#decision if that makes any sense. i have all the court cases i just need specifics from the SCOTUS blog

[mylovelies-docx]

Social Cues

A/N: Wow. Okay. So it's been a couple of years since I've written anything and since I promised everyone that I was working on a Cassian fic.

Welp. Here's that fic now - only two years later than I was expecting.

My bad.

Take this 20k fic as an apology/your due/something that I wanted to give you years ago.

Plot: You and Cassian go undercover as a married couple, but things take a turn for the worst when your past finds you.

C/W: Angst, slow burn, hurt/comfort, reader has an abusive mother (featured heavily), gendered reader (daughter), no use of Y/N, *SMUT* (18+, Minors DNI), Not beta'd, also not proofread (if I spent any more time on this, I would never get it out here). Probably more, let me know if I need to include something.

I started writing this before the show came out (which I have not watched... I know, I know.) Anyway, as is always the case with any Cassian fic that *I* prefer, there is no such thing as canon.

“Married,” you echo quietly in disbelief. You have never been more shocked in your life; and when you quickly glance over, Cassian apparently hasn’t been, either. His jaw is tense and his eyebrows have raised slightly.

General Draven had just dropped the specifics of your mission, and it was not one that you could have anticipated. You and Cassian were to pose as a married couple that had just moved into an affluent neighborhood full of Imperial officers, weapons dealers, and senators.

In other words, right into a Sarlacc pit. Only this situation was thrice as deadly.

“With all due respect, General, this isn’t something either of us have experience with. Would it not be better to send Rishi and O’tal?” Cassian suggests diplomatically. 

You nod your head at Cassian’s idea, showing your support. Rishi and O’tal are a real married couple in intelligence for the Alliance, so they are uniquely fit for this specific placement. 

“They’re currently on assignment right now. And besides: you two are the best intelligence officers we have. Mothma and I don’t want this handled by anyone else.” Draven’s compliment of your abilities would have been more than enough to placate you if you weren’t still reeling from the previous revelation.

“Yes General, I know what you’re saying and I thank you sincerely for the commendation, but I’m still unsure if this is a wise decision,” you rebut. You have never once doubted a mission assignment, and you know Cassian hasn’t either, but this was territory neither of you have ever found yourselves in. “This will be the first joint mission for either of us. Would it not be possible for a different relationship? Perhaps a hired guard would suffice for one of us?”

Sure, you’ve seduced and courted marks before, but bringing along a partner that you needed to present a sense of physical and emotional intimacy with? That is something entirely out of your realm of expertise.

Draven is stationed at the head of the table, using the projection screen in front of him to present information, schematics, and diagrams. From his vantage point, Draven watches a slight frown mar Cassian’s face at your suggestion, but it’s gone just as soon as it appears.

“I understand your hesitancy, Captains, but rest assured that we have exhausted all other avenues,” Draven consoles. “But you both will be in control of the gritty details, so you can make it work. We’re only providing the accommodations and whatever alibis you require.”

“Yes, sir.” You and Cassian acquiesce with no further argument. You look at Cassian out of the corner of your eye, hoping he can’t see the real reason for the hesitation.

This is going to be an adventure neither of you can prepare for.

***

“This is going to be a difficult enough mission, so I think sticking as close to the facts as possible is our best option,” you explain to Cassian, jotting down bullet points and ideas on your datapad to relay back to Mon Mothma and Draven so that they can fabricate your history once it’s been decided.

“I estimate a 33% chance of your entire plan falling apart, Captain (Y/L/N),” K2 chimes in.

“Agreed.” Cassian ignores K2’s comment and speaks directly to you. “We can use our first names for simplicity, but we need a surname,” Cassian recommends from the co-pilot's chair. 

“Would you like to know why?” K cuts in.

You appreciate the fact that you and Cassian are on the same wavelength about using your own names. You haven’t discussed it with him yet, so your similar logic on this bodes well for the rest of the discussion and the mission as a whole.

“Why don’t we just stick with Andor, for simplicity’s sake? It’s a common enough name and you’ll respond right away if someone calls for us. Plus, we both go by so many codenames that no one will ever think to search for us by this one.” 

You’re swiping away on your datapad to avoid either of them seeing your reddened cheeks, so you don’t see Cassian’s ears flush subtly at your suggestion as well. Your heart flutters madly, causing a pang in your chest to the beat of your ‘new’ name.

Cassian clears his throat and readjusts in his seat. “That could work,” he remarks coolly while rubbing the back of his neck with one hand.

K2 turns his head quickly to observe Cassian, the metal joints whirring with the motion. The droid begins to speak and Cassian glares at him, but there is no reigning in K2.

“Because two can keep a secret only if one of them is dead,” K elaborates on his one-sided talkingpoint, still observing Cassian’s reaction to your recommendation on becoming Mrs.Captain Andor, however temporarily.

You hurry on to get your mind off the impossible fantasy the name has conjured up for you. “Great. I’m just trying to think of the likely scenarios that will be brought up at dinner parties or Imperial galas. Obviously how we met, connections to the Empire…”

K is just being a bugslut with his next comment.

“And I’d prefer if it was Cassian who remained living.”

The aforementioned man shoots K2 another glare, wordlessly saying “behave”. The droid shrugs his large mechanical shoulders and mimes a zipping motion with his fingers over his audio port.

You roll your eyes at K2’s insistence that your plan will be a failure and at his obvious distaste for you. You’re unsure what it is about you that he finds so distasteful, but you find yourself wishing he tolerated you a little more. Perhaps then, Cassian would join Rogue One more often on small adventures and get-togethers.

Being around Cassian is easier than being with anyone else; you don’t seem to exhaust yourself as quickly or as often with him. He is a source of calm, controlled energy that speaks to the weary parts of your soul.

Focus. 

“So. Instead of saying we met during a Rebel council meeting, how about we meet in the middle of truth and lie? Keep the time frame the same, just change the location. So for instance: we met five standard years ago at the launch of an Imperial class-II Star Destroyer. There were so many of those around that time that no one should question it – and even if they do, we could pretend we were too drunk on Merenzane Gold or love or whatever to notice anything but each other.” 

You are proud of yourself for keeping this discussion so professional despite your intrusive thoughts. Your heart is racing and your hands are slightly trembling with anxiety, but your voice is steady and you still sound confident. Maker! Why can’t you find the same focus and steadfastness that you have on missions? You can only hope that your professionalism will kick in once you land and begin the assignment in earnest.

“You were wearing a pink dress,” Cassian murmurs, staring distantly at the stars passing over the cockpit’s transparisteel. He mutters it to himself mostly, but you still hear.

You snap your head up, eyes large and mouth slightly parted, finding that he has his hand spread across the lower half of his face with his head turned away from you. You had been operating remotely for the Alliance for a while in various social circles and planets prior to settling down on base. You had just finished with a mission and were wearing a pink dress when you met Cassian for the first time during a debrief of your findings.

You shouldn’t be surprised that a man who had grown up as a spy can recall details as small as what you had been wearing, since you can also do the same. But you had been absolutely nothing to him then, so why would he bother to pay you any attention?

“And you had your A280-CFE heavy blaster strapped to your thigh,” you divulge. 

Your mind is still trying to wrap itself around the fact that Cassian had been watching you for far longer than you realized. He turns his head to look at you in surprise and catches your eye. Your puzzled expression is revealing too much of your thought process, so you drop your gaze from his and return to your holopad.

K2 breaks the tension with his usual tact.

“There’s a 93% chance you’re both lying to yourselves.”

“That’s enough, K,” Cassian reprimands, not for the first time.

“I’m only stating facts and highly calculated odds,” K defends himself.

“Facts as you see them,” you point out distractedly.

“Oh, I see a lot more than you do. A lot more.”

You’re still too self-involved to reply further and Cassian steers the conversation back to a safer topic: your mission. 

“Anyway.” He clears his throat. “Let’s say we were dating for...six months? Eight months? Enough time to get to know each other, but short enough to accommodate our ‘love at first sight’.” Cassian lets out one compact ‘ha!’ at the notion of falling in love with a total stranger without knowing who they were.

“Eight months seems reasonable. That would give me a few opportunities to let you meet family and friends, and vice versa. Speaking of: do we have any?” you question, back to yourself after banishing any and all thoughts of Cassian’s motivation to study you so intently. You can only hope to gather more data as the mission progresses.

“Hmm,” Cassian ponders, unsure what option would be best. He scrubs a hand across his stubbled chin and cheeks in thought. “No family seems suspicious, but we don’t want to create too many to keep track of.” He reasons out. “These people are well-connected and will be looking into our history, so we need to think of how our team back at base can create the strongest alibi.”

“True. And there’s no doubt they would recognize our infamous friends by name. That really narrows down our options.” Your lips are pursed to the side in thought and your chin is resting on your closed first. 

Your thinking pose works because you have an idea come to mind. Cassian stops his musings on ‘our friends’ to find your delighted expression when he turns at your little ‘a-ha!’ and finger snap.

“Do you remember anything about my mission on Aria Prime? My alias had a few family members we can repurpose.” You’re relieved that you’ve figured out a way to use established plants and make the intelligence officer’s work back at base easier.

“Antolin and Mauria, yes?” He confirms.

“Yes,” you verify, flustered yet again by Cassian’s attention to detail. “I’m glad you read my report – makes this easier for us.” 

“I read all your reports,” Cassian remarks before realizing his error. “I mean. I-I read all the reports. Everyone’s. It’s best to have a clear understanding of the bigger picture,” he corrects hastily.

You’re struggling to understand why, why, why, but your heart flutters nonetheless at the small thrill you receive. 

“Like I said,” K-2SO’s modulator is pitched to where only Cassian can hear, “lying to yourselves.”

***

This discussion had started a parsec ago, but is still going with no end in sight. Neither of you can agree on this, but neither are willing to yield.

“The more we use pet names, the less people will remember our real ones. First introductions we only give our names once and then use only nicknames after. People like them will be too embarrassed to have forgotten a name and won’t ask for them again.” 

Cassian is making excellent points, but your insides squidge in a nice uncomfortable way whenever he offers up an example. You can’t help but remember all the times your marks had forgotten your name, so they used demeaning pet names to refer to you. Maybe that’s why you were so easily onboard for using your names on this mission when you’ve never done it before. One: because it’s easier, and two: because you don’t feel as if you hear it spoken often enough.

Three: because you don’t want Cassian to forget your name when this war eventually claims your life.

You’re making yourself unduly anxious with the thought of that eventuality, and your response comes off melancholic. “They won’t remember me anyway.”

Cassian is thrown off by this. How could anyone forget you? He had a hard time not thinking about you some days. 

“Why do you say that?”

You give him a sad sort of expression, a wry smile turning your lips. “Isn’t that our job?” you question him. “Making yourself completely unrecognizable to the point that if your target ever saw you again, they wouldn’t even notice?”

Cassian can see where you’re coming from, but the look on your face and the tone of your voice makes him wonder at how lonely you feel during missions.

