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actual-changeling · 6 months

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Welcome back to Alex's unhinged meta corner - although today it is less unhinged and more of a watertight analysis.

What I am about to present you is something most people have probably already noticed, but it has been three months and I still lose my mind while going through the final fifteen frame by frame (which is a normal thing normal people like us do, right? right).

You literally cannot convince me my following meta is wrong, and the only person whose criticism I will accept on this post is Michael Sheen and Michael Sheen ONLY. If you're not Michael Sheen (hi Michael Sheen who probably has a secret tumblr account) then your guess is as good as mine, though again, I think mine is solid.

So.

We all love and hate Aziraphale's "I forgive you", but what I find even more painful is the fact that before that he almost said "I love you". Then he stops himself and changes it, and the amount of micro-expressions on his face as he makes that decision is my current cause of death.

Here's the clip as evidence #1, and while it can definitely support itself, let's dive into the pain a little more, shall we?

One important thing I noticed is that Aziraphale doesn't look at Crowley while he stutters his way through his initial reaction. He blinks up at him for a few frames before averting his eyes again and only holds eye contact after the almost-confession (from here on referred to as IL-).

This is Aziraphale holding eye contact with Crowley (left) vs. him looking away (right):

The frame on the left is from the I forgive you (IFY) part of the scene, the other one from right before IL-. If we go through the above clip little by little we will find that he avoids Crowley's face the entire time and his gaze slips further and further down, which I interpret as him overthinking/trying to come up with something to respond to this entire situation.

He is overwhelmed and surprised, caught between his two main desires: Crowley and being a Good Angel.

Combing through the frames, we can actually nail down exactly when Aziraphale first makes eye contact before the IL- and when he stops. Keep the above comparison in mind! The angle is slightly different because his chin is lower and he straightens up throughout the scene.

So! This is where he starts looking at Crowley:

And this is where he stops:

Hard to see? Let's zoom in on his eyes (numbers are the file names):

Now, you might ask me "Alex, this is all fine, although a bit insane, but why is any of this important?"

Because, fellow tumblr user and good omens enthusiast, I think that looking at Crowley is what changes his mind about what to say.

He doesn't look at him -> about to confess his feelings.

He looks at him -> says the absolutely worst possible thing.

Partly to hurt him because they're both lashing out at each other during this argument, but he looks at Crowley, looks at the person that just kissed him, that told him they could have been an us, that wants him and has always wanted him, screw everyone else.

He looks at Crowley and he wants to say l love you but then what? Once he says those words, he can't leave. He just can't.

We have to remember that they have existed within a complicated dance, a game that they have been playing for centuries without ever telling each other what that game actually is, what the rules are - because they couldn't. It was based entirely on trust and knowing the other person well enough to play it safe.

Crowley just flipped the playing board. Nothing is the way it should be, he is refusing to do their dance, refusing to play. He is looking at him and daring him to stop trying to put the pieces back on the board. The only thing neither of them has done yet is actually say I love you out loud.

Saying those words would mean stepping away from the playing board and acknowledging the room they have been playing in. It would mean saying fuck you to heaven, yes, but it would also force Aziraphale to finally define himself outside of the role he has been playing for both Crowley and heaven, and he isn't ready for that yet.

Additionally, there is the fear and/or knowledge (depending on what else the Metatron might have said or done that we did not see) that heaven will retaliate against him and Crowley if he disobeys them now, and he does not want to risk that either.

All that is what, in my opinion, happens in his head when he averts his eyes and interrupts himself. I do kinda what to make a whole different post about his facial expressions leading up to the IFY, so I will end this one with one more bit of pain.

Ready?

Firstly, the face he makes when he makes his decision.

Look at the tight line of his lips, the pain etched into his face, the pure pain in his eyes.

This is the face of someone who knows exactly how badly he is going to hurt Crowley and himself. This is an apology, an I'm sorry for what I'm about to do, this hurts me as much as it hurts you. I'm sorry but I have to.

And then he winces afterwards. I don't know about you, but this is exactly the kind of face I make when I'm emotionally torturing myself with my own thoughts. For the final blow, please look at the picture very, very closely, especially the last frame, because Aziraphale isn't just sorry and he isn't just in pain.

Aziraphale is scared because he knows* that he might lose Crowley over this. He knows that saying I forgive you is (almost) unforgivable. He KNOWS.

He does it anyway because he will lose Crowley either way but he'd rather have him alive and hating him than dead.

With that I am concluding today's unhinged meta corner, thank you for your attention and you're welcome for the pain.

Also: If you want to call me a 'tin hatter' or insane or otherwise make fun of me - this is very much a girl, what were YOU doing at the devil's sacrament moment because you read my meta post all the way to the end. <3

*authors note: what Aziraphale thinks he knows and what is actually real is not the same thing but that's a different post

#alex talks good omens #good omens #good omens meta #ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale #good omens season 2 #go2 #aziracrow #crowley x aziraphale #ineffable divorce #the final fifteen #good omens kiss #good omens 2 meta #no nightingales

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sunlightmurdock · 2 years

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Operation Apollo | Jake Seresin x Reader AU | Prologue

Masterlist | Next Chapter

Synopsis: After a threat is made against her life, the President’s grown up daughter gets her security tripled. Her long term detail is about to retire and needs replacing, only — she isn’t the easiest to work with. Ex-Navy and current Secret Service, Jake Seresin is devoted to being the best at everything he does. He isn’t going to let a bratty little girl cost him this job.

Warnings: age gap, power imbalance, enemies to lovers, danger and angst + eventual smut , minors dni, word count: about 4k

…

“Ex-Navy? — A pilot? — I mean… shouldn’t we be looking at someone with a little more ground experience?” Matthew frowns at the file. It’s the middle of the night, he’s sitting behind his desk still in his pyjamas, wishing that this could have waited until morning.

Wishing that he didn’t have to worry about this at all, actually.

“He’s good, Sir,” Matthew is reassured over the loudspeaker of the phone on his desk. “His last role was something similar to this. He has knowledge of what it will take and he’s good at what he does.”

Matthew rests his cheek against his fist, shaking his head softly, “He’s only thirty-four… I’d rather she had someone more experienced.”

“We were looking at candidates that will blend in with her friends a little better.” The man explains.

Matthew sighs and turns the page over. When his daughter was younger, back when Matthew was just a governor, he had told himself that he was doing all of this for you. To make you proud. To better your future. And now he’s here.

Looking through files at three in the morning because your security needs to be increased following a threat made against your life.

You were fifteen when he was elected the first time. Nineteen when he secured his second term.

He wasn’t doing it for you. He knows that. You’re a grown up now, you’re living on the other side of the country and you’re in danger because of him.

Matthew’s brows furrow as he looks over the file one more time. He swallows, nodding his head.

“Fine… sure. They’ll do. But Allen stays. At least a few more weeks.”

The man on the line pauses. Matthew knows that he’s being silently cussed out on the other end of the line but can’t bring himself to care.

Allen is your security detail and has been for the past seven years. He’s an ex-marine with over forty years of service under his belt. Only the best for Matthew’s little girl.

With all these new names coming in, it’ll be upsetting for you — you hates change and you hate having a detail. Allen’s the only one that has stuck the job in the entire seven years since Matthew was elected.

You aren’t going to like this. The least that Matthew can do to make it easier is to have Allen show your new details the ropes before he retires. He was supposed to retire last week, but Matthew just couldn’t let him — not with all of this going on.

He looks down at the file once more and flips it closed as the phone line clicks dead. He sighs tiredly and pushes up from his desk. He leaves the office and begins along the corridor. The curtains are all drawn, given the time of night, behind them sits three inches of bulletproof glasses. Every single window.

This is the place he chose to raise his family. This is the position he put them in. He opens the door to his bedroom just a crack, as to not let the light in and startle his wife. Matthew slips into bed next to her and presses his lips to her shoulder.

Martha stirs slightly and snuggles into her husband’s side. She’s used to calls in the middle of the night by now, she rarely asks at this point. If it’s important enough for her to know, he’ll tell her. Matthew lies awake at his wife’s side.

The information he holds is important. She should know. He should tell her. Their only daughter just had a serious threat made against her. She’s in danger. Matthew closes his eyes and lets out a deep breath. Telling her will just make her worry and worrying never did anyone any good.

Jake gets his orders in the middle of the night. He’s arriving in California by mid-morning. It all happens so quickly that Jake’s still thinking of how good the dinner his mother had made the night before was when he is picked up from their airport.

He was with his last family for three years. This is a big step up - people don’t usually get a chance like this when they have his kind of limited expertise. Jake’s palms sweat, and not because it’s June in Los Angeles. There’s AC blowing in his face that’s damn near chilling, but Jake still finds himself wiping the back of his hand over his brow.

“So you’re ex-navy, huh?” Manny asks. He’s part of the security team, he looks even younger than Jake does. Apparently he’s the same age. Jake has clearly had a tougher thirty-four years than this kid has.

Jake’s sitting in the passenger side of the SUV, being driven towards a house in the hills. He would rather get out and walk than answer this question, tell this story, all over again. He nods curtly.

“Yeah. For a bit before this.” Try eleven years. He enlisted the minute he was eighteen. He hadn’t ever wanted anything as badly as he had wanted to be a pilot.

Manny looks across at him and gestures to himself, “Ex-Marine.”

It isn’t surprising. Lots of vets move towards this kind of thing. Jake’s eyes land on the sign above the highway. He hasn’t been in California for four years now. Even when he was here before, he wasn’t ever anywhere like this. It’s easy enough to pretend that he’s somewhere else.

“Damn, she lives here?” Jake questions, turning the topic quickly away from their respective pasts as Manny turns the car towards a gate. He leans out of the driver’s side and types a passcode. 0000. Jake makes a mental note to get whoever set that fired.

“Mhm. The President bought it as a gift for the First Lady. Was just sitting out here empty.” Manny explains as the gate opens. He adjusts his sunglasses and the car drives on in. Jake looks around the property. He can imagine his sister’s pitch for this place already. Sprawling property in the LA hills with views and blah, blah, blah. He squints slightly.

It’s nice. It’s just not what he was expecting.

He doesn’t know exactly what he was expecting - a safe house sounds a little ridiculous when he thinks about it now - but this place doesn’t look like much of a hideout. Jake wonders if you’re aware of the seriousness of the situation. The gravity of the threat.

“Cool, right?” Manny asks as he stops the car at the top of the driveway. Jake looks across at him, and then back at the house. Jake doesn’t know much about real estate - that’s more his sister’s forte. It’s modern and covered in windows. Not the best place to keep someone who’s supposed to be hiding, he knows that much. He looks up at the house, and the way that each of its windows are all open.

Sure, there’s a fence around the perimeter, but when the passcode for the main gate is four zeroes, Jake’s already starting to doubt the efficiency of this operation. Still, he has been filled in plenty.

Allen O’Malley is running the show. He’s an expert, he has served almost ten presidential families. They talked about him in Jake’s training. Stopped two assassinations back in the nineties. Jake knows better than to come in and pretend he knows all of the ropes on the first day. He usually saves that kind of showing off for the second day.

He swings his duffel bag onto his shoulder and steps out of the car into the heat. He squints, bringing his hand up to shield his eyes as Manny grabs his other bag from the back of the car.

Jake’s features tighten slightly. Manny has the sense to stick his arm out and pass the bag to Jake. It’s a visible difference when Jake has it back in his grasp, his lips quirk up into a polite smile.

“Thanks, I got it.” Jake breathes out.

Manny gives him a nod. He has already made up his mind that Jake isn't going to last long around here if he’s touchy about small things like that. He smiles and shrugs his shoulders anyway, “No problem. But we’re a team around here, we help each other out.”

Jake follows him silently into the house. He looks around at tasteful furniture, long hallways, and hardwood floors. He lets Manny lead the way. Dining room on the right side, formal sitting room on the left. Kitchen just past the dining room, large entertaining space at the back. One bedroom downstairs.

“That’s Allen’s - he likes to be able to hear the door.”

Manny keeps walking through. He leads Jake onto a patio at the back of the house and walks over to the glass railing, leaning onto it with his palms. Jake’s brows furrow slightly as he follows Manny forwards. Sounds like a pool party, not like someone who just got a death threat.

Jake’s body tenses as he grows close enough to be able to see over the railing.

There’s Allen O’Malley. Sitting on the edge of a sun lounger with a phone pressed to his ear. He looks concerned, at least. That’s a good sign. And then there’s Apollo. The target. That’s your code name anyway.

You’re in the pool. Jake barely recognises you. You’ve been mostly out of the limelight for a couple of years now, hasn’t been in the news that much since you father’s last election. Well, not the kind of news that Jake keeps up with anyway. They usually use pictures of you as a kid when they talk about you in the news. America’s sweetheart and that kind of thing.

Jake watches as America’s sweetheart cranes her head back, opens her mouth and readily takes in a less than healthy share of rum.

There’s another girl standing by the edge of the pool pouring it into her mouth. Jake turns his head to look at Manny, frowning, “This is a joke, right?”

There are eight people around the pool, excluding you and Allen.

Jake’s jaw clenches. This is a code red situation. He was called in because this was serious. The big leagues, his chance to prove himself after — after the navy. He looks back at the pool, ignoring the r&b playlist alerting half of the hills that the princess is exactly where they thought she was.

Allen looks up and catches sight of the two young men on the patio. He mumbles something into the receiver and sets the phone down. Jake straightens up. There has to be an explanation for this shit.

“Seresin, good to finally meet ya,” Allen grins as he reaches the top of the stairs. Jake can’t help but notice the slight rattle as the man takes in a breath. He has to be nearing his mid-sixties by this point. Jake glances back towards the girl in the pool and imagines that she has probably given this guy a run for his money. “Folks in D.C. won’t shut up talking about you.”

Jake smiles. Flattery always helps Jake not want to tell someone they’re dogshit at their job. He reaches out and catches Allen’s hand, giving it a firm shake.

“You too, Sir - I’ve heard great things.”

“Come on, I’ll give you a tour of the place. We can talk,” Allen jerks his head and steps towards the front door. Jake does a double take. He has yet to stop sweating at this entire situation. He looks towards the giggling girl in the pool, then back at the man who is supposed to be protecting you.

“Shouldn’t -“ Jake wills himself to not rush into bossing his way around. He exhales. “Should she be out here on her own?”

Allen chuckles knowingly, then shakes his head. He turns towards the house, clearly expecting Jake to follow. Jake turns his neck and looks at Manny.

Manny adjusts his sunglasses, “I’ve got it.”

Jake pauses. There are eight people down by the pool. There’s one of him and he’s nowhere near you. Not close enough to intervene. This isn’t how things are done. Jake considers him lucky. His last placement showed him how things were done. He was the security detail for a congressman. The senior agents there showed him exactly how the job should be done.

Not like this.

Still, Jake has let his ego get the best of him before, and he’s still paying the price for that today. He shrugs his duffel bag closer to his body and follows after Allen.

“I’ll take you up to your room first, let you drop your stuff off.”

Jake can feel his heartbeat in his throat as he tries to keep his mouth shut. He thinks back to the Navy. To basic training. To the cocky kid who learned to shut his mouth once. He can keep it shut now.

Jake’s room is next to yours. That’s good. He feels better with that knowledge. Manny’s going to be right down the hall. Allen’s got downstairs covered. That’s good.

Jake drops his bags onto the bed.

His room has an en-suite and a shared balcony with your room. Jake pushes the sliding door open and steps out onto it. It overlooks the pool. He isn’t interested in that. His shoes are silent on the concrete ground of the balcony as he steps towards your door. His hands nudge out, fingertips grazing over the frame of the door. He brushes the locking mechanism on the outside.

