#but something about that whole discussion just seemed to be missing the point / not engaging with what people actually mean

[triptychgardener]

Hello sorry if this is a bother but I am asking in good faith where is the reading for transmasc nepeta. I’m asking this cuz of your last ask (the June one) and I see aradia Dirk and Jane. Thoes all I have seen post and analysis about. But I have not really seen anything about nepeta.

Okay so first thing you gotta understand is that gender in Homestuck, for lack of a better way to say it, can be understood in how characters reflect and relate to each other. That being said to understand Nepeta's gender, we gotta understand the gender of at the very least one other person.

Dave.

And more specifically.

Davepeta, Homestuck's very own first(ish) trans character.

Davepeta is noted to be a sort of platonic ideal of existence for both Dave and Nepeta. Somehow, through a strange series of cosmic coincidences, these two end up making an odd sort of parallel. Both having a strange relationship to a man who loves him some goddamn horses. The whole Akwete Purrmusk thing. I mean, Dave canonically engaged in semi-nonironic furry roleplay with Nepeta offscreen, and given what we know about what becoming a furry in Homestuck means, it's not a leap to describe this as their ideal form.

But, although we don't see a lot of Nepeta's character arc, we do see a lot of Dave's. He struggles his whole life under an incredibly oppressive masculine force (both of Bro and, indirectly, Lord English), and once the game is over ends up deconstructing and largely rejecting that.

So when Davesprite, who's also probably been thinking about this for even longer, bereft of purpose or identity, finds a kindred soul in a spunky catgirl... well the rest is Davepeta.

And similarly, there are points in the story where Nepeta acts kind of uncomfortable with how others see her as exclusively something to be protected. The whole "Dear, sweet, precious Nepeta" grates on her early on, as Equius uses it as an excuse to control her actions. The whole of moiraillegience as it is originally explained (i.e. one party helps to calm down an especially brutal and violent person from outbursts of anger, and in turn that person will protect the more docile, even-tempered soul from external harm) even kind of FEELS like the way heterosexual relationships are portrayed in a lot of conservative spaces, where women are nuturers and caretakers while men are protectors. And Nepeta is supposed to, in this situation, be the person who helps Equius manage his emotions, which she feels some consternation at!

Now, over the course of Hivebent, their relationship appears to evolve and get a bit more balanced, but it still carries these overtones of "I will protect you, and you will handle my outbursts." Notably, when Equius goes to seek the Highb100d, and leaves Nepeta behind.

And of course not after roleplaying as each other.

Which. I mean come on.

But notably, Nepeta doesn't just stay put! She doesn't really want to be protected all the time! And when push comes to shove, she leaps out to defend, or at the very least avenge, her best friend.

And then, we don't really see Nepeta for a while!

Until we get to the end of the comic.

During their whole "date", Nepeta seems a little uncomfortable with Jasprose's affections. She may be a bit flattered, but Jasprose also fully admits later that she was frankly looking for any girl she could fall in love with after the tragic death of her girlfriend and possible more tragic untimely resurrection.

But then the pivotal handshake happens, and we get to see who is perhaps the most happy being in all of Homestuck.

Then we get into some of the only actual discussion of gender in Homestuck. We don't get much besides that, for both of their lives, Dave and Nepeta both felt something was missing. Something felt wrong that they couldn't quite place that made them both miserable. I don't think it's a massive stretch to say this could be gender dysphoria.

And when they combine, they feel the fullness of the gendered experience they were missing, melded together like a two-piece puzzle.

Now while the abovementioned "strong identities as a boy and a girl" might throw you off, I would point to what Victoria Lacroix said about this passage: note the lack of the word "respectively." I rest my case.

Now full disclosure, my personal headcanon for Nepeta is genderfluid transmasc. The whole affinity for roleplaying lends itself to a more shifting identity and I just think Nepeta, given more time, would love exploring the little nooks and crannies of gender.

This isn't going into the more complicated shit with Gender when it comes to Equius and Dirk and all that other stuff. Here's a quick summary so you can see exactly how my brain is broken.

Anyways, thanks for the question! I hope I answered my thoughts on the topic adequately! If other people have more to say about this, please feel free to add on!

#whoof this was a long one #asks #anon

[clean-bands-dirty-stories]

Babbling ~ P.P.

A/n: Sorry for missing Monday, but here’s this <3 Another request done :)

Request: “Tasm!Peter x male reader where reader gets invited to a party and brings Peter as his plus one or whatever and Peter getting drunk and touchy and confesses and saying how he wants to be with him and spend the rest of his life with him...” by anon

Word count: 2700+

MASTERLIST

Peter Parker and Y/n had always been a story for the ages.

It hadn't been life long friends, and their meeting hadn't been all that important. They'd had a class together and as both of them engaged with the content and asked questions and did reports and read out loud, their faces became familiar with each other. Then Spider-Man had gotten caught up in a fight and his mask had come off. Y/n had been stunned to see the big brown doe eyes of the cute guy in his AP bio class.

It had been the most anti-climactic thing, truly. Y/n had discovered a sight dedicated to "fangirling over Spider-Man" except that they didn't do much discussion or giving of content. However, when Y/n went through the internet looking for pictures with Spider-Man's face, there was a startling very few available. For how many hungry reporters and shocked civilian or eager tourist was here and with how often Spider-Man lost or destroyed or just straight up took off his mask, there should be more.

When he found that there were images, they were just unavailable, he deep dove it and used his skill witch coding to figure out what happened. And what he uncovered was stunning - the website "dedicated to fangirling over Spiderman" was either a cover, or they believed that the best fans were dedicated to keeping Spider-Man's secret identity a secret. Peter Parker was New York's little secret.

It made Y/n so curious to meet the man. So of course they had to.

Asking for notes or a pencil or complimenting a sweater or giggling at his jokes that he said under his breath turned into lunches together for convenience and then studying together and then suddenly they were friends. Exchanging phone numbers and inside jokes and nicknames.

It was obvious that he was Spider-Man if you knew what you were looking for. His poor excuses and his sudden exists and late entries. Cancelled plans right when Spider-Man was needed, and all for a job that didn't even pay that well.

Peter was fairly good at hiding it. He was a disaster - a mistake waiting to happen - but he had a whole city behind him so it was okay.

It made Y/n fall in love with Spider-Man even more.

And maybe Peter Parker too.

There was something about the boy though. Something darker that he shook off when he had the mask. Something heavy that was easy to miss when you couldn't see his facial expressions. There was a distance when Y/n would jokingly flirt or be physically affectionate. He offered to take Peter to meet his folks once and Peter had seemed... to not like that. He had squirmed and wriggled, desperate to get away. When he came up with an "emergency" and Spider-Man stopped a mugger and got a kite out of tree Y/n knew that he shouldn't bring it up again.

It was obvious that Peter had lost someone, so Y/n tucked away any realizations or feelings and let them stay casual friends. Not best friends, not truly close - always at an arm's length. But friends.

Until, of course, Peter got drunk.

Peter never wanted to go anywhere or do anything. Y/n was pretty sure he was depressed. Which had driven him to try and get Peter out more, to find him hobbies and past times. Peter had come to the parties and gatherings and slam poetries and walks and clubs Y/n had dragged him to, just like tonight, with the understanding that if he needed to leave he could at any moment.

It didn't seem that moment would come tonight.

At some point Peter had put down his phone and walked away after having a few drinks, getting looser and more relaxed. He never went far from Y/n but seemed to have a hard time sitting still or staying in the same place. They paced or walked in circles and that seemed to do the trick. Y/n had noticed the other man put down his phone after checking the time and walked away again, so Y/n had snagged it for safe keeping. He would give it back tomorrow morning.

It took a lot or drinks for Peter to get proper wasted, but it happened. It seemed to be absent minded and on accident. He kept talking and walking, keeping his voice above the music in the room, and Y/n found himself trailing after in a love sick haze. Peter was gorgeous on his own, but the way his face light up and his hair got messier and messier... he was breathtaking when he went on rants, and Y/n was more than pleased to listen.

So he didn't stop Peter from drinking. And to be fair, neither did Peter.

Y/n knew they'd both made a mistake when Peter stopped walking, leaning against a table behind him and sighing. Y/n came closer to check on him and Peter reached out, fingers wrapping around Y/n's waist and face pressing into his shoulder. Y/n's body blossomed with heat and something akin to a buzzing, making him tense but giddy.

He tried to ignore that.

Peter sighed, leaning against Y/n, and the more sober of them gave a little chuckle. "You okay, Pete?"

"You're so comfy," was all Peter had to say. His voice was soft and airy, almost sleepy. But he had no problem mostly keeping himself up, nor did he seem to sway or buckle. He was just... drawn to Y/n. Like a magnet.

Y/n blushed. "Thank you."

Peter stared, for a long time, not saying anything. Y/n got nervous, shifting. The look was full of adoration and warmth. Admiration simmered at the edges, a sappy smile smearing across his face. "Did I ever mention that you look really attractive when you get all..." he tilted his head, searching for a word. "Blushy." He giggled. "Shy? No. Not just shy, but reserved too. Nervous." His face flitted briefly into a scowl, but when he went from trying yo grasp the word in his mind to admiring Y/n again, the smile came back. "I'm glad we met."

Y/n couldn't get the courage to look at him. "So am I." He cleared his throat, melting under that gaze. Under those words. "Perhaps we should get home."

Peter nodded. "I don't want to be here anymore. Let's go somewhere - just us." He took Y/n's hands, taking longer to do so as he traced Y/n's fingers and sighed blissfully at the contact. Like he was relieved after so long wanting it. Like how Y/n did when he felt the touch.

"Yeah. If that's what you really want." Y/n closed his eyes, chastising himself and forcing himself to stay focused. "Tomorrow. Tonight you need sleep." He began walking, keeping an eye on if Peter needed help walking, but he didn't. Not surprising for the same Spider-Man that could balance on a string that seemed thin as hair, or cling to any surface.

Peter whined and Y/n had to hide a smile with his free hand. "Not tomorrow," he begged, tugging on Y/n's hand. It was almost like a child begging for candy in the store, but less dramatic and much mote desperate. The thought of leaving Y/n seemed to genuinely upset him... Y/n didn't know how to feel about that. "I'll go to bed if you spend the night."

Now that was dangerous.

Y/n only hummed in thought, actually considered it. Drunk people were hard to handle and even if he didn't, he would need to lie to Peter to get him home. If the superhero genuinely didn't want to go or decided that messing around with Y/n to prolong their time together it would he near impossible to get ahold of him again...

They got all the way to Peter's door before he spoke again. "Are you staying?"

Y/n gave him a sideways look as he pushed the door open, having snagged Peter's keys from his pocket. He'd thought he's gotten away with it after such a long silence, but it seemed Peter was eternally patient even drunk. He sighed as they moved into the apartment, Peter always snatching Y/n's hand the second they were free. "Why does it matter so much to you that I stay, hm?" He pulled himself away from the drunk man again, closing the door and putting the keys away. Pulling Peter's jacket off and removing his shoes and grabbing a glass of water and Ibuprofen for tomorrow morning, setting it on the table at Peter's bed. It was only when he seemed finished, about to head out again, that Peter caught him.

Holding one of Y/n's hands in each of his, looking deep into his eyes, Peter didn't just seem genuine, he seemed raw. Exposed. "Y/n. I've been punishing myself for so long... always alone. For so long." He closed his eyes, pressing their foreheads together. "It's suffocating me, the loneliness. And you make it easier to breathe. So... stay. If you want." He swallowed before adding a breathless, "Please."

Y/n's heart was ramming in his chest. "If you need a friend tonight, I can of course stay." He added friend on purpose this time - to remind himself.

That seemed to upset Peter though. "Don't call yourself that. Please, please don't-" he closed his eyes tightly. "I know we're friends. And I'm goad we're friends. But don't remind me we're friends when I want to kiss you so badly. Please."

Y/n's breath caught. "Pete-" He stopped himself. "You're drunk. You don't know what you're saying."

Peter chuckled, shaking his head. "Drunk words are sober thoughts. That's a popular saying for a reason."

Oh god.

"You- I-" Y/n's face was burning and he was running out of reasons to go. Ways to deny it. Peter was Spider-Man. There's so much Y/n still wasn't supposed to know. They'd been friends for a while now, and they were just getting close. There was still that gap though. That space that Peter kept.

Now he was throwing all of it away.

Peter didn't wait for Y/n to form thoughts. He let go of Y/n's hands, reaching up for his face instead. Peter's face trailed Y/n's jaw. "Can I kiss you? I... I've wanted to kiss you for so long. If you felt the same way. The way your heart is racing, I thought you might."

Y/n's eyes widen. Of course he can hear heartbeats. The world wouldn't be as unfair as it was if he couldn't.

But also, how could be lie now? When Peter knew he was? And maybe it was selfish, and he'd get his heart broken in the morning, but Peter was begging and god if Y/n wasn't just as eager.

"Okay."

There was no hesitation after that. Y/n had expected raging fire, or fireworks, but there was none of that. It was relief, cool to the touch like a breeze on a sweltering day, or a breath after drowning. It was laying in bed after a long, exhausting day or drinking something warm and sitting by the fire after a day of ice and snow.

Y/n did more than just stay over. It happened so fast, each kiss getting more and more desperate until their hands were wandering and they were falling back onto the bed and Peter didn't stutter a single second. He didn't stumble or hesitate. He had seemed to drink so much but all his words came easily, any slur he'd had before completely gone. He seemed sober.

Y/n was an idiot.

He tried to leave, but Peter had gripped onto his arm and begged him to stay. So Y/n woke up next to him in the morning, slipping out of bed and wandering into the living room.

Okay so that had just happened.

He felt like a villain. He felt like a moron. Peter had been drunk. FUCK he was a horrible person.

Out of part guilt and part anxiety, Y/n tidied the living room and kitchen before beginning to make breakfast. He couldn't in good will just leave Peter alone that morning, but he also couldn't stay in that bed. See Peter panic when he woke up and realized what had happened.

Would he panic? Would he be angry?

He would be justified to feel angry.

Y/n jumped when a set of arms wrapped around his waist from behind, a face burying into his shoulder. "Smells good," came Peter's muffled voice.

Y/n wordlessly finished the food, plating it and turning off the stove before turning to Peter. The brunette seemed weirdly unphased, taking each thing and making two plates, then wandering into the living room to set them down on the clean table, plopping onto the couch. He smiled. "And you clean? I'm spoiled."

Y/n crossed his arms over his chest, a little confused and a little annoyed. "Peter. We need to talk about last night."

The smile faded off of his face and it happened so easily that Y/n was stunned to realize it had been more fake than he'd realized. "I'm sorry."

That came as a shock too. "You're sorry? You? Peter, I'm sorry."

Peter looked up at that, narrowing his eyes in confusion. "I'm the one who was pushing you into-" He looked away. "You obviously regret it, and it was stupid, and I'm sorry I just-"

Y/n scoffed. "Peter, you were drunk. You were more honest than you usually are. That isn't a bad thing. But you were drunk, and I wasn't, and I completely took advantage of you and-"

Peter tilted his head. "I wasn't drunk."

Y/n froze. "What?"

Peter blushed. "Well- I was drunk at first." He looked away, fiddling with a couch pillow. "But by the time we got here I was pretty much sober. I have some what of a healing factor, so-"

Y/n's eyes widened. "You have a what?"

Peter looked back, his expression dripping with amusement. "Y/n, I'm not good at keeping secrets, and you're not good at it either. My mask is hanging up on the hook by the door and you hung up my keys next to it and didn't even blink."

Y/n's head whipped around and - sure enough - there was the mask.

Damnit.

He looked back sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. "I... just..."

Peter laughed, standing from the couch. "It's okay. I... appreciate it, honestly. Most people demand explanations or details or ask an overwhelming questions. When I realize you knew?" He shook his head. "How long have you known?"

Y/n pursed his lip, shrugging. A... while."

Peter snorted. "Since the beginning then."

Y/n winced. "Not the very beginning."

Peter laughed again, this time closing the distance between them. "I don't know what you were beating yourself up for but I hope you realize that you don't have to. I was drunk, and that made me much more affectionate than I usually am... but, it was the affection itself that drove me insane.  It was likeI'd been starving." He shrugged. "I probably was. But kissing you..." He smiled sweetly.

Y/n blushed. It was quiet for a moment before he asked, “So you’re glad last night happened?”

Peter grinned. “Yes. I am.” He shuffled, as if he wanted to ask something but felt too silly to do so.

“I’m glad it happened too,” Y/n eased. Peter melted in relief, his expression blooming with adoration - so close to the way he had looked at Y/n last night. Y/n took his hand, tracing the bones and veins. “Do you… want to be my boyfriend?” He cringed - it felt so silly to ask. Like he was in middle school all over again.

A chuckle came from Peter, but his answer didn’t follow in the form of words. Instead he reached over, catching Y/n’s chin and leaning into a kiss. They sighed blissfully at the same time, and Y/n divided that was answer enough.

-

Male Readers: @ravenpuff-oli @sortzz @fadedver

#Peter Parker #peter 3 x reader #peter parker x male reader #peter parker imagine #peter parker x reader #the amazing spiderman x male reader #the amazing Spider-Man #the amazing Spider-Man imagine #the amazing Spider-Man x reader #Spiderman x reader #Spiderman x male reader #Spiderman imagine #male reader #marvel

[spectrumgarden]

Okay so I've never really joined the whole "small talk" argument that's been happening increasingly over the last years because I tend to just not agree with anyone I see discuss it. Like no I dont think people who use it are evil or making things hard on purpose, I also dont think it makes them lesser, ... I Also dont think that someone who refuses to use it / cant use it is automatically worse and will not make friends.

Importantly i also dont think everyone can learn it. I should know because I spent multiple years with professionals trying to teach me how to have a conversation At All and I still am actually nowhere near what would be expected at my age group. (Most recent reports usually go something like "makes slight improvements in having a two sided conversation" - because I can say nothing, or I can ramble on and then not react to your answer. The rest? Struggle time, to this day, in every aspect) No matter how many intricate guides you write, if I fail at the basic concept of a conversational structure very frequently then I will not succeed at small talk either. And additionally I also genuinely can not tell what might be too personal for this other person.