“As long as you are yourself around those you care about, it makes it worth it. Yes?” Cassian counters.

A small, wondering smile graces your lips as you lean back against the hold and look up. “Yeah, I guess so…”

You’re thinking of all the fun you have with Jyn and Bodhi when she drags you both away from base to explore, or when you’re all laughing at the exasperated look on Baze’s face when Chirrut walks into blaster fire with only his prayers to guide him. 

Or when you catch the relieved look Cassian throws you after a near-miss, like he’s impossibly glad that you’re okay. You always point finger-blasters at him with a smirk, trying to diffuse the situation, but he usually just shakes his head and tells you to focus.

Ahh. There you are, a voice in your mind whispers suddenly. It’s a cool and sinister voice, one you had not heard in some time.

You startle, knowing that the disembodied voice cannot see you physically does nothing to prevent a sense of overwhelming fear from taking over. You try to take a series of deep breaths to calm your racing heart and slow the pounding of blood in your ears. Hoping repetitive and familiar motions will calm you down and refocus your mind, you begin to rub up and down one arm with your knuckles. With the amount of pressure you’re using, you’ll end up with bruises but the dull pain helps.

Cassian sees you fidgeting out of the corner of his eye, but when he turns toward you, you’re already up and walking to a more private area.

“E-excuse me,” you stutter out. Your legs feel weak and you run one hand along the wall to keep you steady.

“Are you okay?” Cassian asks, preparing to stand up and follow you.

“Yeah. Yeah, ‘m fine. Just give me a moment.” Your voice is quiet, but you throw a shaky smile over your shoulder to try and stop Cassian from following you. You make it to one of the rooms and slide in, the door hissing closed behind you.

“That,” K2 says.

“What?” Cassian asks his companion, confused by the non sequitur.

“That is precisely why I don’t trust her. She hides too much,” the droid explains.

“She’s one of us, K,” Cassian defends. “We all have secrets.”

“Yes, but our secrets don’t make us run away. She’s hiding something big: I know it.” The droid asserts, giving his head one sharp nod to drive the point.

***

You survey the progress of your “home” being put together from the lofty heights of the balcony overlooking the foyer. Everything is white and gray and black, mimicking the Empire’s color scheme.

You hate it.

The only pop of color is your elaborate dress. The emerald gown is the height of Coruscant fashion, and you needed everyone who saw you and Cassian dock to know that you are important people.

Your quarters span the top two levels of one of the tallest towers in a swanky residential sector. The prestigious location alone should influence everyone’s opinions, but you also need to look the part of a spoiled and arrogant wife. So you have to dress and act accordingly.

You sense Cassian walking up behind you; his presence is unmistakable and you recognize his gait as his shoes tap against the expensive flooring. 

Your fingers grip the balustrade imperceptibly tighter, the only reaction you will allow yourself. Since shutting down on the U-wing to try and prevent the voice’s return, you’ve been able to keep your thoughts and emotions in check: no racing heart, blushed cheeks, or errant feelings. This is the only way you know how to keep your mind your own.

Cassian places his hands on either side of yours, trapping you between his warm body and the railings. His chest is pressing into your back and his sharp chin is resting on your shoulders. You weren’t prepared for this level of fake intimacy so soon, so your breath hitches in your throat and escapes as a soft gasp. You feel his warm breath fan across your ear as he pretends to nuzzle into your neck.

“Kay and I placed the data collectors throughout the public rooms.” Cassian mumbles, moving from one side of your neck to the other. You tilt your head in the semblance of allowing him room to kiss along your skin, growing hot where his breath fans now and goosebumps where it had once been. “We’re ready for the company to arrive.”

“Hmm,” you hum in acknowledgment. You’re developing a pit in your stomach at the proximity, but you grasp Cassian’s hands under yours for the illusion. Your palms are sweating and you’re sure that Cassian can feel it, but he continues resting his lips near your ear.

You glance down at the individuals moving your furnishings throughout the rooms, catching one gray-skinned and multi-eyed lifeform watching the two of you surreptitiously. You scowl down at them, feeling Cassian’s head turn enough to give them a side-eye as well. They turn back to arranging the many fire-waters and spirits you bought in preparation for your first gathering as new residents.

Some aliens begin making their way from where they were setting up the sleeping quarters behind you and Cassian. As they’re passing, Cassian pulls away from you. You take a deep breath to recenter yourself and cool your skin.

“Come, Love. Let’s break in the new bed,” Cassian says, loud enough for the passing workers to overhear.

You feign a saccharine smile and allow him to place his hand on the small of your back. Cassian leads you to your shared bedroom, dropping contact as soon as the door closes behind the two of you. You both sweep the room for any foreign devices and find none. You remain standing on opposite sides of the room, aware of the awkward atmosphere.

“I am sorry for that. A few of the workers were watching us,” Cassian apologized. One hand is scratching the scruff along his chin to hide his discomfort.

“I saw. It was an effective way to give them observations to take back to their superiors if some are spies like we suspect.” You carefully place yourself on the edge of the luxurious bed, taking this time to rest your feet before you need to get ready for the evening’s plans.

“Yeah…” Cassian draws, giving you a quizzical look. 

He knows that you’re on a mission now, but your tone and mannerisms are throwing him off. He always felt at least a sense of comradery with you, but this pliant and civil manner you’ve taken up bothers him for reasons he won’t can’t name.

You ignore his probing eyes. The voice in your mind is too recent an experience to let yourself relax even slightly. Your muscles are rigid from the straight posture of the elite woman you’re playing and from the stress of keeping your mind calm and under control. A headache is starting to form.

“I take it that K is situated?” You inquire of Cassian as you stand with bare feet. You pad over to the extensive closet space, selecting an outfit for tonight.

“Yes. He’s taken the ship to the lower levels and will stay there while we’re here; he’s close enough if we run into any issues.” 

Cassian’s voice is still low as he follows you to the wardrobe, just in case any of the movers are lurking outside the door. You both stand back to back as you each survey your arsenal of clothing for this mission. You run your hands lovingly over the soft fabrics, happy that your sensitive skin won’t have to endure anything rough for this mission. Cassian’s clothed shoulder blades scrape along your exposed back, sending imperceptible shivers down your spine. 

You quickly pull out a beautiful dress and move away from Cassian. You call over your shoulder to him as you near the refresher. “I’m wearing pink, unless you don’t have anything to match.”

“Of course I do. You selected the wardrobe,” he reminds you. 

You hadn’t seemed yourself since the ship, which Cassian picked up on immediately since you were so sure and confident at the beginning. He is trying hard to understand your abrupt change.

You shut the door on Cassian and take in the immaculate space around you. You hang the dress so it can air out while you apply your makeup and arrange your hair and try to enjoy the solitude while you can, knowing that tonight and all the nights to come will wear you thin. 

***

Cassian comes in a while later, taking note of your elaborate hairstyle and details of your thoad-eye makeup. He feels the nearly overwhelming need to comment how stunning you are and how similar you look now to when he saw you that first time, but holds his tongue. He doesn’t want to make this any more awkward for either of you.

You had been staring listlessly into the mirror before you until Cassian walked in. You can barely recognize the person staring back; hollow eyes, down-turned lips, dull skin. She isn’t you, but she is who you need to be until you’re sure the phantom hasn’t found you.

You move your eyes to study Cassian as he stands in the doorway. He looks handsome in his party-ware, the organic tones complementing his features and your pastel gown nicely. But you don’t dwell on how the sight alone of Cassian in something other than his everyday wear threatens the stability of the winged creatures in your stomach. You want them to be dormant, need them to be, but something about the man behind you sets them to tittering.

Since closing yourself off from your emotions and the galaxy at large, you have come to realize that you haven't been as careful as you should have. Despite your better judgment and without conscious effort, you have formed attachments in the Rebellion. Found yourself building relationships that mean something to you. Your fellow rebels from Rogue One are your life-line in this never-ending war.

Your bond with Cassian is one you are especially fond of.

You have grown to care for the man in a way that you know you shouldn’t. Your detachment now allows for you to reflect on your feelings in an objective way, understanding that you put yourself and the entire Rebellion at risk without fully realizing.

It stops today.

You harden what little bit of your heart you can still feel and fill in the small, Cassian shaped hole that had started to carve itself there.

You take your eyes from where they had locked onto his own. You can sense his hesitation to approach you and his inner turmoil that feels so like your own had earlier in the day. So while dabbing under your eyes for fallout and around your lips to neaten the line, you speak up.

“I’ll be done in time to greet our guests with you, but I need a few moments.”

Your voice is flat and devoid of any warmth that it once held for the man. Cassian notes immediately that your countenance has taken another turn, one that has pulled you even further away from him. His chest tightens. He sets his mouth in grim acceptance and leaves with a small nod in your direction.

***

All throughout the evening, a sense of foreboding had settled itself deep in your bones. You can feel it getting heavier and heavier as the party drags on, weighing down your body and worsening your already sickening headache. You continue to laugh and smile demurely despite it, but the bright light from the chandelier hanging above your head is sending bolts of pain behind your eyes.

In order to present a united front to these Imperial officers and sympathizers, Cassian has his arm wrapped around your waist and you’re resting your hand over top of his on your hip. The warmth of his hand as it caresses your curves sends heat between your thighs completely against your will. Your mind and heart know what you can’t have, but your body has wants of its own.

When an interesting piece of information comes up in conversations, one of you will squeeze the other’s hand in silent communication to pry further. It arose through no effort on either of your parts, but Cassian feels the rightness in the subtle exchanges. It feels like you’ve been partners for longer than a day, fake married for longer than a day, fake intimate for longer than a day with the way it feels to hold you. 

He can’t get over the rightness of having you in his arms. It’s unlike anything he’s ever felt, even with the few past partners he’s allowed himself to have between missions. He can feel the heat of your skin beneath his palm and through the fabric of your dress, making him want to pull you all the more closer as the night wears on and the open windows bring a chill to the crowded room.

You’re both in the middle of a conversation with a commanding officer when it feels as if all the air has been sucked out of the room, like a cabin losing pressure out in space. Your eyes widen and your heart races as your sense of foreboding from earlier ramps up into full fight-or-flight mode. You’re hastily scanning the faces in the room, terrified.

Cassian feels you tense in his arms. With a quick glance at your face, he knows something is wrong. Your eyes are flickering around the room and the pulse in your neck is prominent against the stiffness of your body. He tries to catch your eye or squeeze your hip, but he gets no response.

Quickly and subtly shifting your body behind his, he excuses the two of you from your conversation. You don’t feel yourself moving, too caught up in trying to find the source of this feeling. 

You’re intimately familiar with this presence, having spent years in its company. You had tried so hard and traveled lightyears away in order to escape, but all your efforts seem futile now. You should have gone into hiding, should have locked yourself away on a little no-name moon, should have done something more. 

