock of life itself, pushing and guiding the musical ideas along. This allows the lead vocal to take center stage, as there is limited high-end frequency content to compete with.

Textures and Timbre

There are some very interesting uses of texture and timbre on the album. In Meurtre a L’Marilou, the cymbals signify the sound of the fire extinguisher while the kick drum allows for the pounding heart to bounce toward her death. Life returns and air of optimism prevails in Marilou sous la neige. Here, Serge, lyrically, paints a dark picture of her burial under the snow. In a bold venture of contrast, the music is light, upbeat. The most interesting use of textures and timbre lay within Lunatic Asylum and Première Symptoms. Here, the albums epilogue, the sounds revolves around like a trance through a didgeridoo motif, like call to the wild. The texture and tone of the female vocals at the end of the song envisage and suggests Marilou raising from the dead, coming back to life to haunt our anti-hero for one more time. Textural and rhythmical analysis is summarized here as core musical themes:

Life: L’Homme à Tête de Chou – aggravated, downbeat, strange and surreal.

Love: Marilou Reggae – upbeat and optimistic, bright synthesizers used in major key.

Death: Meurtre a L’Marilou – tense, unknowing, frantic drums.

Rhythmic Syntax

Rhythmically, the album is a rewarding experience. It spans rock, country, disco, jazz, reggae, and funk. What’s evident more so is that some rhythms are used to support themes further. In Marilou Reggae caribbean rhythms allude toward the exotic sexual worlds of far way places. The drum tracks act as bedrock for the narration. Meurtre a l’extinguisher provides the most dynamic rhythmic analysis. It begins with hi-hats suggesting the sound of foam, then is replaced by a beating heart of a kick drum beating towards death, then, ultimately, the rhythm completely falls apart, settling again in the hi-hats, the narrator lost and quiet in his remorse and or satisfaction.

IV. End Note

L’Homme à Tête de Chou demonstrates Gainsbourg’s skill at integrating contemporary influences into chanson; highlighting the fact that it could be global, more far reaching. He allowed it to connect with young generations who understood the rhythms and sounds of international pop music. Gainsbourg’s omnivorous cultural tastes allowed the album to showcase the unstable nature of chanson was during the early 1970’s, ‘illustrating the effects of globalization on so-called traditional genres’ [6].

In classical mythology, the hero tended to be confidant intelligent, with few, if any flaws. In such, a hero tends to exude idealism, courage and morality. The classical anti-hero then, as the title suggests, is a flawed and conflicted character. The anti-hero, on the other hand, is plagued with self-doubt. Our characters hindrances made him prisoner of the mind, his imperfections of thought, of ideals of life, love and death, took him on a journey, full of sensual intentions with the end goal of lust and companionship.

What Gainsbourg has masterfully laid out for us is the story and journey of an anti-hero who completely lacks the skills and capabilities to perform such a feat and ends up failing in the most spectacular and morose fashion. Gainsbourg, furthermore, uses and indeed, manipulates the power of shifting rhythms, instrumental tone and timbre to help supplement and support our anti-hero’s transition into insanity. It’s perhaps the perfect concept album, one where the musical ideas support the extensions as documented above, all swimming in harmony, in the echoes of an untamed sexuality.

References

J. Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music, trans. Brian Massumi, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1985.

H. Dauncey & S. Cannon, Popular Music in France from Chanson to Techno, Hants: Ashgate Publishing, 2003.

S. Frith, Performing Rites, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.

P. Tagg, Black Music, Afro American Music and European Music, Popular Music, 8/3 pp.285-98, 1989.

S. Hawkins, Settling the Pop Score, Hants: Ashgate Publishing, 2002. [6] J. Briggs, Sounds French – Globalization, Cultural Communities & Pop Music 1958-1980, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.

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