A lot of these people who get upset when people say "I cant do small talk because I'm autistic and I cant learn it, I tried and failed" and go "of course you can!", just sort of like. Ignore that a lot of the developmental delay in conversation and / or (nonverbal) language never closes up for many of us, the way a lot of us generally never reach the developmental level of our peers (in some areas). and it's not because we have not seen enough complex flow charts or not practiced enough. when so many of us literally spend so much additional time of our youth sitting in front of whiteboards and workbooks and such, being explained over and over how to talk to someone at all. I am 22 and after years of explicit teaching I still have to ask for verbal confirmation and explanation of any nonverbal cues that I think were used by my conversational partner, but do not know what they mean. Which is pretty much all of them. And I probably miss a lot of them existing at all. You can scream "just practice until you can recognize the other persons little cues on if they want to deepen or end this" until you turn blue but it will not actually make me accomplish it if the fucking people who've been spending their whole life teaching it didnt make me figure it out. On account of, you know, the developmental delay.

Sure some people can learn! That's why they try to teach us after all! Cause it has been successful! But generally stop with this shit of "everyone can learn this you're just choosing not to!"

I will never be rude to someone for engaging in small talk, I will obviously fail at their attempts to engage me in some, which usually makes them stop trying (thank god). But I will not tolerate others talking shit about it that is uncalled for (implying malice from every user, making fun of people who seem to crave it, ...).

But I also do not care to learn it anymore at this point? It's no goal of mine. I have made multiple friends, most non autistic, without ever using small talk. Including in adulthood. We simply skipped that stage. We went from "hi!" "Hi!" Immediately to "heres when it went wrong in my life (humorous but still often dark / personal). Also these are my political opinions. Sure I want to hear about the girl you dated for years in excruciating detail. Let me retell you the plot of this old indie movie you will never watch for 20 minutes and why I enjoy it. Let's go to a concert together after talking slightly in depth like this twice". Is this the way that you creep everyone out in everyone's friendship acquisition theory I've been seeing? Sure! It's been working perfectly fine, enough of the times for me, though.

Will this work in like a work environment or something? Most likely not, which is why I generally plan to keep to myself. Does this mean I still confuse every stranger who approaches me trying to small talk? Sure. that's why I'm still fucking disabled. But I have created meaningful relationships as an adult without small talk. I have genuinely tried learning in many ways and failed. And I'm done apologizing for that, either you take me with my inability to small talk or you wont.

#actually autistic #autistic adult #autistic community #actually disabled #developmentally disabled #idk what to tag this at idek if i want to actually post this because ive seen people get so mad abt this stuff #also putting this in the tags because the post is already too long . no i dont think the concept of small talk is ableist #insisting to people that they are 100% able to learn it after they told you they can not? that is. #“if you cant do it then those long posts telling people how to get better at it dont apply!!” when will yall learn that if you make - #-overarching statements a la “hey random reader. yes you too! all of you! you can learn this thing!” then you are including disabled people #and us telling you that we are in fact incapable of this is a fairly normal reaction to being semi directly addressed #and all youd have to do is say “anyone who is not unable to do this for disability reasons. you can do this” and move on #instead of going “hey of course when i address everyone i dont actually address disabled people. silly. want everything to be about you” #like last time i checked i was part of everybody and excluding me of that because of disability does not pass the vibe check

[idontwanttospoiltheparty]

I'm not sure you need people to announce that they're just here for fun? it's tumblr...surely that can be assumed?

i dunno sometimes it seems like when you say this stuff it's a bit of a straw man argument because I don't really see anyone on here taking this stuff that seriously. we are not larries! no one is claiming Paul's kids are fake or anything lmao. yes people like to look at the history but again it's tumblr, it's just for fun.

maybe there is a whole other delusional side to beatles tumblr that i am not seeing, but i think maybe if people are getting mad when you argue with their dumb little posts it's just cause they think that you, in fact, DO want to spoil the party!

I have been waiting for someone to make this joke ever since I got that url. Have had to make it myself often <3

1. "we are not larries" is an incredibly low bar.

2. the specific contents of theories isn't the only thing that makes them conspiratorial. it's about the way they're argued.

3. Actually, I am thinking of One Specific Event from about a year and a half ago that was treated as people "spoiling the party" when in fact it was an example of good faith engagement with a seriously worded discussion post.* Maybe you missed that, and it's not like it's a super common occurrence. But in hindsight, I don't find it surprising given the climate here.

*I can provide more details on this specific thing in DMs if someone is curious. I don't wanna hash it out on main, especially since I was only peripherally involved.

4. This isn't about whether tumblr is your space to have fandom fun – I do assume that. It's about whether someone is making arguments in jest or if they mean them seriously. Both of these things might be fun to someone (but maybe I could have worded that point better in the original tags).

5. No, no fake kids, and this fandom isn't plagued by a central figure who's to blame for all the "bad stuff". Plus, it's "decentralized", so no singular entity is controlling some super specific narrative. This definitely keeps the space in check. That's part of it though: it's all very sociological, which makes my issue difficult to address because most single posts aren't a problem in of themselves, but there's a tangible vibe to the whole thing. That's also why I want to tread lightly here; I know a lot of it is a joke, but it's hard to tell what isn't. Like, yeah, I've been passive-aggressive lately, but I've also been watching this for a long time. And I regularly see things I perceive as a strawman against my position as well as absolutist rhetoric, which reads just as much as picking a fight as any of my recent posts do. If you talk about there only being "one explanation" for something, what is that, other than putting forward your theory as true? Is it really Not Serious? Every time? Even when the post is presented in a serious way, with sources and evidence? People on this site talk about what they expect Mark Lewisohn to include in his Definitely Trying To Be Serious And Factful biography series. Those demands are never serious? And I don't want to just ruin people's fun for no reason! But I also have a hard time dismissing every single thing that Sounds Kind Of Serious as Probably A Joke (and I do do it, pretty regularly) And I semi-often see people doing things that set off my alarm bells, even when they are not proclaiming Stella McCartney to be a lifelong actress. (reminder that several people on here freaked about the For Paul tapes story being semi-debunked last November; like actively scorned people who were trying to figure out how that story came about and where it originated. That's not normal, sorry to say! And, funnily enough, about a year ago, there was a blog on here pushing a very very very esotheric version of McLennon [and even trying to monetize it] and while most people dismissed them for the kook they were, they splashed onto the tumblr scene in an identical way [saying something that amounted to: "how dare you imply this apocryphal Paul McCartney quote might be fake?"] –––– so my question is: is it not that serious? I Don't Know You Tell Me!)

6. This is @ me mostly, I guess. I just feel like this space has become more and more of a monoculture. Shipping is the default angle with which everything is approached. If John and Paul write songs that are maybe not about each other that's not often seen as worth diving into. (See: Beautiful Boy tinhatting). I actually want to try and change this; get more diverse content on this site, but I guess I assume it's not welcome, which is on me, really. I have slides explaining my specific reading of Double Fantasy (yes, seriously) and there isn't really much stopping me from posting them, outside the fact that most people on here seem to have a very different relationship to the songs from the album than I do, so I assume they won't care. But y'know, I'll try to just Make More Content and see what that does. (For the record I know that sounds whiny. And I do seriously want to do better on that front)

#ask #anon #discourse #fiona.docx

[trashcankitty12]

A Snippet From My Upcoming Fic

I'm real excited about this one, even though it's not finished yet and probably won't be for a bit. (All of the chapters so far have been longer than I normally write... And I'm planning for 22 of them. So... Yeah...)

But I'm excited. And I wanted to share a snippet of Chapter One!

This story is from my Grace Au, which is a continuation from my fic "I Didn't Have It In Myself To Go With Grace", which is a story in which I essentially had Griffin murdered by Valtor. On accident. Sort of.

This fic takes place roughly 25-ish years after the initial story and Valtor is being 'recruited' to work for the New Company of Light against his Mothers.

Fun, right?

Anyway, snippet under the cut!

Remembering his manners, he gave a careful bow, thrilled his limbs were starting to get used to cooperating with him again. “I’m glad for the chance to meet the one who got me out of Omega. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Take a seat, we have much to discuss.” Her tone had a slight drawl to it, (Rancorian?), and her tone was one that suggested she was a ‘no-nonsense’ person. 

Fantastic.

Valtor gave a nod, taking a seat in one of the chairs, observing as she did the same. “I’m going to cut to the chase, I know you, Mr. Bellan. I’ve read your files, studied the archived footage of battles you participated in and the security footage from the places you robbed from.”

Great start.

“I personally think defrosting you and bringing you here was a piss poor idea.” She took what seemed to be an exasperated sigh as she pinched the bridge of her nose. (And just where had he seen that quirk before?)

“Unfortunately, we’re currently in an ‘all-hands-on-deck’ situation and several of my colleagues are big believers in ‘redemption’ and ‘second chances’.” She used air quotes around the last bit.

“I take it you’re more cynical?” Valtor pointed out the obvious, giving a slight smirk. So she had turned out like her mother. “You don’t believe in second chances or redemption?”

If looks could kill, he’d be dead. The way her eyes bore into his, the way her whole body seemed to tense. But she gave a smile, though it seemed more of a grimace. “Actually, I do believe in them. However such concepts only work if the subject is willing to attempt to do better. To be better. And you, Mr. Bellan, I don’t believe you can do it.”

“Tell me, do you still feel justified in what you did during The First War of Magic? The stealing, the murders, the sacrifices made to the Ancestral Coven? Do you have regret for destroying entire planets? Can you even feel remorse?”

Valtor crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. How dare- “We were in a war, things weren’t so cut and dry.”

“Even war has rules of engagement. The Ancestral Coven, you, disregarded all of them.”

“And I confessed my sins during my sentencing.”

“But did you feel regret for them?” Valtor huffed. “Exactly.” She shook her head, glancing down at a file in her hand.

His. “Honestly if the situation weren’t dire, I wouldn’t even be entertaining this idea.” She turned her gaze back to him. “But here we are.”

“Here we are.” He paused, something she said echoing in his mind. “Did… You say the First War of Magic? As in… There’s been others?” 

“We’re currently in what the press has dubbed The Second War of Magic.” She answered, glancing back to his file. “Which is why I was outvoted in bringing you here; my colleagues think that with your knowledge, you’d be a great asset to us, and of course, you’d be proving you can do good and be a productive member of society.”

Valtor frowned, his hands tapping along the table edge. “And why would I be of use? What happened after I surrendered?” What did he miss?

She paused, tapping on her files. “Long story short: the Company won The First War of Magic and there was a period of peace and restoration of what had been lost. However the Ancestral Witches apparently had a back-up plan in place and we are now, metaphorically speaking, in the eye of the storm.”

“And because I’m Their son, you think I can help figure out Their next moves and how to stop Them?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know, can you? I mean, you said it yourself, you surrendered. You abandoned Them before the final battles, cast Them aside for a pedestal in a frozen wasteland. They may have changed everything about how They operate. But we are willing to take that chance on you.”

“And by ‘we’ you mean your colleagues?”

“Precisely.” She clasped her hands on the table, looking him in the eyes, “so, are you interested? Or am I right in thinking this was a waste of time?” Dragons, she looked like Griffin. His eyes and eye shape, but damn… Dammit.

“If I decide not to help, I go back to Omega, right?”

“If you refuse to help us, I’ll kill you where you sit.” She admitted. 

Valtor clenched his fists, his brows furrowing. “What?”

“If you don’t help us, which would mean being monitored and kept on a tight leash so you can’t go gallivanting off to wreak havoc on your own, you’ll be executed. Nothing personal-”

“Feels pretty damn personal!” He all but growled out. She glowered at him, raising one of her hands. 

The room’s temperature went up several degrees, sweat immediately breaking out over him as she narrowed her eyes. A warning.

He put his hands up in surrender as she lowered hers, the temperature going back to normal. “As I was saying; it’s not personal, but if we leave you in Omega, other Coven members may come to break you out. We can’t risk you rejoining your Mothers as Their favorite errand boy. There’s far too much on the line.”

“So what’s it going to be?”

#winx club au #winx club #winx club fanfic #grace au #winx club grace au #snippet #fanfic snippet #my writing

[acewithapaintbrush]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY @greenvillainredemption

I hope this little story will cheer you up. You know how Disney usually makes their villains have a green color theme? Well how about a little 'green villain redemption'? *wink wink*

*******************************

Mirabel lounges back against the trunk of a tree and watches through half-lidded eyes as Bruno and Camilo bicker back and forth about the plot of their next play. She is so glad that the two of them got over their initial awkwardness with each other. Camilo's guilt about his misinterpretation of their uncle and Bruno's anxiety about the ensuing distance between the two of them had been painful to watch at times. 

"I still think letting the same character fake her death twice is… overkill." 

Camilo snorts at his own joke while Bruno just raises an unimpressed eyebrow. "You can never have too many funerals where the character reveals that she is actually still alive. You can't get more dramatic than that! And theater is all about the drama!" 

"I thought the whole point of theater is to engage the audience?" 

"Yes! Through drama!"

Mirabel snickers silently. Her Tio gets so endearingly passionate about his plays. 

Before the discussion can grow even more heated, Antonio emerges from his tree house, riding on Parce's back and waving a book over his head. The little boy joins them under the tree and beams at the three family members that have agreed to join him in his room to read him a story together. 

"I found it! This one." 

He holds up the book and as soon as she reads the title Mirabel glances at her uncle. 

There is no obvious outward change in Bruno's attitude, but Mirabel has grown quite accustomed to noticing even the smallest changes in his demeanor. So she doesn't miss the tightening around his eyes or how his smile grows a bit tense. 

It's Antonio's favorite book at the moment. A collection of short stories and fables by someone named Dalt Wisney. Princesses and knights and witches and dragons. All the stuff that's usually right up Tio Bruno's alley. 

But something about that book seems to bother him.

Not that he would ever tell Antonio! The boy loves the book and Bruno is doing a great job at reading from it with different voices. Which is probably one of the reasons why Antonio loves it so much and almost always chooses this one for story time. 

A vicious circle. 

Bruno keeps smiling and reaches for the book. "Great choice, Tonito."

For a split second Mirabel wonders if maybe she should just mind her own business, but she had never been particularly good at that. 

Before she can intervene though, she is beaten to the punch. 

"What bothers you about that book so much?" 

Bruno startles, much like Mirabel, and stares at Camilo. The boy is frowning and has crossed his arms over his chest. 

"Wha.. Uhm, what?" 

Camilo scoffs and rolls his eyes. "Come on. Takes an actor to know an actor. It's obvious you don't like that book. Why?" 

Antonio pulls the book back towards his chest before Bruno can take it. "You don't like it?" 

Bruno flails his arms and looks terribly flustered. Mirabel elbows Camilo in the side. While she had planned to mention it as well, she would have at least done it with a bit more tact. 

"It's not like that, amigo! I like the stories! They're fun! It's just… well…" 

"What is it?" Antonio doesn't look sad or angry. He looks very curious. "Some of them are kinda sad. Do they make you too sad?" 

Mirabel's heart swells. What a good, sensitive boy her little primo is. 

Bruno apparently feels the same because he sighs happily and pulls the boy to sit on his lap so he can rub his head against the curly head. "Aw Tonito. It's not that, don't worry." He sighs once more and reaches around the boy to take the book out of his hands. Antonio wiggles until he is sitting on Bruno's lap with his back against the man's chest, the book opened in front of them. Their usual reading positions. 

Mirabel and Camilo crowd closer as Bruno flips through the book at a steady pace. 

"I like the stories. It's just that… well every villain is… green." 

"Green?" Mirabel mutters. Her eyes track the pages which have a lot of illustrations besides the text. 

"Their color scheme." At Antonio's questioning hum, he explains. "The color that represents them. When they do their evil deeds." He growls the last two words and tickles Antonio, who immediately giggles. "When the witch curses the princess." He flips a page. "When the lion kills his brother." Another page. "When the evil stepmother locks the poor cinder girl away." 

Green green green. 

"I never noticed." Camilo says. 

Bruno smiles and closes the book. "Didn't expect you to. It's not a big deal. It's just… when I was younger the other kids would say that my eyes are creepy, you know? Glowing green and stuff. They would call me-" he glances down at Antonio's head "names. Not nice names. I guess, seeing all the villains in this book having green as their signature color… I don't know. I'm just being stupid." 

"You are not stupid!" Antonio denies vehemently. "This author is stupid! And the kids back then were stupid! Green is a great color! It's the best color. Lots of nice things are green. Mira's glasses are green!" 

Mirabel touches her glasses, a pleased smile on her face. "Yes they are! I chose them 'cause I liked the color, you know? And yes, a lot of nice things are green. Like plants. And Isa's cacti! Oh, and four-leaf clovers. They are green and they bring good luck!" 

"And apples!" Antonio shouts. "I love apples and they are sometimes green."

Camilo grimaces at the mention of apples. He is not a fruit guy. "Chameleons. Chameleons are green." 

Mirabel smirks at her cousin. "And sometimes Cami eats too much and gets a bit green around the nose. That's not scary or evil. That's just funny." 

Camilo smirks right back. "And sometimes Mirabel gets green with jealousy cause I can eat however much I want without gaining any weight and she can't. That's also quite funny, don't you think?" 

Bruno's laughter interrupts them. He is looking less tense already, the crow's feet around his eyes more pronounced when he smiles.

"It's alright kids. Green is great, I get it." He opens the book again and nudges Antonio's shoulder. "How about we read a story now? Like I said, I like them. I'm happy to read them to you, Tonito." 

Antonio scrunches up his nose in thought before throwing himself out of Bruno's lap. "Wait here!" 

He returns quickly with various crayons which he dumps on all of their laps. "I wanna recolor the villains first!" 

"Oh Antonio, are you sure you want to draw in your book? Won't you regret it?" 

"Nope!" Antonio has already grabbed a red crayon and is busy recoloring the eyes of a witch. "I don't want them to be green anymore! Green is the color of the good guys now." 

Mirabel makes sure to ignore the tears gathering in her uncle's eyes to spare him the embarrassment and grabs a pink crayon. "I wanna color that evil stepsister pink!" 

"Because Isabela used to wear pink all the time?" 

"Whaaaaaat? Pffffft. Nooooo!" 

They spend the afternoon recololoring all the villains and even making some of the heroes wear green. 

Not a word is being read that afternoon, but that's okay. 

At the end of the day, the book is a lot more colorful. 

#encanto fanfic #encanto fanfiction #encanto #disney encanto #camilo madrigal #antonio madrigal #mirabel madrigal #bruno madrigal #encanto headcanons #bruno is best uncle #We stand the green in Bruno's eyes in this house #Antonio is a sweetheart #I'm very proud of my stupid name pun #Tell me how proud you are

[palin-tropos]

an opinion I hold that may be a bit controversial or that may spark some defensiveness is that disco elysium doesn’t completely impress me in its discussions of fascism. or at least I wouldn’t say it’s a game with as much to say about fascism as it says about communism and liberal centrism.