A whimper escapes your mouth without permission, and Cassian’s heart lurches at the frightened sound. He’s always known you to be the bravest, strongest person he has ever met, but the woman in his arms right now looks like a scared child, looks like someone he doesn’t know. He would take your cold and detached manner from the previous day over this. 

Because this? This scares him. And Cassian does not scare easily.

He leads you into a secluded area of the penthouse, away from prying Imperial eyes and whatever has caused your body to convulse with tremors. He still has his arm wrapped securely around your waist holding you close to him, and his other hand has a gentle but firm grip around your upper arm that is pressed tightly into his side. Cassian is practically dragging you away as your knees refuse to hold you up.

Cassian finds a small cupboard furthest away from the party. He looks around to be sure no one is near enough to listen in, and pulls you inside. A dim light turns on above your heads and Cassian places you gently against a wall. You start to slide down, but he puts his arms under yours, giving you support.

You can still feel her, can sense her proximity and her sinister presence in the back of your mind. It’s been so long since you were last with her, but your body must have known somehow that she was drawing nearer. Your headaches and anxiety that had only heightened throughout the party should have made you think.

But you didn’t.

Having Cassian at your side had made you feel safe, no matter that you were actively avoiding having any feelings for him. You have known his character well from watching and interacting with him over the years, learning to trust him and his calm and reserved nature. You were remiss in thinking that you could keep yourself and your feelings away from him during this mission. 

Now that the walls you carefully constructed on the ship have crumbled around you, you can’t help but feel again. Can’t help but feel the warmth radiating from his chest and into yours from where he’s standing so close to you. Can’t help but feel his breath against your face as he’s begging you to tell him what’s wrong. Can’t help but feel the pressure in your head slowly dissipating as you force yourself to breathe in time with Cassian’s instructions.

You readjust against the wall after a short while, standing taller and trying to regain feeling in your legs. Cassian’s hand shifts from the wall and cups the side of your face so that he can look into your eyes. You can see the question in his concerned gaze and answer in a still-weak voice.

“My… my mother. She’s here.”

Cassian’s brow furrows slightly as he wonders what that could mean for you and this mission. He opens his mouth to ask for more details, but you shake your head.

“She’s - we’re - I don’t know!” You cry out softly. You bring your hands up and grasp the lapels of Cassian’s shimmersilk jacket as you try to ground yourself and explain. “She’s in my head, Cassian. I can feel her. I can hear her. I couldn’t get away, and now she’s found me.” 

You suck in a deep breath through trembling lips. You look deeply into Cassian’s eyes, watching as a dawning understanding fills them. 

“I’m scared, Cassian,” you admit.

Cassian wraps both of his hands around your head with his palms against your neck, using his thumbs to sweep softly under your eyes, catching the tears that had fallen without you noticing. Your breathing is still stuttering in and out of your lungs, and Cassian can feel your pulse as he continues to stroke your cheeks.

“I know. I know, Princessa. But it’s okay, we can figure this out together, hm?” Cassian murmurs to you. 

You nod your head and close your eyes as you lean back against the wall, drained of energy. Cassian takes both of your wrists into one of his and holds them against his chest when he feels your grip slacken, hoping that you can feel his heart’s rhythm and use its steady beat to come back down from your adrenaline rush.

“What do we need to do?” Cassian asks after a moment. “I can signal K and we can leave right now.”

You shake your head as you look back at him. You can’t let this opportunity for information slip away because of you. And you’re definitely not giving K-2SO any more reason not to like you.

“No. No, Cass, I’m fine. I’ll be fine. Just… give me another moment or two. Please,” you implore. 

Rational thought is coming back to you as you finally match Cassian’s heartbeat and breathing. You start to feel embarrassed about your breakdown, but Cassian’s sympathy and understanding prevent you from doing so. You’re now focusing on the shift in your mission.

“The good news is I’m using my real name, so she can’t ruin us immediately,” you begin slowly. “The bad news is now we have to contend with her story and timeline of events. I haven’t been with her since I ran away, Cassian. I haven’t spoken to her in years, but she’s been in my head a few times since then.”

What you have to tell Cassian next is hard, but he needs to know. For your own selfish needs, you want somebody to know what you’ve been through. 

“She… she studied under the Sith in her childhood, but never completed training. When she had me and realized I was force sensitive…” You’re pleading with your eyes and your grasping hands on his jacket once more. “She raised me on the Dark Side. To become the Sith she never could be.”

Cassian tries to pull away from you, shocked and angry by your perceived betrayal. His face hardens and his hands drop away from you, but you’re quick to hold tighter to him, keeping him from leaving you.

“It’s not what you’re thinking, Cassian! I never joined the Rebellion for her or anyone else. I stopped training and cut myself off from the Force after my 16th year because I knew what she was teaching me was wrong. I joined you because I wanted to make up for all the awful things she made me do, to give myself over to a cause that I believe in.

“I never intentionally put the Rebellion in danger. Every time she found my consciousness, I shut myself away from whatever I was feeling that let her in and left the base until I was sure she hadn’t found me,” you explain. “I don’t know why she’s here now, but it can’t be good. We have to find out, and I’m the best shot we have.”

You can see Cassian’s mind moving at lightspeed to determine if he can trust you. You’ve never given him any reason not to, but this secret is explosive enough to shake his faith in his own discernment. His eyes are shifting between yours, staring into each to find any trace of duplicity. You keep your expression honest and open. It’s the first time you’ve ever presented your emotions – true and real emotions – to someone. You’re vulnerable in this state, but Cassian needs to see it.

And he does. Cassian’s shoulders drop imperceptibly and the tension you can feel under your hands loosens.

“Does Mon Mothma know? She’s the one that recruited you, yes?” He asks, looking for a solid reason other than his gut instincts to guide his decision.

You nod. You hadn’t told her the full truth all those standard years ago, but she knew enough to think of you as a worthwhile risk.

Cassian exhales and reaches for your hands where they clutch at him. He gives them a squeeze in acceptance and you can’t stop a small smile from coming to your lips in relief.

“What’s your plan?” He asks you, deferring over to you on how this mission should move forward now that there’s a massive obstacle to manage.

“I think…”you hesitate, already dreading the series of events your next words are going to set in motion. “I think I need to get close to her again. Not ‘close’!” You reassure Cassian when a troubled look comes over his face. “Just make her think I’m still on the Dark Side. Being here already lends itself to that.”

“I don’t know. Putting yourself directly in her path like that is dangerous,” Cassian reasons.

You give a short laugh and look at Cassian with amusement. “We’re Rebel Intelligence currently undercover with elite Imperial officers and weapons dealers. I think we’ve been in danger.” 

Cassian mimics your small grin and rattles your hands around a bit. “Smart aleck.”

You’re feeling better than you have been since the U-wing. A weight has lifted from your shoulders and now you can breathe easier, safe in the knowledge that someone knows your secrets. Knows a large part of you, and doesn’t hate you for it.

Cassian’s smile fades. He doesn’t want to interrupt whatever this moment is, but you need to go back to the party. 

“I’m going to signal K-2SO; we might need him for security.” At the thought of K running his mouth off near all these officers, Cassian decides that he’ll instruct the droid to disable his modulator. “Are you ready?” he asks.

Your face drops into a determined expression. You gather all your strength and prepare to greet your mother. You’re going to need it.

***

“Well there’s my darling daughter!”

You keep your expression neutral, but quirk one eyebrow up as you look to the direction her voice is coming from. You watch as your mother saunters over to you, pulling along a middle-aged man in an Officer’s uniform; he must have been her way in, since you hadn’t seen her during your reconnaissance phase. He was of low-rank and low-importance, but you invited him because he could still harbor important information.

Your mother has aged: wrinkles line her eyes and crease her forehead, gray hairs are dyed an unnatural shade, and the skin on her neck and hands is thin and dry. Her dark robes swathe her frame in an abundance of fine fabric, perhaps to distract from all that you are observing.

“Mother,” you reply in a clipped tone. No one but Cassian notices the beginnings of sweat on your forehead. He leans in to place a kiss on your hairline, wiping away the droplet with his dry but soft lips. You grasp his hand tighter in appreciation.

“I knew I would find you here…” she taunts, but trails off as she eyes Cassian beside you. 

You stiffen because you know that look. You angle yourself to where your breasts are pressing against Cassian and you lay a possessive hand over his chest, clearly indicating he was ‘yours’ in the only way she really understands. 

But she hasn’t changed in all this time, so she tries her hand with Cassian. Even though her escort has an arm around her stomach in a not-so-subtle effort to keep her close to him and away from your partner - or anyone else in the room that catches her eye.

“My, my. Who is this handsome man you’ve conned into spending the night with you, daughter?” She addresses you, but bats her eyelashes coquettishly at Cassian. “I’m sure you’ll have much more fun with me, young man. I can give you anything you want,” she tries to whisper seductively, but fails in your opinion. 

Her date looks at you and Cassian contemptuously, as if you were the ones to blame for her behavior.

Your mouth curls into an uncontrollable sneer and your expression morphs into one of disgust and anger. How dare she proposition Cassian in such a way? What a lewd and demeaning way to come onto someone! 

All fear is forgotten in your outrage. You’re about to respond with vicious words as you start to move your hand towards the poisoned blade hidden under your dress, but Cassian stops you as he tightens his arm around your waist and pulls you further into him so that you’re basically looking over your shoulder - you’re full front is pressed against his as he takes his own hold on you. His hand snakes down to cup your ass in a proprietorial way to show your mother that he already has his hands full. 

Your heart quickens at the possessive act. Focus.

Cassian gives an uninterested nod as his greeting, making a show of looking her over and finding her lacking. It’s cruel, but it fills you with a spot of joy.

“The husband, actually,” he remarks coldly. “Weapons Specialist.”

“Oh.” She pouts for just a moment, disappointed that he wants nothing to do with her. “Well!” She claps her hands together and steps out of her date’s arm. “I’m sure you gentlemen won’t begrudge me a moment with my long-lost daughter,” she bids. She flaps her hands around as she says, “You boys talk amongst yourselves.”

She walks off, expecting you to follow like a kriffing Kath Hound. One of your eyes twitches in agitation as you look to Cassian. He uses one hand to adjust a piece of your hair, wanting to draw attention away from his lips as he mutters to you.

“Do not let her get to you. I will be right here when you return.”

“I don’t think I can follow through on the plan. I don’t think I can get close enough without failing,” you whisper. 

You are terrified of this woman and what she can still do to you, what she can still make you endure because of her connection to the Dark Side. But… you can’t really sense anything from her. You allow what diminutive control you have on the Force to surround her and probe for information, and you find very little. 

You’re wondering now if whatever prevented her from completing her training as a Sith has been depleting her midichlorians since then as well. Her voice in your mind has been diminishing for quite some time now; the event today having been the first time in over a year, when you used to hear her every other month.

A hypothesis begins to form. But in order to explore further, you need to follow your mother.

You rub Cassian’s cheek with the palm of your hand in farewell and his stubble is rough against your skin. He takes your hand from his face and places a soft kiss on your knuckles, but doesn’t meet your eyes.