Jake bites his cheek as he takes the lock between his index finger and thumb and pushes at it. It creaks. A little more pressure and he would be able to snap it clean off. He turns to find Allen leaning against the doorframe.

“Shit show, isn’t it?” He mutters.

Jake’s brows raise slightly. He knows better than to agree.

“She’s safe here, I want you to know that.” Allen explains. Jake remains stoic. Allen’s surprised at how accurate the descriptions of Jake were. He’s exactly like they said he would be. Careful. Hiding something.

“I’ve kept her safe since she was fifteen years old,” Allen announces. Jake has no idea how. He glances back down towards the pool at the sound of a scream. You look like you’re having the time of your life. You still haven’t noticed him. “We might not do it like they do in D.C. but she’s a kid, not a president. I’ll run you through it all.”

Jake sits on the chair on the balcony and listens. Allen chain smokes as he runs Jake through the rules. The rattle between each of his breaths tells Jake everything he needs to know. They did things differently in the eighties, Jake tries not to question it. Allen’s tall and foreboding enough. But his shoulders are starting to slouch and his greys take away the edge Jake knows he once had.

Even with everything he has seen so far, Jake likes Allen. Allen’s a Clint Eastwood type of guy, white lines between his wrinkles - he has plenty around his brows and the corners of his eyes. Lots of angry frowning through the years.

It’s a long story, hearing all about the years you’ve spent with Allen watching over you. Allen seems to have it down to an art.

Breakfast she’s not always awake for. You should remind her to have something. Jake frowns.

Lunch she always fixes herself. Dinner I always fix, we usually all eat together.

Jake can’t keep the sour look off of his face. He glances down at the holster on Allen’s hip, and the empty space where his gun should be. When he was put on a private jet at three o’ clock this morning, Jake hadn’t realized he was stepping into an emergency nannying position.

Another scream from behind him. He looks back. It’s nothing.

We get threats like this pretty often. That might be so, but this time they’ve chosen to increase her security - that hasn’t happened since you went off to college. Jake read your file. It’s in his bag.

She gets it. She’s kind of just saying goodbye to her friends. From tonight we’ll be implementing a curfew, house goes into lockdown after ten.

Jake’s lips quirk up in disbelief. He cannot believe what he’s hearing. Allen watches the smirk develop on Jake’s features.

“A curfew?” Jake asks it politely enough, but they both know that he’s mocking the idea. There are people actively planning to hurt you. The house should be on twenty four seven lockdown. He looks back down at the little pool party happening behind him.

“It’s what works for us.” Allen insists calmly, bringing his lighter up to the cigarette between his lips. He lights it and puffs. Jake wonders how the hell this guy passes his physicals.

Jake rests his fist against his temple and listens to the rest. He bites the inside of his cheek and realizes that Allen’s on an incredible salary for the babysitting work he has been doing. They sit upstairs on the balcony for over an hour. Allen smokes maybe five cigarettes in that time.

“So, I’ll leave you to get unpacked. I’ll sit the kid down in a bit and you two can get acquainted.”

Jake waits until he can see Allen by the side of the pool until he feels like he’s actually alone. He considers getting out now. Begging to be reassigned. Saying that it’s too painful to be back here.

He unzips his bag and stares at the contents. He can grab his stuff and start unpacking, or he can zip it back up and hightail it the hell out of here. If he leaves you with these idiots, if you die, it’s going to be all over the news. He’s going to be seeing that headline every day for the rest of his life and knowing that he did nothing to stop it.

Jake takes a deep breath and pulls his shirts from the bag. He moves about unpacking meticulously. He’s been moving around for his entire adult life now, he’s good at this kind of thing.

“Hi.”

Jake’s crouching at the bottom drawer of his dresser, folding shorts away. He turns his head, met with painted toenails and wet legs, dripping on the hardwood floor. Jake’s eyes trail up. He’s in no rush. It takes him a while to meet your eyes.

You’re leaning against his doorframe, arms folded over your chest, still wet from the pool and in a tiny bikini. The news definitely needs to update the pictures it uses.

Jake stands upright and sticks his hand out. “Jake Seresin. Good to meet you.”

You smile as you take his hand. His grip is firm and his hands are warm. You wonder what the hell your father was thinking, sending you this practical underwear model. Jake watches you look him up and down. He pushes his hands into his pockets.

“You enjoy your party?” Jake teases. Waiting to see if you apologise. If you know better. You should, your file says you’re smart. You look like any other spoiled rich bitch to Jake.

You hum and shrug your shoulders, “I’ve been to better.”

His brows raise slightly.

“We’re going out tonight. You should come, see the city.”

Jake stares at you. He hopes that this is a joke, that Allen put you up to this to test him. The look on your face tells him that it isn’t a joke.

It takes Jake a moment to answer. You know you’ve ruffled his feathers already. You cross your arms tighter over your chest. You turn away from him. Knowing that he will follow. Also knowing that the back of the bikini is just as nice to look at as the front.

“You heard what Allen said,” Jake shakes his head as he follows you along the hallway. He glances down and notices the movement of your hips. There’s no way in hell that you aren’t doing that on purpose. Sticking your ass out, swaying your hips side to side slightly with each step. Droplets of water on the small of your back, still wet from the pool. Jake ignores you. “You can’t go out right now.”

You stop walking and round on him abruptly. Most of the other guys would have run right into you with the speed that you just stopped, but Jake stops about a foot away. Quick reflexes. Your lips quirk up and then you’re looking up at him sweetly.

“Look, Jack-“

“Jake.” He corrects you firmly.

It’s like a tennis match. You testing him. Him biting back. You’re pleased enough with his reaction. You were waiting to see if he was that type. A lot of the time, staff are too worried about being disrespectful to correct you. Not him. He isn’t as pliant as most.

“Jake,” You correct yourself, smiling. His poker face is almost as good as his reflexes. You take one step closer to him, he lets it happen and doesn’t show any sign of weakness. Not one crack. Cool as ever. “I’ve been playing this game for a very long time.”

Jake watches you. His brows raise slightly as he waits for you to finish your little speech. He isn’t going to be swayed by a skimpy bikini on his first day. Although he has to admit, he hadn’t been expecting to see so much of the president’s daughter so soon - you’re always dressed pretty conservatively in the magazines.

His eyes don’t falter, locked on yours. What a professional.

“This kind of thing happens all the time,” Your shoulders rise and fall in a soft shrug, Jake notices the way your breasts move with them in his peripheral. His eyes remain locked on yours. He has seen plenty of tits in his life time, and great as they all were - not one pair was worth pissing off the president for. You tilt your head. “Eleven times in seven years, actually. I’m still alive. So, if you need me, I’ll be at the Chateu.”

Jake crosses his arms in front of his hips, holding onto his wrist. He watches you turn away from him and walk over to your closet.

“Are you saying you break your curfew on purpose?” He’s still calm as he asks. Well, calm on the outside. Internally, he’s cursing the shit show that he knows he has just been thrown into the middle of. The moment you disappear into the closet, he closes his eyes and grits his teeth.

Jake was told that Allen was good at his job. That he was just about the only one who had gotten you to behave. Now, Jake realizes, he hadn’t ever gotten you to settle down - he had just taught you how to do it under the radar.

“You know that that curfew’s in place to keep you alive, right?” Jake asks.

Your fingers curl around the doorframe of the closet, you pull forwards just enough to peek your head out. Jake notices the lack of fabric around your neck and realizes that you’re topless but just about hidden.

You grin at him.

“What are you gonna do? - Tell my Daddy on me?”

Allen stands at the kitchen island downstairs with fresh parsley in his hands. He makes eye contact with Manny across the counter. They listen to the sound of raised voices upstairs.

“Fuck.” Manny sighs as he closes the lid to his laptop. Allen grins at him across the counter, dropping the herb onto the chopping board and rubbing his hands together.

“Cough up. You owe me twenty.” Allen chuckles.

Manny shakes his head as he digs into his pocket for his wallet. He really thought that this new guy was going to last longer. He checks the time on his watch before handing Allen a twenty dollar bill.

Under three hours. That’s got to be a record.

There’s arguing for about six minutes before it stops abruptly. Jake comes walking down the stairs about two minutes after that. Manny and Allen pretend not to know that Jake just got himself fired.

“What happened?” Allen asks gently, not looking up from preparing dinner. He hopes that Jake didn’t get too much unpacking done.

Jake shakes his head as he moves to join the two of them at the kitchen island.

“That girl needed a reality check.” Jake explains. Manny presses a hand over his mouth. Jake’s oblivious. “I just told her how it’s going to be from now on. The rules around here have to change — we aren’t her babysitters.”

Manny and Allen nod along silently.

Jake feels confident in what he said. You needed to be set straight, he did that. He’s confident that if you follow his rules, the two of you will get along just fine. Allen’s counting down the minutes.

It’s sixteen minutes before a hidden number is flashing up on Jake’s homescreen, his phone buzzing with each ring. Jake’s brows furrow slightly as he picks up, pressing the phone to his ear.

“Jacob Seresin?”

“Speaking.” Jake answers calmly.

“Please hold for the President.”

Jake’s eyes widen. He glances across at Allen. There’s no way you just told your Dad on him for being mean to you.

…

Tags:

@alanadetigy @thedroneranger @momc95 @basicchelsea @perpetuelledaydreaming @cherrycola27 @mak-32

#jake seresin au #jake seresin smut #jake hangman seresin #Jake Seresin #jake seresin x you #jake seresin x reader #jake seresin imagine #hangman #hangman x reader #hangman x y/n #glen powell #operation apollo

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bunglegaydogs · 8 months

Text

dazais plan

quick little ramble one

well this wont be quick

anyways

im fucking torn apart after the newest episode, because ive not been able to watch it until now because ive been busy.

anyways.

i am in shambles.

i know it sounds like wishful thinking, but i genuinely do think dazai has a plan. of course he does; asagiri isnt going to kill him off just like that without any good reason. unless there is a completely valid, reasonable, sound explanation, then no, i really dont think asagiri will kill dazai. there are too many unanswered questions, too many shut down paths should that happen. it'll pretty much tip the balance of the narrative slightly, shift the story. idk. anyways.

my point is, dazai cant die here. not like this. just like chuuya said when they fought lovecraft. this is not the place to die. they still have so much left to do together. he cant possibly leave him here now. not without a plan.

i just like to keep referring back to the lovecraft fight; "when have my tactics ever been wrong?"

this gives us a pretty clear indication that dazai's plans almost always follow through. we've seen instances where, no, they haven't. oda. 55 minutes. some parts of fifteen.

but these are all extreme cases. he could do nothing about oda, because he didnt know of moris involvement/plan. he could do nothing about oda, because oda had already made his mind up. he could do nothing about oda, because it was too late.

he could do nothing about gab, because gab had been changing the outcome of the entire thing using time travel; dazais no exception to that. if gab knows that dazai knows what he will do, he goes back in time and now knows that dazai knows what he will do, and can therefore get the jump on dazai, who is still in the stage of not knowing what gab knows. confusing lmao.

ANYWAYS SORRY.

my point is, only in the extreme cases where everything is doomed to fail from the start do dazai's plans fall through.

this is an extreme case where dazai's plan NEEDS to come through. it cannot crumble. the literal fate of the world depends on the agencys next moves, and they have to be careful and cautious of/about them. because, should they make one wrong move, everything's fucked.

and, that's the beauty of soukoku. the raw trust.

honestly, trust doesn't even put it into words.

it doesn't do their bond any justice. because it's so much more than that. they rely on each other, they exist within one another. they literally are one soul in two bodies. they exist WITH each other. there's no chuuya without dazai, and there's no dazai without chuuya. so, asagiri will not put chuuya into a world or a plan without dazai there, because they need each other. they need each other to be alive and well and fine. they need each other to pull through this, each playing their roles.

i dont know what kind of wack ass plan dazai has in mind. but i hope to god it comes through soon.

i think the anime really did ch 101 such a good fucking justice; something about that scene was so raw, so emotional, so beautiful. the colours, the expressions, the movements. i've always said this, but soukoku is like a private thing. whenever they're involved, it always seems like you're intruding on their moment. this is theirs. this isn't for the eyes of anybody else. the lack of music and the softness about the dead apple scene, the unity and trust and reliance in the lovecraft fight, the playful back and forth bickering when they rescue q, or at any other moment.

each and every moment between these two is something so special, so foreign and so delicate. like a glass flower. it's so beautiful, and it pulls you in. but you know better than to touch it so carelessly; you must handle it with care and attention. everything about this is important. each small glare, each tiny dent. each little glint in the light, each sharp edge, each smooth side. all of it is worth looking at, and all of it means something. even the most insignificant parts of it have a role to play in making it look so beautiful.

and that's what i think is so fascinating about soukoku. every small interaction, every dynamic, every word spoken between them; it all means something. even their stupid bickering. even their harsh glares. it's all important.

i may be rambling, but god idk. something about soukoku just makes me feral i guess.

the soft moments between soukoku are definitely my favourites.

dazai catching chuuya's falling body out of the sky, and laughing quietly about how he wants to doodle on his face. there's something so childlike and innocent, so pure about that. they get to be the kids they never got the be around each other. they get to relax, unwind. they get to live easy, and breathe easier when they're around each other.

the one panel of dazai gently holding chuuyas head as he rests in his lap. dazai gently cupping chuuyas cheek, nullifying corruption and taking away the absurd amounts of pain that chuuyas in. just in their own little bubble. quiet whispers. something about the way dazai makes no comment when chuuya collapses onto his lap once more, eager to let him rest. something about the way he smiles at him when he's not looking. something about the way he talks to others about him. something about the little comments he makes, without even mentioning chuuya's name, and everyone knows its about him (everyone being us ofc). something about the privacy of their partner/relationship, nobody else knowing the details. nobody else knowing how deep that trust runs between them. nobody.

it's just theirs. their little thing to have with each other. it's only theirs, and nobody can take it away from them.

not even asagiri.

because how can you rip someone's soul apart?

how do you kill half of a single soul?

anyways. im very tired. its half 4 in the morning right now, and im just so out of my mind and sad but happy about soukoku, and how much i fucking love them and their dynamic and could talk about them for hours. genuinely, it feels like i blacked out writing this, i just get out of hand and start going on and on and on and getting more fucking metaphorical as i go.

anyways, hope you enjoyed LMAO have a lovely day/night, wherever you are <3

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jasper-the-menace · 2 months

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Hey, since you're interested in scorpion biology, I thought you'd be interested in the idea of... intersex Chima scorpions! Well, sort of.

There's a specific character that's been bugging me a bit. Scutter is kind of the scorpion equivalent of a centaur; he has two torsos, one anthropomorphic, and another of the scorpion body. With scorpion anatomy in mind, it's easy to reach the conclusion that Scutter's reproductive organ would be heavily altered because of his body, making him intersex to a certain extent.

I hope this makes sense. I'm trying to look for possible trans rep in Chima characters (like in this example). What do you think of this idea?

Oh friend, you don't know the essay you just inspired.

You Opened This Can Of Worms, Now Lie In It

Some important bulletpoints before I get going, just to get all of my followers on the same page:

Disclaimer: I am a transgender nonbinary perisex individual. This means I am not intersexed (to my knowledge), I don't identify with the gender I was assigned at birth, and I don't identify as male or female. The closest thing to describing my gender is literally "no".