I like where it starts to go. I like how disdainful it is of fascism, I like how wet and pathetic fascist harry is, I like the discussion of fascism as psychological malaise, self-repression, meaningless longing for a romanticized past, etc. all of that is very good! I also like that kim as a character has been affected his whole life by racism, in obvious but also subtle ways.

the fascist characters in the game are amusing and satisfying in how their vileness is openly mocked, and I’m actually quite weirdly fond of them. measurehead and gary in particular, kicking one in the head and making the other snivel and grovel at your feet, really satisfies my id. but they don’t feel like huge threats. fascism never truly does, except for the krenel mercs, who get called fascists and certainly are violently racist and colonial, but they are also enforcers of the status quo, of the liberal world order. which is political commentary in its own right, and it’s making a good point, but there’s something missing.

the game does not seem to want to engage with anything approaching nazism or neo-nazism. in fact, it feels like there never was an equivalent of nazism for there to be such a thing as neo-nazism, unless that’s just worldbuilding I never ran into. there’s traditionalism, monarchism, eugenicism. etc. the suzerainty, a more... mercantilist? I suppose... empire, is described as fascist.

something I told my game buddy more than once in my playthrough is that this feels like a world where there was never anything like the holocaust—or more sinisterly, if there was something like the holocaust, it has been swept under the rug. never dealt with directly.

the antecentennial revolution, in elysium, is the equivalent catastrophic world war that was so scarring that people accepted the peace that came with the moralintern. in our world, the equivalent of the “moralintern”, the UN, very much exists in the shadow, specifically, of wwii, the nazis, and the holocaust, using the atrocities of fascism as the blueprint for “here is what we are going to protect the world from”. not that it does a good job at stopping genocide! it sucks at that. but that’s important historical context.

and so the setting of disco elysium leaves me with a undercurrent of deep deep dread (obligatory “as the descendant of holocaust-affected jewish people” disclaimer) because it feels like they haven’t yet seen the worst of fascism, or haven’t acknowledged it, and it doesn’t adequately address the apocalyptic death cult, the full scale industrialization of killing, that fascism truly is, because it’s not gotten to that stage

this is just about the game by the way. not the entire setting, not anything that might be discussed in Sacred and Terrible Air (in fact some things I’ve heard about its plot suggest that my instinct of dread is well founded)

#cw nazi mention #cw holocaust mention #not maintagging bc people will take this as a Game Criticism when it's more of a personal experience I had with the story #if there's fascists in a story my question is who are they fascisting At? who is the scapegoat #and not just 'everyone who isn't like them' but who is the center of their conspiracy about why the world isn't Good and Pure #who is the The Jews lol #who would they want to eradicate at all costs #maybe thats just the generational trauma vigilance talking you know?

[matan4il]

I am for the first time re-watching the whole show before the season and it's honestly crazy how much everything Buck and Eddie hits after season 5. But curious if I missed any more things in regards to how they tried to set up Eddie and Anna because there are 2 things screaming at me.

One Buck gets guessing Eddie's name wrong. Anna gets it right the first time. Yet perfect Anna wasn't for Eddie.

Two Anna is a math genius and we get multiple jokes about Buck being terrible at math. Again no perfect Anna for Eddie.

And three in a round about way we have this perfect version of Anna making the (BTW the most uninspiring boring food) huge amounts of muffins, cakes and salads with Christopher. Yet Eddie's your a miracle worker moment with Buck comes when Buck tells Chris a cautionary tale about food safety.

It's like the writers were really challenging the Jinx episode vibe of the universe is screaming at you Eddie. You have a beautiful quirky family that is life goals in front of you.

Was just curious if I missed any other parallels of Anna vs Buck that were less obvious because they really were there all along

Hi Nonnie! Thank you for this ask.

I agree a lot with this. I believe that in all the meta I've written for Buddie, I probably referred time and again to how Ana is meant to seem on paper like she's a perfect fit for Eddie, and yet at the end of the day, she's not who he wants. And she always ends up coming short when compared to Buck.

I think the biggest of these comparison points is how Ana is a teacher who works at a school for kids with special needs, so she seems like the ideal co-parent for a single dad raising a child who has special needs. Yet, who is Eddie's actual co-parent? It's Buck. Who actually gets Christopher's needs and helps Eddie fulfill them in 312 (unlike Ana's advice to cease and desist after one failure, when the attempt was unsupervised and without anything adaptive being used)? All Buck. He encourages Eddie to help Chris fulfill his dreams even when they seem impossible with that baseball tale, and then he literally helps make it happen by helping to construct the adaptive skater for Chris. And if Buck's look at the end of the scene where Eddie and he were discussing the skater incident over beers is anything to go by, or how depleted Eddie still looked at that point, I bet it was also Buck who actually did the online search, found out about the skater, and discovered how they can get the instructions to build it. Tell me that doesn't just scream Buck!

And that's reinforced when in 514, we once again see that Buck's way of helping Eddie also takes Christopher's special needs into account, when he makes sure to take their kid along for the visit at the horse ranch, where Chris gets to engage in some horse riding therapy. Buck didn't have to! He could have found another excuse to bring Eddie there. But no, Buck is fully Christopher's other parent, and time and again he has proven he’s a co-parent who understands this kid's special needs better than a woman whose job it actually is.

And then we also have Christopher's reaction to these people. He seems to really love Ana, he embraces her in 408, when he discovers that she’s the woman his father is dating. But when he's distraught in 510, do we see him asking for Ana, who had just recently departed from their lives? Do we see any indication that he misses her past her break up with Eddie in 503? No. But we know from what Eddie said in 305 that when Buck couldn't talk to the team because of the lawsuit, Chris was missing him. And in 513, when Christopher is scared for Eddie, he doesn’t call his dad’s most recent partner, supposedly the person who would know best what’s wrong with Eddie, he calls Buck. That’s his other dad. That’s his safe person. That’s Eddie’s partner who can be trusted to figure out what’s wrong with him and help fix it.

Which is exactly what Buck does! Meanwhile, even when Ana did become aware that there was something wrong between her and Eddie, as her words indicate in 503, she just ignored it instead of doing anything to figure out what was wrong and check whether it could be fixed together. Whether it was the relationship itself, or something Eddie was going through that was affecting it, she doesn’t try to find out. Even though on the surface, she seemed like an intelligent, giving and caring woman, who would make a good romantic partner. No, it’s Buck who’s checking up on Eddie in 502, realizes something is wrong, insists on finding out what it is, helps with resolving what needs to be done, and as it turns out, what Eddie had to do was break up with Ana. That Buck being Eddie’s true partner is what leads to the break up is truly insanity of the most romantic variety. Or romance of the most insane variety, I can no longer tell.

Nonnie, please let me know if this reply is what you were hoping for! I’m wishing you the loveliest of days! xoxox

(If you're looking for my ask replies, here is my ask tag! xoxox)

#buddie #911meta #buddie meta #911 meta #9-1-1 #evan buckley #eddie diaz #edmundo diaz #evan buck buckley #christopher diaz #ana flores #anti-eddieana #ask #anon ask #911onabc #911 on abc #911abc #911 abc

[dadjokeslady]

I'm having a bit of a back and forth with @bowserwife about gender and radical feminism, some of the points I'll e repeating here, so hopefully in future discussions I can use this as a reference and this might spark the discussion with other people.

Preamble

About this discussion, I'll just point out some notions for the debate.

I'm going to engage in good faith and I'll assume you're engaging in good faith too, but I'll match your energy, if you wanna go blood sports let's dance.

I'll assume you disagree with me because you might have heard some argument that I did not or because you haven't heard one I did.

English is not my first language, I'd something sounds uncanny it might be that.

Hypothesis

Let's start with a brief list if things I will not debate, if you disagree with any of those this post ain't for you.

We live in a patriarchal society

Sex is a biological category that follows a binormal distribution (most of us are either male or female)

Gender is a biopsychosocial category informed by gender but not defined by gender

Sex and gender are different things

The whole debate space between trans folk and radfem can have some nasty people saying mean things to each other, those things do not make anyone right nor wrong

Any definition of woman that includes Buck Angels failed

Any definition of woman that excludes cis woman failed

Any definition of woman that includes cis man failed

The arguments

Part 1 - rigorous definitions

I do have some background in math and I used to have a professor who said that there are three important things in math:

Rigour; rigour; and rigour. Some say you need a forth one, rigour, but I find it unnecessary.

I'll agree that rigorous definitions are valuable tools to understand the world, so let's express clearly what is meant by a rigorous definition. Some criteria one can use to identify if some object belongs to some class of objects such that the criteria includes in the category all the things that it should (no object is missed) and that the criteria do not introduce anything that it should not (no object is miss classified).

I'll provide one example, the natural numbers as defined by Peano:

1 (one) is a natural number.

For every two natural numbers a it's successor, a+1 is a natural number.

OBS: Peano did not include zero as a natural number, this is by design.

You'll notice that the definition is separated into two parts a base case and a recursive case. The definition leaves nothing to be interpreted, either something is a natural number or it is not, there is no context influence, no conditionals.

Or does it? It is pretty easy to overlook, but the Peano definition of natural numbers depends on the definition of the + (plus) operator. It might seem trivial but it is not. Peano natural numbers only work under the hypothesis that any numbers plus one is different then the original number, i.e. a+1 /= a.

Then, we can point that we need to define what equality means, so we can define what difference means... This'll run down until we need to define axioms, statements that can't be proven and we assume as true.

If math cannot rigorously define natural numbers without axioms, what hope do we have of defining anything as rigorously in the real world? We'll see.

Before we continue and leave this dreaded land of math, let me raise some other properties of definitions.

If two categories have the same definition, e.g. the non null absolute values of the integers is another definition of the natural number (a pretty round about way to define them but still). Those two categories can be viewed as being the same.

If two different categories of objects, with different definitions, can have their objects translated from the first category to the second one without losing any structural properties, it is a homomorphism. A pair of homomorphisms such that the translation can be undone is an isomorphism. Two categories between which there is an isomorphism are said to be equal up to isomorphism, or in plain English, equivalent.

The equivalence itself is contextual to what we mean by lost structural properties, and it can be distilled further, but we can specify those as we find it necessary later.

Part 2 - definitions in the real world

In the real world definitions are much more loose than in math, just as an example to hammer this home, we cannot define if things are equal without some leniency and good faith. Is two blank A4 sheets of paper equal? In that sense? They for sure are not maid by the same atoms. They for sure do not have the same thickness down to a piconometer scale... Whenever, this point forward, I say something is equal or equivalent to something else, I mean equal or equivalent up to a good faith interpretation.

In other words, let's not occupy ourselves with petty word games, please.

The, "what is a woman?" discourse have the this trope of degrading into "what is a chair?" Questioning. For everyone who ever tried to respond to this kind of questioning, you misunderstood the argument. There are no objective answers to what is a chair that do not rely on a sea of unlisted axioms, and with the axioms being, by definition of axiom, unproven but assumed as true, any two definitions, as unequivalent as possible, have the same validity.

There will be a more lengthy discussion about what I'd argue should be the criteria of choice for differentiation between definitions, but for now let's assume that given two different valid definitions we'd all agree on what'd be better.

Other than chosing between two valid definitions, we can take a step back and attack the axioms on which that definition rests, if we try and define a car as having four wheels, that depends on wheels being round and we need to ask if that holds for every case...

Than again, we can still attack a definition by pointing out edge cases, and this is where we need to have good faith, there are cars that have any number of wheels, defining it as having four is "good enough" of a definition if we agree that those outlier are too much work to deal with as a whole and that we can go on a case by case basis.

That means we lost some of our rigour on our definitions, they all now have to have an asterisk pointing that there are edge cases. This is a toll most of us are willing to pay, and only concern ourselves with for petty word games, if some wants to use only definitions without it, I'd refer that someone to the endless chair defining threads.

Then how much of the general population constitutes and edge case is another discussion, deeply linked with the discussion of which of two equally valid definitions we should use.

Furthermore, in the real world we communicate using fallible language, and words have definitions themselves. As such we should at the very least differentiate nouns and the objects they refer to. There is the word "woman" and there is the category "woman". Words have meaning but we do have word play, sarcasm, double meaning... In the definitions I'll provide, I'll try to limit how much this can influence our understanding by aiming to define woman as a category, not the word woman.

Part 3 - defining gender and sex

The three categories: female, intersex and male, are sex based. But sex, as a metacategory needs a definition to itself. We can define it in terms of genotypically male or female, hormonally male or female, anatomically male or female. All those are interlocked so someone who is in the male category on the genetic level will most probably also have hormone levels that'd classify them as male, and the anatomy of a male. The genetic aspect informs the anatomy and the endocrine aspect, they both inform each other, but they can be pretty cleanly distinguished. In the real world, we look at the anatomy.

Do a newborn have the superficial anatomy of a male? they'll be classified as a male. This early classification is the origin of the terms AGAB (assigned gender at birth), AMAB (assigned male at birth) and AFAB (assigned female at birth). Please, let's point out that those terms are not rigorous, the AGAB is not a gender, it is a sex. The Female maker on anyone's birth certificate do not refer to the biopsychosocial construction of gender. Edge cases for this will include intersex cases where a sex is not assigned, those I'll argue we should see in a case by case basis if we classify them as AFAB or AMAB. The same, I'll argue, we should do to cases where there are no birth certificate, and most other edge cases.

So male or female can be defined better by doing so by observing the anatomy of a person. To do so we need a non exhaustive list of sex markers, be they discrete or continuous. The short version of this list is: body hair; genitalia; breasts; bone structure; fat distribution; height; muscle mass; etc. Each marker indicate one or other sex, having enough markers of one sex classify one as this sex, having enough markers of both classify someone as intersex. This definition is context free in relation to social aspects, we can with this definitions, classify people into male or female regardless of the society in which they exist.

In other words, I'm defining sex purely in terms of what can be determined in a physical examination. And foreshadowing the discussion I want to have about utilitarianism later, sometimes we might need or want to classify someone with incomplete information. Mostly, you don't look at someone's genitalia before clocking then as male or female, even if you ignore gender markers, most people with hairy chests are male, and that is a safe assumption to make.

Now that we have sex, what is gender? A shallow definition could be made as "psychosocial sex". That's the idea that originates the "pink brain/blue brain" simplification. It is not an invalid definition, but it do not make as clear as desirable what is meant.

As much as sex can be broke into multiple levels, gender has multiple aspects. We can speak about gender identity, expression and roles.

Gender roles are the society archetypes in terms of expected behavior and responsibilities. Those are not written into stone, gender roles change over time, change over geography, social economic status etc...

Gender expression is the individual instances os adherence to gender roles, mostly focused into aesthetics, but not exclusively.

Lastly, gender identity is the internal alignment with the external gender division. It is how someone feels, how someone see themselves, and how someone would wish to be seen.

Differently than the sex, gender can be perceived in all levels simultaneously. Unless there is some lie involved, if someone say they identity with a gender, you can for sure know their gender identity.

Gender expression, because of its presentation quality, can be queried by looking at someone's non biological appearance markers. Make-up; clothes; posture; voice tone; etc... And gender roles you can just as easily determine by watching what do the person do, what are the roles they assume.

Now, gender roles and gender presentation, as the set of markers, are not immutable. If you tell me that woman should not wear pants I'll tell you to fuck off, this is a marker that is waaay outdated. If you tell me man can't wear makeup I'll probe you to understand what makes you think like that... This are trivial examples, but the point is we're talking about dynamic markers that are context dependent and vary in function of the person whose perception we're considering... This is complicated.

Of course some gender marks are also sex marks. Meaning, some parts of what makes someone male or female also makes someone man or woman. Okay, that should not be that shocking, sex and gender are deeply related. It is not coincidence that most people are cis.

And now, for the fun part, let me introduce some definitions of what is a woman, in terms of the criteria one could use to classify something as a woman or not. For the sake of brevity I'll assume we're excluding everything that is nor a human and not an adult. Lastly, up to isomorphism, those definitions are equal.

Female

Someone who bears the anatomy markers that identity them as being of the female sex, is safely a woman. There will be edge cases but those ones we can treat on a case by case basis.

Someone perceived to be female

For all intents and purposes, someone whose only visible markers are ones of a female, is most certainly, a woman. There will be edge cases but those we can treat on a case by case basis.

Some who is perceived to be a woman

Now, detaching finally from the biological criteria, if someone is perceived to be a woman, they are a woman. There will be edge cases...

Someone who wants and is perceived as a woman

Well, for all intents and purposes, if someone wants to be perceived as a woman and succeed in doing so, they are a woman, and now, most of the previous edge cases are no longer an edge case.

Someone who identifies as a woman and is perceived as one

Remember that part of the gender identity having a relationship with wanting to be perceived in an specific gender? Of course there will be edge cases, but then again, in here they'll be fewer.

Now, what if the perception includes the gender identity?

Someone whose gender identity is woman

Now look of what I've done, I'm suppressing two aspects of gender to use only one as a criteria, just as we did with sex. This one is relevant because of the edge cases, in previous definitions, a butch woman whose gender expression and gender roles do not align with woman's was an edge case, now it is not.

Before we continue, you might have a problem with me saying that some of those are equivalent to the others. In specific it might seem that a pulled a fast one by going from perceived femaleness to perceived womanhood, I didn't. In the same way we defined sex in terms of its markers there I'm defining gender in terms of markers here. To be perceived as a woman is to have enough gender markers that indicate that one is a woman for the given context of this one. In a circle of trans positive friends all the necessary markers are the ones associated with the gender identity, so those definitions, in terms of gender perception, are clearly context dependent.

Part 4 - utility of definitions and inclusive language

Now, if we have all those definitions being equivalent to each other, why spend all this time if the first one is good enough? Because some are more useful then others.

Let's start by pointing out that language is mutable, and what we mean by woman changed through the last couple centuries, both in terms of what the word means and what the category women includes and excludes. Any definition of woman that'd include some trans man in a first moment but then we go and say that this buff guy with a harry chest is not actually a woman, he's female but look, he's an edge case...

Let's be honest, this type of ad hoc exclusions and inclusions is what make the definition seem less rigorous. We should choose a definition that minimizes the confusion.

Moreover, definitions can be prescriptive statements, saying "trans woman are woman" is both a description of someones beliefs and a prescription that trans woman should be seen as woman. The definition that we choose to use reflect the world we wish to create.

I, personally, want to create a world where no one has a label forcefully put on them, if a young female do not want to be seen as a woman, let them identify themselves out of womanhood. Let's not invalidate the fact that for this person, their gender identity is other than the one prescribed by the general "adult human female".

Using language so that people don't feel uncomfortable unnecessarily is preferable.

Part 5 - Lying men in dresses

Now, we have one last topic to sort, I'll be brief, if you agreed with all that I have laid until here, there is one last thing I imaging you can argue, what about a man who identify as a woman just to gain access to woman only spaces. That is, of course, the case of, if we're working with the gender identity model, the case of someone lying.