 After your revelations in the cupboard and dispensation of some of the fear you had been holding all your life, you’re finding it easy to fall into this level of intimacy with Cassian -- false as it may be. You are no longer held back by thoughts of your mother reentering your life and wreaking havoc for the Rebellion. She’s found you here with Imperialists, ‘married’ to a war profiteer, and presumably on the same side.

But Cassian is still Cassian and you are still you. Public displays of affection make both of you uncomfortable, but you’ve been pushing it aside for the sake of the mission. You let go of each other and walk away from him, but you can still feel his eyes on you as you go to your mother.

“I never imagined you as a credit-seeking harpy, daughter of mine. Always so toffee-nosed and self-important. You never agreed to a single match I tried to make for you,” your mother starts in as soon as you’re close enough to hear. Some party-goers glance in your direction, but your glare sends them looking away.

“Perhaps you never set your sights high enough, mother. Maybe I sought better for myself than you could provide?” you retort, channeling Cassian’s cool demeanor into your character for this mission. 

You had never imagined as a youngling that you could ever be brave enough to face your mother in this way; she had dominated and dictated every facet of your life, refusing you free-will and a normal childhood. But you need to complete this mission and find out why she’s here, so you don’t have time to dwell.

She looks at you now with thinly veiled contempt. You imagine she thought you would still be that girl who was too afraid to speak out against her. And if it wasn’t for this mission and Cassian dragging you from the party so you could collect yourself, you would still be.

Your hands are trembling where they’re hidden behind your back and beneath the capelet on the dress, and gravity seems to have broken: incredibly strong at your feet and incredibly light on your head. It keeps you rooted to the floor while also making you feel like you’re floating away. Rationally you know it’s your fear response, so you work on taking inconspicuous breaths.

“‘Sought better for yourself’; don’t make me laugh! Those ‘friends’ you had were barely sentient! Let alone have any connections to elevate you anywhere,” your mother mocks.

You’re momentarily dumbfounded: how did she know about your friends? You made sure to never mention them or hang out with them when your mother was on-planet. “What friends?” you ask quietly.

“Don’t play ignorant with me, daughter, it’s so unbecoming of a Sith. Did you forget? I’m in your head.”

You jerk away from where your mother has leaned in towards your face, taking a step back. Her last words had been inside your head. 

“I’ve missed this, daughter,” your mother coos telepathically. She brings a wrinkled hand up to cup one side of your face while you’re struggling to breathe. “I’ve missed having you under my thumb.” 

At this, she drives her thumb into your cheek, pushing your head roughly to the side. She has a firm grip and directs your face back to where you have to look at her. You’re breathing fast and shallow, panic taking over. Your hands have flown to take a hold of her wrist and forearm, struggling to remove her nails from your soft flesh.

You finally wrench her hand away, just in time to feel a strong arm snake around your waist and pull you backwards. Cassian steps in front of you in a protective stance, one arm still holding you against his back and the other pointing his blaster in your mother’s face.

If looks alone could kill, your mother would have evaporated under Cassian’s glare.

You can feel his breath escaping him in angry heaves, nostrils flared. His mouth is set in a thin, angry line, and you can hear his teeth gnash together as he clenches his jaw. His eyebrows are furrowed over his hard, piercing stare, your mother the sole object of his ire at the moment.

She doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even look at Cassian as her focus is still on you. Staring down certain death and one of the most intimidating men in the galaxy, she doesn’t move a muscle except to smile cruelly.

“They were so heartbroken when I told them you were dead,” she mocks as you stare at her from around Cassian. “It was quite fun to watch them suffer.”

They thought I was dead? Your hands grasp Cassian tighter at the thought. Is that why they never tried to contact me? 

Feeling your shaking hands on his back and unsteady breaths against his neck, all Cassian wants to do is blast a hole through your mother. As soon as he saw her lay a hand on you, he was racing over to the altercation – blaster drawn and heart on his sleeve. He knows how strong and capable you are, but this mission is asking more of you than he can stand to watch be taken away. 

He feels your warm hand slide around his where it grips his blaster. You bring his arm back down to his side and step out from behind him.

Your nerves are shot and you’re so nauseous that you could vomit at any moment, but you need to take control of the situation again. Your mother is making you look weak and incompetant in front of the Empire’s largest figures. The party had come to a screeching halt when Cassian drew his weapon.

“It’s alright, my love,” you say loud enough for those around you to hear. “I believe our guest has forgotten who is in charge here.” 

You snap your fingers in K’s direction where you see him stationed against one of the columns beside the entrance. You’re elated when you see him actually heed your command and stalk over. He grips your mother’s arm and waits for your command.

“I do believe it’s time you and your date left now,” you say as you wave your hand in a dismissive gesture.

Your mother is absolutely fuming as K2 leads her out of the hall, stopping to grab her date as he tries to make himself small amongst the crowd. You can see her trying to move her arm out of the droid’s grasp, but she’s unsuccessful. Her date’s jacket sleeve is nearly ripping at the shoulder from how unwilling he is to be pulled along by her.

Cassian is immensely proud of you for standing up to your mother. After he watches her being dragged out by K, he turns to you with a glimmer in his eye, only to notice the sallowness of your skin and the movement of your throat as you swallow multiple times.

Cassian immediately turns to your guests and makes an announcement so you can sneak away unnoticed. “Now that we’ve weeded out the undesirables amongst us, it’s time to get this party started. Fosu–” Cassian calls to the Ortolan leading the live band “–let’s go!” 

You make your way out of the crowded hall with one hand fisted over your mouth and the other holding your stomach. You hear the band start up as you reach the nearest refresher and bolt inside. As soon as the door slides closed and you’re alone, you promptly empty the contents of your stomach into the vacc tube.

-------

You’re shivering against the wall when Cassian comes in some time later. Your body has lost all ability to function after trying to purge itself of these mephitic feelings, so you’re collapsed into a seated position on the floor with your head leaned back to rest against the wall. The expensive stone interior of this refresher is beautiful to look at, but severely uncomfortable to sit on. 

Cassian crouches down next to you and hands you a crystal flute full of water. You give a small smile in appreciation and sip from the cup, closing your eyes as you feel the cool liquid slither down your raw throat and into your empty stomach.

“You did good,” Cassian says to you.

You peep open one tired eye and look at him. His face is sincere and his eyes hold no hint of the disappointment you feel for yourself. You scoff at his words and close your eye again.

“The entire mission has gone completely barvy because of me,” you mutter harshly. If your mother hadn't shown up, you would have completed this mission without any problems. But as soon as you felt her presence and realized that she was in the same room, you broke down. And when she spoke to you and grabbed you...

At the thought of your mother’s touch, the anxiety in your stomach rumbles into nausea again. You press a closed fist up to your mouth to fight off the feeling. “I can’t even think about her without wanting to spew my guts up.” You roll your head to the side so that Cassian can’t see the self-deprecating expression you know is on your face. “How pathetic is that?”

A warm, rough hand encircles the wrist that still hovers in front of your mouth. The firm pressure brings your face up and forces your eyes open. Cassian is leaning towards you with an arm outstretched to you and balancing on one knee. You can’t help but feel bad that he’s ruining such a nice suit just to get you to look at him.

“Nothing about you is pathetic, Princessa,” he urges. “The way you handled that situation? There is no one else in the galaxy who could have gotten through the way you did.” He moves his hands in an exaggerated gesture to emphasize the shape of the galaxy around you, but your wrist is pulled along for the demonstration since it is still held between his fingers. 

“I didn’t really do anything. I asked K to kick her out for me. I’ve probably lost any ounce of power and respect we scrounged up in such a short time.” 

Your eyes are downcast as you say this, so you don’t notice Cassian’s other hand reaching up from where it was hovering over his bent knee. He oh-so-gently grabs your chin in the same place your mother had, but the difference between the two touches are immense. His thumb ever so softly brushes along the side of your mouth where a bruise is most likely forming, and his fingers perch below your chin as he pulls your face up to meet his gaze.

“If anything, you gave us more respect. You effortlessly took away all her power and turned her into the laughing stock of the party; these sorts of things are the highlight of any event for these people. You’ve just ensured that they’re all going to be coming back just on the off-chance that something like that happens again.” 

His eyes are so intense on yours and his hand so kind against your abused jaw that it brings a flush to your face. You shouldn’t be relishing in the closeness you’re feeling in this moment because he is only trying to comfort you and get you ready to be hostess of the party again, but you can’t help the warm feelings and fluttering of your heart at his proximity.

You think he must have noticed your blush and became embarrassed for you, because he drops his hand from your face and rises from his crouch. Cassian clears his throat and pulls your wrist up towards him, indicating that it is time for you to stand as well. You push against the wall with your free hand and stand in front of him.

You’re unsure of what else to say besides a whispered, “Thank you.”

Cassian nods his head in acknowledgement and drops your hand. The loss of contact stings a little.

Cassian quickly starts ruffling his hair and jerking his clothes until they’re disheveled. Your questioning look is answered a second later as the same realization comes to your mind. A married couple locked in a bathroom together for some time after an apparent power move? Everyone at the party is going to think that show of dominance got Cassian hot with desire for you.

Your blush reappears with a vengeance as your hands remove some pins from your hair and ruffle through it. Your heart thunders in your chest as you grab Cassian’s shoulder as he is preparing to unlock the door. He looks back at you and you drop your hand.

“It.. it would be more believable if some of my makeup…” you flap your hand towards his face, indicating what you mean.

Understanding crosses his face as he slowly leans towards you. You take your thumb and smear it across your lips, dragging the lip color from its place and around your mouth in a facsimile of the chaos a kiss would create.

You take your makeup covered thumb and firmly glide it across Cassian’s lips. The contrast between the softness of his delicate skin and harshness of his stubbled chin remind you that your face and neck need to be more red.

Making to take your nails and redden up your skin, you’re stopped by Cassian’s question of, “Can I?”

You look up to see his hands reaching for your face and you allow him to hold you. He brings his face into yours and presses his stubbly cheek into your skin. You hold back your gasp of shock, but the inhaled breath allows in the intoxicating smell of him. You close your eyes in order to maintain some semblance of control over yourself. Your hands are itching to run through his hair and dishevel it even more, but you refrain in case it makes him stop.

Cassian is nuzzling into your neck now and you can feel a slightly shaky breath leave his lips and fan across your ear. A shiver races down your spine and lands hotly in your lower abdomen. The sensitive skin of your neck is red now from both his ministrations and your increased temperature.

All too soon, Cassian pulls away. You're warm all over except for the irritated skin on your neck that feels cool without Cassian’s warmth against it. He looks at you unsurely, probably worried that he overstepped a boundary.

“Your hands wouldn’t have left the right pattern,” he mumbles out. 

He doesn’t seem unsure of himself, but not wholly convinced that you necessarily wanted him to do that. You nod your head too quickly when you agree with him to reassure that you do not mind. At all. 