I am a strong advocate for making as many characters transgender as possible, regardless of "realism". That's why, in my own writing, half of the Scorpions are retroactively transgender (though they don't understand gender on the whole and most of them would probably be nonbinary if someone took fifteen minutes to explain gender, variable social constructs, and the concept of genitalia tying to gender roles) and also Razar is too on account of I said so.

Being intersexed does not inherently mean being transgender. There is a lot of discussion and individual choice between intersexed people about whether or not they're part of the queer community. It's a very individual thing, and I am not part of those discussions on account of not being intersex myself.

When it comes to humans and other beings with a level of sentience and sapience, the term "hermaphrodite" and its derivates are considered slurs. When talking about animals, hermaphrodite and its derivates are scientific terms. So in something like the Legends of Chima series and other humanoid-animal media, the proper term is "intersexed". (I noticed you used the term "intersex" in your ask, and I appreciate it!)

I know too much about scorpion mating and birth.

We're talking way too much about genitalia and gender tonight in regards to fictional characters.

I am genuinely delighted that you decided to drop in here to discuss this, because boy howdy do I have a lot of thoughts about transgender headcanons/representation and scorpions specifically! Scorpions are just. So damn cool.

Note for my fellow arachnophobes: There are no images attached to this post, but it's really easy to find videos of scorpions doing various things on YouTube, which is actually how I've been studying them.

Scorpion Sex, Mating, and Genitalia

Scorpions of both "genders" have genital opercula (singular: genital operculum), and their asses run up into their tails. In order to mate, they don't just do like horses. No no, buddy, they have a really weird, specific method!

In order to start wooing his potential mate, the male scorpion will lock chelae (pincers) with the female scorpion, and they will start to "dance". The male scorpion will drop a sperm packet onto the ground and lead the female scorpion over it. If the female scorpion is down, she'll basically squat and absorb the sperm packet into her body, which is then followed by a "mating plug" to keep it in while it does the fertilization thing.

(It's important to note that the courting process also contains "juddering", aka the male scorpion doing the dance that the stickbug meme did, and may also contain clerchical "kisses". Honestly, pretty romantic for an arachnid. And possibly tail-rubbing and sexual stinging. Scorpions are very kinky!)

(It's also important to note that some species of scorpions have been reported, though not reliably, to reproduce through parthogenesis.)

Post-coitus cannibalism has not been scientifically seen in scorpions, so the male scorpion is generally safe as long as he scadoodles.

Gestation in some scorpion species can last over a year, and different species can have anywhere from 2 to 100 little scorplings - the physical size of the scorpion is not necessarily tied to how many babies they'll have.

Also, scorpions give live birth!

The baby scorpion is essentially folded like a Fedex package and launched out of the womb. It will then unfold and climb on top of the mother to make way for its next sibling. These will hang onto the mother until their first molt, which happens as a group and launches them into the juvenile stage. After this, they will still stay with their mothers until their carapace finishes hardening and gaining color, at which point they hunt prey on their own and will wander off on their own terms.

Hey, Jasper, That's Pretty Fucked Up, But How Does This Tie Into Chima?

I'm getting there, hold your centaur scorpions!

This is where we get into the worldbuilding of the Legends of Chima series, the Character Encyclopedia, and our poor boy Scutter.

See, the Legends of Chima as a series is very much a product of its time. There is some rife ableism and questionable word choices in regards to the Crawlers (and Sir Fangar, but this isn't about him). According to the Character Encyclopedia, Scutter is "less evolved". There's a looong history of racism in using phrases like "evolution" in regards to other humans, so taking that and applying it to an animal world leaves us with some very strange dissonance, because it's used in Chima to mean animals turned into a more humanoid form by the Chi.

Because really, what is the Chi? It's a magical substance that, depending on how you read it, could be the animist spirit of the land (I say, as an animist myself), or it could be drugs. Or it could be any number of other things! I know one person who writes Chi as the blood of dead gods, which is metal as fuck!

Ultimately, it depends on how one is writing the Chi that makes the usage of phrases like "less evolved" more or less questionable than it was intended. We're all dragging around the corpse of a Lego theme across our writing desks anyway. And the way I go about answering the question of "what is Chi" is definitely different from others. (Again, see the dead god blood part.)

The question of whether or not the Scorpion Tribe, namely Scutter, would count as intersexed relies on 1) defining intersexuality in regards to genitalia arrangement (scorpions don't have penises and vaginas by default; and the Wikipedia article on scorpions just uses "genital orfice" or "genital opercula"); 2) determining if the Chi has magically changed how genitalia works for Scorpions (admittedly, I do this because I didn't want to have to use the term "genital opercula" over and over); 3) determining the humanization extent of the Scorpion Tribe as you write them (I lean more towards human than you do, just from what I've seen of your work); and 4) deciding if such terminology even exists in Chima.

But looking at Scutter and going with the assumption that the back end is fully scorpion... No, I wouldn't count him as intersex by default. Intersex implies landing between the two human biological extremes (which, as we all know, is not as cut-and-dry as high school biology taught us), when really he's kind of a secret third thing (a Scorpion who probably doesn't have either a penis or a vagina).

(Of course, there's also what you said, paraphrased to my own wording: the Chi may have just decided to fuck up this poor man's genital situation and do a half-ass job.)

That's not to say he can't be trans. I mean, I made Scorm and about half of the Scorpion Tribe trans already. That's also not to say they're not all trans by default, considering scorpions without the ability to think wouldn't have the concepts of genders anyway.

Okay Jasper, So How Do You Write Him?

So, here's the thing. I'm aromantic-asexual, and I also write smut and, to a lesser extent, romance, which means I think about fictional character genitalia too much. But thinking about Scutter has left me utterly baffled.

On one hand, I usually write the Chi as a magical animist force of the land of Chima on the whole, and part of that is that the Chi tries to get everyone on the same playing field, physically speaking, which is how we get retroactive transgender man Scorm in my Tales of Chima series.

On the other hand, look at him. Look at him. He's a centaur arachnid. I know he can pass the Harkness Test, but I still feel weird thinking about his genitalia. If I go with my theory of the Chi giving everyone penises and vaginas at random, then I don't want to think about how much that would get in the way for the poor boy! On the other hand, his lower body is still mostly scorpion instead of, well, Scorpion, so who's to say he doesn't have a genital operculum?

Too Long, Don't Want Details About Scorpion Sex

Alright, spoilsport. Here's your TLDR:

It genuinely depends on what the Chi does in your version of the story and how bad it fucks up. It depends on how dedicated you are to scientific accuracy. It depends on how much you want to think about scorpion genitals.

And being intersex is not necessarily trans rep, unless it is, unless it isn't. I'm not intersexed, so I'm not going to say what that falls on myself. There is an intersex pride flag that was created by Morgan Carpenter in 2013.

Trans characters can exist outside of being intersexed, you don't have to conflate the two in order to have transgender representation. Just hit the characters with the Transgenderinator 5000 Beam. Fuck realism, this is a series about walking talking animal people. Who's going to stop you? The fun police? Transphobes? Eat them.

Further Reading

Start at Wikipedia and go from there through its sources for anything of particular interest:

Intersex flag (in case you're curious about it and its history, which can also launch you into further reading about humans being intersex)

Scorpion (morphology section)

Scorpion (mating subsection)

Scorpion (birth and development subsection)

So, uh, yeah! Thanks for coming to me with these questions, it's really touching that you value my thoughts this much, and I love talking about my boys and scorpions and the complicated web! I apologize for any errors or too-crass sections, because I wrote most of this in one sitting after playing wayyy too much Skyrim today.

~Jasper

#answered #olivescales3 #legends of chima #lego legends of chima #lego chima #chima #scutter #loc scutter #scorpions #science #biology #queer #trans #transgender #intersex

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a-queer-seminarian · 5 months

Note

Hey Avery, I love this blog and the binary-breakers blog. They’ve both been a great help to me as I reconstruct my faith. But I’m struggling with something: my fiancé and I are scheduled to light an advent candle during the Sunday morning service at his church. Initially I was really looking forward to it, but by chance I was curious about how old Mary was when she bore Jesus, and when I looked it up I learned she could have been anywhere from 13-16. Moreover, some traditions put Joseph as being much, much older. It’s just hard not to think in a very . . . sinister direction when considering that context, especially as far as God’s role in this is concerned. What did you learn about this topic in seminary, if anything? Is there any hope that my “problematic” interpretation is unnecessary/invalid?

Hi there! I think it's lovely y'all are going to light an advent candle tomorrow, and I hope it's a meaningful experience! I also totally get your dismay about Mary's age at Jesus's birth.

To start with the facts: yes, Mary was almost certainly a teenager when betrothed to Joseph. The Bible doesn't give any confirmation of her age, but in both ancient Jewish culture and Roman culture, girls were usually married off not too many years after they started menstruating.

When it comes to Joseph's age, I do have some slightly relieving news — he's unlikely to have been the old man he's often depicted as in medieval art. (I actually had a fascinating conversation on this topic with queer Catholic art historian Amy Neville on my podcast that you can read or listen to here!) He almost certainly would have been older than Mary, but it's uncertain how much older.

In ancient Jewish culture, the "ideal" marriage was actually one between a man and a woman who were both in their teens, with an expectation that a man marry by age 20. Being able to support a wife & kids was a key indicator of manhood, so men were expected to get married as young as they could. But in practice, it was more common for men to marry in their late 20s / by age 30, which does mean that their wives would often be a good ten or fifteen years younger than they were.

The Bible doesn't tell us what age Joseph was when he and Mary were betrothed, but it's unlikely he was older than 30, just as it's unlikely she was older than 18.

So maybe that's not quite as discomfiting as the image of a much older Joseph, but by our modern standards, it's still pedophilia. So what do we make of that? And what did God think of that??

I believe it is an act of faith to be troubled by elements of scripture that should be troubling, rather than shrugging them off as being "God's will" just because they're in the Bible. I highly recommend Rachel Held Evans' book Inspired on this topic, which has a whole chapter on grappling with difficult biblical texts (you can read a long passage from it here).

While exploring our emotions and giving them holy space, it is also important to accept that biblical cultures are two thousand or more years old — the ancient world had completely different understandings of morality from us. That doesn't mean we shrug off displays of sexism or xenophobia in scripture — bigotry is bigotry, whether an ancient iteration or what we have today — but learning about biblical cultures enriches our understanding of why certain things, like slavery or women having little say in whom they marry, are present in the Bible (and often completely taken for granted by its human authors). It can help us distinguish between what is truly God-ordained, versus what the humans writing down their experience of God presume is God-ordained.

I appreciate how womanist theologian Wil Gafney explores the complexity of appreciating the Bible as an ancient human text while looking for Divine truth "between the lines":

“There is liberation in the gospel even though it is sometimes obscured by the structures of power that benefit from holding people captive. There is also a story in and between the lines of and behind the text we hold so dear that points to a liberation that not even the authors and editors of scripture were able to see clearly or, see their way to record.

Jesus was a rabbi, he would have never wanted us to cling to the letters and syntax of these texts as though they were his very body and blood but rather, his spirit and the Spirit of God, blow through them, ruffling and disturbing them and permitting us to read new truths in and out of them and, not lose sight of the ancient stories that are also part of our shared heritage."

___

When it comes to Mary's young age when betrothed to Joseph and approached by Gabriel to request her "yes" to carrying God's child, your question of God's "role" in that is a vital one to ask.

In Mary's world, a woman without a kyrios, a man to be her protector, was in a very precarious position. Mary has to be betrothed to someone in her teens. We don't know whether God "approves" of this cultural practice, but we can see how God works within this custom to ensure Mary's security throughout her life:

when Joseph plans to divorce her after she becomes pregnant with Jesus, God sends an angel to persuade him to stick by her;

when Jesus is dying on the cross, he ensures that his beloved will protect Mary after he's gone.

Throughout scripture, God largely seems to operate within a people's cultural expectations (with key exceptions, like how God insists Their people treat foreigners the same as members of the group, or when God warns against giving the people a king just because that's what all the other nations have). That's what I see here. Mary must have a husband to be secure in her culture, and I imagine God ensuring that that husband will be one who will treat her well.

Then there's the question of God espousing Mary — of the Holy Spirit "overshadowing" her so that she conceives Jesus. What exactly is this "overshadowing" act? Why is God getting a teen girl pregnant?

Again, Rev. Wil Gafney provides words that wrestle out the good news with this complexity. When reading Luke 1, she urges us to sit with our distress at the image of a powerful "male" figure (Gabriel) approaching a teen girl to tell her what's going to happen to her body:

"Sit with me in this moment, this uncomfortable moment, before rushing to find proof of her consent, or argue that contemporary notions of consent do not apply to ancient texts, or God knew she’d say yes so it was prophetic, or contend that (human) gender does not apply to divine beings, Gabriel or God, and the Holy Spirit is feminine anyway. Hold those thoughts and just sit in the moment with this young woman."

Our distress is holy; it shows our connection to a fellow human being, our thirst for justice. Honor what you feel, don't discard your emotions, even while you join them to sociohistorical understanding.

I highly recommend you read Gafney's whole article, but here's a little more from it that balances ancient culture with modern ethics:

"Yet in a world which did not necessarily recognize her sole ownership of her body and did not understand our notions of consent and rape, this very young woman had the dignity, courage, and temerity to question a messenger of the Living God about what would happen to her body before giving her consent. That is important. That gets lost when we rush to her capitulation. Before Mary said, “yes,” she said, “wait a minute, explain this to me.” ... Did the Ever-Blessed Virgin Mary say, “me too?” Perhaps not. A close reading shows her presumably powerless in every way but sufficiently empowered to talk back to the emissary of God, determine for herself, and grant what consent she could no matter the power of the One asking. And yet in that moment after being told by someone else what would happen to her body, she became not just the Mother of God, but the holy sister to those of us who do say, “Me too.” "

Because Mary was a teen girl, an impoverished Palestinian Jew living under empire, she can extend solidarity to people across all time who experience similar oppression, whose bodily autonomy is equally precarious. Just as her son, God in human flesh, extends solidarity to all who have ever been arrested or executed under an unjust state through his crucifixion. Divine power is expressed in and through those whom the world denigrates and discards — that's why God chose Mary, and why Mary in turn chose God.

Sorry this got so long and has a lot of complex stuff to wrestle with. I honor your courage to ask the hard questions, and I hope you are able to take time throughout Advent to keep pondering! There are no easy answers, but wrestling can yield a blessing.

#mary tag #advent #annunciation #reading and studying the Bible

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swbumblebee · 2 years

Text

Personally, I don’t think grown up Anakin and Qui-Gon would get on, at all. Qui-Gon’s expectations seem ridiculously high and I imagine he’d find Anakin lacking in control and temperament. And Anakin’s need to be constantly informed and in the loop with plans and decisions just wouldn’t work with Master “The force told me too” and “Ask for forgiveness rather than permission” and I think would lead to a lot of bitterness.

With this in mind, here’s a Snippet Of Nothing about what, or rather who, they do have in common:

One would think, having one’s beloved Master return from the Force fifteen years after the fact would be amazing, wonderous, and the answer to all of life’s problems.

And it was, at first. Obi-Wan Kenobi (once he had regained consciousness after a slightly embarrassing fainting spell) had wasted no time picking up where he’d left off, relishing in the more experienced Master’s wisdom and knowledge. Their rhythm had been slightly off for a short while certainly, but it stabilised as they both adapted to their new roles; not as Master and Padawan but as colleagues and friends. Qui-Gon’s steady presence at his back once again bolstering Obi-Wan in times of need.