I'll be honest, I cannot see why would a man do this, but I am not one so I can't really tell. All the discomfort of being treat as some gender different of the one you identify as seems a bit too much when there exists alternatives. I won't say it never happens but those are the edge cases.

Then again, why would a man willingly identify himself into receiving misogyny? Well, this seems to me that this should be treated in a case by case basis.

Conclusions

Someone is of the woman gender if their gender identity is woman.

#dadjokeslady #trans #terfs #terfblr #what is a woman #long ass post

[twofrontteethstillcrooked]

Make the season bright

deancas post-12x07 au, fluff and angst, mutual pining. Season's Greetings, y'all! 🎄

(first posted to ao3 December 2021 but I never really put it here, so. I'm putting it here now 😊)

-

22 December

"Orders must be in today to guarantee local delivery by Christmas!!!" the email subject line said, with its three exclamation point emphasis.

Dean sat bolt upright in bed and squinted at the phone screen some more. If today was December 22nd, and he had no reason to think his phone had been hacked to display a false date, that meant Christmas was three days away. Less than three. Two and change, the day racing into the lower half of an hourglass like a storm scouring everything in its path with sand.

He fled his room and skidded down the hall so quickly he managed to rake his ankle against the doorjamb and yelped to announce his presence.

"Dean," Cas said, eyes big as gumdrops. "What's wrong?"

"Ouch." Dean grabbed up his mangled foot before realizing he was going to tip over in the process, and caught himself on Cas's doorknob. "You're still here."

Still here still here still here. Hi, Cas.

Cas stopped folding a towel. "Yes?"

He'd arrived a week ago. The fervency with which Dean wanted him to stay -- forever, whispered the voice in Dean's head -- was in direct contrast to Dean's ability to discuss this for even one-tenth of a second.

"Just. Good." Dean put his foot on the floor and looked at Cas standing there in Sam's old sweatpants (cut off at the cuffs) and one of Dean's better old hoodies (blue a shade darker than Cas's irises) and nearly let an avalanche tumble out of his mouth.

One calamitous weather metaphor after another, Dean thought. That's me.

He cleared his throat. "It's good you're still here because I forgot to tell you happy solstice yesterday. And." His voice cracked a bit. The bunker air was so dry in wintertime.

He tried again. "Christmas is this Sunday."

"Oh." Cas placed the towel on a stack of towels. "Sam thought maybe you weren't doing that this year."

Dean narrowed his eyes. "You guys talked about it?"

Cas seemed to sense a need for diplomacy. "He wasn't upset at the prospect you were going to skip it."

Dean winced, flexing his foot. "He wouldn't be."

"But you don't want to to skip it." Cas smiled, looking down at the bed.

"Of course not." Dean rallied his sanity. "Christmas comes but once a year, the most wonderful time of the year, even, ho ho ho and mistletoe, and all that."

Crap. He hadn't meant to mention mistletoe and would not be referencing it twice.

"What would celebrating Christmas entail?" Cas asked, with what sounded like a promising amount of genuine curiosity.

"Whole lotta festive food, for starters," Dean said. "Maybe a tree? Exchanging presents." He thought about it. "Spiked punch. Or mulled cider, or something." He replayed what Cas had said in his mind. "And you're family, so. You get to set some traditions too."

"Oh," Cas said. His cheeks went a little pink. "I don't… The impression Sam gave me is that you didn't really have many traditions for the holiday."

Dean snorted, to conceal how much he wanted to sidle closer. "Sam has a standing annual engagement as the Grinch, with an understudy gig in Scrooging."

Cas frowned. "Sam seems always ready and willing to be generous about helping people in need--"

"I just meant, he's pretty 'Bah, Humbug' about Christmas," Dean said.

"You might be missing the essence of that novel," Cas said, head tipped like he was about to start an advanced discourse on the nature of social responsibility or the torment of eternal regret, as though those were two themes that hadn't bashed Dean over the head pretty much every waking day of his life.

Dean held up a hand. "Let Sam feel about Christmas however he wants to feel about Christmas. We can be merry with or without his active participation."

He bounced on the balls of his feet for a second and was content enough that his banged-up ankle didn't protest. A cold draft of something close to shyness crept up on him as he watched Cas think.

Another thought pierced through. "If you have someplace you need to be instead, because of Lucifer--"

"No," Cas said. He took a breath and held Dean's look. "Not yet, anyway."

"Well, then," Dean made himself say, like he was a healthy person who just said stuff out loud, "let's go shopping."

-

However, first there was coffee, showering, more coffee, putting away laundry, a bacon sandwich for Dean and a glass of water for Cas. One more cup of coffee.

Dean savored the last bite of crispy pork perfection and hummed to himself.

"What is that?" Cas asked. "You've been humming it for twenty minutes."

"Huh." Dean drank the dregs of his coffee. "I don't know."

Cas cocked his head at him.

"Yeah, that's weird," Dean conceded.

He picked up his phone and dicked around with it until he found the evil so-called assistant that lurked inside it. He hummed as many bars of the chorus as he thought he knew.

The phone displayed Search Results: 87% match.

"Oh god," Dean said in agony.

"What did you find?" Cas sounded terrified for him.

It took all of Dean's strength to inform him, "It's by Perry Como."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Cas said, in a voice devoid of actual pity.

"You don't even know who Perry Como is," Dean sniffed.

Cas gave him a narrow look and took a very prim sip of water.

-

In what might have been the seventieth store they entered, the sole employee had the harried air of someone being menaced by vengeful ghosts or a pack of church ladies.

"Ma'am, I don't believe we have anymore of the dessert plates in stock, though we do have four of the soup bowls-- Yes. Yes, I will set those aside. No, the after-Christmas sale starts on Monday--"

After Christmas, Dean thought, passing the store's front desk with a pang of sympathy for the shopkeep who had a pencil sticking out of her hair like she'd stabbed herself in the head on purpose.

"--Will do. Thanks, Darlene." The shopkeep hung up and made a whoosh noise. "I am going to kill one of these uppity dipshits, so help me, Satan," she muttered to no one in particular.

Dean saw Cas flinch out of the corner of his eye.

The shopkeep pasted on a smile that appeared mostly sincere. "May I help you, dear?" she asked Dean.

"I'm just browsing," Dean said. With a gun to his head, he wouldn't trouble this frazzled lady old enough to be his grandmother.

"You were going to--" Cas started, waving from the other side of a curio cabinet.

Dean groaned inwardly. "You don't have any children's books for sale, by any chance?"

The shopkeep -- Sandy, according to her name tag -- perked up. "We do! A few still, anyway."

She came out from behind her desk to send him and Cas toward a back corner. In that booth was a shelf with a decently curated selection of kids' books from the early to mid parts of the twentieth century -- quite a bit before Sam's time, though Dean read through the titles on the worn spines just in case something interesting stood out. In between a grimacing Santa figurine and a jewelry box decorated with plastic holly leaves was a selection of junkier trade paperbacks.

"No luck?" Cas reached past Dean to pick up a yellow stoneware bowl; his hip pressed against Dean's.

Dean froze. He saw the bowl being turned over in Cas's large hands as though in a fugue.

He looked up to see Cas watching him, nothing but patience in his face. "Uh. No, um. I doubt Sam would find any of these--"

In forcing himself to look away from Cas, Dean'd seen something. He moved over and picked out a paperback with a faded green dogeared cover and a very pre-Nickelodeon illustration of two grubby children.

"It's perfect," he said, grinning at Cas.

Cas smiled back, game if confused. "One down," he said, like he was ticking items off a mental checklist. He glanced over his shoulder at a pegboard on the wall behind them. "Do you think Sam would like a hat?"

The slightly lumpy knitted toboggans were clearly homemade and came in an array of colors that could all be described as loud. "He likes to jog before breakfast, you know, like a freak, so probably," Dean said.

Nodding, Cas picked out one that was orange with a green zigzag around the bottom.

"Two down," Dean said. They took their finds to the shopkeep.

As Sandy rang them up, Dean saw Cas look at and look away from and look again at a tabletop tree, one of those faux vintage types with frothy white branches, decorated with golfball sized emerald green and candy apple red glass ornaments. A gold ribbon was threaded throughout, a spindly star tied at the apex. It was not exactly a towering behemoth of a tree, but it was awfully late in the season to go chopping down a balsam or a pine or buying one that was already halfway to kindling.

Oh there's no place like home for the holidays. Damn earworm.

Dean pointed down the aisle. "We'll take that little white tree too."

Sandy beamed at him. "Oh, I'm happy someone's taking it," she said. "It deserves a nice couple to enjoy it."

She scurried to the table to fetch the tree and Dean did not glance at Cas or say anything or even think anything. He was a blank sheet of paper, a bank of newfallen snow. He was fog and dissolving inside a descending fog.

Sandy was smart enough to give the tree to Cas, who took it with polite thanks.

Dean and he probably talked about something on the drive back to the bunker -- the weather, perhaps, which was by now worn-in levels of dreary. The tree was delivered to one of the library tables until Dean could think of a better place for it. Rain water trickling under his collar woke him up more quickly than a smack with a snowball would've. He wondered if he'd parked Baby in the garage or if he'd even turned her off. The bunker had some protective sensoring management thingy, though, didn't it? He and Sam wouldn't die of carbon monoxide poisoning overnight?

"Is there an agenda for tomorrow?" Cas asked, as though he hadn't noticed Dean's brain trying to leave his body and this whole infernal mortal coil through his nostrils.

Dean considered the question. Yes.

After a minute, Cas said, "Dean?" which, Dean guessed, meant Dean hadn't actually said anything.

"Yeah." There went that dry air again. His kingdom for a goddamn humidifier. "Yep. Um. Groceries. And finish up shopping." He drummed his fingers on the library table. "Probably. You. You don't have to get me anything, not at all -- like, I'm set." He refused to answer Cas's frown. "But I will probably need an hour in town. By myself."

Cas stood taller. "That's fine." His tone was as flat as a taupe paint sample.

Dean crashed onto the bed in an hour or two and laid there willing the snowglobe glitter sloshing in his mind to calm the fuck down already. He had almost achieved this as Sam stuck his head in the room.

"Busy day?" Sam said.

Dean jerked hard enough to make the bedframe rattle. "Fuckin'--" He rubbed his eyes. "Where've you been all day?"

Sam stepped inside with one of his aw, shucks attempts to seem short. "Movie. Told you that."

"Hmm. Yeah. What'd you see?"

The words that flowed from Sam's mouth were probably…European. Dean understood 'hallucinations' and 'Münchhausen' before Sam moved on to saying, "And the documentary went into a much more in depth discussion than I'd been expecting of dreams as illustration of quote, unquote, 'the fantastic' in cinema blah blah blah blah."

He had not actually said the blahs; Dean was merely an excellent translator.

"Okay," Dean said. He was reasonably convinced Sam had seen the world's most boring film and wasn't off somewhere plotting something catastrophic behind Dean's back.

If nothing else, Dean had spent the whole day with Sam's most trusted and chaotic collaborator, so.

"You talked to Mom lately?" Dean asked, busily untying his boot shoelaces.

"Ah," Sam said, in a knowing tone. "Yeah, she's hanging in there. Just finished up a case in Nebraska, I think. She's plotting revenge for your last word play, by the way."

"Squeezy, heh."

"Oh, don't like that."

"It has several perfectly respectable definitions, Sam. Grow up."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Nothing's come up on your radar, case wise, has it?"

"Nah." Dean checked his phone screen for alerts. "Nah. It's the holidays. Maybe the monsters are taking a beat."

He didn't mention Lucifer. Sam didn't mention Lucifer. Neither of them invoked their mother, or Cas, Amara or Chuck or that Arizonian night hag a month ago who'd been chewing on his neighbor's ear (detached from said neighbor, who turned out to be buried in the backyard) as Sam broke down the front door. It was almost comforting, the familiarity of not talking.

"Maybe," Dean said. "Glad we get to be home for Christmas. Spent enough of 'em in motel rooms."

"True. And Cas is here as well."

"He is," Dean said, mindful in stepping around the sinkhole in Sam's tone.

Sam gave him a look. Dean ignored it.

"Okay. I'm going to sleep." Sam waved and exited.

Dean sat with his feet flat on the floor. He stared at the wall until it appeared unlikely he would be able to punch a hole in it with his mind.

He sent his mom a quick text. "Hi. Hope you're well. Forecasters calling for snow Christmas Eve. Been a while since we had a white one."

Mary wrote back, "Ho ho ho!" plus a Santa emoji.

Dean put the phone on the nightstand and his head on the pillow.

-

23 December

Dean entered the kitchen the next day on a wave of violin music pouring forth from a bluetooth speaker. Cas had stuck pieces of scotch tape to the speaker's flat top, for easy access while wrapping, Dean guessed. The table where they ate was additionally cluttered with two boxes, a bolt of ribbon, a pair of scissors, and a scattering of tags. Cas was glaring at a large piece of foil wrapping paper printed with candy canes like it was Crowley.

He noticed Dean and his expression softened. He turned down the music. "This is harder to do than I had anticipated," he said in his deep voice, a bit sheepishly.

Dean poured another cup of coffee to give himself something to do other than what he wanted. And instead of ten things he might have asked, he said, "Whatcha listening to?"

Cas paused midway through sawing at an edge of paper. "Copeland. Rodeo."

"Rodeo like…a rodeo?"

"It's a famous ballet."

"About a rodeo?" Dean was lost enough he sat down on the stool beside Cas. Which, incidentally, was not the stool he'd intended to take.

"I am given to understand it's about a cowgirl looking for man." Cas resumed cutting, and moved on to folding, and furthermore to taping. The box he was wrapping began to look festive and not at all like the work of a skyscraper crammed into the body of an investment banker with subpar hand-eye coordination. "It's difficult for me to follow the synopsis of the storyline based only on the movements of the music. But it's humorous, and beautiful, at times."

He cocked his head at Dean. Dean sipped his coffee and hoped the light was bad enough that whatever blushing he was doing -- or flushing, that was more the thing, because the coffee was hot and full of legal stimulants -- wasn't noticeable.

"Sure," Dean said eventually.

Cas looked away with a small smile.

A text message *boing* interrupted the music for a blip. Cas turned over the phone and swiped the screen.

Dean could see an attached photo of Claire and Alex, cross-eyed and faces crammed near the camera. The visors of their respective baseball caps were festooned with plastic ornaments, one of which, on Claire's, was Bigfoot.

"Thx 4 the sasquatch & say hi to the dorks," Claire wrote.

"Hi back," Dean said, and Cas dutifully relayed the message.

"You're welcome," Cas also typed. "Merry Christmas to Jody and Alex as well."

He punctuated the end with a string of emojis so incomprehensible he had to have learned it from Claire.

Claire sent back a trio of crying-laughing smileys.

In a minute, Cas put down the phone, something vulnerable around his eyes that put a lump in Dean's throat immediately.

Before Dean could say anything, Cas changed the subject with, "The later in the day we head to the grocery, the more likely there is to be a crowd."

"Dude. Lebanon is not that big."

That statement should not have turned out to be the stupidest thing Dean had ever said, because he had said a royal fuckton of idiotic things in his cursed life. And yet.

Their shopping list had mostly been vanquished. For Christmas dinner, there would be ham and sides, beer, pecan pie with chocolate chips. The only bags of pecans left were large enough to make multiple pies, and though this was pleasing, the two men haggling over the last quart of egg nog in the nearby dairy case made the simple act of walking by them feel risky, like Dean was scaling an icy mountain ledge. Also, he'd wanted some nog. Alas.

"There's soy nog left," Cas pointed out.

Dean and the two hostile bros all looked at Cas with dismay. Cas's comment did pop the bubble of imminent violence. The bulkier of the nog hogs growled and pushed the carton into the hands of the other guy. A Christmas miracle.

"So that's no on the soy nog?" Cas asked Dean. Something about the look in his eyes was not quite innocent.

Heat shot up the back of Dean's neck fast enough it could've made an audible crack. He swallowed and wheeled away toward the other end of the baking aisle.

"I think we need one more dessert," Dean said, proud of how unaffected he sounded.

"I saw a recipe for cookies--"

"Yes?" Dean leaned toward him like a flower seeking sunlight.

Cas procured a torn scrap of candy cane wrapping paper from the depths of a trenchcoat pocket. "The recipe seemed very simple." He consulted a series of scribbles that may have been Enochian notation. "One cup each of creamy peanut butter and granulated sugar, and one raw egg. Unshelled."

"That's it?" Dean asked skeptically.

"According to the lore--"

Dean assumed that meant: Reddit, or some shit.

"--you stir until the egg is well incorporated. Roll spoonfuls into balls, press the balls onto a cookie sheet with a fork. Bake for ten minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit." Cas looked up at him in a way that made his eyelashes seem particularly dark and luxurious and distracting. "I don't mind peanut butter."

"You had me at a cup of sugar," Dean said, jolly as an elf who flirted with everyone and not just the guy he currently wanted to…

His breath stuttered for a second.

Bake cookies with.

A literal fact, and only that. No analogies, illusions, allusions, metaphors or euphemisms here.

Jesus fucking Christ.

Cas said, "The premade nut butters are an aisle away."

"We need a couple other things anyway." Dean girded his loins, the very loins he was otherwise disregarding entirely, as one would in a grocery setting and all other outings (fucking hell) with one's best platonic pal, and pushed through a clot of customers raiding the loose nutmeats tower.

There were fewer people in the new aisle, but also fewer available choices. Cas stood on tiptoe to grab the one jar of peanut butter in plain sight, and Dean pondered soup.

"Acorn squash or tomato bisque?" he asked.

On a delay, Cas said, "You know Sam will eat either."

Something about the way Cas clipped off the last word made Dean follow his line of sight.

Several feet away, a baby, not yet a year old most likely, was held on a woman's hip. The baby swung one foot back and forth as if sitting on a dock watching a turquoise lake ripple in northern breeze.

A tiny foot, in a tiny lavender sock.

One emotion and another crossed Cas's face far too fast for Dean to describe them, much less name them.

The baby's eyes were glued to Cas: anticipation.

Cas gave her a tiny wave. Her gummy, drooly grin was instantaneous.

The woman gave him a friendly smile and said, "She's never met a stranger." She crossed her eyes at the baby and the baby laughed. "Have you, Pattycake?"

The baby agreed by patting her adult's face.

Cas waved goodbye and the baby threw her hand up in an approximation of a high-five.

Dean took a breath for the first time in ages. "I'll get tomato." He tipped two cartons into the cart.

His shoulders felt tight. Concrete floors were hell on the ol' bones.