He stuffs his hands into his pockets, but swings out one elbow as an offer to you. You take a deep breath to calm down and place your arm within his before exiting.

***

Weeks pass and you and Cassian have been inundated with dinner offers, gala invitations, and special meetings from members of the Empire and their allies. It seems that Cassian was correct in saying that everyone at the party - and not at the party - would be clamoring to get into your good graces after taking so much power away from a prominent member so easily. 

When the topic is brought up, you always smile and laugh haughtily so they think such a thing was no big deal to you. The problem is that it was a big deal. You never stood up to your mother like that when you were younger - you always took the abuse until the day you jumped on a random cargo ship and ran away. You had always thought you were weak and powerless against your mother, but Cassian and these Imperial scum are beginning to make you realize that you’ve grown enough that she no longer holds power over you.

This realization makes you feel strong and more competent than ever. You’re fully ingratiating yourself with the beings around you, pretending that the Empire is the only way forward and that the Rebellion is just full of useless chizks. 

Ha! If only they knew they were being played like an Ewok drum by one of those ‘useless chizks’.

As you’re laughing at what some high-brow weapons dealer is saying, you glance around the room to find Cassian. You were separated when someone dragged you away to have a ‘female talk’ that was excruciating to sit through. You spy him across the hall, but your heart drops as you watch him follow a beautiful Twi-lek into a side office.

Over the past few weeks, you and Cassian have gotten close. Or you thought you had. You were both becoming increasingly comfortable in each other’s arms and Cassian had even taken to kissing your lips when others were around.

You couldn’t help but take those little kisses and tight hugs personally. You know that, rationally, he is only doing those things to keep up the pretense of a happily married couple, but your touch-starved heart was going soft for the Rebel captain.

And maybe it’s that soft heart that makes you excuse yourself from the current conversation. That soft heart that makes you follow in the pair’s footsteps. That soft heart that constricts and feels as if it’s crumbling away when you hear the soft murmurs coming from behind the closed door you have your ear against.

You’re unable to make out anything being said, but the closeness that whispering requires crushes your soft heart. You know this is a mission and you both need to get intel at any cost. Cassian is one of the best spies in the Rebellion – kriff, the whole galaxy – so it shouldn’t come as any surprise that seducing a target is one of his methods. 

But we’re supposed to be married, you reason out. Happily!

You hear the Twi-lek whine. Your chest tightens and your eyes start to burn for no reason. You shake your head to try and force the tears back. Taking a deep breath, you channel your current persona and feel her wrath and anger at the situation funnel through you.

You twist the handle and barge into the room. You stand scowling at the two as you eye them up and down. Cassian is unruffled and holding onto the Twi-lek’s shoulders as if to keep her at a distance. The Twi-lek, on the other hand, has her dress pulled down past her shoulders to expose her chest and her hands clasped onto Cassian’s lapels and fingering the buttons of his shirt.

Their eyes turn to you: Cassian’s relieved ,and the Twi-lek’s shooting daggers.

“Husband,” you deadpan, “what’s the meaning of this?” 

But you’re not looking at your fake husband, you’re eyeing up the female who still has her dress around her waist and her dirty hands on your man.

“Princessa,” Cassian seems to plead with you. You flick your eyes away from the Twi-lek and onto him. Princessa has become a normal term of endearment from Cassian since your heart-to-heart in the fresher, and you can’t get enough of how ardently he always calls to you. But now the name sends a pain through your heart, because you’re just now realizing he may have used it for others during missions as well.

Your eyes threaten to start burning again, so you look away from Cassian and back to the one that pulled him in here. You notice that she was hanging out with the one that pulled you away for that ‘talk’, making you think that this had been their play all along.

Your nostrils flare as you stare her down. “Fix your gown, find your friend, and leave this house. I will not repeat myself,” you growl at her. 

The Twi-lek’s eyes widen a fraction at the venom in your voice, hopefully understanding the danger that your persona emanates. She pulls her hands from Cassian and slips them through the sleeves of her dress before scurrying from the room.

You turn to watch her leave, narrowing your eyes as you catch hers as she shuts the door. You hadn’t only turned to make sure she left, you also turned so that you didn’t have to look at Cassian. You didn’t want to look closer and see what they were up to.

“Thank you,” Cassian murmurs as he walks up to you. “She seemed to think that I would sneak off with her willingly.”

“Didn’t you, though?” 

Your question catches him off-guard and you see his furrowed brow in your peripheral. You tried not to put any emotion into your words, but don’t know if you succeeded or not.

“What do you mean?”

“You were gathering intel, right? It’s part of the job to seduce targets.” You’re still looking to the door and away from him, but Cassian turns his body fully towards you and raises a hand in your direction. You lightly step away as you finish. “I just didn’t know our cover had changed, is all. I won’t interrupt you next time.”

Cassian calls out for you, but you’ve already left the room.

***

No one notices anything out of the ordinary after you re-enter the party, but you can feel eyes on you the whole night. Whether they’re Cassian’s or others’ is hard to say – once you returned to mingling with the guests, you started wrapping them around your little finger.

You aren’t discriminating against anyone that seemed interested in you. Any being that you felt had even an inkling of knowledge about something and would only give it up if persuaded, you flirted with. Subtly, of course, since you are ‘married’, but enough to let them know you find them just as interesting as they find you.

You’re only laying the groundwork tonight, so you don’t have to worry about planning any rendezvouses. You wish that Cassian had discussed seduction with you while you were both laying out plans on the way to Coruscant. 

No. 

You wish that seduction wasn’t part of the plans at all. Because as selfish as it is, you want Cassian all to yourself – if only for this mission. 

Stop lying.

As selfish as it is, you want Cassian. Period.

***

You don’t enjoy yourself tonight. Not like any of the other events had been times to enjoy, but at least for those few weeks Cassian had been at your side for most of them. Even so, you can’t pinpoint exactly when Cassian began this part of the plan, which means you are too distracted to be doing your job correctly. You internally berate yourself for the slip up. 

It’s late by the time you and Cassian are standing on the landing platform waiting for your cruiser to arrive. The wind this high up causes you to shiver and cross your arms to try and protect yourself from the chill. While you’re thankful for your thin clothing inside the incessantly warm buildings, walking out into the brisk night air always catches you by surprise. Cassian in the past has always draped his jacket over your bare shoulders when he noticed that you were cold, but he refrains tonight. He stands several feet away from you with his hands clasped behind his back and his jaw tight.

The tension roiling between you is uncomfortable. There were no soft touches or easy conversations between you this evening like you have grown used to. After you left the office and Cassian behind, you had avoided him at all costs. But you’d catch him staring at you as you laid a hand on someone else’s shoulder or whispered into another’s ear. 

You know that he’s upset with you for tonight, but you don’t know what for specifically. Did he think you were too bold in your attentions? It’s not like you had snuck off into a private room with someone in full view of the entire party. 

The thought briefly crosses your mind that you’re trying to make Cassian jealous, but it’s quickly brushed away. Why would it make Cassian jealous to see you flirting with others? It’s not like this is a real relationship anyway… no matter that you were starting to think it was.

Your transport arrives and the doors slide open. The warmth of the ship draws you in and you clamber in on your sore feet. The high-arching shoes you’ve been wearing are kicked off quickly so that you can pull your legs up to rest on the seats beside you. You’re fully reclined when the journey to your suite begins, but Cassian is still rigid in his seat in the farthest corner of the ship from you.

The warm transport grows stifling as you feel the heat of Cassian’s gaze on you. Your eyes are closed where your head is resting on the hull, but you’re too tired to open them and stare back.

“Go on and say whatever it is you’re upset about,” you challenge wearily. The events from earlier in the night and your subsequent ‘star of the party’ mode had worn you to the point of exhaustion. You were ready to be alone and to sleep for the next standard year.

“You do not think that was too much?” Cassian hurls at you. “You throwing yourself at them? We are supposed to be happily married. Why are you not acting accordingly?”

The force of his anger surprises you; you knew he was displeased with your actions by the look on his face throughout the event, but you didn’t think he was angry enough to yell at you. Nerves begin to course through your blood at his raised voice. It reminds you too much of your mother’s anger when you were younger – you have been invisible ever since then, so no one has had a reason to scream abuse at you. 

Until now.

Despite your weariness and building anxiety, the growing sense of your own power helps to bolster you. You will not let him lambaste you for putting your all into this mission. You’ve been here too long as it is, and you need to get away from Cassian so that you can get back to the right headspace without thoughts of him getting in the way of your duties. You’ve been too consumed with the feelings that his touch and presence bring you when you’re together. Too consumed with the thought that maybe he finds your presence just as all-consuming as you find his.

Your hands tremble slightly with nerves and anger as you plant your feet on the floor and turn to face him with a fierce stare.

“You will not speak to me that way, Cassian. I’ve had enough of that to last a lifetime. And I do not need you questioning me when you’re the one that started seducing targets without consulting me! I also thought the plan was to be ‘happily married’, but imagine my surprise when I found a half-naked Twi-Lek in your arms!”

The transport has arrived at your dwelling by this point, so you grab the hem of your dress and your footwear before stomping off into the entrance hall. You can hear Cassian muttering expletives under his breath as he races after you.

“If you would let me explain,” he begins after grabbing your wrist and spinning you around to face him. You jerk your arm out of his grip with a hiss.

“Don’t grab me,” you growl out. “We’re done for tonight. I’m sleeping in the guest quarters.” 

And you stalk away, leaving Cassian angry and alone.

***

Night turns into day, and the day turns into many more. Neither of you would admit to what was really the cause of the anger and the fight, not even to yourselves. 

You still attend functions and dinner plans, but the small and casual affection between you and Cassian has disappeared. Instead, quick pecks and a loose arm around the waist was the only physical contact.

You hate this. You hate that you’re acting this way - so unreasonably. If it were anyone else, you might even laugh at their blatant flirtations with others. But with Cassian… any time you see someone else on his arm or someone else whispering in his ear, you see red. The fire you felt that first night with the Twi-Lek comes back with a vengeance and you can’t help but feel stupid for it.

Your ‘home life’ isn’t any better. You both sit at opposite ends of the dining table, staunchly ignoring the other. At least, you try to ignore him. Cassian is still your friend, despite the silence lingering between the two of you. You want to break the war of no words, but it seems like every event resets both of your tempers.

You had yet to return to the extra cot in the master bedroom you used to share with Cassian.

It all came to a head one afternoon. The same Twi-Lek, Anansi, had put her hands all over Cassian in the middle of a crowded dinner party the night prior, eliciting murmurs from the other party-goers about your and Cassian’s physical relationship. Or lack thereof.

You had glared daggers at the both of them, catching Cassian’s eye and snarling your lip at him out of hurt more so than anger. If he wanted to flirt so openly and auspiciously with the targets, then so would you, you rationalized. You found the most eligible officer and made it abundantly clear that you were willing to do anything to stay with him just a little longer. So you went back to his quarters once the party was over. You didn’t stay over for long, stumbling back to your and Cassian’s penthouse long before the suns even rose.