It was similar for most of the other Jedi who had known Qui-Gon, and some who hadn’t; Despite his eccentricities and dislike of explaining his reasoning, most recognised a man who had much to offer the order and were happy to have him back once again.

Some, but not all.

It had been a very disappointing moment for Obi-Wan when he witnessed Anakin and Qui-Gon, the two most important people in his life, seem to mutually come to the decision that they were incompatible. An unstoppable force and an immovable object.

It happened gradually: the first few times they all met Obi-Wan had been delighted to simply sit and watch them be enthralled with each other, basking in their lineage’s completeness. But little by little, over the course of a couple of shared missions and many shared meals, it became clear that it was not going to be the partnership of the Councils dreams and instead devolved into snaping and pettiness as they lost patience with each other’s completely opposing viewpoints and styles.

It was a real shame, because as two of the most skilled and powerful members of the order, it made a lot of sense to pair them as mission partners.

With a buffer, of course.

And so, Obi-Wan Kenobi now had two fully grown Jedi to babysit and keep out of trouble on a regular basis…

“We need to stop at Samutis”

“Why? We don’t have time.”

“The Force wills it, young one. We will stop”

“No we won’t! You can’t just-“

Obi-Wan shook his head at his smug Master and irritated former student for about the millionth time as he crossed the hanger.

“Anakin” he barked. “Get in the ship. And you” he turned his ire on his old mentor “Stop winding him up” he scolded.

The older man opened his mouth to argue and Obi-Wan simply held up a hand.

“We will stop if you can come up with a flight plan that means we get there with enough time” he compromised.

Compromising and adapting seemed to be all he did these days, constantly trying to balance the two large personalities out and disappearing into the middle ground.

It was exhausting. And so incredibly frustrating.

“Something has to be done Mace, I can’t go on like this!” he whined into his rapidly disappearing second pint. The other Council Member gave him a sympathetic look from across their usual table in the Happy Tankard.

“You’re doing so well” his friend reassured him tipsily. “They’re just – they’re just different, they’ll come around. They just need something to bond over.”

Obi-Wan snorted.

“They most cert – certainly will not” he retorted. “They’re completely, completely different on everything.” He grumbled taking another swig of his ale. “Though once they did agree on how much they hated my plan. That was a nice moment I suppose” he added thoughtfully.

Mace arched an eyebrow.

“Did that plan happen to involve you? Maybe…in danger?”

“Well, I suppose, why?” The younger Jedi thought for a moment.

His irritating friend just shook his head.

“Classic Kenobi” he said with a sigh.

“Oh shut up.”

---

The busy Master didn’t get the chance to think on his friend’s words before he was once again on a mission with his two favourite pains in the ass, and it had once again, gone sideways.

“m’fine” he managed to rattle out between chattering teeth as the clone medic he’d been leaning on passed him to a comrade who continued all but dragging him to the medical tent. “Legs are jus’ a bit wobbly” he tried to explain as he shivered in his freezing wet clothes.

“No Sir, you’ve been shot twice.” the medic corrected him in a long-suffering tone.

“Hmm?” Shot? Then why was he so wet? And cold?

“You’ll be fine sir, just stay with me.”

The moment Kix got hold of him Obi-Wan felt himself getting more and more distant from the situation, noises and feelings happening around him as he floated above it all on The Good Drugs.

“Where is he?”

“What happened?”

And then two familiar voices cut through the haze.

“Sirs I need you to be calm he’s-“

“Obi-Wan!”

“Master!”

“M’fine” he mumbled quietly into his lovely soft pillow. “M’ok.” He tried to prop himself up to look at the two worried faces in front of him, but it was terribly difficult.

“Jus’ tired” he reassured them.

“He was shot off a gun tower and into a frozen lake” someone explained in clipped, unhappy tones. Obi-Wan turned baleful eyes on Kix.

“Wasn’ my fault” he muttered.

“I know Sir.” Kix gave him a gentle pat on the leg. He turned to Anakin and Qui-Gon, now crowding the room. “I’ll be right outside. Do not, under any circumstances, agitate him” the chief medic instructed sternly.

“They’d better go then” Obi-Wan mumbled, smiling a little at his joke and simultaneously waving a clumsy hand to beckon them closer.

“Obi-Wan-“

“Master-“

He patted the hand he now appeared to be holding.

“S’alright, you’re allowed.” The hand was squeezing his now. “Brilliant” he attempted to explain. They were so brilliant.

He tried to look at them but the room was now spinning. Obi-Wan could feel two presences brush fondly up against his own in the Force and he chuckled. They were so achingly similar.

“Wish you’d get along.” He said with his eyes closed. Guilt flooded the force and he attempted to bat it away but the hand holding his own stopped him. “Just need to find something to agree on” the wise council master explained.

It really was that simple.

He could hear the two of them speak, he assumed it was the usual defences and excuses, but couldn’t be bothered to pay attention.

They were so stupid.

“Stupid.” He explained with a quiet sigh, before leaving them to it and having a well-deserved nap.

---

Everything was less fuzzy when he woke up. As a reflex, he cautiously began stretching limbs and tensing muscles, taking stock before fully committing to consciousness and everything it brought with it.

Ow! Hmm not quite 100 percent. Never mind, he’d delt with worse.

“None of that now.”

An admonishing voice to his left has his eyes flying open in surprise, blinking at the bright lights of the medbay, and the form of his old Master, sitting next to his bed watching over him with concern in his eyes.

“Hello there”

His voice was gravelly, and it took a lot of effort to speak, but his characteristic greeting prompted a relieved smile from the older Jedi.

“Good afternoon. Here”

Obi-Wan took the offered cup of water gratefully, as a large arm came behind his shoulders to prop him up whilst he drank.

Anakin bustled into the room with a bundle of something in his arms, his eyes lit up when he saw his Master awake, but seemingly doubted his ability to answer a simple question, he addressed Qui-Gon.

“How’s he doing?”

“Better, but in need of much more rest.” his former Master answered just as Obi-Wan opened his mouth.

“Right yeah, I figured.” Anakin placed the bundle down to reveal a flask of tea, some kind of lunchbox and an extra blanket, a particularly fluffy one.

“Here, thought you might like some bits” he said by way of explanation, giving Obi-Wan an uncharacteristically shy smile, placing the tea and food on the bedside table and throwing the other end of the blanket to Qui-Gon, on the other side of the bed.

“Oh thank you Anakin that’s very kind of-er…” Obi-Wan started smiling gratefully, only to pause as his two companions shifted the blanket across him and started tucking it comfortably.

“What…is happening?” he asked, mildly alarmed as he watched the two move around him, now plumping his pillows, straightening his blankets and filling the water jug.

Qui-Gon shrugged.

“Just making sure you’re comfortable” he said unhelpfully, pouring out the tea and producing a book from somewhere in his robes. Obi-Wan’s current read.

Riiight….

Anakin, nowhere near as cool under his Master’s gaze, flushed a bit.

“We just…thought you might some stuff.”

His dubiousness must have shown on his face because Qui-Gon chose that moment to make a strategic exit.

“Reast well Obi-Wan, we’ll be back shortly.” And with that they were both gone.

The baffled Jedi tucked up in bed stared at the door for a few seconds longer.

What in the galaxy?

---

His recovery was, unfortunately, far from complete (in Kix’s view) when they reached Coruscant, and Obi-Wan was ordered to rest and recuperate for a further few days.

Usually, this involved Obi-Wan promising to be on his best behaviour, and then promptly breaking that promise the moment Anakin and various medical professionals turned their backs.

But not this time. This time there were two of them.

And so he had spent the last two days more comfortable than he had ever been; lying on the perfect arrangement of cushions and blankets in a perfectly clean living room, with a constant supply of tea and books and holos and company.

It was weird.

Extremely weird.

But before his thoughts could turn into a full-blown existential crisis, the door chime went.

“No”

Both Anakin and Qui-Gon pre-empted his shuffling to get up with an unwarranted telling off. Qui-Gon going so far as to hold out a hand as if to push him back into the sofa nest.

“It-“

“Come in!” Anakin yelled at the door. Obi-Wan rolled his eyes.

“Anakin-“

“Good evening”

The curious form of Mace Windu appeared in the doorway, eyebrows raising in surprise at the occupants of the room.

“Hello Mace” Obi-Wan greeted flatly from his nearly horizontal position.

“Master Windu”

“Mace”

There was a strange silence as they all took each other in.

Mace’s lips twitched up in a smile.

A very knowing smile.

Bastard. I hate it when he’s right.

Obi-Wan scowled at him, physically nudging away a plate of biscuits and metaphysically batting away the two concerned and suspicious force presences that filled the space around,

Ugh.

He was pleased, in one way, that the two most important people in his life were finally getting along.

He was displeased, in many other ways, that they had bonded over ensuring he was aggressively taken care of.

Bonding indeed.

#Snippet of nothing #obi-wan kenobi #Qui-Gon Jinn #anakin skywalker #Master Kenobi #Fluff #Lineage feels #everyone is soft for Obi-Wan #Obi-Wan fanfic

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sweetlikehoneystingslikeabee · 1 year

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I want to hear more about Zero Year Riddler being kind of a loser, please.

Zero Year Riddler is Actually A Nerdy Dork-Ass and I Have Evidence

aka at max ten pictures from the comic books. I apologize now that I had to get selective with photos and that these photos I took myself because I'm too lazy to scan. Includes hcs based on the canon stuff.

TW: Spoilers for Batman: Zero Year also known as Zero Year - Secret City and Zero Year - Dark City

We are going to be jumping around a little with these pictures. So the most basic/stripped down timeline- Edward sets off a massive plot w/ Doctor Death to first black out the City of Gotham while he prepares the Big Guns. Weather balloons filled with toxins to ensure no one is getting in or out of Gotham. He floods the city. Tells the surviving citizens that if they all want to get out, they have to give him a riddle he cannot solve. If you think that last part sounds very folk-lore or fairy tale like, YOU WOULD BE RIGHT. This period where he's setting up this challenge is the titular Zero Year. He is set up inside the Sphinx display in the Gotham History Museum. Batman stops him. onto the actual discussion.

We are first going to start with his introduction. I've discussed this before in a different post but this is meant to tell you multiple things. He has fifteen degrees he's earned. He makes conspiracy theory string boards. He is a dweeb who wears pocket protectors. The important thing to note story wise is that most of the points in this board are important/have a specific role in the story. He's correct about them. They matter. You might be saying "ok Fox/Belle but how does this say he's a nerdy dork-ass?"

look at him. He's described as being "boastful and annoyingly egotistical, but socially he's an egghead." This is not a man who plays well with others. But he genuinely thinks of himself as someone better than everyone else. What do you get? A smokescreen of theatrics, egotism and showing off to hide how socially inept he is.

Next, and sorry the first picture didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. This is the first meeting of Edward and Bruce Wayne. Of course Edward has already plotted his death. Will try to enact this plot. The page with the snake is a reference to the ancient Egyptian game of Mehen which Edward mentions in passing earlier in the story. Historians currently don't know much about the game other than it's distinctive board- However here it becomes a parallel to Ouroboros. The snake that eats it's own tail. Its known as an alchemy symbol and spiritually represents the unity of all things. Life, Death, Rebirth. In Edward's mind: destruction and rising from ashes aka Gotham in his plans.

The second is post Zero Year, telling the citizens of Gotham his motivations. This is his monologue showing his warped version of the Hero's Journey. The Hero's Journey for those who don't know is a very old archetype on which many fictional stories are all based on (whether they realize it or not.) In it's simplest terms, a hero goes on an adventure. The hero through trauma and hardship, learns a lesson, wins their "boon" and returns home with newfound knowledge that transformed them as a person. Note this sounds kind of similar to the Ouroboros thing, doesn't it?

Edward wants to leave a mark and transform Gotham. Potentially the world. He wants control he never had growing up. He wants all of it.

On the headcanon end... This information combined with his hyperfixation on mythology (mentioned below), this man plays tabletop. Hear me out. God complex. Verbose. Theatrics. Obsession with heroics, the heroes journey and folklore... this man not only plays DnD, he has been a GM countless times. I think he'd play other tabletops as well, but DnD is his bread and butter.

His main race (in traditional) is a gnome because of the intelligence stats. When he does DM/GM, the story is rich and so fucking detailed. He is also mean as hell and will murder all your characters in emotionally devastating ways if you get unlucky. He'll never admit any of this to people he finds cool or too attractive (unless they get to know him first). He has a strong wall up to try and prevent any weakness or vulnerability to show through.

He likes fun facts. Not just about mythology he is the one who spits out statistical data and random fun facts in regular discussion. It's almost compulsive. At another part of the comic where he almost shoots Lucius Fox dead via robot, he states the statistical probability that he was already hit with a bullet, but to reload and shoot again anyways. Then he is in the middle of telling a trivia fact about foxes before Batman comes in to save Lucius.

This feeds into my headcanon that he's neurodivergent. And also was a Jeopardy fanatic as a child. Probably still is. He likes to impress (especially dates) with the knowledge he can pull from seemingly nowhere. Also if you haven't gotten the impression yet, he cannot and will not stop talking. Loves the sound of his own damn voice. You know he's monologued himself to trouble multiple times. Also note how smoothly he's just glossing over his shitty dad/abusive childhood (again.)

Piggybacking on the last point- He has a special interest (read: potentially hyperfixation) on mythology and folklore. On multiple occasions he mentions these stories in passing as an anecdote for the events currently happening around him. Archimedes was a greek mathematician in ancient Sicily. He invented a great many things and would come to be known as one of the leading scientists of classical antiquity. The story Edward references is a rather famous one- Archimedes invented complex pulley systems and was tasked to prove the strength and ingenuity of these pulleys by moving the Syracusia, a luxury cruise ship, in and out of the water.

The second he mentions the story of the Gordian Knot. The tale goes as such: Alexander the Great's time. Whoever could untie the Gordian Knot was said to be destined to rule all of Asia. No one could solve it. The knot was impeccable. It was complex. Alexander the Great showed his great mental genius by doing what no one else had done. He cut the knot. There's more to it but that's the gist. That's the why of why Edward looks to this story and remembers it.

Everything about The Riddler of Zero Year is about proving his intelligence. Creating a name and a culture enveloped with smarts. If we didn't have the lore associated with Egyptian mythology as well, I'd say ancient Greece is his topic of choice but I think he likes all of it. That said, this man likes historical movies, historical texts, museums. If you take him to a museum or any kind of zoo or aquarium, he's going to talk your ear off on what he already knows for at least several hours. Are you impressed? Please be impressed. Tell him how smart he is and praise him like your favorite house cat.

The final pictures with actual analysis. These might seem silly or a rather insignificant detail to zoom in on.

This is him setting off the triggers to flood the city. Note the suitcase. He says this out loud to no one but himself. His own joke that only he gets to laugh at. Then he LITERALLY walks away whistling. A lot of this kind of behavior feeds into him knowing and being so smug about how clever he is. He's watching dozens upon dozens of citizens who have no idea what is going to happen to them, running in fear. And he's focused only on how gleeful he is that it's all coming together.

In the second: this is the final trial. Batman saving the city of Gotham and Riddler getting to have his big villain moment. And from the moment he reveals the lightshow of lasers ready to cut down our hero at will- he begins playing with his cane and hat. To the point that Batman is almost panicked for him to stop and just ask the damn questions.