Cas seemed to twitch back into his body. He placed the peanut butter jar in the cart as well. He didn't avert his eyes from Dean as much as not seek him out. Dean exhaled against some somethingerother squatting on his gut. An out of context passage of Dickens floated up to the surface of his memory.

"...A little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach…"

Yeah. That's all it was. Undigested beef. Wavy gravy. Whatever.

Still, he crowded next to Cas as they continued toward the check-out at the front of the store. There were indeed more and more customers arriving, right before dinnertime and this close to Sunday. It was a courtesy to conserve space.

-

Sam helped them unload groceries and even helped making and eating some sub sandwiches, and then he escaped the kitchen, probably to partake of nerdiness like reorganizing the magic spell ingredients room or discussing Proust with other nerds online.

"We're having ham on Sunday," Dean yelled down the hall at him. "Happy Christmas!"

"Sounds great," Sam yelled back, from wherever.

Dean rounded on Cas, who was fidgeting with the oven. "You have to press down on the dial and turn. No jangling," Dean said. "It's gotten loose or outta whack recently."

"Jangling?" Cas asked under his breath.

"No jingling either." Dean took down a big metal bowl and tossed it with a clang onto the metal countertop. He did the same with their one cookie sheet, which always looked to him like the Men of Letters had used it for target practice, and a metal measuring cup. "Cookie time, hell yeah."

The dough, such as it was, was funky thick. Not too terrible to work with. Forming it into balls seemed pretty simple. Cas used a fork to press tine-marks onto the tops with a concentration appropriate for advanced surgery. They put the sheet into the oven and closed 'er up, and leaned against the counter with the general air of two clueless guys waiting for a kid to be born.

Dean winced, as soon as he thought it.

He let himself settle. "Hey."

"Hmm," Cas said.

"How are you?" He looked over and caught the bloom of surprise on Cas's face.

"I'm fine," Cas said slowly, like Dean had asked a trick question.

"I mean." Dean didn't look away. "You had a rough time of it, with Lucifer. For months," he clarified, as though Cas might've forgotten.

"I knew what I was doing, Dean." Cas studied the stovetop. "With Crowley as well, even if that was… Not the same." He huffed out a breath. "At least working with Crowley… He never had control, of course."

It might've been a dismissal, of the kind Dean was an expert in providing, if not for the sadness in Cas's eyes.

Sadness. Resignation.

"I truly thought Lucifer could help us," Cas said. "But as usual I didn't--" He shook his head. "Everything with Amara and Chuck was so much bigger than I imagined. So much worse, for a while." He raised his gaze back to Dean, and it pierced right into Dean's chest like a blade. "You had it much worse than I did."

You really believe that, don't you? Dean thought. He could barely breathe around it.

"Amara," Dean started, and stopped. He let the timer tick off ten or fifteen seconds. He chose. "She thought she knew me. Understood me. She brought Mom--" His voice faltered. He kept going. "Amara had the power and I. Did not. I was ready to die to keep her from killing the world, but I didn't want to die, you know? And she was in my head because she let herself in, not because I let her in."

He thought about Cas hugging him. Saying, I could go with you.

In the inadequate kitchen light, Cas's eyes shone. The blade sunk in deeper.

"I don't think I had it worse," Dean said. "I just had it different."

Cas made an expression that seemed to say he would accept this falsehood for the sake of manners. Dean wanted to kiss him so badly he shifted backwards in case his treacherous hands went reaching for Cas of their own volition.

"I'm sorry he hurt you," Dean said, and Cas's face was about to crumple, he could tell, and that was the exact second the timer buzzed loudly enough to make them jump like they'd been goosed.

"Fuck." Dean slapped the timer off and grabbed a potholder, the adrenaline snapping through his veins making his hands shake.

The cookie sheet was removed from the oven and placed on the stove top. Dean took a chance on glancing at Cas, whose eyes were wilder than cookies normally required until he took a deep breath.

"They do look like cookies," Cas said with the dry serenity of a desert.

Dean cough-laughed and grabbed a metal spatula from the drawer.

"We're supposed to wait two minutes before removing them," Cas said.

"Okay."

Dean squinted at the cookies. They did appear to be cookies. Round. Lightly browned. Smelled fantastic. All in all you would not mistake them for anything other than cookies.

Two interminable minutes gone by, Dean tried scraping one off the cookie sheet.

"Hmm," he said, as the cookie splintered into chunks.

He went at the next ones more gingerly, until the plates Cas had were full and most of the cookies intact.

"Moment of truth," Dean said, putting one of the broken pieces into his mouth and chewing.

Cas did the same.

They looked at each other.

"Holy shit," Dean.

The sentiment was mirrored on Cas's face. "The molecules are still prominent," he said, "but I like it."

"These're stupid amazing." Dean was already cramming a whole cookie into his gob and attaining transcendence. "Three fucking ingredients."

"They are nice," Cas agreed, chewing another bite with measurably more dignity.

"Goddamn voodoo," Dean said, picking up cookies double-handed, 'cause second-degree burns? Worth the risk.

All but ten of the cookies were gone in a matter of minutes. Dean inwardly congratulated himself for buying extra milk at the grocery earlier.

He felt giddy with cookie triumph, or possibly just sugar. Cas was watching him with a smile almost right there, threatening to break out at any time, and now Dean was bumping his arm against his. He wanted to see that smile at full wattage. The cookies were Cas's idea, Cas deserved the glory here. Best batch of cookies Dean'd ever had a hand in.

He could kiss the taste of them off of Cas's mouth--

"You make cookies?" Sam said, strolling into the kitchen like he lived here or something.

Cas moved away to find Sam a plate.

Dean thought about the jury trial that would have a prosecutor proclaiming things like, ...And he killed his brother with a metal spatula a mere two days before a national holiday. Your honor, we seek the death penalty.

Before he shut himself resolutely alone into his own bedroom, Dean did knock on Sam's door.

"You're doing okay with everything, right?"

Sam squinted at him and toed off his sneakers. "Relative to what?"

"Been a stressful few -- several -- months. Possibly years, even."

"Possibly." Sam let his eyebrows rise and fall. "I'm okay, Dean."

"You wouldn't tell me if you weren't, would you."

"Probably not." Sam paused. "We gotta stop Lucifer, but. What else is new."

He didn't sound dangerously hollowed out about it, so Dean let it go for the time being.

"Okay!" He clapped his hands together. "Good chat."

Sam laughed silently. "You invited Mom to dinner Sunday?"

That brought Dean up short. He looked at Sam for a beat, past the white noise. "I will."

It was a simple text, after another hour of deliberation.

"Having ham n stuff Sunday around 6. We'd love it if you'd join," he wrote.

"Thanks. Love you," Mary wrote.

It wasn't exactly an affirmative RSVP, but he hadn't expected one.

-

24 December

Someone was throwing a concert in the largest bathroom at seven a.m.

The song, amplified by the tiles and concrete, coagulated as Dean entered.

Cas was scrubbing one of the stalls with a sponge and chemicals strong enough to singe nostril hair. On the floor, the clunky jambox Dean had bought for three bucks at a junk shop issued forth the impeccable Mr. Plant and his beseeching vibes.

As you would for me, oh, I would share your load -- let me share your load.

"Hello, Dean," Cas said over Page's guitar. "I won't be but another half hour or so." He rinsed the sponge in a bucket.

"You're listening to the mixtape," Dean said, startled and grinning, and possibly not awake enough for prudent self-censoring.

"Of course," Cas said, as though it was patently obvious he would. He had a fond look on his face. "I like this song in particular very much."

Dean was suddenly far too awake, far too underdressed, far too…far too… Ol' Robbie just kept singing, "Baby, let me," and oh hell what was Dean supposed to say to that. He'd given Cas the tape weeks before, having made it one night with the help of what, in retrospect, was liquor-fueled bravery.

It was hours too early to start drinking again.

"Um. Yeah. Yes. I like this song as well." Dean fidgeted. "Obviously."

Cas, preoccupied with disinfectants, was not noticing this display of barely concealed panic, thank god for minor mercies. "The lyrics have a lovely message."

"Yes," Dean said faintly. "Oh."

Cas looked over.

"No," Dean said, "it's only I-- It took a while for this song to grow on me when I was younger. It felt too much like prog to me."

"Is prog anything like a trog?" Cas asked. He stepped out of the stall with a small smile.

"No." Dean shook his head, smiling a little defeat. "It means-- You know, it isn't important."

Whatever track his train was on had derailed at the sight of Cas's forearms, uncovered by the rolled up sleeves of an old plaid flannel that may have been Sam's.

Cas did notice this lapse in conversation. "There's fresh coffee in the kitchen," he said, like caffeine withdrawal might explain Dean and his jitteriness.

Coffee did sound great, though. Maybe it would still be scalding hot and Dean could pore it directly onto his face.

"Thanks for cleaning in here," he said, moving toward the hallway.

After he'd downed a cup of coffee so quickly his tongue was numb, he tried to put himself in some sorta order, mentally.

Cas was supposed to listen to the mixtape; that was the whole reason Dean had made it for him.

Cas lived in the bunker, as far as Dean was concerned. It only stood to reason Cas would be responsible for some of the chores.

Cas had arms. Arms were not invisible.

Unfortunately, all of these thoughts in procession had the cumulative effect of making Dean feel even less sane.

Another pot of coffee would cure him. He was sure of it.

-

He'd heard once that shopping on Christmas Eve wasn't too bad since by December 24th a lot of folks had given up and/or were tapped out, finances wise. Dean was not benefitting from any widespread collective surrender, but he did find his mom a beautiful winter scarf in shades of gray and pale green. He bought Sam some of those overpriced multivitamins he liked, and, for want of figuring out anything else to buy Cas, another blue hoodie, this one paler with a zipper.

He didn't know what it was about this time of year, or this specific year -- the persistent gloom, the hooky-spook feeling of everyone in the country being out of the office, emotionally or otherwise, the long-delayed whiplash of being batted around by the creator of the universe and His questionable-to-horrific kin, the revelation that England had a Men of Letters chapter and they were such a bag of dicks they made angels look civilized (no offense, Cas), etc., etc. Traffic jams. In Lebanon, even. The town's population measured in the dozens, but okay.

Dean turned off the Impala and sat there in silence for a few measured breaths. He imagined Cas into the backseat and his face went warm.

So much for that, he thought, shaking off the daydream.

The bunker was suspiciously empty at six o'clock and smelled like someone had been cooking, despite a lack of foodstuffs sitting around. Dean was about to start calling names and kicking butt, and then saw something twinkling in the library.

The tabletop tree had been bedazzled with a single string of teensy white lights. A piece of folded paper was tucked beneath the tree base.

Behind the bunker, on the knoll

Cas's handwriting.

He left his bags in his room and put his coat back on. Outside, he trudged up the hill in powdery snow that had begun to accumulate on the grass. In the strange bright darkness, he could just see Cas sitting on an old log, his face tipped up to the sky.

Dean watched his profile for a minute, from a safe distance. He let the ache roll over him until he knew he could withstand its weight.

He kept climbing.

Cas had probably heard him huffing up the last few steps, where the embankment seemed slipperier. He'd buttoned up his trench like he was capable of getting cold -- although, maybe he was? He looked cold and elated to see Dean, and the combination made Dean's longing heavier for a moment.

"Good thing I wore my lumberjack boots," Dean said, because why waste an opportunity to be an asshole.

Cas stood up, expression changed on a dime. "Good thing there's no-one around to be offended by my stiff wardrobe." That one cocked eyebrow was less polite.

Touché.

A big brown cardboard box sat at Cas's feet.

Dean looked at it pointedly.

Cas sighed. "I didn't know what to give you." He held up his hands. "I know you said what you said. I wanted to get you something."

"Pretty big box, Cas," Dean said, putting on a smarmy voice. "Settin' the bar real high here, man."

"You may want to reserve judgment on that." Cas rubbed his hands together, less from glee and more, perhaps, from chill. He picked up the box with zero effort, as always.

Dean took the box from him tentatively, until he realized it was extremely lightweight. He sat it on the log and opened up the untaped flaps.

"You bought me…popcorn?" Dean asked, staring down at what was a whole jar's worth of kernels popped into fluffy abundance.

Cas plucked at a piece and a long, long, long rope of popcorn rose from the box. "I saw somewhere that some people have a tradition of making popcorn garlands for the wildlife at the holidays. I thought we could put it on this fir that's up here."

The wind was sure cutting into Dean's eyes, wasn't it? Making them burn.

He wanted to laugh, or scoff, and found he couldn't, he just couldn't. He was going to have to walk back down the hill with Cas in a while and pretend like this wasn't the most romantic Hallmark movie shit ever, like it wasn't crushing him that Cas didn't mean it that way, 'cause why would he.

Dean helped Cas take the popcorn chain all the way out of the box and they walked in general synchrony to the fir. Their hands lifted the garland up and around the not too tall tree; when they were finished they stood back and admired the effort.

It looked like a proper Christmas tree in a storybook, like twee squirrels and precocious deer would arrive soon. It was the prettiest Christmas tree Dean had ever decorated.

"Thanks, Cas," he said, meaning it more than usual.

"You're welcome." And if Cas's voice sounded kind, well.

That's who a real friend was, wasn't it? A kindness.

Bird feeding, homemade gift giving, dashing Disney prince amounts of kindness.

In his bedroom, Dean stood around opening and closing his hands, trying to put their circulation back in order. Trying to clear his head, lift away the twinges in the crooks of his arms, the back of his neck. He needed to wrap his measly offerings. He needed to plan tomorrow's cooking schedule, get some sleep already. No use waiting around as though sleigh bells were gonna ring out.

Cas would know where the wrapping paper was being stored. Dean knocked on his bedroom door twice.

"You decent?" he asked, opening the door after there wasn't an answer.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Cas wiped his eyes and looked over. "Of course."

The tears thick in his voice were so disconcerting, so unexpected and rending, Dean was perched beside him in an instant without as much as another conscious thought to justify his actions.

"Cas?" he asked softly.

Cas closed his eyes. Another tear or two dripped onto his hands folded in his lap. "I've been thinking," he said.

And as soon as he said it--

"No," Dean whispered.

There was no snow here, no froth or fog or checking out. Cas's intentions were as clear and sharp in Dean's brain as an icepick.

"I should leave Monday," Cas said, watching the flame of a jar candle on the chest of drawers flicker. "I'm of more use to you, to all of you, if I'm actively searching for Lucifer, which I should have been doing all along."

"No," Dean said, for once in his life not in anger but in utter dismay. "You don't have to earn your keep, for pity's sake."

Maybe Dean was reentering puberty and that's why his voice was so perpetually fucked up anymore.

Cas wouldn't look at him, something ashamed and mournful in his eyes.

Something lonely.

A calm, terrible sorrow poured into Dean's throat.

"I don't want you to go," he said, enunciating every word, not fumbling as he dipped his head into Cas's space to make him look at him. "Cas. We need you-- I need you to stay. Not because you are capable of smiting a demon or tolerating Crowley. Not because your dumb fuck of a brother is plotting whatever he's plotting and your dad left, again." Dean took a breath. It made his voice shakier. "I want you here because I want you here. You have any idea how much I missed you when--"

The when being any of a number of times Cas had been in heaven, captured, hunted, imprisoned, possessed, tortured or outright dead, or assumed to be such, and Dean--

Whatever Dean felt had been like its own animal stalking a cage; a clawed-open wound that only ever began to heal when Cas was home. How Amara might have empathized, if she'd understood human empathy. Dean had been able to keep his own feelings locked away for years.

And now… Not so much.

Despair was creeping in at the periphery; he only had a little courage left.

Cas didn't look away.

Dean's throat closed.

I could be your home, if you wanted, he thought, without hope.

The lock clicked back into place.

He looked down, swallowed. Okay. Okay. Cas would be leaving. He'd survived before.

They both had, Dean supposed.

"Dean," Cas whispered, and his fingers gently pried open one of Dean's clenched hands, until he could press their palms together. He was leaning closer, his eyes full of candlelight and wonder.

Dean had missed something.

"I heard you," Cas said, his forehead touching Dean's, "when you prayed to me, a moment ago."

The lock began to crumble. Dean lifted his other hand carefully.

"Please, please stay," he whispered, brushing his thumb across the top of Cas's cheek.

Cas leaned into his hand. He nodded. Dean ducked his head again, and Cas met him for the softest, warmest kiss Dean had ever felt.

They pulled back. It could have been left there, maybe. A modest kiss. A friendly, fleeting moment.

For as many as two more unsteady breaths they stared at each other. Dean felt his stomach lift as Cas's pupils dilated.

There was nothing chaste about what Dean wanted, or what he saw in Cas's eyes.

When he and Cas crashed back together, somebody made a helpless, relieved sound. Each of them had the other's head cradled in his hands.

Neither of them left the bed for hours, and neither of them slept.

-

25 December

"Deck the Halls" issuing forth from the floor did rouse Dean from an ultra relaxed haze. He groaned and reached down over the edge of the mattress. His fingertips met cloth and boot treads and he scrabbled around attempting to locate the errant phone that was mixed up in the heap. The phone kicked into high gear with a shriller version of the song, prompting Cas to snap his fingers.

The music stopped.

"Nnnn," Cas said into Dean's shoulder blade.

The heat of his exhalation trembled against Dean's skin. "Was that an alarm, or did you change your ringtone?" He shifted back into Cas's hold.

Cas tightened the arm around Dean's waist. "It's eight a.m."

"Ah."

Dean drifted and basked. Cas opened his hand and began to slide it lower. Dean was extremely, if sleepily, into this next gambit. And then he remembered what day it was.

He caught himself before he actually fell out of bed.

Standing up was successful, in that he didn't fall down then either.

"You have to start cooking already?" Cas blinked at Dean like Dean was endearing and inexplicable.

The floor was numbing Dean's feet as he tried to distinguish his clothes from Cas's. "Soon. Coffee first."

"Naturally." Cas sat up and stretched and yawned and scratched through his messy hair that made him look like he had when they'd first met, which in turn made Dean's heart cramp with adoration. "I can make that."

A pot of coffee guzzled, they dragged each other into the bathroom, propped a chair against the doorknob, and cleaned up, round-aboutly. Getting dressed in clothes that hadn't been on the floor was also somewhat less efficient than it might have been under other circumstances. The caffeine was meeting serious resistance; Dean almost fell asleep halfway through putting on a sock, since he was lying down, curled against Cas.

Cas stroked his fingers through Dean's hair over and over. Already addicted, Dean raised his head to kiss him, and it was more effective than another pot of coffee would've been.