You don’t even fully undress before you fall into a deep sleep. 

You neglect to leave your bed in time for the first meal of the day, but you make it to the small offering a few hours later. Cassian is already seated at the head of the table, so you avoid his eyes as you move to your place across from him.

Nothing is appealing right now, the firewater moving its way out of your bloodstream making you slightly dizzy. You glance up when Cassian’s utensils scrape across his dish.The noise sends shivers down your spine.

“Could you not?” you question quietly.

Cassian looks up with a quirked eyebrow. “Why? Enjoy yourself a bit too much last night, baby?” he taunts, scraping his plate again.

You send him a deadly glare, daring him to do it again. “I’m sure nowhere near as much fun as you had with Anansi last night. Another office, really?”

Cassian slams his hands down on the table and pushes himself up forcefully. “At least I didn’t take her home, unlike that officer. Couldn’t even leave the party with your own ‘husband’ – you just had to leave with him. Did you at least get anything from him?” he demands, glowering from across the spread of food between you.

You smirk at him. “Oh, I got plenty from him last night,” you taunt as you stand as well.

You’ll be the first to admit that was a low blow, but Maker did it feel good to give right back as good as you were getting.

Cassian growls and stalks over to you. The sight of his taut shoulders and ridged jaw send you backwards until you’re up against a low table against the wall. His hands land either side of your hips, caging you in. 

Your heart is thundering and you’re slightly shaking with adrenaline. A warm sensation fills your gut and you can’t believe that his anger is making you feel this way.

“Yeah?” Cassian asks in a low voice, his breath fanning across your lips. His face is so close and his eyes are staring deep into your own. “I bet I can give you more.”

And with that, Cassian’s lips are on yours and it’s hard to even breathe. Your arms snake up around his neck and pull his lips closer to yours, deepening the kiss. His hands move from the table and grab onto your hips, allowing him to grind against your abdomen. A hungry growl escapes his mouth when you bite his lip at the action.

Cassian reaches down to your thighs and hauls you onto the table that had been digging into your lower back. You gasp into his open mouth when he spreads your legs wide and settles between your thighs.

The days of anger and pent-up frustration explodes between you both and there’s no stopping the desperate kisses and wandering hands. You grab the side of Cassian’s face with one hand and slide the other down his chest to lay flat on his lower abdomen. You feel his muscles tense as your fingers slip under his waistband to tease him, forcing his hips to rock into you.

Cassian leaves kisses from your waiting mouth and along your jaw until he reaches your ear. He whispers huskily, “I bet he didn’t kiss you like this.”

You groan as Cassian sucks harshly on your neck, leaving red marks. The dress you have on rides up your legs and bunches around your waist as Cassian’s hand trails up the outside of your thigh. When he reaches your hip, he lets out another low groan at what he finds. Or doesn’t find.

“Nothing on underneath? Did you leave him a souvenir? ” he breathes harshly into your mouth, using his other hand to palm your breasts through your dress.

“Ha,” you laugh shakily. You can do nothing except throw your head back against the wall as his fingers travel towards your wet folds. Nothing had prepared you for this interaction with Cassian, but kriff were you glad you weren’t wearing underwear.

Cassian’s thumb presses harshly on your clit and you grasp his wrist tightly to keep him in place. He slowly teases one finger into your aching hole and grabs your neck to force you to meet his eyes as he feels you flutter around his finger. A small whimper escapes you at the hungry look in his eyes and the second finger nudging at your entrance.

“I know you didn’t get this wet for him,” Cassian purrs, still staring into your eyes. It’s hard to keep them open as he pumps his fingers in and out of you slowly, but the look he’s giving you is impossible to look away from. 

Your free hand that had been on the table below you to keep you upright takes his hand at your throat and makes him squeeze. You gasp softly at the pressure and Cassian’s eyes blaze. He forces himself closer to you, moving his thumb harder and faster against your nub and forcing your chests together so that there is no space between you. Your eyes slam shut when he scissors his fingers to open you wider and you hear the noise of your juices echoing throughout the room from his movements.

His hand around your throat pushes you back against the wall so that Cassian has a better angle at which to see his fingers moving against you. His mouth waters at the sight of his hand glistening down to the wrist. 

You’re rising higher towards your peak, but not quite there when Cassian leaves you altogether. You cry out at the loss of contact and immediately open your eyes to glare at him. Only he’s no longer face-to-face with you – he’s down on his knees and propping your thighs onto his shoulders. Cassian licks his lips as you stare at each other across the distance of your quivering body.

Your heart beats erratically in your chest, and when he licks his lips it sends another flood of heat towards your pulsing pussy. “Tell me how much you want it,” Cassian murmurs as he kisses your inner thighs while still looking up at you.

“Yes,” you breathe, panting and squirming to get his mouth closer to where you want need it. 

“‘Yes’ what, Princessa?” he questions while blowing lightly along your slit.

“You. I want you,” you gasp out. “Now. Please.”

And that’s all it takes for Cassian’s mouth to finally close in and taste you. Your hands fly into his hair and your shoulders are bearing all of your weight as you lean into the wall for support. You tug and pull at Cassian’s hair, ensuring that he’s in just the right spot at all times. A harsher pull at a particularly good lick causes Cassian to moan into you and you nearly come just from the sensation.

He suckles your clit into his mouth and pushes his fingers back into you. You cry out at his ministrations and try to grind against him, but his arms are pressing you down securely and you can hardly move.

“Yes. Please – please. Cassian!” you chant, trying hard not to dig your nails into his scalp and shoulders as your hands grab onto him. You’re so close that you can taste it.

“Did you scream his name last night? Or were you pretending it was me fucking you?” Cassian nips your folds when you don’t answer immediately, causing you to jerk and moan.

“I-I didn’t– Ah!” 

Cassian once again pulls away from you, raising his eyebrows in challenge. You’re determined that this is the last time he leaves you right on the edge, so you lean over and grab him by the shoulders and haul him up to you. You wrap your legs around him to keep him in place and begin to undo his shirt.

You deliberately let your hands press and knead as you tease him, wanting him as needy as you are. Cassian grabs your jaw and kisses you hard as you reveal his chest. He treats you in kind by pulling the straps of your dress off your shoulders and below your breasts. He palms them with both hands, tweaking the nipples when you reach for his pants.

Cassian rutts into your hands as you work him out of the confining fabric. He’s hot in your hand when you finally release his cock and pump his length. He groans into your mouth again and moves a hand down to yours and pulls it away. 

You try to fight against it, but he guides your entwined hands to your center and makes you soak your palm with your own fluids. Getting the gist of his actions, you rub yourself with his guidance. You’re panting into his mouth as he continues to kiss you. 

You deem your hand thoroughly soaked and place it back on him. He pumps into your fist until his cock is coated in your essence. You reach your free hand around his waist and pull him into the crux of your thighs, guiding him to where you desperately ache to be filled. Cassian pulls your hand away from him and places it against his neck, while his other hand keeps him positioned at your entrance.

He edges into you and stops when he meets a slight resistance. He looks into your eyes for permission to continue, and you nod your head vigorously.

With your acknowledgement, Cassian thrusts in to the hilt. You keen loudly at the sudden intrusion, but the fullness quickly turns all discomfort into an overwhelming need. You open your eyes from where they had closed suddenly and see Cassian already looking at you. He grabs one of your legs to hitch it up further around his waist and uses his other hand to cup your jaw and lean you back against the wall.

Cassian follows you and leans all his body against you. Your naked flesh moves against each other when he begins thrusting into you quickly. You gasp and shake against him, using your arms to keep his mouth on yours as you climb higher and higher once again.

Cassian can tell that you’re close. He raises your leg even higher and places one knee on the low table you’re fucking on, causing him to reach such a deep angle that you see stars with every movement. He’s practically on top of you now, bearing all his weight on his other arm that is grabbing hold of the back of the table to give him even more leverage.

He uses this new angle to thrust hard, slow, and deep. Your eyes water as the head of his cock slams into your g-spot over, and over, and over again. You can barely breathe with all of the pressure against you, but you drag in just enough air in order to scream as your orgasm washes over you. Your arms and legs go rigid around Cassian, forcing him to stay close as he continues to pump into you.

He can feel you pulling and squeezing his dick as your walls try to milk every last bit of pleasure, which leads him to his own finish. Cassian comes inside you hard, groaning in satisfaction. He continues to push into you softly as you both ride the last waves of your highs.

Your legs lose all muscle control and the one not being held up by Cassian drops down against the table. You’re gasping hard, trying to draw in a breath that will allow your head to start clearing from its post-coital fog. You can’t for the life of you remember ever having better sex.

Cassian slowly extracts his length from you and you cry out at the hollow feeling. He chuckles darkly. He pushes the hair that had fallen into his face back with both hands, removing all contact with your skin. “You won’t forget about your ‘husband’ now, will you?” Cassian smiles ruefully.

It takes you a moment to process the thinly concealed venom in his words. You still in disbelief as you puzzle out his meaning. 

Wait… wasn’t that? Didn’t he–?

Your face burns with embarrassment at having been caught out. You’ll admit you were angry at your ‘husband’ at the beginning of this experience, but you threw your anger out the very high-rise window of this dining room as soon as Cassian kissed you.

You replay the words he had said during sex in your mind. You had been too busy at the time to pay much attention to what he was actually saying. He really thought you slept with that officer last night? A Rebel captain, sleeping with an Imperial officer? Who did he take you for?

You thought… but that look in his eyes when he entered you. The-the kisses and the closeness and the feelings. The intimacy that comes along with sex. Doesn’t he…? 

You sit upright and grab the fabric of your dress to cover your breasts. The movement of your hips causes Cassian’s cum to leak out of you, and you watch his eyes trail the droplet as it races downwards.

You don’t understand. You don’t.

Did he not kiss you because he wanted to? Because he has feelings for you? Or did he only do it out of anger?

Your feelings for Cassian have grown over the weeks you’ve been together on this mission, and you thought he felt a similar way. All the intimacy in public and pretty words – even if it has been a while – were they really just an act this whole time?

You stand slowly, feeling your eyes grow hot with tears to mimic the warm wetness between your thighs. You bite your lower lip as you look at the floor by Cassian’s feet.

“I–” you start. “I didn’t sleep with him…” You look up to see Cassian’s eyes widen a fraction. You can’t tell if it’s in disbelief or surprise. “You really think I’d do that?” You question him.

“I don’t know…” Cassian whispers, shaking his head imperceptibly. His hair falls back into his eyes, but he doesn’t make a move to fix it.

You look away from him and towards the skyline outside, avoiding his gaze. You tug your dress back onto your shoulders and wrap your arms protectively around yourself once again.

“I thought you – I thought we… I don’t have sex with just anyone, Cassian.” 

Your voice comes out as a whisper and you wrap your arms tighter around your chest. Your heart constricts in fear and anxiety as you utter your next words. 