These both run to one point and that's to him, this is all a game. We don't know this in the story yet, but he has an additional failsafe to blow the city up even if Batman wins (he doesn't expect him to, but he always makes sure to be a step ahead in case). He's lighthearted because, despite his curiosity around Batman and being constantly surprised that Batman keeps surviving, he considers this chess game match and set. His own arrogance supersedes the idea that Batman could be a genuine hero willing to take all the risk to save these people.

Riddler says to "get smart or die." Edward does not expect someone to do just that and more. For these the behaviors are more dorky vs the actual analysis but you get the point.

Bonus: we get the full picture that he constantly has a crown image above his screen in Gotham Square during Zero Year. Sir, Why Are You Like This? A lot of this comes down to: please give him attention he is so desperate for attention and probably physical affection. He's starving for it.

If you actually read through all of this, I'm love you and I hope you're having a fantastic day. Thank you for taking the time to listen to my rambling.

#Zero year riddler #riddler #foxwriting #batman: zero year #Edward Nygma #zero year is a really fucking good story but my only complaint is that there are pretty much 0 female characters

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wonder-worker · 8 months

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Elizabeth Woodville and Elizabeth of York: Queenship

"As an English queen consort, Elizabeth of York, like her mother, had a web of family connections that became the focus of her major patronage activities" - Michelle L. Beer

"After the safe delivery of their eldest sons, both queens Elizabeth gave thanks by founding chapels. Elizabeth Woodville's was in fact eight years after the event and probably as much a thanksgiving to Westminster Abbey for sanctuary as to God for her son. The chapel was attached to the old Lady Chapel of the abbey and dedicated to St Erasmus, a saint invoked against birth pains as well as patron of sailors which made him an unusually apt dedicatee given the king's absence abroad at the time of Prince Edward's birth. Elizabeth of York's foundation was more immediately linked to the birth of Arthur at Winchester, a site chosen for her lying-in by Henry to associate his first-born with the legendary king after whom he was to be named. Here Elizabeth founded a chapel dedicated to Our Lady." - J.L. Laynesmith

"In 1499 Elizabeth of York wrote to the prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, asking for a literal carte blanche of presentation to the highly desirable, centrally located living of All Hallows, Gracechurch Street, London, for which Elizabeth Woodville and her husband had also wanted preferment" - Derek Neal

"Both queens were granted rights of presentation to canonries and prebends in the royal chapel of St. Stephen, Westminster." - Derek Neal.

"Most of the border patterns (of The Fifteen Os, printed by William Caxton and co-sponsored by Elizabeth of York and Margaret Beaufort) are of stylized flowers, mythical beasts, and semi human creatures, quite possibly reused from other books, but one is of a vase of gillyflowers, the emblem of Elizabeth Woodville, whose family had been such important patrons of Caxton, and just over half-way up the margin these flowers lead into a rose branch, crowned with the emblem of her daughter's marriage, the Tudor rose, as if in reference to Elizabeth of York's adoption of her mother's patronage." - J.L. Laynesmith

"In 1480 she (Elizabeth Woodville) petitioned Pope Sixtus IV to allow her subjects to enjoy the indulgences attached to the newly re-established feast of the Visitation, even if the office was recited in private. She also expressed to the Pope her desire for the 'devotion of the faithful of the realm for the [Ave Maria] to be increased more and more'. The Pope obliged by attaching indulgences to the use of the Psalter of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to the recitation of the Ave Maria at each Angelus bell. He also dictated that copies of the letter granting these indulgences be exhibited across the country, thereby ensuring that everyone knew not only of the opportunities to gain indulgences but also of the queen's intercessory role in their spiritual welfare. … Elizabeth's daughter, who of course shared her name saint, was apparently inspired by her mother to develop the devotions still further. Following her petition in 1492, the Pope granted 300 days of pardon to anyone reciting the salutation three times at each tolling of the Angelus bell.” - J.L. Laynesmith

"Elizabeth Darcy, the lady mistress of the nursery for Elizabeth Woodville's children, was appointed to the same post for Elizabeth of York's children, probably as a result of the younger queen's childhood affection for Darcy." - J.L Laynesmith

A couple of reasons why this interests me:

- Elizabeth Woodville was the first English queen since Philippa of Hainault to raise royal daughters, with almost a century and five other queens in between them. I don't think there's ever been such a huge gap in that regard before, which means that Elizabeth would not really had any direct precedent or source of inspiration to follow beyond what was ideally, conventionally expected. Clearly, judging by the fact that her daughter was widely considered a successful queen and emulated several of her mother's own activities, Elizabeth did her job well.

- There's a strange, persistently recurring trend in historical fiction and general histories that tends to make the relationship between the two Elizabeths contentious and/or distant, or tends to emphasize their polarity in whatever capacity, or tends to prioritize Elizabeth of York's relationship with her uncle Richard III and his wife Anne Neville than her own mother (and her own father, tbh). This speaks volumes of the vilification and negative depictions of Elizabeth Woodville in contemporary media, but also the tendency to use Elizabeth of York as a cipher for historians' own thoughts about historical figures rather than a historical figure in her own right. This is particularly prevalent in Ricardian and Ricardian-leaning media, the latest shining example being Alison Weir's "The Last White Rose". On the other hand, a few sympathetic Tudor analyses tend to (understandably) focus on re-evaluating Elizabeth's relationship with Margaret Beaufort and debunking the irritating misconception that they didn't get along. But in the process, Elizabeth of York's relationship and inspiration from her own mother gets lost and forgotten in the mix, when it should in fact be highlighted the most. It's frustrating, because Elizabeth Woodville was evidently her daughter's most important role model: Elizabeth of York was regularly at her mother's side during her childhood, observed her successful queenship for 17 years, and, as we can see, directly mirrored several of her mother's activities during her own tenure as queen. Interestingly, as the 5th quote shows, even when she co-sponsored a book by William Caxton with Margaret, Caxton himself clearly associated Elizabeth of York's patronage to her mother's influence. It's a shame that only a few specific historians tend to focus on the connection between mother and daughter, as I think there's a wealth of analyses to be made on it.

- While both Elizabeths were English queens, with a web of family connections that they used to their and the crown's benefit, their situations were definitely not the same and should not be treated as such. Their different status prior to their marriage meant that their respective families and actions were always going to be viewed and treated differently, for one. More importantly, though, Elizabeth Woodville was the first Englishwoman to be crowned queen. Her English family's advancement and involvement in national and local politics was to be expected, but it's important to keep in mind that it was not precedented. It simply hadn't happened before, and it wasn't expected to happen again. Elizabeth Woodville was very much a novel queen in that regard; certain aspects of her queenship were very unique and unprecedented for that time, and she was the one who established the precedent of using her homeborn family as a network of politics and patronage that all later English consorts followed. In contrast, by the time Elizabeth of York became queen, this was a comparatively more established and familiar practice, followed by two former consorts, her mother and Anne Neville. So, even apart from their differing status and the propaganda against them, it makes sense that their activities were regarded differently, both by contemporary detractors and subsequent historians. There's also the fact that Elizabeth Woodville and her relatives had far more direct power and involvement with the Crown Prince's council, household and administration than Elizabeth of York and her relatives did, which we know massively contributed to the commentary and/or criticism the former received.

Sources:

Michelle L. Beer, "Queenship at the Renaissance Courts of Britain: Catherine of Aragon and Margaret Tudor, 1503-1533"

J.L. Laynesmith, "The Medieval Queens: English Queenship 1445-1503"

Derek Neal, "The Queen's Grace: English Queenship 1464-1503"

#historicwomendaily #elizabeth woodville #elizabeth of york #queenship tag #english history #15th century #tudors #queue #oh well #my post

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blueskittlesart · 2 years

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omg wait- please give us your thoughts botw women!

im skipping zelda because i talk about her all the time but this is mipha, urbosa (and riju), impa, and purah lol. it's LONG so prepare yourself

mipha. ive said before that i think she was done dirty by the writers in that all of her characterization revolves around men. and i stand by that. i generally dislike the archetype of a physically small, softspoken female supporting character whose only role in the story is as a protector or healer--someone for the male characters to bounce their feelings off of. and i think mipha very often falls into this trope. with that being said, i do still think there is room for a nuanced analysis of her character because there IS nuance there it just gets lost a lot of the time because of how she's written. When thinking about her it's important to remember how zora age in relationship to humans. after a lot of math i place her at around 60ish years old physically, with that being the zora equivalent of a 14-16 year old hylian. she is INCREDIBLY young by zora standards but physically, she has lived longer than almost every non-zora she will ever meet. because of this, there's this dissonance between the way her family and kingdom view her vs the way her friends and colleagues view her. We see it most obviously in the champion's ballad dlc--when zelda speaks to mipha about piloting a divine beast, she speaks as though she's talking to an adult. but mipha's father is convinced she is far too young and inexperienced for this role. Mipha, in turn, is caught between these two differing perceptions of herself, to the point where she doesn't really KNOW what she's supposed to be. she takes on a protective role for those younger than her (sidon and link, specifically) and does her best to support zelda where she can, knowing that zelda likely views her as a senior, but she also often vant disguise the fact that she's still a child herself. she plays with sidon in the waterfall. she has a very childish, innocent schoolgirl crush on link. she's caught in between these two perceptions of herself and because she is, for all intents and purposes, mentally fifteen years old, she doesn't quite know how to handle it. The fact that zora live on a totally different time scale compared to other hyrulian races isn't something that would normally pose much of a struggle for them, because zora's domain is deliberately isolated from those other races. zora could likely go a generation or two without ever needing to interact with non-zora at all, beyond the occasional stray traveler. (remember how when you're working your way towards zora's domain post-calamity, you meet a bunch of zora who are super excited to see a hylian at all? most of those zora look to be in early adulthood, meaning by my math they'd be about a hundred years old. post-calamity, zora's domain clearly returns to that same brand of isolation, so most of these zora have probably never interacted with a hylian at all.) but because mipha happened to be born into such a turbulent era, she finds herself having to interact with these other races more than basically any zora ruler might have had to for the past several thousand years. which is why she has so much trouble with link. from her perspective, he changes SO fast. she meets him one day a wide-eyed child and the next he comes back to her a silent, traumatized soldier. she's hardly aged a day but he has experienced a lifetime of things she can't begin to understand and she has NO IDEA how to talk to him anymore. When they interact, she switches awkwardly between treating him like the child she knew and attempting to fix the trauma he's been through without her, but it's always with the goal of getting things BACK TO THE WAY THEY WERE. she is completely incapable of moving on from the past relationship with link that she remembers because as far as she's concerned, it's only been a miniscule amount of time since then. due to the nature of her race, mipha is basically doomed to be stuck in a past that link can never return to. god. i wish they explored her character more in-game im going to lose my mind

urbosa is SUCH a good character. agh. her narrative purpose is essentially to be an actual POSITIVE mentor to zelda, which. let's be honest. without her that poor girl would absolutely not have made it to seventeen. jesus christ. Anyways urbosa is everything zelda wants to be. A strong, independent, powerful ruling force that her people rely on and look to in times of need. she is completely self-assured and confident and she is quite honestly literally the only positive influence on zelda's life. Urbosa is a character well into adulthood, who we can assume has long since grown into herself and found her way. Which is why she is SUCH an important character for zelda, yes, but for ALL the young champions who are just. so desperate for a positive force in their lives. She's so GOOD at what she does, too. urbosa is a woman who was meant to be a mother in one way or another, i think, because the way she handles the kids she's working with is really thoughtful and well-done, ESPECIALLY when compared to the other dogshit adults in their lives. She allows zelda more compassion than anyone else has ever seen fit to give her, and when zelda DOES mess up, urbosa offers gentle but firm redirection. (in aoc specifically, she notices zelda comparing herself to link and immediately shuts it down, WITHOUT making zelda feel stupid or inferior.) she does the exact same thing, albeit less overtly, with link, who she obviously has a lot of compassion for despite being kind of at odds with him over zelda. I think she and link are actually incredibly similar characters--stubborn, a little bit showy, and generally unwilling to admit defeat in any situation. She's uniquely positioned to be able to relate to both him AND zelda, as a ruler AND a soldier. And i think she's completely aware of how similar she is to link, which is why when she pushes him, she does it in a calculated way so that he never takes it as a challenge or an attack. she never outright tells him "this is why zelda dislikes you, you need to work on your communication skills" she talks to him about zelda's childhood in plain terms because she knows that breaking down link's mental wall between himself and zelda by evoking empathy is the way to get the two of them to fucking COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER. i really think every game should have an overwhelmingly positive female mentor figure like urbosa. she is so good

in relation to urbosa, we then have riju, the youngest and only female of the new champions. she is fourteen years old and she has been thrust into a position of leadership and she works so hard to project that same confidence and maturity that was urbosa's staple. and to her credit she ALMOST gets there but she's fourteen and no fourteen year old is capable of performing adulthood perfectly. Riju's projected personality feels very much like she's regurgitating stories she was told about her ancestors. Urbosa was strong, urbosa was fearless, urbosa commanded lightning, urbosa stepped up to serve the knight and princess when asked. but, crucially, urbosa was not fourteen. riju's insecurities about filling urbosa's shoes are incredibly evident, but she seems to do her best work when she drops the pretense and acts as herself. there's a reason she had us fight naboris on sand seals--they're a source of comfort to her. something she KNOWS she can act confident about. there was no acting involved in her pursuit of naboris--she KNEW she was good with that seal. there's also something to be said about the successor to urbosa, the mentor, being an inexperienced little girl. riju clings to the stories of the champion chief who came before her because she desperately needs a mentor. I wish urbosa could meet her for real she deserves a mom

impa. i. well i wish 90% of her characterization didn't come from hyrule warriors bc i honestly dont like how she was written all that much. i think they had a really strong framework to build off of in botw but aoc just kind of. took it in a direction i wasn't a huge fan of. anyway. impa is sheikah, a race descended from the original protectors of the goddess hylia. Interestingly, in botw the sheikah have been almost completely integrated into hylian society, with kakariko village being mostly sheikah who live like regular hylians. it seems like very few of them actually follow the ways of their ancestors, in contrast to other games where sheikah were only ever warrior bodyguards of the goddess hylia's bloodline. Impa is, presumably, one of the few sheikah who continues to follow the teachings of her ancestors and serve the royal family. this... honestly causes a dillemma if you think about it for more than a few seconds, because, since most sheikah live as regular citizens now, in place of sheikah bodyguards the hylian royal family has an extensive royal guard, eliminating the need for sheikah warriors like impa almost entirely. i can only assume this is why she was relegated to basically 'haha funny quirky ninja sidekick' in hyrule warriors. but personally i think it would have been much more interesting to use this as a commentary on the state of hyrule and even to give her some more obvious internal conflict!! hyrule has until now been in a ten thousand year era of peace. it's no wonder most sheikah settled down and gave up on the whole bodyguard thing. they might have even believed there wasn't going to be another demise incarnation for them to take action against, especially after ten thousand years without any whisper of conflict. to most sheikah, pursuing their traditional martial arts and continuing to serve the royal family would likely begin to feel like a waste of time. for some reason, though, impa didn't feel this way. ten thousand years after the last conflict between demise and hylia's descendants, impa still chooses to train as a sheikah warrior and serve the royal family. why?? my personal headcanon is that she was drawn to the myth of ancient hyrule in the same way that purah was drawn to its technology. purah is the more obvious nerd of the sisters, but i think impa's choice to pursue sheikah martial arts HAD to have its basis in an interest in the creation myth. She is also one of the few characters in botw who explicitly KNOWS and can convey to you the myth in its entirety, or at least, as much of the myth as had survived by the time she began studying it. So here we have a young sheikah girl who is incredibly interested in her own culture as it relates to the myth of hyrule and she's basically singlehandedly attempting to revive a part of it that's been nearly completely lost, all amidst this incredibly tense political environment in which her peoples' past inventions are also being dug up and revived by the royal family with like... seemingly very little care to the context in which they were made or why they might have been buried in the first place. like, in this climate which shows a subtle but obvious disregard for her culture, impa is loudly, deliberately returning to her roots. that's SO INTERESTING!! if aoc had leaned into it more, we could have had moments where impa contemplates her place among the royal guardsmen and the champions--she's not quite one of them, but they have a mutual goal and, in the case of the champions, their lives are all deeply intertwined with the myth of hyrule; or even a bit of commentary on the political climate of hyrule pre-calamity and how fucking horrible it was. i REALLY wish they had explored this more it could have been so cool