Around ten o'clock, a crust was being blind-baked and Dean was wiping down the counters for the next phase. A kettle of apple cider and cinnamon simmered on the stove. Cas was up to his elbows in potatoes at the sink. He'd queued up a Christmas playlist on Dean's laptop and Loretta Lynn was singing to heck with ol' Santa Claus.

Dean had rarely been happier in his life.

"We're still friends," he said with some amazement.

Cas plopped the pan of potatoes down on the counter. "Was there some question about this?"

Dean blushed, feeling lovesick and disastrous. "No. It's only... I am really great at ruining things." He flubbed around for the peeler and managed to feel even stupider.

"Dean." Cas put a hand on Dean's wrist delicately. "I'm never not going to be your friend."

Sensing perhaps that Dean was one million percent incapable of responding to that without crying, he leaned up and kissed Dean's temple.

Dean hugged him.

Cas hugged him back. "I'm not peeling the potatoes, Dean."

Jesus. That crafty look in his eyes was going to be Dean's kryptonite.

"Chop pecans for me instead?" Dean asked, taking advantage of Cas's inability to stop looking at his mouth.

Cas kissed him and slid a knife out of the closest drawer simultaneously. Dean tried not to perish from lust.

At some point it crossed his mind that Sam was taking advantage of a holiday to sleep late. He bounced down the hall to give him grief, as was his right as the older brother.

Sam's bedroom was empty. Instinct told Dean that Sam's bedroom had, in fact, been empty since sometime yesterday morning.

The bunker's main door clunked open and Dean raced toward the map room yelling "Sammy!" with enough panic in his voice that Cas was right on his heels. They mostly crashed into the room together.

"The fuck, man," Dean panted as Sam clipped down the stairs.

"Mary," Cas said, looking up at the balcony.

Sam gave Dean a half apologetic, half brat grin and hoisted a giant duffle bag into Dean's hands. "Merry Christmas."

"Hey, Dean," their mom said as she descended, smiling more regretfully. "Hope it's not too late to say yes to dinner."

"No, of course not," Dean said, thrusting the bag back at Sam, who had reached for the other bags Mary had and was therefore lousy with bags.

"Here," Cas said, more helpful than a concierge. "Hi, Sam."

The two of them hauled away the bag assortment, leaving Dean and his mother unencumbered.

She hugged him at the foot of the stairs. "You doing all right?" she asked. She smelled like vanilla and frost.

"Yeah, Mom." He let go with immense reluctance. "Real well."

She put a hand on his jaw and studied him. He tried not to squirm, wondering what she saw in his expression.

"Good," she said, eyes shining. "I hear you've got quite a menu planned. Need any help in the kitchen? Or company, at least?"

"The latter for sure."

He took a deep breath. She hooked her arm around his and they went to join Sam and Cas.

-

"Dude, no way," Sam said before he'd even torn all the paper off the book. He'd lit up like a bottle rocket as soon as he recognized the bottom half of the cover illustration.

"'The Herdmans were absolutely the worst kids in the history of the world,'" Dean recited, and Sam joined him in unison: "'They lied and stole and smoked cigars -- even the girls -- and talked dirty and hit little kids and cussed their teachers and took the name of the Lord in vain and set fire to Fred Shoemaker's old broken-down toolhouse.'"

Sam cackled like a witch. "Thanks, seriously. A classic."

Their mom and Cas shared a look of pure confusion.

"It was my favorite book for, I dunno, two or three years in a row," Sam explained.

"Try five or six years, minimum." Dean tossed a sticky red bow him. "I read that book to you I could not even count how many times. Hundreds."

"Maybe ten."

"Fifty-seven times if it was once," Dean insisted.

"I said thank you," Sam said loudly.

Cas hid a laugh. Dean knocked his knee against his in solidarity.

During the bestowing of marshmallows atop sweet potatoes, while their mother and Cas chatted and set one of the library tables for dinner, Sam said, "So."

Dean stirred the pan of green beans. "Yeah?"

Sam placed the final marshmallow and admired his handiwork. "You and Cas, huh." He waited, gave up, and opened the oven to slide the dish of casserole inside. He closed up the oven and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Yes," Dean said, content to leave the topic there.

He glanced at Sam. Sam flicked him on the head, and Dean swatted his hand away.

"No fighting near a major heat source," Mary said, returning to the kitchen and exiting just as quickly with a tray of veggies and dip and a stack of napkins.

"'Bout time, is all," Sam told Dean, following her out.

Well. He wasn't wrong.

-

"They remade Shop Around the Corner into You've Got Mail," Sam was telling Mary, "which was about people emailing each other. I think." He shrugged. "Email was still basically a novelty in the '90s."

"I think it's novel now," Mary said. "Type a letter, a million words, I guess, hit send, it goes around the world before I can even open the next one from Bath & Body Works." She shook her head. "They send me about nine emails a day, and they sell so many types of soap. Who is using this much soap?"

Dean blinked. "I mean. We do go through a fair amount more than most folks."

Mary threw a wadded up napkin at him. "Yes, all right. But normal people, I'm saying."

Sam changed the subject back to holiday movies. "There've been a bunch more adaptations of A Christmas Carol, including one with the Muppets."

"What?" Mary's eyes bulged.

Dean's attention was drawn to Cas coming back into the room with the gift Sam had given him, a leather pocket journal with a removable notebook inside.

Cas sat in the chair beside Dean and started filing out the notebook's first page.

"Emergency contacts," he said.

"You're such a Boy Scout." Dean set his foot against Cas's under the table.

"You have a higher than average number of phone numbers." Cas hooked his ankle around Dean's. "And I'm already on my twelfth phone in eight years."

Dean resisted the urge to put his chin over Cas's shoulder, but he did poke at a corner of something sticking out of the journal until he could slide it out.

The badly ragged photo turned out to be of himself from over a year ago, taken at a dive in Tennessee that Dean vaguely recalled as being named something like Rubbin' Butts BBQ. He looked delighted; there was a pile of trashed ribs on the bar in front of him. Sam's elbow was also in the picture, to the side.

Cas cleared his throat and kept making notes.

Dean couldn't kiss him here. Or, technically, he could, but it seemed like the kinda thing that would bring the other discussion to a screeching halt.

The ache he'd felt over the last few days -- months, years -- when thinking about Cas hadn't dissipated as much as evolved, in the scant, if intensely pleasurable, hours since late last night. It occurred to him that just because he could have what he wanted, didn't mean he wouldn't want it.

Like, at all. And what he wanted, he wanted very, very badly.

Cas gave him a steady look.

They were definitely gonna have to figure out this thing where Dean started praying without realizing that's what he was doing.

"I like the version with Patrick Stewart in it," Dean blurted overtop whatever Sam was saying about Albert Finney.

He was the only one who heard Cas snort. He kept his foot right where it was.

-

"These antlers were made for a child," Dean grumbled.

"Then take them off," Sam said, unimpressed.

"I didn't say I was gonna do that." Dean added another glug of brandy to the mulled cider and stirred. "But you have to put the Santa hat back on."

"Fine." Sam ladled punch into four cups. "Are we watching a movie or no?"

In the other room, their mom laughed a hearty belly laugh.

Sam shot Dean an amused look. "I think she's telling Cas about that time you peed in the bathtub."

"I was two," Dean protested. "It's not like I still pee in the tub."

"You better not," Sam muttered, taking two cups as he wandered out.

Dean turned off the stove and was about to bring the other two cups to the library when Cas strolled in with an armload of dirty dishes. He was already wearing the sweater Mary had given him, more to prove it fit than because the bunker was chilly. Winchester genetics, or maybe sheer common sense, meant Cas's casual wardrobe was quickly becoming a trove of blue tops.

Cas left the plates on the counter. Dean kissed his cheek; Cas went very still, and his eyes went very black.

The kiss Cas returned to him was the sweetest, filthiest thing that had ever happened to Dean in any kitchen, which felt like a challenge for future encounters.

…When no-one else was essentially a room away.

"Are we going to watch a Christmas film?" Cas asked, as though the spot behind Dean's ear would reveal this most hallowed secret.

Dean never really answered. They did wander back into the library eventually, one after the other, Cas carrying the kettle for the refills bound to be necessary. Neither Mary nor Sam seemed annoyed by their temporary absence and thrilled to be offered more cider.

Dean ate another slice of pie, in case the pie felt neglected.

-

None of them had the energy to stay up and visit much past ten p.m. The dishes were declared the morning's business. Dean left Baby's new five-quart bottle of motor oil on the library table and his own new sweater folded neatly beside it. Goodnights were exchanged in the hallway. Mary headed to her old room and Sam to his. Dean saw Cas touching one of the feathery white Christmas tree limbs with a smile before he clicked off the lights.

Dean offered his hand and Cas took it, let Dean lead him away.

Cas just held him for a long time, the two of them slumped against the door inside Dean's room, where it was quiet and safe.

Both the room, and the circle of Cas's embrace.

"Wanna hold you too," Dean murmured.

The tenderness in Cas's face was almost too much to endure. Dean still found himself starving for it, greedy to be gentle with Cas in return, to make him shiver and gasp.

Later, Cas traced a triangle with his fingertips on Dean's bare hipbone.

Dean kissed the notch of Cas's throat, his clavicle, his palm, caught as Cas raised his hand to bring Dean back to his mouth.

Together, they learned how best to pray, no other soul or spirit privy to a single syllable of their confessions.

-

26 December

"Dean," Cas said.

"Mmmm." Dean made himself as immovable as possible. "What time is it?"

"Almost ten." Cas stroked Dean's back with his huge, warm, perfect hands. "If you let me get up, I can make coffee."

As though he couldn't pick Dean up one-handed.

"Mmmmmmmm," Dean said, without doing anything else like opening his eyes or rolling away.

After a minute, he said, "So. Anything about the holiday you'd care to make a tradition?"

Cas didn't respond.

Dean lifted his head from Cas's chest and smiled at the sight of him.

My dear home, he thought.

"Any of it," Cas whispered, eyes soft. "All of it."

"Done," Dean said, and kissed him good morning.

#deancas #destiel #spn #fic #holiday fluff

[addictedtostorytelling]

It's me again! I have finished all the original CSI seasons and I'm now on Vegas. One thing I am frustrated with is the lack of GSR kissing. I know a kiss was cut and I have seen your rant about the lack of kisses, but why do you think that is?? They are so happily married and obviously attracted to each other! Why do the writers constantly not give us more PDA between these two??

hi, @i-collect-things!

good to hear from you again!

re: your question:

my sense is that the reason why the writers were so stingy with gsr kisses (especially in the reboot) was because they were laboring under some mistaken impressions even though they really should have known better.

they believed that it was the paucity of gsr kisses that made the few that we got to see over the years special, when in fact such was never the case.

because of the way the fandom had responded to the gsr slow-burn storyline, they essentially mistook our enthusiasm for the few "table scraps" we had ever been fed as a preference for scraps in itself rather than correctly interpreting it as evidence of how much more excited we might have been had we ever been given access to a true feast instead.

they seemed to think that if they had made gsr kisses a regular occurrence for us, said kisses wouldn't have been "special" anymore, and our interest in the ship (and by extension the show) would have diminished.

no two ways about it: they were flat-out wrong, and the stunning lack of kisses in places where there should have been some is just egregious in retrospect, an absolute failure of writing and production, indicative of just how badly the csibods misjudged their audience in the later seasons of the show and reboot eras.

more discussion of the issue after the "keep reading," if you're interested.

warning: here be salt about csi and csi: vegas writing and production decisions. read at your own risk.

__

three kisses in twenty-one years for the only actual romantic couple in the entire csi: vegas storyworld: it reads like a bad joke at first, especially when one considers that said couple goes from being the classic "will they or won't they?" pairing, to dating, to engaged, to married (twice!) over that long span of time and has many of their most significant relationship moments play out on screen.

certainly, the experience is incomparable to anything else i have ever dealt with in my almost thirty years as a fangirl.

gsr kisses are rarer than gemstones, even though there is absolutely no narrative reason why they ought to be.

so what gives?

well, for my money, the lack of gsr kisses all goes back to the fact that, as anthony zuiker talks about in this interview, the original csi, by design, "never brought characters home [or] delved too deep into their personal lives."

that writing choice meant that while gsr was the show's flagship romance, it was never something that received a lot of mainline narrative focus.

—which in some ways made negotiating the gsr slow-burn romantic storyline difficult.

on other primetime shows, a flagship slow-burn romance will typically play out over the course of about three seasons, receiving measured but nevertheless steady development, with little romantic moments scattered in here and there, punctuated by one or two "romantic focus episodes" per season. there will be plenty of pining, some near misses, and usually a midgame ship or two along the way to stir up jealousies, resentments, and personal revelations until finally the two characters come together in the inevitable "consummation moment" that sees them confess their love, hold hands, kiss, and/or have sex for the first time on screen, after which point they are then officially a couple.

however, because csi never had any interest in giving gsr that much mainline attention, they didn't adhere to those traditional patterns. while gsr did get occasional peripheral development during the show's first three seasons—and even played the whole "one endgame character gets into a midgame ship with someone else that causes the other endgame character to get jealous" game for a while—by the end of s3, grissom and sara were actually further apart (relationally speaking) than ever, with grissom flat-out rejecting sara's most overt romantic overture to date.

on a show more willing to expend narrative resources exploring and developing the characters' personal lives (and depicting their actions outside of work), they might have been able to write their way out of this narrative low point for grissom and sara in relatively short order, having them "hit rock bottom" only to then bounce back and get together sooner rather than later, maybe by sometime in mid-s4. but on csi, where grissom and sara's romantic storyline by necessity had to (per the rules of the show) always remain in the margins only, getting the two lovers "back to good" was going to take more time; their relationship wasn't something that could be fixed quickly.

i mean, there is a reason why s4/s5 are such a roller coaster ride, gsrwise. and the fact that it couldn't be meant that the writers now had something of a pacing problem.

writing a slow-burn romance is an art, particularly when it comes to pacing. for as much as it's about teasing the audience's expectations and playing the "will they or won't they?" game for as long as possible, there has to be some indication that the characters are moving toward each other and will eventually reach that all-important "coming together" moment at some point. on the one hand, you have to be patient and draw the development out in order to build up the narrative tension, making the audience yearn for the consummation so badly it almost hurts before you ever give them the satisfaction of seeing it. on the other hand, you need to make sure that even if the slow-burn runs long, it still is in a constant state of progression, with the tension escalating over time until the consummation inevitably occurs, or otherwise you risk losing its momentum (and with it, the audience's interest). with gsr, the csi writers had already drawn things out with them almost as long as they could without overtaxing the premise.

that so, they had to wonder, after grissom's seemingly decisive rejection of sara at the end of s3, was there really any way to move the story forward? had they dragged their feet too long already, making romantic gsr unviable, or was there any way to navigate the coming season so that eventual consummation (maybe two or three seasons on) was still a potential option? initially, the writers thought the answer was "no."

but thankfully billy and jorja thought the answer was "yes," and they advocated for the romantic gsr storyline to continue, eventually persuading the writers to stick things out a while longer.

nevertheless, even once the writers decided to continue writing romantic gsr after all, given that by then they had long "overshot the runway" in terms of the usual slow-burn tropes, they had to get creative with trying to stick the landing—and what they decided, for better or worse, was that since the entire reason why grissom and sara hadn't gotten together previously was that, as a rule, the show didn't focus on the personal lives of their characters, they were going to double down on that narrative choice.

ipso facto, after spending s4 and early s5 slowly moving grissom and sara back toward each other, instead of having that traditional "consummation moment" occur on screen, they opted to just kind of skip over it.

have it happen but not on screen.

have it happen but not allow the audience to know that it had (at least at first).

while there were probably a lot of factors that influenced this decision on their parts, one of the big ones was the fan response they had already gotten to gsr so far: gsr had always been a "love it or hate it" ship, with very few people neutral on the matter.

among fans who hated the ship, certainly there were those who did so because they favored other grissom and/or sara pairings instead; however, there was also a fairly vocal contingent of folks who were just against the concept of csi portraying any romance in general, arguing that it pulled focus from the forensics of the show, posing a distraction from what they viewed as "csi's main point."

meanwhile, fans who loved gsr were (by this time) annoyed that the relationship had been teased for so long without being made canon.

by sublimating the consummation and making it happen off-screen, the writers spoke to those two disparate responses, essentially saying, "yes, this is something that's happening (see, gsr fans?), but, trust us, it's not gonna be a distraction from the show's main focus. grissom and sara have already been together for a long time, and you didn't even know it (gsr haters)!"

it seemed like a good way to compromise between doing what was right for the characters and gratifying some of the fans while at the same time honoring the show's thesis and production values without alienating the other fans altogether.

unfortunately, taking this particular approach also created a problem: just because the writers decided to skip over the initial consummation moment didn't mean that all that pent up tension and expectation for it just evanesced.

fans still wanted to see a gsr kiss, dammit, and the longer they didn't see it, the more ravenous for it they became.

and so the writers had written themselves into a bit of corner, making it so that any gsr kiss they might write would be, by its very nature, chimerical: a first kiss from the audience's perspective but a thousandth kiss from the grissom and sara's.

writing such a kiss would require finesse.

however, it also wouldn't have been impossible to do.

it's just that the writers chose not to do it.

part of their decision to keep holding off undoubtedly stemmed from that same old reluctance to focus on the characters' personal lives too much (and from a fear of alienating fans who either hated gsr and/or just didn't want there to be too much romance in the show in general).

however, part of it also undoubtedly came from the way fans were responding to lack of kisses so far—i.e., by being super vocal about wanting to see a kiss, campaigning for it online (as by now online fandom was definitely a thing), tuning in in numbers every week and particularly for episodes that touted heavy gsr content, and by just generally engaging with the show on the basis of wanting to see a kiss happen.

essentially, at the same time that the writers had officially concluded the gsr slow-burn storyline, they had also (largely inadvertently) stumbled upon a way to prolong the whole "will they or won't they?" of the thing, sustaining the same narrative tension that had kept them afloat for so long.

even though the couple was officially together, the audience still had something to yearn for with them.

and that yearning was too sweet to just easily relinquish.

so the writers milked it.

they dangled the promise of the kiss™ overhead, tantalean, making sure to remind us all the time that grissom and sara did in fact have a physical relationship but never letting us so much as glimpse it.

they teased it all through s7 and into s8, even going as far as to stage a "near miss" kiss during grissom and sara's engagement scene in episode 08x04 "the case of the cross-dressing carp" just to drive the fans up a wall. and who knows how long they might have continued in that same vein going forward, except for the fact that, all of a sudden, jorja fox was going to leave the show.