“I really like you, Cass. I kind of thought the feeling was mutual…because of – you know.” You shrug your shoulders self-consciously. “I thought as soon as you... felt that I hadn’t been with anyone in a while, you stopped pretending to be mad at me.” You look back to him with sad eyes, tears threatening to fall any second. “We were pretending, right? Because we were jealous?”

Cassian repeats your name in a whisper, sounding like an apology, beginning to lift a hand towards you but seemingly thinking better of it. He closes his mouth and shakes his head in a definitive ‘no’.

That hurt. That hurt bad.

Tears overflow your lashes and a small hiccup leaves your throat, but you nod your head and turn to leave. You feel ashamed of the feelings you had poured into your love-making, realizing that he hadn’t felt it. Realizing that he hadn’t done the same.

You shuffle softly to the door, your steps quiet. Your shoulders rise as a hiccup escapes your lips. You press one hand against your mouth to stifle the sob that is sure to follow. You’ve nearly reached the door when you hear Cassian take in a shaky breath.

“She said she was looking to sell weapons and wanted to know if I was interested. I went with her under the assumption that we could gain ammunition for the Rebellion.” Cassian says to your back. 

His voice is soft. Pleading. Begging you to turn around and understand. Cassian doesn’t know why he had said those things to you just now. Why he had to go and ruin one of the best things that had happened to him in a long time.

He sees you pause in your steps, so he takes a deep inhale to calm his emotions before continuing. He needs to get this right so he doesn’t lose you.

If he hasn’t already.

“I did not mean to hurt you,” he begins. All of his focus is centered on you, so far away. “I can not begin to apologize enough for the things I just said to you. Because I was jealous. Very. But those words – that is something you do not deserve. It was uncalled for to act in the way I did. I was angry at myself for not being brave enough to tell you how I feel. For letting you leave with someone else when all I wanted… when all I feel...is...” Cassian shakes his head in confusion while trying to come up with the right way to say this.

You take a moment before asking the question burning burning between you. 

“...How do you feel?” 

You wring your hands nervously in front of you while awaiting Cassian’s answer. Your heart is racing and you begin to feel light-headed from the anxiety coursing through your body in anticipation.

You feel more than hear the quick footsteps that stop just a hair's-breadth away from your back.

“Like…” Cassian begins, struggling to find the right words to convey just how attached he is to you, “like the galaxy wouldn’t be worth saving without you in it.” A tell-tale warble in his voice sends a stab of pain through your chest.

There’s a light touch at your waist, like he’s afraid that you’re going to run away at the slightest movement. That touch sends the chill that had seeped into your skin burning away and leaves you feeling all the warmth that had disappeared when you sat on that table alone. You let out a sob before spinning around to wrap your arms around his neck and cry into his neck.

Cassian hugs one arm around your waist and the other around your shoulders so that he can cup the back of your head. He squeezes with all his strength and presses a gentle kiss to your temple. He whispers “I’m sorry” over and over while you shudder against his chest. “I shouldn’t have said the things I did. I should not have accused you of sleeping with an enemy when I know you would never.” Another kiss to your temple, then one to your cheek. “I let my jealousy overrule my thoughts. I am so sorry.”

You hiccup again as you turn your face to press your forehead against his neck and bring one of your wrists down to wipe the tears from your face. “We were both wrong,” you tell him. “I misread the situation and didn’t give you the opportunity to explain. I just jumped to my own conclusions and caused this whole mess. I’m sorry.” 

Your throat is raw from your earlier activities and your crying spell, but you feel so much better now that your feelings are out in the open and you’re communicating about how’ve you’ve wronged each other. 

Cassian pulls away slightly and moves his hand from the nape of your neck to smooth along your cheek to collect the tears that are still there. His eyes are soft and sorrowful as he sees what he’s done to you. He makes a silent vow to never be the reason you cry again.

“It hurt to not be near you these past days,” Cassian whispers, resting his forehead against yours. “We’ll promise to talk everything out from now on, yes? 

“Yes.”

You both close your eyes and breathe each other in.

***

You wake late in the evening, the suns a few moments from setting. You feel Cassian’s warm breath against the back of your neck and his whole body as he cradles you from behind. You smile at the closeness, once again relieved that you both apologized and confessed your feelings for each other. 

Cassian escorted you back to the master sleeping quarters when he realized just how exhausted you were after this morning’s events. He’d slipped your dress from your form and pulled the covers up around your shoulders when you slid onto the bed. He crawled in on the other side and moved closer, placing a kiss in your hair before wrapping his arms around you.

You can’t remember the last time you felt so safe. If the universe was kind, you would willingly spend the rest of your existence just like this. You turn over as softly as you can, not wanting to jostle Cassian. When you’re looking into his peacefully sleeping face, you can’t help but lift a hand and trace along his features with the back of one finger.

Cassian’s eyes open for a brief moment before closing again, a hum escaping his lips. You laugh softly at his unwillingness to wake up and continue your tracing.

“We should probably check on the status of everything,” you whisper. “We’ve been MIA for a while now.”

“We have, haven’t we?” Cassian’s gruff voice responds. He lets out a deep sigh and pulls the arm that was around your waist up to catch your hand. “Tickles,” he murmurs while twining your fingers together and leaving them to rest on the pillow between your faces.

What’s a few more minutes going to hurt?

***

This is not good.

Cassian had just called you over to review footage and audio that has been recorded inside your suite from the past couple of days. You noticed an odd gap of time between when one crewmate entered the hallway leading to your private quarters and when they returned. This in and of itself wouldn’t have been enough to warrant any worry, but you saw them slip a piece of your Rebellion issued surveillance equipment into one of the pockets of their uniform as they walked away.

There is no way some common staff member could have found some of the only evidence linking you and Cassian to the Rebellion. No way unless they were smart enough and trained in the same occupation as you. 

You’ve masqueraded as household staff enough times that you should have realized that this was a distinct possibility when hiring a crew to keep up appearances.

You’re barely getting over your shock as you move to watch the next clip of the Adarian’s movements around your quarters. You take note of every movement of their cranial aperture as they scan their surroundings for sounds. Cassian had risen from his seat beside you in order to confirm that one of your signal jammers had indeed gone missing and to then send an encrypted message to Mon Mothma and General Draven to let them know you are now compromised. 

Cassian is just returning to you when you come to the last holovid recording. He’s too riled to sit down again, so he stands behind your chair and lays a hand on your shoulder. You place your hand over his and worry your lip.

You watch as the Adarian closes their eyes and presses their head against a wall adjacent to the entryway from the landing pad. You're wondering what they could be hearing when Cassian’s hand grips your shoulder.

You look up at him and open your mouth to ask what the problem is, but he stops you.

“Look at the time.”

You furrow your brows and glance at the timestamp. Your blood runs cold in your veins.

“They heard us...” you breathe to Cassian as you tighten your hold on him.

“I mentioned buying ammunition for the Rebellion…” Cassian remembers out loud. Your lip is nearly bleeding with how hard your teeth are working it.

“Kriff,” you mutter.

Cassian flexes his fingers under yours before sliding back across the room to update the message to your superiors about your immediate removal from the situation. You ponder the implications of ending the mission here, now, and realize that if someone knew enough to plant a spy within the staff that the Rebellion hired directly, then they knew enough to be dangerous.

You stop Cassian before he can send for an escape vehicle. “This is the only one that has shown any subversive behavior.” You begin. “We need to follow them and find out who planted them here.” Your eyes bore into his as he takes the time to deliberate between escape and possible death.

Cassian finally assents. “They’re to finish their shift in the next standard hour, so we’ll have an opportunity then.”

You spend what little time you have planning the recon details with heads together and hushed voices.

***

The alias given by the Adarian, Sulet, didn’t turn up anything useful when the Rebellion ran the initial background check before they were employed, so you are now confident that this is a false identity. Their history is incredibly detailed and in-depth, so whoever they work for has good connections.

You and Cassian follow Sulet onto a hyperbus that takes you to another sector close by, where they are soon picked up by a private hovercraft. You have to commandeer a speeder left nearby, deftly connecting wires and slinging yourself onto the vehicle. The small seat has you pressed up against Cassian’s back and feeling his muscles move as he steers. 

Cassian follows the craft from a distance that still allows him to watch its movements, but not be detected by the passenger. The insane traffic pattern soaring between the buildings on different levels makes you glad that Cassian is the one driving and not you, since your eyes are watering from the wind. You have a hard time focusing on anything further away than Cassian’s elegant neck and windswept hair. You burrow your head between his shoulder blades to escape the biting wind as you both race after the hovercraft.

You feel the speeder slow as the hovercraft drops Sulet off at some upper level quarters. The prime location and size alone tells you that they have the credits to employ their own personal spy.

You watch from above as the Adarian looks around furtively and moves inside.

“What do you think?” You ask Cassian.

“It could be a trap,” he replies. “They were smart enough to figure out we’re part of the Rebellion, they had to have known we’d be able to follow them at any point in time.” He peers down at the unassuming penthouse below.

“Especially with that device and what they heard this morning after we… after.” You blush profusely at the memories that are only hours old and remembering how loud you were when you came on Cassian’s hard…

Stop it.

“We need to be careful,” Cassian murmurs. “Backup will not arrive for a while yet.”

You nod against his shoulder blade and have him settle the speeder down onto the same landing pad the hovercraft dropped the Adarian off. You grasp your blaster firmly in your hands, ready to defend yourself. Cassian follows you as you both dismount and make your way slowly and cautiously to the doors.

You settle either side of the opening and look into each other’s eyes, signaling your readiness after not hearing anything from inside. You both jump away from the wall and bring your blasters up, pointing directly into the darkened living space. There is no sign of movement, the Adarian nowhere to be found.

Sparing a quick glance at Cassian, he motions for you to search your half of the room. You nod. Creeping along the wall, you scan behind the sofa and nudge the window coverings.

Nothing.

You look over to Cassian and find him already looking your way. He shakes his head, not having found anyone either.

“I don’t like this,” you mouth. Cassian agrees with another head shake.

You’re just turning to face the closed door keeping you both out of the rest of the home, when the door suddenly flies open and there’s a blaster pointed right at you.

Your eyes widen in surprise. Your training kicks in and your blaster seems to aim itself while you dodge for cover. Your blaster isn’t the only one that had gone off – Cassian slams into the cushions behind you and rolls down to crouch on the floor with you, his blaster smoking.

Adrenaline is high as you and Cassian take turns to give covering fire as you make your way slowly back towards the landing pad and your stolen speeder. You’re hunched behind a sturdy end table, waiting for your blaster to cool off, while Cassian fires on your assailants. He’s positioned not far from you, his back to the exit to cover your next move so he doesn’t see the figure land just outside the doors.

“Cassian!” you yell desperately, reaching a hand towards him to drag him down and out of the way of blaster fire. Your gun is still too hot, incapable of taking out the figure that has the two of you pinned down. Your hand clutches Cassian’s shirt, twisting him and throwing him down to the floor on your other side. Unfortunately, his weight destabilizes your center of balance, causing your bent legs to give way and making you topple sideways over Cassian’s now prone figure.