PURAH. people think im insane when i tell them shes in my top five loz characters of all time but i am literally obsessed with her i dont care that shes a random new addition to botw only. i think she is a really interesting way to introduce and lead into the idea of ancient sheikah technology. considering how important ancient sheikah tech is to the worldbuilding of botw, giving the player a sheikah scientist guide to walk you through it all is a smart way to go about introducing it. beyond that, though, i think as a character she serves as a reminder of hyrule before the calamity--cheerful and carefree despite the obvious dark implications of her actions. when you first go to meet her you find out along the way that the kids in hateno are scared of her; they think she's a ghost or something along those lines. she is eccentric and strange and she just sort of... glosses over the entire series of events that led both her and link to their present situation, because by de-aging herself, accidentally or not, she has become stuck perpetually in the mindset of pre-calamity hyrule. She still views sheikah tech as something interesting to be studied and played with while most sane people in hyrule view it as nothing but an incredible danger. she's super intelligent, but can't quite break out of the scientist mentality enough to acknowledge the harm the tech she so obviously loves is capable of causing. the de-aging and the bubbly personality are likely a coping mechanism, i think, though maybe not a conscious one. she's remaining frozen in time forever, deliberately refusing to think about the damage she might have caused. I don't think she's ENTIRELY in denial though, if only because she helps link when he asks for it. she's been waiting for a hundred years, never quite sure if the shrine of resurrection worked or if she laid link to rest forever in that cave, so she does whatever she can to keep living, preparing for the worst. When link DOES reappear, it's a genuine shock, to the point that she cant quite let go of the denial she's been using to keep herself going for the past 100 years. but just because she expected the worst doesn't mean she can't work with a better outcome, it just means she isn't quite prepared to deal with it perfectly, which is why she seems frozen in time when you interact with her in botw.

#WOMENNNNN. AGH #loz has a bad track record with female characters but the botw girls are so genuinely good. i love it #zelda analysis #asks

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gildeddlily · 1 year

Text

finally re-reading stormbringer, first post of a long list (30 photos limit go die) we stan the flags

I read stormbringer this summer, and it was something (it destroyed me and made Chuuya became my favourite character of all bsd- more than anyone else (like sigma, he's my fav in the decay of angels arc), chuuya solos everyone and you know it shut up)

so, like I did with fifteen I feel the urge to share everything cause yeah we all need to suffer more

1. We Stan The Flags

This always makes me laugh, cause Chuuya's like "yeah, it's probably the shadiest and most dangerous role I could have as a non-executive, what's so important ab it? It's cool guys I'm not better than you all" (imposter syndrome sir)

I love Pianoman. I just- I love the Flags, and I will always fantasize ab a world where they're still alive. and them bullying chuuya is my favourite trope alr.

and i just know that in a no powers au chuuya would have been the kind of teenager to befriends people older than him like ten years age gap, cause people his age just weren't for him (in an healthy way guys)

try to not think ab chuuya's inability to accept gifts and love, and just some of the most powerful men in the mafia being excited ab a silly guy (silly chuuya who's stronger than half of them(gotta write chuuya and iceman first meeting))

the... the fruitiness of this sentence is menacing so I'm gonna- just yk

the au where Chuuya takes Lippman place ad the mafia's contact with the light is so beautiful and sad. and that fic where he takes chuuya on set I'm crying stop it

canon chuuya is so mean. Like not mean, just harsh. a lot of people only sees him as someone who gets mad at Dazai and is a peace of cake with everyone else- like no? he send to hell every person he talks to and goes on with "wanna know the power of gravity" every two seconds. he's just chuuya, gotta accept him as our little mass murder with anger issues that needs to be controlled cause the Mafia boss is afraid he's gonna die if he doesn't <333

and this is so beautiful in a way. he always talks ab killing dazai and dazai doesn't help with that, only giving him more reasons to do so, and same with the flag. anger issues maybe, but is he really angry with dazai and the others? we see him really mad, and it is not a pretty thing to watch- and they all know what mad chuuya really looks like and just know when he's yes angry but not really. everyone is ready to fight, and are relieved when things dont escalate (they love chuuya so much stop please)

they comfort him in a way that is heartwarming. they don't offer him useless words or things like "don't worry you have a past and you're human", they don't beat around the bush. Pianoman's like "hey, we know you don't know if you're human, and I'm gonna be super harsh ab it cause we're in the mafia and all of that but listen kid, here we are ab to solve your existential crisis"

even Iceman, the cold blooded hitman who almost killed chuuya a couple of times and was ab to try it five minutes before this, is fucking smiling. they're so happy to help him it hurts (just know iceman called him kid at least some times. he's the real big brother and I just know it)

yes, this is the first time chuuya has real friends- not kids he has to look after and protect without receiving gratitude but just a "it's the least you can do" attitude, not whatever-the-fuck-is-going-on with dazai, just friends. they spend time sìtogether, they give eachother gifts. they're kind with eachother in the ways the know how

an chuuya doesn't know what to do, cause he has never had this type of relationship with anyone, the "give-receive" mechanism that every relationship should have. he doesn't know what to do, and I need to hug him

and then the gag we needed and something I need to draw (Pianoman definitely is the tired mom. Iceman is the dad cause yeah who other. Chuuya and Albatross the sons, Doc the gay emo cousin (what do you mean you wish to be carried by Adam sir) and Lippman the sassy aunt. just see it)

he kind of is sir (he's fucking sixteen just kill me)

something I love ab him is the fact that he's emotionally constipated but like one of the less serious one. he knows that he can be easy to read since he's very open ab his emotions (even if they understand he could just kill everyone, so), but can be serious in a way a teenager shouldn't be able to. he chooses to be so open with dazai, the flags and the people he cares about. the trust king fr

they all know he's gonna come back (and that he's crying) cause he probably wanted them to, or he would have reacted worse to getting understood so easily

and this is the trope asagiri give us so many times and the best one in the history of tropes. bad scary guys having fun with some other bad scary guys and enjoying their time together like normal people.

...kafka, my love, stop it. you were doing do good

#bsd #bungou stray dogs #stormbringer #chuuya nakahara #the flags #bsd verlaine #bsd chuuya nakahara #bsd stormbringer #reading things and making too many screenshots #bsd spoilers

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altschmerzes · 10 months

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I hope you don’t mind me asking but I was just wondering what relationships Jamie will have with Roy and Keeley in your baby Jamie story. Something I’ve really enjoyed in your other fics like The Same Story, and your most recent fic is the amazing friendship Jamie has with them. Obviously a lot of things are different in your upcoming fic, and their history with Jamie is going to be vastly different, so I was really curious.

i don't mind at all!! i love love love talking about this fic and this is one of the like. central components of it and one of the parts that's most fascinating to me to think about and poke at, roy particularly.

roy and he have the same antagonism that they do when we meet them in canon though it looks obviously very different because of the fact that yknow. jamie's fifteen and not on the team so roy is MUCH less aggressive/actively beefing with a teenager lmao but they do sort of..... roy is endlessly frustrated with jamie's attitude and the fact that jamie seems to, from minute one, hate his guts for absolutely no reason at all. it evolves over time as the story progresses from this kind of frustrated, baffled resentment to roy somehow now TWICE OVER landing in a situation where he is sort of parenting someone else's kid with them without really meaning to, that's just how it happened.

there's phoebe, who he's fulfilling a very directly parental role with (and as somebody who usually means 'mother and grandmother' when i say 'my parents' i loved seeing this on screen. he's not her dad but he is very much a parent to her) and then there's the way that he and ted end up sort of coparenting jamie together by the time they get him out of his dad's house. it's like..... it's complicated and not very clear cut, because while ted is very much Jamie's Dad at this point roy is like..... he's not jamie's dad but he is A Parent, much in the way he is with phoebe which is a very fun like. family dynamic to explore in all directions (roy and ted and jamie as a collective, what this does for roy and ted's relationship, the relationship jamie ends up having with roy's sister (who i'm once again calling sarah sdlfs) and phoebe).

(there's also some complex stuff in there about the way that i've adapted some canon events - including the city win over richmond in 1x10 which jamie still plays a key role in and roy's retirement and refusal to coach jamie when he came back which, jamie's not on the team but that Situation still manifests in a way)

and with keeley it's obviously EXTREMELY different since they are not, never will be, and do not even come close to being involved romantically or sexually, gd bless. absolutely not. so we, and jamie, are introduced to her as the girlfriend of the richmond captain prior to roy, a very briefly appearing man i've dubbed leo charles. and then she's around richmond doing PR because of the job rebecca gives her, which is when she and jamie start interacting more. and the relationship they have - which again i feel i must stress because you know how fandoms are lmao is completely platonic at every point - is a very important one to jamie because she like....... treats him like a person, not like a child. she asks for his opinion on things and actually listens, she has a respect for him and his thoughts that he hasn't seen a lot.

and compared to the others too there's this sense, even when those relationships improve, with ted and roy and company, that they feel like he's someone they need to protect and care for, which is true! they do! and keeley is protective of him as well, is aware he's young and has been badly hurt and needs looking out for, but that's not the role SHE directly has in his life so she's like. someone who he doesn't feel like thinks he needs minding, or whatever, she's someone he can go to if he needs to feel Normal and go check out the new hipster coffee shop that's opened in the area or give an opinion on an outfit or something. he admires her and thinks she's probably the coolest person alive, pretty much.

#gav gab #gav answers #long post #fic: wriggle up on dry land #writing liveblog #i still plan to have the first chapter of this up tonight or tomorrow btw #even with [waves at my life] all of the fuckening

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fourleafclovxr · 10 months

Text

liveblogging fotsge because i just bought it

alternatively: soman please don't disappoint me

i have no recollection of what happened in rotsge. fair warning.

"young lad with dark red curls and a smattering of freckles" oh a school master? i want to think he's a sader & a seer so i can say that my sader meta is supported by soman but this desc reminds me of tristan/yara actually...

did soman forget his own lore. didn't august sader tell rafal that he needed the readers.

hook is actually quite a good character and pissing off BOTH twins! good for him.

these evers are. wow. incredibly in character. they rly do capture the essence of good for the sake of being good? on that note, the commentary on evers being spoiled and bored in this duology has been pretty okay (if a bit. pointless? to be honest these books were pointless)

NAMELESS BOY? rhian love interest?

the idea of pan's world is actually really interesting. a place that doesn't follow good and evil, but rather chaos, which places good and evil as the opposite of chaos— order? and hook says "that's why it's so dangerous" which i guess does make sense from his pov but. i hope this concept gets explored more later

kyma questioning whether they're good is also v interesting! comparing the good pirates to evil pan (their roles are reversed, the pirates usually evil and pan usually good— also kyma seems traditional which explains her traditional fairytale view)

"close-shaven black hair [and] violet eyes" HELLO??? lady lesso??? what is your ancestor (?) doing in neverland (it can't be a coincidence right... knowing soman it could be though) one of pan's lost boys huh?

kyma IMMEDIATELY going against pan as soon as he threatened a fluffy animal. and getting them into trouble.

pan is getting more and more creepy though... especially for a thirteen-year-old?

SADERS WORKING WITH PAN????? guys look my meta was right. the saders being on the side of CHAOS instead of good and evil?? because it'll turn out better for them??

"three children who go exploring an enchanted island" rafal i'm pretty sure that's kind of important for you...

kyma is so. good. and her conversation with the ingertroll is oddly touching. she's like the sensible, good version of evelyn sader and i am HERE for it

i deeply enjoy midas' character. i wonder what the significance of the name is? midas, the greedy king, ruined by his greed? (greed for what?) (also he said gay rights. happy pride!)

i also have to say that soman writes homoeroticism incredibly well and that he should have done this more if he wanted people to think his books had good lgbtq+ rep because they would eat it up

luoto bakthi is really. the villains in this series are a lot more sinister than in the proper sge series and i'm actually kind of impressed?

that was over really quickly! good job kyma!

MALICE ROOM 66???????

"a bug crept into the plot" ie rhian spying idk this is reminding me of agatha in her cockroach form

aladdin is so annoying. please don't call kyma your soulmate you are fifteen years old. kyma is so right stop thinking about yourself!!

SADER LORE... whose side are the brothers on? pretending not to see hook and kyma? exceptions to them aging ten years for pans? THEM TELLING HOOK TO GO TO SCHOOL?

"how much these two paying you?" "not enough." i laughed sorry mistral twins. pay your employees right!

MIDAS HAS GOLD POWERS??? ok maybe the name had a more obvious meaning. should have expected that

hephaestus and the pirate captain are such an iconic duo.

midas saving rafal was the obvious choice to be honest. which brother has been a manipulative lying asshole? not rafal! and his little speech about it being midas' choice was nice.

uniting the schools under pan huh? i see where tlea rafal got the idea from

aladdin ffs STOP being jealous of hook i'm pretty sure he has more love interests (cough. rhian and rafal. cough) than kyma??? and you have more important things to worry about???

rhian is. so evil. i see it now. literal snake

fala is back!!!!

midas has THREE school masters fighting over him. it's pretty easy to forget he's the First ever reader but that says something about him.

"what he'd assumed about himself had guided his actions, and because of his actions, his true nature had irrevocably changed." this is such a clever thing to say actually! the it's not who you are, it's what you do messaging is rly coming through.

the storian guiding pan... writing his story for him... and to HELP him... i could say a lot about destiny but i won't bc it wouldn't be coherent

midas :(

i'm becoming a rafal supporter tbh,,,

rafal & hook reunion! finally!

(can't only men be seers. anyway) sader family showdown!! the elders supporting rafal the boys supporting pan and marialena??

the storian "keeps [their] world alive with its tales"?? how??

RHIAN????????????????????? i mean it makes sense the evil school master but like. But Like. school years trilogy rafal?? what??

the saders having different visions Precisely because the divergence was necessary for the future to become reality. this says a lot about seers. they're not all-powerful nor all-knowing, they're just tools trying to enable the "best" future, the stable one, the one that doesn't result in what. death?

whose side are they on?? their own or this grand unknown destiny's??

midas having nothing but rafal. okay soman. OKAY.

BOTIC REALLY IS A LESSO??????????????????

so pan has the power to change the future? to get the story back?

pan's thoughts on free will vs a good life are actually pretty interesting.

marialena you SNAKE. but also her being evil and her family being good. the interaction between good & evil, and the seers who are seemingly above it. huh. but why would she support rhian... what is her big picture...

midas is being so soft with rafal i really. i'm becoming a midas supporter too i fear

ok rafal is still evil never mind

holy shit rhian just MURDERED a guy. he's plenty evil.

so what happens when both brothers are evil? by nature or by choice?