—and just like that, the writers were out of time.

jorja's impending exit essentially turned the kiss into a "now or never" proposition—and, thankfully, since grissom and sara were still very much in love (and were even engaged to be married) even with sara's departure looming, the answer had to be "now."

the writers had to finally write that kiss they had been withholding for so long.

luckily for them, their old problem of "how should we stage what is a first kiss to the audience but a thousandth kiss to the characters?" was essentially solved by the circumstances.

by having the first gsr kiss also be the last gsr kiss, that made things simple.

the significance was all wrapped up in the moment.

they didn't have to go out of their ways to stage or fame anything.

of course, as you might imagine, reactions to this kiss were mixed. while on the one hand, fans were pleased to finally see their beloved otp lock lips after 7+ years, on the other hand, the context of the kiss was so heartbreaking that it was hard for anyone to truly be gratified. many fans could not help but feel cheated that the first time they got to see grissom and sara kiss was also going to be the only time they ever would do so and also that the kiss itself was so overwhelmingly sad, with sara in tears and grissom confused and scared for her. the moment of the kiss itself was overshadowed by the harsh reality of sara's departure.

while i have no way to prove as much, i think, retroactively, the writers realized that they had fucked up—that they had waited too long to have the first gsr kiss altogether and that what ended up being the first kiss was just kind of unintentionally cruel to the fans.

mercifully, one season later, both the writers and the fandom got a chance for a redux: an opportunity to see one last gsr kiss, this time in circumstances much happier, during grissom and sara's reunion in episode 09x10 "one to go."

that kiss, they stuck the landing on.

it was triumphal. it was significant. it was everything that fans could've asked for and would have served as a very fitting ending to the entire gsr slow burn, had it indeed been the final word on the thing.

except.

then jorja came back to the show.

and her coming back raised once again the problem of how to depict gsr pda anew.

of course, without having billy on the show with her, there was no way to really portray grissom and sara kissing (much less having sex); innuendo was the only option.

and innuendo only would've been okay, circumstances being what they were.

except.

the circumstances changed.

billy did come back—first in his cameo in episode 11x13 "the two mrs. grissoms" and then for his more substantial guest role in "immortality."

and this is the point where i truly get baffled by the writers' choices.

why they didn't write an ending to episode 11x13 "the two mrs. grissoms" that involved grissom showing up at the lab after all was said and done with the bombing case, i don't know. if they could get billy on deck to film the webcam scene, then presumably they also could have gotten him on deck to film something in the same room as jorja. presumably there could have been a kiss.

and this one wouldn't even have had to be a big deal™ kind of thing! it could have just been a very lowkey kiss hello between a married couple that hadn't seen each other in a few weeks.

even more confounding is their choice not to include a kiss at the ending of "immortality."

like.

i literally cannot wrap my head around how they biffed that one so badly.

as i talk about here,

from a production standpoint, i cannot think of one even slightly defensible reason to not include a kiss, particularly given the way the scene is set up.

i mean, gsr is the show’s flagship romantic pairing, and the scene is the culmination of their love story, which has spanned every season of the show.

it would be one thing if billy and jorja hated each other, so the writers and production staff decided to spare them from having to kiss. 

but billy and jorja don’t hate each other. 

they’re dear friends who’ve kissed on screen before, and they even kissed each other (in a friendly way) unprompted at paleyfest. plus, they understand how their characters feel about each other and how television shows work.

all of that being so, i don’t think they likely objected to anything. if they’d been told that grissom and sara had to kiss, they undoubtedly would have gone for it as directed.

so the fact that there’s no kiss in the finale speaks to someone in power having made a very poor production decision along the way—either a writer or producer, who chose not to write a kiss into the script; or a director, who chose to ignore a kiss already written into the script; or even an editor, who took a filmed kiss out in post production.

somebody zigged when they should have zagged.

the csi powers set up the final scene of the episode perfectly to scaffold a kiss. based on the way grissom and sara’s reunion is staged, the music that’s playing, the narrative context, and even the camera angles, the audience has every reason to expect that grissom and sara will lock lips.

because the stage has been set for a kiss, not having one is such a letdown.

not only would a kiss have blown the audience’s collective mind just because gsr kisses have historically been a rare commodity on the show despite the fact that gsr has been a thing™ since day one—2.5 total kisses over fifteen seasons! not even a full kiss when grissom and sara get engaged!—but just in terms of the story that is told in the finale episodes, with all the longing and hesitation and pining and lovelorn looks, a passionate kiss between grissom and sara would have been the way to go. it would have been so narratively satisfying...

you can’t write a finale that is so intensely gsrcentric—to the point where it, frankly, neglects most of the other characters in favor of telling grissom and sara’s story—and spend the equivalent of two full episodes playing the “will they or won’t they?" game, showing ad nauseum that grissom and sara are still desperately in love with each other but too scared to say as much, and then have sara finally make the brave gesture, go to grissom, and lay her heart on the line, and not consummate the moment with a kiss!

based on the way the story has been told, a kiss is what the audience is wanting and expecting. 

a kiss is what would make sense from a narrative and cinematographic perspective. 

a kiss should be the pièce de résistance to what has essentially been “grissom and sara realize they can’t live without each other (and that they’re idiots for ever thinking they could): the two hour made-for-tv movie.”

everything is there, just ready to play out—but somehow anthony zuiker and co. completely fumble the setup.

just as they stoke the expectations of the audience to a frenetic pitch, they decide to bail out and instead go with the letdown move, inserting the hug.

it’s the television equivalent of failing to touch home plate after rounding third with the whole baseball game on the line.

one cannot even attribute the lack of kissing in the finale to the same desire to "build tension" that had led the writers to withhold kisses during s5-s8, as, in this instance, they had good reason to believe that it might be the last time they'd ever have the opportunity to put billy and jorja on screen together as grissom and sara again. it wasn't like there was more "will they or won't they?" territory left to be explored; the answer—they will! they have! they are!—had already definitively been given, and the story was ending on that very note.

all i can figure is that maybe they were somehow laboring under the delusion that gsr fans wouldn't want to see a kiss in that particular narrative situation—like maybe they were worried we would consider it overhasty (in the wake of the divorce and the fact that grissom and sara had been apart for two and half years) or believed that we would more appreciate the "subtlety" of a hug.

in any case, whatever was or wasn't in their heads, not having a kiss at the end of "immortality" was about as big of a fuckup as ever there was one.

and they definitely heard fans say so.

the csi twittersphere talked about the choice ad nauseum for a while, and though there were a few defenders ("the hug was good enough!"), there were many more folks who made their disappointment well-known.

so you think tptb would have learned their lesson for the reboot.

but no.

prior to the debut, fans excitedly speculated about what it was going to be like to after long last have a happy and married grissom and sara together on our screens. many of us speculated that we might finally get to see some regular gsr kisses for the first time in twenty+ years of shipping—a speculation that was only fueled by some of the early press surrounding the show, in which billy and jorja hinted about the show including more intimacy, with jorja going as far as to say "the show is going to air at 10pm, so we can be a little edgier than we were last time" in direct response to an interviewer asking her about the potential for gsr pda.

but then the first several episodes aired, and while we got to see a lot of cute gsr interactions, none of them included much physicality. some of us wondered if maybe pandemic safety restrictions were preventing kisses from being filmed.

but then the promo for episode 01x04 "long pig" dropped, and all such speculation went out the window.

obviously, kisses could be filmed—and one had been.

eureka!

for a few blessed days, the fandom rejoiced.

after so many years, we thought that finally we were going to get to see our otp just share a regular, everyday "just because we're happily married and it's how happily married people say goodbye to each other for the day" kiss.

imagine our devastation when the episode then aired and the kiss was nowhere to be found. the scene it was supposed to feature in came and went, and no middle-aged scientist lips got locked.

fandom complained.

loudly.

and bless her heart, jorja fox responded, tweeting out confirmation that the kiss had indeed been filmed, and she had no idea why it had been cut.

the fandom had no idea, either.

it would have been one thing had no kiss ever been filmed, but since it obviously had been, it made no sense for it to have then been omitted. since it was only ever meant to be a little goodbye peck on the lips and not a major turning point in the story, it couldn't have been edited out for storytelling reasons. ditto on time constraints, as it would have added only a few seconds (at most!) to the episode's run time, and there were definitely some long transition shots that could have been whittled down if needed in order to accommodate it.

my suspicion at the time was that the choice had been made because the powers that be were intent on teasing the fandom—trying to pull the same cutesy "tee-hee! we gotcha!" bullshit that they had been pulling on us for twenty years, withholding kisses just to string us along.

lo and behold, my suspicions were confirmed when showrunner jason tracey gave an interview in which he stated, "when you shoot something and the folks at [the] promo [department] get a hold of it, it’s a very enticing moment [to be included], but from a storytelling standpoint, i think that when the audience sees where we left things [with the season finale] and how we kind of brought it all home for those two characters. sometimes rewards are sweetest if you kind of have to wait. we like the shape of the story that we told. i hope people don’t feel too cheated, but we’ll see how they feel when they’ve gotten to absorb the finale and see that maybe we saved the best for last.”

basically, he thought that the roller coaster kiss in episode 01x10 "signed, sealed, delivered" would only hit if it were the sole gsr kiss of the season. he believed that having another kiss in the mix earlier on would somehow dilute the finale kiss's potency.

which.

jesus fucking christ.

after twenty+ years, you would think that the writers and showrunners would realize that it is not the paucity of gsr kisses that makes the few that we have gotten to see special but rather just the fact that it's grissom and sara and we love them and we love seeing them together.

that they were still laboring under the delusion that we only cared to see gsr kisses because they happened so rarely is just utterly baffling.

a cursory perusal of any kind of fandom space would show: we have been imagining all sorts of gsr intimacy for over twenty years now and haven't either tired of doing so yet OR exhausted the limits of our imaginations.

the actors were willing.

the story would allow.

we would have been happy to see it any which way and at any old time—but especially at those instances where it truly would have made good, solid narrative sense.

people kiss their beloveds at big reunions.

people kiss their beloveds at goodbyes.

people kiss their beloveds when they're giving comfort.

when they're celebrating.

when they're trying to seduce them away from their work in the middle of the night.

when they rescue their lost wedding ring out of a vat of liquid human decomp.

putting kisses in those parts of the story in no way would have cheapened those moments or inured us to the magic of the thing. it just would have made sense.

as i say elsewhere, "poor is the writer who can’t make a hundredth kiss feel just as special as the first one"—and especially not when they're working with such fantastically physical actors as billy and jorja who have natural chemistry in droves.

it's such a shame that the csi and csi: vegas teams never learned that lesson and instead persisted in thinking that they had to keep dangling that carrot in front of us in order to get us to watch.

anyway, suffice it to say, i'll be salty about this bad choice forever.

three kisses in twenty-one years!

infuriating.

what a complete waste of so many good opportunities.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

#answered #i collect things #asks: csi #** #my meta #meta: csi #meta: vegas #meta: production #later seasons #csi finale #let's talk shop #csiverse

[arkus-rhapsode]

My Thoughts of FE Three Hopes

Wow, Arkus talking about 3H? What is this? 2018? Also talking about FE3H, I must have a death wish.

So before I start even talking I really want to put this disclaimer out here, especially when talking about the divisive nature of 3H, these are my OPINIONS. This is not a objective analysis of the game nor am I am claiming it to be. These are the thoughts I had playing this game. If you enjoyed it, good. If you didn't, that Is also good. You do not have to agree with me, but I am asking for people to be respectful if they want to engage with this. And if you do agree with me, please do not use what I say as an excuse to attack people with other opinions. I am not trying to personally attack or offend you if you like this game/character/plot point. This is my opinion of a piece of media. There is plenty of opinions of this game on the internet, all I am doing is adding my thoughts to the conversation.

Anyway, people might now I am generally more middling on 3H nowadays. I think its greatest strength was its character writing and its willingness to try different things even if I wasn’t a fan of them like the time management aspect. But I felt the social sim aspect and developmental issues behind the scenes resulted in a much uneven game and at times unfinished project. I’ve also looked back and realized a lot of its politics are not that great. Like the strength of the narrative is the character conflict, that you have these three forces who all want what is best for people like them with crests, and its very compelling drama where you see how much they care about each other, but just can’t agree. But step back from the context of the conflict, the issues aren’t really crests or even the church, but rather the feudalist system which is never really addressed in a major way (And we know you can be a rich noble without a crest). With most of the plot centering around a lot of people who are nobles. Heck, you have actual subjugated and colonized people and most of their plots are either treated as backstory or something to be resolved in their character endings (Even Claude and his anti racism isn’t that relevant in comparison to the strife of the crest bearers and their place in Fodlan). While I think characters like Dedue and Petra are good, the story of 3H is not their story. Like every ending still seems to maintain the system with slight alterations, the thing that’s changed the most is who is calling all the shots in Fodlan. Which isn’t uncommon for many FE’s that maintain a simple “The good lord is the good one to rule”, but given 3H attempts to ask more nuanced questions, it feels like it the political aspect is much more undercooked. Which sucks because anytime discourse about 3H happens it boils down to: “Church bad! Church good! Fascist! Not fascist!” when there is an actual discussion to be had about the issues of the internal politics of the game and how it relates to the status quo. But again, when it focuses on CHARACTERS the 3H story is very good.

But hey, now we have Three Hopes! A musou style game that is an alternate take of the 3H world with loads of extra content! Surely this will be able to scotch tape the issues with the original while also providing another three completely separate routes that are all satisfying on their own, right?

Well... not really.

Look, I know I’ve lost people when I said that, but from what I have seen, I think a lot of people wanted Three Hopes to be, Fodlan: The Definitive Edition. Give the people Three House with all the stuff it missed out. Like how Persona Royal is the definitive way to play P5 which not only improved the story in an organic way, but still let you experience P5 as it was. But 3Hopes isn’t that. 3Hopes is a completely alternate universe, with honestly so much variations, I would say trying to apply logic and revelations from Hopes and retrofit it to houses just clashes too much and doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I see a lot of people try to apply stuff learned about in Hopes as being relevant to Houses, but I disagree with that. I feel like knowing about this in Hopes doesn’t retroactively fix the problems of Houses, and I feel some character are almost completely different so the application of this Hopes characters ideas and thoughts are relevant to the Houses version isn’t really fair. Overall, if you are just here for another game with the Fodlan kids though, I get why this has its appeal and its easily the better FE Musou while integrating more FE elements. But it is a spin-off and I am treating it as such.

Okay if you are still sticking around to listen to me ramble after that, let me just get positives I liked about the game out of the way first.

From a story standpoint, I like that this game is willing to fill in stuff from 3H that went either on addressed or was flat out ignored. Shez is better than Byleth in everyday and their relationship with Arval feels far more genuine than Byleth and Sothis. Yes their design is very “OC do not steal” but honestly, I prefer your MC to just be a mercenary that got made a student and not a teacher.

In terms of routes, I will touch on some subjects later, but I actually do believe 3Hopes did manage to make Edelgard in particular more compelling, by actually showing her weeding out the conspiracy in the Empire and centralizing her power rather than it being all off screen, as well as actually allowing her to do more dubious acts when wartime came which was one of my biggest issues with Crimson Flower as a whole as it was an antagonist route where they didn’t do a lot of the actually pretty bad stuff they did in other routes like making the Dukedom which empowered Cornelia. So using Bernadetta’s father as a pawn or saving Lenato as an act of good faith with manipulative undertones actually made Scarlet Blaze a better route. 

Speaking of routes, I quite like how 3Hopes was willing to basically say “This character could go any way in this war, and this is who is ride or die their lord.” I avoids some really weird stuff like Ingrid ever being on black eagles with the only reason being “The Professor told me to” and also adds an interesting layer with characters like Yuri or Dorothea who will do what is best for them and their groups. It also I think allows for more story opportunities like Felix and Sylvain backing Dimitri, Hilda and Holst tag teaming with Claude etc.

Rhea not just disappearing or getting captured also adds for her character to take a lot more initiative. Rhea is mostly passive in 3H with the exception of Crimson Flower. Which led to her character basically being a lot of speculations. And I don’t particularly care for discourse that ends up just being based on speculation. SO yeah, Rhea feels like more a character here.

The politics in 3Hopes are... still pretty bare minimum. I like more characters talk about policy more openly and address concepts like getting people involved in government and the only reason they are keeping lords around is to manage things until they are replaced. It doesn’t feel weighted on one side or the other: all lords get a chance to have an opinion. But again, it is something. 

Graphics wise, it is an improvement. It looks far better than 3H and the character animations, expressions and attacks look so much better. Like Im not even gonna say “Well its a Musou, I expect it to look good”, because I remember FEW, it didn’t look that great with some of its animations. 

That’s the positives out of the way. Lets get into the negatives.

So you know how I said the three routes in 3H generally feel unfinished or not as fleshed out as they could be? Well 3Hopes is the same. It adds more, but due the spin off nature again, it feels not quite finished. I think you should know what 3H is before playing it, but Hopes has just a lot of “because I said so” momentum to its plot. I understand it needs to get to next battle, but it also doesn’t feel super meticulous on its route system. So it really just feels like Fates where everything was already decided for me when I make the choice of what house to join. 

I do respect the game willing to just say that war and conflict doesn’t end no matter what choice you make, but it also just generally feels like you accomplish little when you beat the route big bad, but there’s not a real resolution.

Now while I think Edelgard became much more interesting character in Hopes, I feel like she also gets a worse treatment. Having things like Hagemon Husk and mind control forced on her really feels like its limp wristlet trying to avoid her doing her most ambitious acts, and generally not addressing her and Those who slither in a satisfying way and once again just focusing her sights on Rhea. I have never been a fan of Thales’s influence on the plot and boy it doesn’t becoming any clearer in this game. Scarlet Blaze again feels incomplete with Tharles and Rhea just doing themselves in feels extremely unsatisfying. And before you think I am picking on Edelgard, trust me I have words for all the lords. There was a lot of people upset with Claude in Golden Wildfire seemingly being so bent on killing Rhea as that was the only way to fix the system. While many have already pointed out how that is wrong and basically his own ending proves that conflict doesn’t just end when one figure head is taken out, I actually do think this showed an interesting thing about the perception of 3H characters. Claude is often called a schemer, but we don’t really see him take any duplicitous actions beyond not reveal his racial background. He’s honestly a pretty open guy, but one willing to be very observational which sets him apart from the very single minded Edelgard and Dimitri. However, Wildfire does make Claude much more manipulative in his actions with Edelgard and his murder of Rhea. But many found this out of character as it seemed as Claude is the one who always found another way. I think overall, Golden Wildfire is fine, but once again, it playing with a different Claude and I think that will effect some people.