WHAT IS MARIALENA'S AIM.

midas :(((

how is botic a lesso. man is pathetic

"good always wins" rhian doesn't that go against your ENTIRE philosophy of balance

NOT THE GOLDEN ARROW it is NOT midas' fault.

the rafal -> hook -> kyma relationships. nice.

"his princess" no more aladdin!! yes!!

"when a lost boy serves his purpose, it's time for him to grow up. only there is no growing up in my world." that hits deep tbh.

MIDAS :(((( his lines about how he became more than a boy in gavaldon... how it's not The End... his belief in rafal to his last moments... rafal BETTER make this right

oh my god the gold. seriously. the entire school?

"two brothers, eternal once more" wow. AND WHO WAS THE GUY FROM THE FIRST SCENE. i doubt he's a sader but??

the tale of pan and pen?????

the concept of pans being good and their shadows being evil is v interesting especially when you remember that you kill pan by killing his shadow.

the evil always wins, it always destroys the balance. so the evil has to be eliminated by the storian. and that's why the shadow is the thing that has to be killed. wow.

SO THE MAN WAS A PAN. OKAY.

"a gold-soaked corpse ready to fly" soman rly did write quite a few good quotes in this book

"far from the tyranny of men" midas :( kyma :(

RHIAN JUST MURDERED HIM???? WTF??????? RAFAL???????????

rhian you bastard

how is he the school master

i mean i knew it made sense but. this is incredibly unsatisfying.

oh the pirate captain is blackbeard is he.

do they KNOW it's rhian?

uhh is he calling himself "deviant and perverse" for being. straight. i mean. okay i guess.

#sge #school for good and evil #fotsge #fall of the school for good and evil #fotsge spoilers

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schraubd · 11 months

Text

Loose Cannon

Judge Aileen Cannon has been assigned to oversee the criminal prosecution of Donald Trump.

I've seen enough high-profile political cases to be familiar with a very specific script that gets written about the judge assigned to the case. Pretty much without fail, you'll get a passage that reads something like the following:

Judge Smith is a veteran judge who ascended to the bench after fifteen years in the U.S. Attorney's office. He has a reputation for being no-nonsense and demanding a tight ship at trial that includes rigorous questioning of attorneys on both sides.

"He doesn't tolerate a lot of guff," said one attorney who had practiced before him for many years. "You won't agree with all of his rulings, but he's universally respected."

This template is so common I've begun to wonder if it's reflex (not every judge can be "no-nonsense"!). Which makes it all the more striking that nobody -- nobody -- is writing lines like this about Judge Cannon. They weren't writing them even before she went 100% YOLO in trying to block the Mar-a-Lago investigation; they certainly aren't writing them now.

Since the news broke, I heard folks suggest that Cannon was only assigned to the preliminary aspects of the case, which appears untrue. Then I heard other folks assert that Cannon likely will be forced to recuse herself from the case. And honestly, I'm dubious about that too.

To be clear: Judge Cannon absolutely should recuse. Her conduct in the Mar-a-Lago case suggests that she's so completely in the tank for Trump that there's no possibility that she'll be perceived as impartial. But if she was the sort of person who could be shamed into recusing just because it's the right thing to do, it wouldn't be as much of a problem if she didn't recuse.

The fact is our judicial system is not well-equipped to handle a problem like Cannon. The problem is not that she was nominated by Trump -- two of the three 11th Circuit judges who bench-slapped her Mar-a-Lago catastrophe into oblivion were Trump appointees. The problem is that Cannon, specifically, is a complete hack who's decided that her job as federal judge is to be Donald Trump's offensive line.

For very good reason, our judicial system starts with a healthy presumption of impartiality on the part of its judges. We don't let either party force out a judge just because they don't like their lean. Recusals are easiest to justify when the judge has a direct financial stake in a given controversy, or when they're close personal friends or associates with a party. These sorts of connections give everyone a face-saving option -- the problem isn't actual bias, but the appearance thereof; one could be as pure as driven snow and still agree that it is a sound policy to not preside over a case where your best buddy is being charged with a serious crime.

Unfortunately, other than the fact of her nomination Judge Cannon doesn't have those concrete ties to any party here, which means that there's no hiding the actual issue on the table. Judge Cannon needs to recuse because Judge Cannon is, in relevant respects, incompetent. I say incompetent not to suggest that her mistakes stem from ignorance rather than malice; rather, an important part of Judge Cannon's job is to administer the law fairly and impartially, and she has demonstrated herself to lack competency in that dimension of the judicial role. Hence, she cannot be trusted and is not qualified to preside over a trial like this one, with a defendant for whom she's already shown herself to be incapable of adjudicating impartially.

But once again, if Judge Cannon was the sort of person capable of recognizing that shortcoming, she likely wouldn't have it. There's no clear face-saving out where one can disclaim actual bias but recuse for prudence's sake, and there's no universe in which Judge Cannon agrees "I was so egregiously wrong in the Mar-a-Lago case that one can't help but infer I was biased." Which means it is up to an appellate court to make that determination for her, and needless to say, that's a very awkward proposition which appellate courts are going to be loathe to undertake.

Appellate courts are not prone to saying "this case must be stripped from this district court judge because this judge is in general too biased to handle it." The closest one sees to that sort of ruling is when a case is stripped from a lower judge after repeated obstinance in refusing to implement appellate orders, and that is exceedingly rare. Even assuming that the Mar-a-Lago reversal should count towards such a showing in the criminal case, the problem with Judge Cannon's ruling there wasn't really that of repeated lower court disobedience of superior court mandates. It instead stands out because of Judge Cannon's absolute, rancid lawlessness. But again, our system is not well-built to account for the possibility that an Article III judge might as a general matter -- not due to financial stakes or personal connections, but purely as a matter of ideology -- be congenitally incapable of ruling in accordance with the law.

It's a similar problem to the situation with those single-division Texas judges. The thing everybody knows and everybody is thinking -- that the problem is that these judges are utterly and completely in the ideological tank such that law simply doesn't matter for them anymore -- can't be uttered out loud, at least not in a formal proceeding. On the outside, everyone knows that's the problem. But in a filing, you can't come out and say "judge, our basis for recusal is that you're a lawless hack." And since that is, at the end of the day, the problem, whatever alternative basis you try to hang your hat on will ultimately be a poor fit that probably won't end up justifying recusal. The structure of Article III life tenure means that placing a hack like Cannon on the federal bench is an irreversible mistake.

So count me skeptical that Judge Cannon will recuse herself, and count me skeptical that any superior court will force her recusal, at least immediately. Unfortunately, the reality is we're likely stuck with Judge Cannon and whatever hijinks she comes up with to justify torpedoing this case -- at least for the foreseeable future.

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/qbk4rVJ

#crime #Donald Trump #judiciary

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miszswan · 1 year

Text

PEOPLE YOU KNOW PART 3 TEASER

Jack had spent the last couple minutes looking through Camila and Amiria’s stories on Urbans phone as the latter along with Neelam was getting ready to go.

All he could see was the two friends shopping and enjoying themselves, preparing for the festivities that were approaching within the hour.

He smiles to himself as he hears her laugh again, he’d been deprived from the real thing for too long.

That’s how it’s been since she left. Amiria had blocked Jack on everything, from her Twitter to iMessage, Jack had no way to contact her. So he’d use Urbans phone to see how she was doing, how Ani was doing even though Amiria hadn’t posted a single picture of her daughter on the internet.

He thought it was smart, kept her out of the public eye, she was far to young for that.

He also knew that she still kept in close contact with their mutual friends but only invited Dru, Neelam and Urban.

Amiria was actually the person who introduced Jack to Druski when she was invited to an event he was hosting. At the time the two had been very good friends for just over a year, were and still are like brother and sister.

Urban and Neelam on the other hand just remained in contact with Amiria and checked on her as much as possible. Sometimes they would visit her when they were in town, especially before the big fight that ended everything.

Even though they’ve all been a lot busier, they still keep in touch.

Part of Jack wanted to beg the three of them to not go but he didn’t want to ruin her day.

With Neelam waiting in the hallway of the hotel the three were staying in, Urban goes to Jacks room to get his phone. He walks in to find Jack lying on his bed with a frown, scrolling through more of her posts or posts of her co stars with her.

When he sees Urban he switches off his phone and gives it back.

“You can’t keep doing this.” Urban scolds as he looks at the state of his best friend. “Especially after the stunt you pulled last week.”

“What else am I supposed to do? She won’t talk to me.”

“You aren’t entitled to a conversation with her.” The moment those words leave his mouth, Jack roles his eyes. “I’m telling the truth. Ami doesn’t owe you anything. Especially after everything you put her through.”

“I wasn’t that bad.” Jack says trying to defend himself.

“She has the right to take as much time to think about whether she wants you in her and Ani’s lives or not. You have to give her that time.” Urban scoffs. “I thought after fifteen months you’d realise that you genuinely fucked up.”

“So you’re taking her side.”

“Get over yourself, I will always support you but for this I can’t. Amiria is being a mother. She’s protecting her daughter from as much pain as possible and that includes you after you clearly showed her the kind of father you’d be.”

“That’s not fair, I was pissed that day.”

“That’s always been your excuse when it comes to her.” Urban purses his lips as he felt his more protective side come out. “I’m sorry man but Neelam, Dru and I are going to be supportive friends. Clearly this is important because she wouldn’t be having this thing 6 months after Ani was born.”

Urban makes his way to the door. “What do you mean? I thought this was just another family tradition.”

“It is Jack but Amiria told us multiple times that this happens because if the mother or the child or both have a dangerous and risky birth. The same event happened with Mrs Campbell when she was 6 months old, Amiria when she was 6 months old and clearly this is happening because somehow bad happened the day Ani was born.” Urban says quickly before leaving, not being able to see the dumbstruck expression on Jacks face.

If something really bad happened while Amiria was in labour, is there a chance that she could’ve been dead today? Is there a chance that Ani could’ve died in childbirth? Is there a chance that they both could’ve died that day?

He had to try one more time. If he was going to properly give her space he had to let her know how sorry he was. One more time.

@iheartharlow

@iikximii

@fashphotolife

@sluttywh0r3forw0m4n

@msliz

@jackierose902109

@gassyandsassy1

@awhoere4more

@rio-lover

@unfuckwitabella

@longingtobewithu

@fulla02

#jack harlow #miszswan talks #amiria campbell #amiria imogen maiah campbell #people you know series #jack harlow x woc #jack harlow concepts #jack harlow x reader #jack harlow imagine #jack harlow angst

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luminnara · 1 year

Text

Flying On Wings Made From Feathers and Wax | Ganondorf x Gerudo OC | Ch 4

Chapter three | Chapter four | Chapter five

Summary: 10,000 years before the events of Breath of the Wild, a little Gerudo vai moves to the desert and makes a new friend in the form of the young Gerudo prince, Ganondorf. The two grow up together, enjoying a worry-free life…but distant memories of a long-dead demon king and a sheikah prophecy nag at everyone’s minds, and tensions between the Gerudo and Hylians are on the rise. As the years pass, it becomes clear that this little vai will play an important role in the shaping of Hyrule. Loyalty and love will be tested, empires will rise and fall, and at the center of it all is that mysterious godly power…

Surviving the desert means becoming even harsher than the ruthless sun and the swallowing sands.

For young Gerudo, that meant survival and combat training. While Ganondorf was allowed the privilege of private tutelage from the best general the tribe had seen in decades—his mother, Mira—Ilula was tossed in with the rest of the vai, donning a training uniform as she trudged across town every morning at dawn.

“Try to at least pretend you’re alive,” her mother joked one day. She still hadn’t told Ilula of her newest assignment from the chief, and as time wore on, she hoped that she might not need to. Ilula was fifteen, halfway through her training, and in a few short years, Ganondorf would be taking over as king. If he—or Ryla—ordered Kiluki to resume her espionage in Castle Town, she would obey in an instant. Of course she would. She was a proud Gerudo, determined to do whatever was necessary to protect and help her people. Her hesitation was not born of disloyalty, but rather an unwillingness to cause her daughter any pain, and the thought of forcing Ilula to abandon her best friend almost pained Kiluki more than the idea of refusing the chief.

Almost.

As Ilula ran off to her morning training, her aunt, Uvira, turned to Kiluki. “Well. She’s certainly dragging her feet today.”

“The other vai still don’t accept her.” Kiluki said.

“I think it’s likely that they never will, at this point.” Uvira sighed, shaking her head. “She’s...different from the rest of them. I dare say Ganondorf doesn’t help her fit in.”

“No, I’m sure he doesn’t.” Kiluki chuckled as she cleaned up the bowls and plates from breakfast. “Though he makes sure they can’t bully her.”

“She makes sure they can’t bully her.” Uvira snorted. “That vai is made of fire and sand seal oil, I swear. Takes after her mother.”

“Oh, please.” Kiluki rolled her eyes.

“It’s true! Why else do Mira and Ryla trust you so much?” Uvira asked.

Her sister glared at her. “Don’t speak on such things so openly.”

“Yes, yes, my apologies.” Uvira said sarcastically. “I am but a humble melon vendor, what do I know about espionage?”

“Uvira…”

“Yes, yes.” she held her hands up in surrender, lips quirked into a smile. “Let us continue speaking about Ilula.”

“I would much prefer that.” Kiluki said.

“I know you still worry, but...well, someone has to be the runt. There will always be someone who’s the smallest, or slowest, or weakest. She seems to be doing quite well, all things considered.” Uvira shrugged. “It is a shame she doesn’t have any other female friends, though.”

“I know.” Kiluki sighed. “I had hoped that she would fit in better here than in Hyrule, but...evidently, I was wrong. If it weren’t for the prince, I fear she would be completely alone…”

“Well, perhaps that’s where her future lies. Being best friends with royalty certainly isn’t a bad thing.”

“No, but she would fare better with more friends. Like us--we both had plenty of friends growing up.”

“And how many of them do you regularly speak with?” Uvira raised an eyebrow.

“Well…”

“I just think that Ilula is doing perfectly fine. Ganondorf has been loyal to her.”

“Loyal to a fault, perhaps.” Kiluki mumbled.

“You know Mira would never let him shirk his responsibilities. Both he and Ilula are proud Gerudo, and that’s that.” Uvira stood and clapped her hands. “Now, are you going to help me open the stall? Now that that sandstorm has died down, we should finally be getting some travelers coming through, and I, for one, would love to actually make some extra money today…”

Kiluki sighed and nodded, and a few minutes later, they were both walking out into the morning sun. As she helped Uvira get ready for the day, though, her mind was elsewhere, constantly drifting back towards thoughts of her daughter, and the prince, and the chief. Ilula was hard at work, focusing on her training, and to burden her with espionage and politics just didn’t seem fair. Kiluki couldn’t speak of any of it to anyone outside the chief’s inner circle, and so she was left to mull it over in her own head, worrying and wondering when she would be sent back to Hyrule.

Hyrule…a lush, green land, with so many more natural resources than the desert had. Yes, the Gerudo managed to thrive out in the sun and the sands, but the Hylians had so much more. They hardly knew what to do with it all, and with relatively good relations between neighboring countries, the royal family was enjoying a long and peaceful reign.

Kiluki knew that the chief wasn’t entirely happy about that.

Though she refrained from telling her sister, Kiluki had received a summons from the palace, in the form of a blank letter, decorated only with Chief Ryla’s seal on the back. She knew all too well that it was serious, and it meant that their happy time in Gerudo Town was coming to an end. As she left Uvira, making up an excuse about finding spices to buy, Kiluki wandered towards the palace and wondered how she was to inform her daughter that they may soon be leaving. It wasn’t fair, and she knew it, though few things were fair when it came to war and politics. She could only hope that Ilula was training hard today, lest the others leave her behind in the dust.

-0-

“Hey!” Ilula snarled, coughing up that very same dust. “That—that was a dirty trick! That wasn’t fair!”

Chani, a young voe at least a head and a half taller than Ilula, stood over her and snickered. “You think fights are always fair? Grow up, Ilula.”

“You tripped me!”

“Our enemies would do worse. You’re lucky that’s all I did.”

Ilula gritted her teeth as she pushed herself up into a sitting position. Training wasn’t going at all well that morning, and the moment she was paired up with Chani for sparring, she knew it was just going to get worse. And of course, it had; Chani was bigger and stronger and had a nasty streak reserved specifically for Ilula, and whenever Ganondorf wasn’t around, she loved to torment the smaller girl.

“She’s right.” their trainer said, looking down at Ilula sternly. “If you cannot survive training, you won’t survive war.”

Ilula gritted her teeth angrily, her jaw clenched as she kept herself from replying angrily. She climbed to her feet, taking up her spear again and facing Chani. “Again.”

The taller girl smirked, readying her own spear as the trainer backed away. There was a terrible glint in her eye, the kind that absolutely infuriated Ilula, and as they began sparring once more, it was nearly impossible to contain her anger. Chani was a good fighter, but only because she cheated–and as she sent Ilula flying to the ground once more with a kick to the back of her knees, she laughed meanly.

“Just give up, pipsqueak.” she sneered. “War is no place for someone like you.”

Ilula narrowed her eyes. She hated it when anyone other than Ganondorf called her names like that. When he did it, it was endearing and fun and lighthearted, coming from someone who was massive compared to her, someone who had earned the honor of teasing her. When Chani did it, the words were laced with malicious intent, always spoken with a cruel laugh. She practically spat whenever she spoke to Ilula, looking down her nose at the smaller girl with a nasty sneer on her face. She loved watching Ilula fail, and sparring was her only real chance to have some fun when the prince wasn’t looming over the runt’s shoulder the rest of the day.

“Shut up,” Ilula spat, standing once again. She didn’t like Chani, but she wasn’t about to shrug all of her insults off. War was for someone like her, runt or not. She was Gerudo, just like Chani, just like Ganondorf, just like all the others. If there was one thing she knew how to do, it was fight.

And she was going to show them all.

She gripped her training weapon tightly as she faced Chani. Ilula didn’t like fighting with spears; even though they were long and extended her reach significantly, she could never get the hang of how they felt in her hands. They felt clumsy to her, and too long to be of any real use. She always used the shortest one available, but unfortunately, they weren’t training with scimitars yet. Ilula had to make do with what she had, and she was determined not to land in the dust again.

“Again,” Ilula growled.

“Again?” Chani barked a laugh. “Look at you! You’re covered in bruises. You can’t possibly spar more today.”

“I can,” Ilula hissed. “Again.”

The taller girl rolled her eyes and readied herself. “Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Their trainer, one of the higher ranking Gerudo warriors, looked on curiously as the two began. Ilula wasn’t the best fighter. Anyone with eyes could see that. But she had to admit that the vai had heart, and no amount of bruising could convince her to sit down and give up. That was worth something in itself; Chani was bigger, and stronger, but she was used to living that way. Ilula wasn’t. She was small, and she was at a physical disadvantage…but anyone who roughhoused with Prince Ganondorf had to be resilient, and even as she fell back in the dirt time and time again, she always got back up.

By the time the sun was high in the sky and everyone was putting their training weapons down, Ilula was coughing up sand. She had been thrown to the ground more times than she could count, but it didn’t matter. She didn’t care. It was the same thing, day in and day out, and while she normally gave up at some point, she hadn’t reached it yet. She wasn’t ready to break. She refused.

“Again.” She growled out, her teeth clenched.

Chani looked down at her and scoffed. “No way. We’re finished.”

“Are you refusing my challenge?”

“Only for your own good.” The bigger girl rolled her eyes. “Face it. You’re never gonna make it.”

She turned, moving to put her training spear back on its rack with the others. Everyone else was hanging their weapons up, grabbing their water skeins and hydromelons as they finished their lessons for the day. Ilula didn’t want to join them, though; she wanted one more shot at Chani, one more chance to win.

And she had an idea of how to make that happen.

“Wow. I didn’t realize you were such a coward.” She said.

Chani froze, looking back over her shoulder. “What did you just call me?”

Ilula shrugged, feigning innocence. “Just seems cowardly to back down from a fight. Especially an easy one.”

“I told you,” Chani growled, “it’s for your own good. I don’t exactly feel like being the one who breaks you in half.”

“But I want to learn from you,” Ilula lied, batting her eyelashes as she looked up at her peer. “Just one more time. Please?”

Chani took the bait and gripped her spear in her hand. “Fine.”

Ilula had to stop herself from smiling as they readied themselves once more.

Up above the training grounds, Ganondorf was watching them with an amused smirk on his face. Normally, he was stuck studying at this hour, but today, the chief had called his mother to the throne room, and he was perfectly happy to end his lessons early. Now, with the desert sun high in the sky, the prince was sitting in the window, sinking his teeth into a slice of hydromelon as he looked down at the sparring vai. He wasn’t really interested in most of them, of course, and Ilula was easy to spot as she brandished her spear and lunged towards one of her peers.

He had been watching his friend train for a while, as he often liked to when he had the free time. She always said he shouldn’t interrupt their training because he was a distraction, and while he had every right to disregard her opinions, he still respected what his oldest (and really, only) friend had to say. So, he tended to stick to the window, entertaining himself with a snack while he looked down at the vai.

Ilula was determined, and she was quick. The spear was too long for her, Ganondorf could tell—why they never gave her something more her size to train with, he didn’t know—but now, after so many failed attempts, she finally seemed to have a real plan. Was Chani slowing down in the heat of the day, after a morning of training? Or was Ilula actually faster than her? Ganondorf couldn’t quite tell, but it didn’t really matter; the smaller vai ducked under her opponent’s spear easily as it jabbed forward, lunging in to deliver a blow of her own.

Chani’s eyes widened in disbelief when she felt the dull spear knock against her side, and she let out a shout as she whirled around in an attempt to catch Ilula with her own weapon. The runt was too fast, though, ducking out of the way, making herself even smaller than Chani was used to. She stepped around the taller gerudo, catching the backs of her knees with the stick of her spear, and when Chani stumbled forward, Ilula gave her a whack across the back that sent her falling into the sand.

“What?!” Chani yelled angrily, flipping over to face Ilula. “That–that was dirty!”

“I thought fights weren’t always fair?” Ilula smirked, leaning on her spear as she echoed Chani’s words from earlier.

The other girl narrowed her eyes, then tilted her chin down in shame. “Shut up…”

Ilula’s smirk only widened. “Come on, Chani. Don’t be a sore loser.”

“Sore? I’m not sore.” she scoffed. “I just can’t believe I lost to you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ilula frowned.

“That I shouldn’t be losing to the worst one here,” Chani spat as she pushed herself up off of the ground.

“Obviously I’m not the worst, then.” Ilula growled.

Chani’s face twisted into a sneer, and Ilula readied herself to hear any number of biting insults. None came, though; instead, she watched as Chani’s eyes grew wide, the vai taking a sudden step back as she looked above Ilula’s head. She was scared, her lower lip trembling slightly, and after a moment, she dropped to one knee.

“M-my Prince, forgive me,” she mumbled quickly, eyes trained downwards.

Ilula stifled a sigh.

“To what do I owe the honor, my prince?” She asked as she spun on her heel, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

She immediately had to tilt her head back to look up at his face. Ganondorf seemed incapable of pausing in his growth spurts, and while still in the awkward stages of his adolescence, the prince was growing into a fine young voe. A large young voe. Seriously, how tall was he now? Still not finished growing, and already as tall as the guards who stood at the city gates.

Ridiculous, in her mind.

When her eyes met with the planes of his chest, Ilula felt her cheeks heating up in a strange way, and she quickly forced them back up to meet his gaze. More and more lately she had found herself looking at him, fascinated by the angles of his muscles, and she wasn’t sure how to feel about her wandering thoughts.

Gan cleared his throat. “I finished my studies early today. I thought I would come by and see how your training was going.”

Ilula resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She knew he was trying to mess with her. She always told him not to come around and interrupt, because of the way everyone else always acted when he did. Everyone always stopped in reverence, and on the rare occasion that they actually got to continue with their lessons, the others always acted strangely, and all semblance of normalcy was lost. Looking around, she saw that this was no different than any other time—they were all down on one knee, heads bowed for their prince.

All except for her.

“Have lunch with me,” he said. It wasn’t a request, nor was it a blatant order; it was just a statement, one that he expected her to agree with.

And she did agree with it, because why wouldn’t she? Lunch was better than whatever Chani wanted to do to her now, and she wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to relax with Gan.

Finally, at the thought of food and friendship, a smile tugged at her lips. “I would love to.”

She returned her training spear to its place as the others finally stood again and did the same, their teacher speaking with Ganondorf as he waited for Ilula. When she looked across the arena and saw them standing together, she rolled her eyes. He was already the same height as the instructor, who was a tall, muscular Gerudo with bright pink hair and a severe expression. Normally, she looked absolutely terrifying, but she seemed much less threatening standing next to Gan for some reason, even as Ilula approached them.

“You did well today, Ilula.” She said, looking down at the young vai. “The prince and I were just speaking of your victory.”

Ilula tried to hide her scowl. She knew that she was only being praised because it was Ganondorf. He had no doubt brought it up himself, and the trainer had no desire to anger him by disagreeing. Winning a sparring match was nothing to boast about, even if it was impressive for her, and she was proud.

“Don’t be so bashful, Lula.” Gan flashed her that smile that she had grown to love over the years and she felt her spirits lifting. “It was clever, what you did. And you’re so light on your feet, you make me look like a moblin.”

Her cheeks flushed and she looked down sheepishly. “It wasn’t that great…”

“You are the quickest out of the bunch.” The trainer nodded sharply. “Chani would do well to remember that she is not guaranteed a victory over every opponent.”

At the sound of her rival’s name, Ilula glanced back up. They were really praising her, weren’t they? It wasn’t just Ganondorf forcing everyone to be nice to her. The trainer’s voice was still as harsh as always, her eyes hard, and if the prince had ordered her to be kind or face his Royal wrath, one would think that she would try a bit harder to seem friendlier than she was. As she looked down at Ilula, there was a seriousness there that told her she was being genuine.

A small smile crept onto her face, and as she took the hand Ganondorf offered her and followed him away from the training grounds, she felt like she was soaring.

“You were great,” he said, nudging her.

“So you were spying.” She snorted a laugh. “I should have known.”

“Can’t I watch you from time to time?” He asked. “You do train just outside my window, after all.”

“Some might consider that unsettling, you know,” she smiled.

He paused, letting go of her hand. “…do you?”

“Not really.” She shrugged as she continued walking ahead of him. “Not when it’s you.”

Ganondorf felt his heart leap and he swallowed nervously, his mouth suddenly a bit drier than before. The midday sun usually didn’t bother him much, but…was it a bit hotter than normal today? He felt his face growing warm as he watched his best friend walking away, unsure of what exactly he was supposed to be thinking. This was confusing. This was Ilula! He had known her for a decade. She was his closest companion, someone who was always there for him, tucked right up against his side. He got along with her better than he did anyone else, and at the end of the day, there was nobody he would rather relax with than her.

He was trapped, frozen in place as he watched her and realized that at some point, his feelings for her had grown beyond friendship. He was impossibly sweet on her, more than he had thought, and he had no idea what to do about it.

“Hey, are you coming?” She asked over her shoulder. “You said we were getting lunch.”

Ganondorf shook himself out of his stupor and forced a lazy smile on his face. “Yeah. We are. What do you want? Your choice today.”

“Something refreshing,” she said as he caught up to her once more. “I’m boiling out here.”

“Then let’s get inside and send for some fruits,” the prince suggested, taking her hand in his again.

She smiled up at him and he thought his heart might stop. “I’d love that.”

-0-

Lunch was spent in the palace, the serving staff bringing them platters of fresh hydromelons, cool wildberries from the highlands, and even some volt fruits to snack on. Afterwards, Ilula enjoyed a nice nap while Ganondorf sat next to her and busied himself with a book, though his mind was decidedly elsewhere. He couldn’t focus. He couldn’t do anything. His attention was usually at least partially on her when she was nearby, but lately…lately, she seemed to demand all of it, all while never trying. Gan was, for once in his life, unsure of how to handle his new feelings, and as he pretended to read, he debated keeping quiet. Never one to hide, though, always bold, he made up his mind to do something about it, and by the time she had woken up, he was already pulling her to her feet.

“Gan?” She asked, still half asleep. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see,” he promised.

Ilula offered him a sleepy smile and let him half-drag her away from the bed. She trusted him completely, fully, with every fiber of her being. She was used to the way he so often whisked her away, but this time, he didn’t appear to have the city walls or the fountain in mind; instead, he led her out of the palace and out to the sand seal pens, and soon, they were off, racing through the desert.

Their destination, it turned out, was a small oasis. Lush greenery grew around a clear pool, the leaves of the tall palm trees casting a welcoming shade over the water. As she craned her neck and looked up, Ilula could see palm fruits growing at the tops, a few birds perched among the fronds. It was tranquil, a beautiful, verdant little place amongst the constantly shifting sands that seemed so untouched and so frozen in time.

“Do you like it?” Ganondorf asked as he watched her.

She turned towards him with a bright smile on her face, and it made his heart leap. “I love it.”

He stared at her, just taking in the sight of her for a moment before he smiled as well. “Good. I had hoped you might.”

“How did you find this place?” Ilula asked, walking towards the water.

Ganondorf shrugged as he followed her. “I explored and ended up here one day.”

“Really?” she asked skeptically, glancing over her shoulder back at him. “This is a bit far from town for that…what were you doing all the way out here?”

He wasn’t sure what to say.

“I…” he cleared his throat. In truth, he had no idea why he knew about the oasis. It wasn’t on any maps, because it was so small, and it did sit a considerable distance from anything resembling a settlement. He had never done any exploration. He was far too busy learning how to be a king for something like that, and he was under constant supervision when he wasn’t off with her.

So how? How did he know where to find such a perfect little place?

He just knew. He knew as if he had been there before, just as he knew the desert so well, as if he had lorded over it in a past life. The oasis was familiar to him, and it was comfortable, and he wanted to share it with her and her alone. He wanted it to be theirs.

Ganondorf cleared his throat, searching for an answer. “I just…found it.”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “Really?”

He shrugged a bit sheepishly, and she just laughed.

“You’re amazing sometimes. You know that?”

And he felt his heart absolutely soar.

“It can be a place for us,” he said, catching up to her as she made her way to stand at the edge of the water. “I can bring some supplies out here, and we can come here whenever we want. Just us.”

Ilula slipped her shoes off, setting them aside as she sank down to sit in the sand. “Just us?”

Ganondorf mimicked her, sitting with one leg outstretched, the other bent at the knee. He leaned back on his hands, stretching out some in the shade. “Yeah. No one else.”

She leaned against him. “I’d like that.”

He felt his chest tighten and then release, and he looked down at her. Her, his best friend. The vai he got along with so well that he never wanted to leave her side. The vai he was so completely, incredibly head over heels for.

His Ilula.

#flying on wings made from feathers and wax #ganondorf #ganondorf x oc #botw #gerudo #gerudo ganondorf #gerudo oc #the legend of zelda

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