And now we get to Dimitri. Who I think got the worst of it all. Dimitri is quite literally down a character arc. I like intro of actually feuding with his uncle, there’s definitely manipulation by Cornelia, but if you know 3H, Rufus has a bit of a point in his fear of Dimitri. But that really never comes. Boar Dimitri is primarily absent and we honestly lose the best part of his character journey, needing to learn his vengeance isn’t going to fix the issues his people are facing. That he must take that anger and make a better Faerghus as king. Im not against maintaining sane Dimitri, but it really feels like Azure Gleam is objectively trying to be the good route. Multiple characters like Miklan get a redemption, the Church sides with Faerghus, Claude and Dimitri ally with not manipulation by Claude, Edelgard is made into a puppet and saved by her adoptive brother and left in a state she is no longer a threat, and he still has his close friend in Shez. Like literally, Dimitri gets everything he wants with his mental issues never being an obstacle. 

Some have theorized that this was intentionally, this was the team creating a deconstruction of the concept of the golden route. That secretly everything happened is bad. But I don’t believe this theory. I believe due to Dimitri being the most popular lord, we saw a route where a lot of his edges were sanded down to give the player a more dream-like, almost Kaga era, style story of noble people over coming noble problems and magic bad guys in black robes was the real evil. Dimitri was already subversive of the standard Fire Emblem lord, he is Sigurd or Chrom that thinks powering your way through will make things right and then needs to be told that how he has acted is wrong. He went to edge and needed to be pulled back. And if not, he will ultimately die.

And speaking of characters, Sothis’s sudden change is... again not that well done. I like the idea of Sothis controlled Byleth and it works for Shez’s story, but its also super disconnected from any church stuff so it feels like another missed opportunity.

And of course there is the game play issues. For a musou game to be this many chapters, its generally monotonous. Some people love it and will never get sick of it, but I will admit when I am on my 3rd play through of the game, I was feeling like I had scene Shez’s ultimate attack a hundred times by that point.

So did I hate this game? no not really. Its an FE spin off game with completely different play style, the only thing I can compare it to is the last FEW which it is a lot better than. I don’t think Hopes and Houses should be treated as linked, they are clearly different takes on the same concept. I think I found myself liking Hopes when it pandered to me already knowing the characters. But I honestly still think Houses was the better way to experience these characters for all the faults I have with it. 

Overall, it is a not worth full price title, but I can’t say its awful. I think what it tries to do is commendable and if you just want more time with the Fodlan kids, I think you will love this. But I just can’t say I liked it myself. 

#fire emblem #fire emblem three hopes #fire emblem three houses #opinions #fe3h #fe3hopes #rhea #dimitri alexandre blaiddyd #claude von reigen #edelgard von hresvelg

[astorythatwritesitself]

8, 12, 29 and +1 for the shep questions please!

8. What is their reaction to the Alchera mission? And after?

Initially? Adrian's reaction is 'ignore it'. There's so many more things to worry about, after all, so much to do, the sense of haste to stop the Collectors and all. No, she's totally not kind of terrified of confronting the fact that she died there (and besides, she'd already been kind of emotionally/mentally half dead since Akuze, in her words). But when they hit a bit of a lull (i.e. 'personally I hc there's a solid chunk of time they're trying to scout out leads on the Reaper IFF where it's just kind of nothing so that's where a lot of the side missions fit in')... she's convinced to do it, if only for her old crew.

It's strangely peaceful, in the end. It's a beautiful world, and she's glad for the chance to find the missing tags to send back to the crew's families/next of kin, especially since (she thought at the time) it seemed hers didn't make it. There's no tears, no... intense emotions, really? Just cold and quiet and calm; even for a while once she returns to the Normandy. It takes some time before she discusses it with anyone, too.

I think it's the tipping point to ending the whole fatalistic streak Adrian had going to some degree since even the first game - not all at once, of course, and there's a lot of 'two steps forward, one step back'. But holding your old helmet in your hands, on what was essentially your grave for a short time... 'really forced to confront your mortality/Ship of Thesus-esque nature so hard you experience the human equivalent to integer overflow' isn't an approved, recognized, or even good method of self-improvement, but it does something!

12. Does Shepard have any nicknames? What do they think of em?

A few, aside from the canon ones: (fine with all of those, though 'siha' has a bit of a rough patch at one point...)

Addy, from her parents when she was little - and yes, they do still use it on occasion; she's only a tiny bit mortified when one of them uses it within earshot of a crewmate.

Briefly picked up 'Tech' in college, as the designated 'fix it' guy among her friends. That one dropped off once they went their separate ways, never felt too strongly either way.

Only half counts since they never repeated, but: an increasingly sickening array of pet names from Kaiden during the SR-1 days (Mistaken observation that led to good-natured faux dating and a war to see how far it could go before Adrian finally cut comms mid-conversation. 'Mon biquet' was the... 'winner', on the grounds of 'I can tolerate a lot of things, Kaiden, but not invoking French'). She's... very glad none of those come up again.

29. How active is Shepard? Are they hitting the gym, playing sports, or do they prefer quieter downtime?

Loves swimming and used to do it competitively, but that one's kind of dropped off over the years; she defaults to running laps or biotics practice now; anything to fully engage the body. Even her 'quiet' downtime is usually spent buried in work, though. It's a long while before she can handle downtime without moving or having something else to occupy her mind - but it does happen, eventually.

(+1: what does Shepard smell like?)

Goes for sea salt or rain scents whenever possible, plus general biotic electric or ozone scent - but, any active combat periods will inevitably include some combination of metal, dirt, blood, and occasionally singed flesh/hair (because someone keeps zapping themselves while fiddling with electronics they're not supposed to).

#ask #spookyvalentine #shep tag #thank you! c: and yes haha I DID finally get to the crash site DLC thank u MELE

[beautifulpersonpeach]

Repost: Ask on BTS Paving the Way

Anonymous: Hey bpp. You talked a little bit about the 'BTS paved the way' discourse on your pinned post but I'm curious to see - read? lol - more on your thoughts about it. If youve talked about it before, can you pls link? Since you might not want to discuss/rehash this at all lol. I got curious because this discourse seems neverending and i just watched a yt video essay abt it. Imo, both sides of the spectrum - army and kpop stans -seems to be missing each other's points. Like, i think a lot of kpop stans havent paid attention to what bts have contributed to kpop and theyve dismissed armys arguments entirely and i think a lot of armys havent been into kpop and kpop history to definitively say the stuff I've seen them saying. A lot of the arguments and statements are very inflammatory too and while I agree with what armys are saying, the language they use isnt going to make kpop stans listen - i mean, the ones who arent blinded by their hate for bts/army anyway lol like a lot of kpop stans think when army say bts paved the way/bts popularized kpop, they always think army mean popularized it in the west. When we have receipts of them doing spectacularly globally, especially in places like india where they seem to have exploded since dynamite. Theyve also broken a lot of records in japan, where kpop is already popular but still seem to have a lot of trouble penetrating mainstream bec theyre very insular. They also think that we mean 'first to xxx', which isnt really what we mean at all. And a lot of army seem to dismiss what older kpop groups have achieved too and just like to prop up bts while putting down other groups and dismissing what theyve achieved for the genre. I just think since a lot of armys are in kpop only for bts -same tbh - we tend to be ignorant of the genre as a whole, which isnt good bec we're always arguing x member is the best in the industry or even bts is carrying the industry on their backs, which dismisses a lot of great artists that are doing great work like solo artists like taemin. Like, I'm an army and I'm not a "stan" of any other kpop artists but the whole argument just makes me v v uncomfortable. I guess i still haven't adjusted to stan culture since i've never been a fan of any artists like i am of bts - to the point of joining the fandom and really immersing myself in it - so the intensity of it is still jarring to me. I know it happens with big western fandoms like taylor swifts too but i think i'm still old school when it comes to being a fan of a musician, you listen to the music, rave about it to friends and buy/stream the music and go about your day.

**

Hi Anon,

Anon, I sympathize completely and not to harp on you here, but my first instinct reading this was “who cares?” - this is generally how I feel about this topic whenever I see it, so not knocking you specifically here. And I’d just like to remind everyone there’s an active, senseless, and deadly war raging right now in Ukraine. Please donate and/or pray for Ukraine if you’re able to.

(And then there’s the leader of Stray Kids who is probably a bigger ARMY than me at this point)

This is not me dismissing the gripes of stans of 1st and 2nd generation groups (the usual suspects), this is me saying that what I’ve seen of this discourse is huge swarths of people engaging in an elaborate exercise in collectively missing the point. And yes I’m also referring to those splitting hairs over the semantics of what it means to pave a road. (Heaven help us). And you already allude to this in your ask, anon.

The phrase: 방법을 만들다 which is what a lot of Koreans have used to describe 'paving the way’, is colloquially used to mean 'chart a course’ or someone showing how something can be done.

If this were a normal conversation with normal people and not k-pop stans, it would be enough to point out that yes, BTS was not the first k-pop group to step foot outside Korea or in the US, but BTS is the one group that has gone farther than any k-pop group has before i.e. created the new path. It’s really that simple. BTS has become a household name globally without doing a single show at Coachella nor having any of the mediaplay seen for other groups that attempted to fully break into the US market. The fact that Korea’s military enlistment laws (which before BTS were enshrined as basically unchangeable) have been modified at least partly on their behalf (and for the benefit of any idol who meets the criteria) and that BTS is the first k-pop group to receive a Grammy nomination, has created a new tier, the highest one yet, of what is possible for k-pop artists.

BTS is the biggest group in the world. They rival Coldplay according to Coldplay. Before BTS, the reality is that this ambition was not even within the realm of possibility for much of k-pop. Even with BTS breaking the records and gaining the influence they have, k-pop is still considered to be niche in some circles, though there is undeniably more visibility and investment brought to the genre since BTS started snagging headlines. Some people still hope BTS will go the way of Psy and BoA who were a fad on the Western landscape for a minute then essentially faded into obscurity. But so far, that’s not what has happened, and everyone is paying attention to see what BTS is doing right, that perhaps other groups can emulate.

BTS won’t be the biggest group in the world forever, but the chances that the next biggest group is a k-pop group, is significantly higher now because of BTS.

La fin.

It’s true some ARMYs can be downright disgusting with how they throw around BTS’s accomplishments and sometimes ignore, dismiss, downplay, or just straight up shit on older groups who made the first moves into Western spheres, whenever this topic comes up.

But a part of me understands them. When BTS won the TSA award in 2017, it felt like hell to be on Twitter and I wasn’t even an ARMY at that point. I did a search through my old screenshots and found more than 15 k-pop fandoms spent weeks shitting non-stop on BTS and ARMYs about how useless it was to win at the BBMAs. It was a non-stop barrage of racism, xenophobia, misogyny, all the -isms you can think of related to POC musicians. Though of course BTS was not the first group to go to the US, all of a sudden, k-pop stans were convinced BTS had 'sold out’, abandoned their heritage and were pandering to 'white colonizers’ (sound familiar?). I started calling myself an ARMY the next year (2018) and as I’ve said already, I was reporting things almost constantly. It was hell.

*

You’re right this discourse seems never-ending because it is never-ending. Remember you’re dealing with k-pop stans who will argue with you that water isn’t wet if it means something positive for their group and some ARMYs are just as bad. Whenever I see people arguing about what paved the way I just mute that whole conversation. I sympathize with you feeling uncomfortable about this topic. I’d like to suggest doing what I currently do which is to not waste a single moment of a single day worrying about something that’s already obvious and settled. This particular discourse is the perfect example of a time sink imo, because really, who cares?

Originally posted: March 18th, 2022 1:35pm

#bts army #fandom #paving the way #bts paved the way #repost #kpop #kpop fandom

[thearchivistsjournal]

Day 330,

Morning thought: Maiko still has the marble.  Fine with me though, so long as I have it back by the next mist night.

*******

I waited until after school was done for the day to tell Cass the news.  Didn’t want her distracted.  My own mind was already wandering enough for the both of us.

In truth, she was actually the one who spoke up first, asking me what I was hiding.  She’d picked up on something last night and (in her words) I was barely trying to hide it today.  If there was something worth smiling about the way I’d been, she wanted in on it.

I’d been smiling?  I truthfully hadn’t realized.  

She was exuberant when I explained the situation to her.  Her initial response was to actually cheer.  It was refreshing to see her actually act like an excited kid for once.  I found myself thinking back to the exchange she and Pat had back on that first equinox festival I was present for; Cass claiming to not be a child and Pat shaking his head saying that was a shame since childhood is something to treasure.  I wonder if any child really understands that before it’s too late?

Of course, she immediately started going on about how excited Lin and Vernon will be to hear this, we should go tell them, unless I already told them, did I already tell them, I better not have told her last.

I laughed, told her to slow down, and assured her that she was the first to know.  That said, her excitement was contagious and she talked me into going to find the others to tell them then rather than waiting until later in the evening.

Under the assumption that Lin would be with Ka’eo and not wanting to disturb that, we went for Vernon first.  We found him in the guards’/mediators’ basilica, engaged in a discussion about the merits of constructing lampposts around the Village beyond the docks and even along the main circuit road.  We tried not to interrupt but when he saw us he seemed practically relieved to have an excuse to excuse himself.  Apparently the lamppost thing is a topic that comes up every few years or so but ultimately never goes anywhere, to the point that some of the older mediators treat the whole thing as a bad running joke.

After I dropped an oblique reference to “his mediation last market day,” he got the hint and led Cass and I to a side room for some privacy.  One of his coworkers started to make a joke about the two of us wanting privacy until another pointed out that Cass was with us.  I guess that rumor/running joke is still going around.

I’d say that I let Cass do the honors of telling Vernon the news, but it was more like she blurted it out soon as the door was closed behind us.  Funny, I’d half expected her to draw it out in a smug “I know something you don’t know” fashion.

Vernon’s reaction was more restrained than Cass’s, but his excitement was no less evident.  He said that he’d start making what arrangements he could for her transition to go smoothly without tipping anyone off in advance.  He also brought up the idea of the five of us getting together at my and Maiko’s house (weird to hear it phrased that way, but I guess it sort of is) the evening before to celebrate.  I said I’d run the idea by Maiko beforehand.  Didn’t want to surprise or overwhelm her.

Moving on (and ignoring that one guy’s comment about Vernon looking pleased with himself after meeting with me in private), we checked the bracelets and realized that Lin actually wasn’t in Ka’eo’s direction.  As it turned out, we caught up with her just as she was leaving the library after having found it locked and empty.  (I wonder if she misses having a key?)  She said she’d been taking care of some last minute market errands she hadn’t gotten around to yesterday before everyone packed up and went home to the outskirts this evening, and had been hoping to unwind with a book and put off going back home for a bit longer.

I pulled out my key with an exaggerated flourish, gave a theatrically formal-sounding apology for the inconvenience, and jokingly begged for her to allow me to right this wrong.  I’m pleased to say it got a chortle out of her as she oh so graciously accepted my act of penitent door unlocking.

The effect was only slightly ruined by Cass piping up that we had some other news that she might like too.

Lin’s reaction once we were inside and had explained was the most subdued of the three by far.  Enough that Cass was confused and even a little put off by her initial understated “Oh, that’s… great,” and downcast eyes.  She insisted that she really was happy about it and thought it was good news, but she was still processing some things.

I told her I get it.  Cass said she didn’t.  I told Cass I’d explain later and gave Lin some space for a bit.

After she’d had her fill of books for the evening, or perhaps just once she reckoned she’d put off dinner with her parents for as long as was reasonable, Lin did have a smile as she said goodbye to us and thanked us for the news.  It was a bittersweet sort of smile and her eyes had a wetness of someone who’d just come close to tears without quite managing it, but it was a smile.

A smile that reminds one that bad times do get better.

Maiko (not that I expect you to ever read this), please remember that, whatever happens, you have people who care about you and are happy to have you in their lives.

<==Previous          Next==>

#writing #original fiction #serial fiction #sliceoflife #Writeblr #daily writing #epistolary novel #writers on tumblr #WIP #creative writing #literature #prose #writers #web novel #novel #journal #isekai #epistolary #fantasy #slice of life #fiction #my writing

[draw-something-cheat-my]

draw something cheat working JBDF%

💾 ►►► DOWNLOAD FILE 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 Stuck on a drawing? We've got you covered with this Draw Something Cheat; Just enter in all possible letters and we will tell you answer/word. Descramble letters to solve a word in OMGPOP's Draw Something app. We have the COMPLETE word list including all special words. Use our Draw Something Cheat to help you discover what your opponent is drawing. Sometimes it's impossible to figure out what people are drawing at Draw. 7 Draw Something Cheats, Tips, and Tricks · 1. Play with Your Family. Family game night may be a thing of the past, but it doesn't have to be! The Draw Something Letters Cheat is available for both iOS and Android. It works to break complicated words down into two or more words. So you are looking for Draw Something cheats, tips and tricks? So this Draw Something App , uhm — this social drawing app is definitely addicting. My drawing are terrible and I am fine with that. One thing, people cheat. Yes, there are Draw Something cheats — we will discuss but there is so much more to this gaming app! Get your family involved in a competitive game of Draw Something. Get the grandparents drawing and use this as a fun way to connect in a digital way. Is your family a bunch of Draw Something Cheaters? Speaking of cheats on Draw Something…. Okay, this game is the easiest to cheat on since both you and the person you are playing get coins. Here is the easiest Draw Something Cheat — just draw the word or write the word out. I admit, I laughed my butt off when I started playing and could easily just write out the word. Draw Something cheaters are missing the point! Once you start playing, you really get engaged with the game and cheating just makes it pointless and stupid. The only good reason for a Draw Something cheat is the free points — coins. You can use those to buy stuff. Just make sure your competitor is down with it before you become a Draw Something cheater. If you want more words, upgrade from the free version. The full version of the Draw Something app will set you back a whopping 99 cents. I recently bought a stylus for Draw Something. This totally upped my game, it was like I was using a paint brush rather than finger painting. But that being said, I paint like a kindergartener. Try using various colors to create your drawings. But before you go off buying the whole palette — see below. See how other people draw items and learn from them. What Draw Something tips have you found that have made you better at this game? It's difficult to find well-informed people for this topic, however, you seem like you know what you're talking about! You are a massive Draw Something Cheat. Why cheat draw something? Here are a few reasons: You are on a massive streak in the draw something app, but now you are completely stuck on a word. I most definitely agree with tip 3! Since getting a stylus, I have found it's much easier to play Draw Something. My drawings also come out much more accurate when using a stylus rather than a finger. I have to give a shout out to the TruGlide stylus from lynktec. That's what I'm using right now, and it is by far the best stylus I have found to date! You should check them out! Share Tweet Pin Reddit Email. Teens Texting Stats. Click here to cancel reply. Thanks for this precious information i really appropriate it. Guest Wednesday 8th of August