A sharp pain slams into your left shoulder blade. You cry out, but still whirl around to fire, hoping beyond hope that your blaster has had enough time to equilibrate. A bright red beam soars from your gun and hits your opponent square in the chest. They go down with a soft thud, leaving your escape path clear.

You turn back to Cassian, planning to grab him and run, but you’re frozen by the look on his face and his hands around his throat. Cassian sputters as if he can’t breathe, trying desperately to claw at his throat to relieve whatever invisible force is closing his airways.

Force.

Maker be damned.

You move your eyes back to the doorway where all your adversaries had seemed to pour only moments ago. Bodies litter the ground, the Adarian’s among them, courtesy of your and Cass’s excellent aim, but there was one person still standing.

A familiar figure you hadn’t seen since you kicked her out of your ‘home’ at your first party.

Your mother stands there, one hand directed at Cassian, fingers curling inward.

“Daughter,” she greets smugly.

“Let him go.” Your voice comes out as a hiss, spitting venom towards the woman in front of you. You already have your blaster pointed directly at her head.

Your mother clucks her tongue. “Now, now, dear. You wouldn’t want to make me kill your husband now, would you?” 

Her fingers come closer together, and Cassian falls to his knees. Your heart twists in your chest at seeing Cassian in pain, but you dare not take your eyes and your aim from your mother.

“Stop.”

“Lower the weapon and I’ll let him go,” she croons with a smile on her face. She is enjoying watching you plead for Cassian’s life. You’re tempted for a split second to do as she says, but Cassian interrupts you before you even move.

“No. Princessa, no,” he gasps. “Kill her.”

Your eyes meet his, and you see determination blazing through him. His strength lends you the power to turn back to your mother and pull the trigger.

Instead of your finger squeezing the trigger, you feel it extending away. You curse and try with all your might to fire your blaster.

Tutting softly, your mother shakes her head.

“I was giving you one last opportunity, daughter.”

Her fingers close the gap between each other and Cassian slumps to the floor.

“NO!” you scream, panicked. You watch Cassian’s chest for any sign of movement, but before you can confirm anything, you feel your own throat being squeezed.

You gasp and turn your focus back on your mother, trying desperately to think of any way out of this before you, too, lost consciousness.

A short sigh leaves your mother’s mouth. “Look what you’ve done, now.”

“Me?” you struggle past your lips. “This is all you.”

“No,” she says firmly. “This is all because of you. Everything I do is because of you.”

Rage burns through you and your words come out icy. “Everything you’ve ever done is all for yourself, mother.” You take as deep of a breath as you can to continue. “Nothing you ever did benefited me.”

“I made you strong,” she growls.

“You abused me!” you cry. Big, fat tears drop from your eyes and what little breath you’ve been able to pull in leaves you in stuttered breaths. “My entire childhood was ruined because of you! My only solace, my only happiness, my only friends. You made them think I was dead!”

“Friends,” she scoffs, tossing her hair over one shoulder. “We don’t need friends. We’re better than everyone else! They should worship us, our strength, our power! We are above them!”

“No,” you whisper out. “We are not better than anyone. We are not anything! You! You think that way. You hurt and maimed and killed so many people because you thought it was entertaining! Because you thought it would teach me ‘strength’.” 

There’s blackness creeping along the outsides of your vision, all the air you’re expelling in your tirade causing a loss of oxygen in your lungs and brain, your heart pumping overtime to accommodate. You gasp big, heaving breaths as you collect yourself.

Your mother stands rooted, anger apparent in the severe set of her mouth and deeply furrowed brows. Her eyes could set the whole city on fire.

You know that there is no coming back from this moment – that whatever happens here, there will only be one of you to make it out alive.

The problem you’re facing now is that you haven’t used your power in years. Over a decade, maybe. The mental muscles you used in adolescence have atrophied in the years that you’ve pushed this part of yourself into the background, trying to forget. 

You pull with all your might, forcing your awareness to focus on your mother. You search deep within her, past organs, past muscle, past tendons. You reach into her cells, finding those miniscule particles she had taught you were the key to your powers. 

You call out to them. Asking, begging, pleading them to obey you. Wanting them to do something that will stop your mother.

Stop her from killing you now. Stop her from hurting Cassian any further – if it wasn’t already too late. Stop her from continuing on this dark path that can only lead to death and destruction.

You feel a rush when the little beings begin to vibrate. It begins as a quiet little shiver, but slowly builds.

Your mother’s eyes widen in fright, her focus broken between cutting off your air or protecting herself from you.

“What are you doing?!” she shouts, arms quivering. She can barely stand, her legs are bowing at the knees and she begins to sink down onto the ground.

The shivering envelopes her cells, vibrates her muscles, quakes her entire body, until she can no longer maintain her hold over you. She collapses forward, crying helplessly. 

The rage you’ve suppressed for your entire life boils through your veins, setting you alight. You feel good. Strong. Stronger than you’ve ever felt; the trials and tribulations she put you through growing up not even comparable to your feelings now. 

“Please. Please! Daughter, stop! Stop!” she sobs into the carpet, curling into herself as if to protect herself from a violent beating, from a violent person. 

But no other threat exists. Only you.

“Why?” you whisper hoarsely, voice barely loud enough to cross the distance between you and your pathetically weeping mother. “You never did.”

With a violent yank, you grab onto the essence within your mother, pulling it away from her and towards you.

She screams for a split second as the power leaves her body, and then she falls unconscious. All the power that once filled her now dances around you. You can feel the energy they house, their want of a new host, their preference for you.

You allow them in.

There’s a tingling sensation across your skin, a warmth enfusing into your blood. You shiver softly, close your eyes, and take in a deep breath. You feel at peace, calm. All your worries have disappeared knowing that your mother could never hurt you again.

A pained groan fills the silence that had settled around you. You jolt, realizing that you need to check on Cassian.

Feeling immensly guilty for taking so long but also incredibly grateful that he is still alive, you rush over to his side. He still lays on the floor with his eyes closed, but you see his chest moving rhythmically with each breath. As you place a hand on his chest, Cassian’s eyes flutter open.

You grin down at him, enjoying the contact as he places his hand over yours.

“You…” he breathes. “You did it.”

“Yes,” you say. “I did. Finally.”

Cassian smiles up at you, pride evident in his eyes. “I’m so proud of you, Princessa.”

The warmth from both the power and Cassian’s hand travels to your heart, filling it with love and hope for a long life with the man here with you. 

“Come on,” you urge gently, tugging Cassian into a sitting position so that you can help him stand. “Let’s get back to base so that you can rest.”

Cassian comes to his feet and you pull one of his arms over your shoulders, allowing him to place his weight against you. You both begin to shuffle away when Cassian turns his head to look back over his shoulder.

“What about her?” he questions.

You glance back as well to see the crumpled woman on the floor. You no longer feel any fear, or anger, or hatred towards her. You feel nothing at all.

“I honestly don’t care,” you reply. “When our backup gets here, they can take her or leave her. I don’t care what happens to her after today.”

Cassian reaches across his body and clasps your hand within his. He gives a firm squeeze, then interlocks your fingers. Placing a soft kiss on your temple, he urges you to keep moving forward.

As you both walk into the fading sunset, you see a picture in your mind. A murkiness around the edges trying to invade the focal point of the image. But that center pulses with an overwhelming feeling of love, and safety, and contentment. 

You and Cassian stand together inside the image, holding onto each other and never letting go.

#cassian andor x reader #cassian x reader #cassian/reader #cassian andor/reader #star wars #star wars fanfiction #rogue one #smut #angst #hurt/comfort #tw abuse

[musical-chick-13]

I think people who pick one character from AsoIaF/GoT to be The Protagonist are missing the point, because pretty much all of the characters think THEY are The Protagonist™ and that’s ultimately what screws them over.

(I also want to preface this by saying that that’s the reason I find these characters so interesting, and that this is not meant to insult any of them. I LOVE this story, and this is one of the many reasons why.)

Cersei thinks she’s the Villain Protagonist™ of a gritty drama. Even if it doesn’t make sense for things to work out for her, she assumes they will, seeing everyone around her as faceless idiots serving her narrative. Anyone and everyone will betray her because that’s what always happens in stories like this, so she won’t give them a chance to ever get there. People will move the way she assumes they will; everyone is predictable and stupid and shallow and cowardly. And as such, no one possesses the necessary skills to take her down. If she’s more ruthless and ambitious and paranoid than everyone else, she’ll get what she wants. But that’s not how life actually works, so all she does is alienate those around her, even necessary allies. People aren’t always predictable, not all of them are compliant or subservient or easily-frightened or incompetent. And if you prioritize ruthlessness and distrust, the people who aren’t those things aren’t going to see any reason to keep you around or give you aid.

Jaime thinks he’s a Cynical Misunderstood Antihero. He doesn’t need to work on bettering himself or de-internalizing his violent impulses, because he’s not the problem, it’s society, it’s people’s incorrect assessment of him. Look, he made a friend in Brienne, that must mean he’s not all bad, right? He thinks this story ends in a Public Image Rehabilitation, but he still conflates love with violence, and he still has a fucked up relationship with consent, he’s arrogant to a fault, he still insults Brienne (and just about everyone else) when the opportunity presents itself, and he never bothers trying to change that. And it’s all of this that prevents him from every truly becoming a good person. He’s so mired in this idea of being misunderstood that he doesn’t make a concerted effort to prove that he actually is. People think he’s an oath-breaker, that he has too big of an ego, that he doesn’t care about the people he swore to protect, and he thinks that simply going, “Yeah, but they don’t have the whole picture” is enough in and of itself to prove them wrong because, in a lot of stories, it is. But all his behavior does is cement his reputation as these things.

Dany thinks she’s The Chosen One, which means whatever she does is automatically the right decision. People will accept her rule because it’s hers, she deserves it, it’s morally right. All of her enemies are blanketedly wrong on all accounts in all cases. Her goals supersede anyone else’s because those goals are the way to a Happy Ending, and she doesn’t consider that other people might not see it that way. Many people’s gripes with her stem from gross places like misogyny or wanting to continue keeping slaves, but she forgets to acknowledge that some people’s issues with her might actually be valid. And that The Chosen One is actually a terrifying idea to people outside that person’s immediate personal context. She has three sentient WMDs, essentially. And if she thinks that using them is always morally correct, that the fallout from doing so can’t possibly be a problem because she’s using them and it’s for a noble cause, you end up with what happened in Astapor; and you end up with Drogon killing a child in Mereen and, eventually, her demise at the end of the show.

Sansa starts out thinking she’s an Optimistic Child Hero in a fairytale. This leads to her being held captive at court (she trusted that the authority figures were benevolent), writing a letter to her family that almost comes back to bite her to a deadly degree once her sister finds out in the show (she thought she could solve everything herself via a peaceful resolution), and to her trusting a complete monster of a boy until it’s too late (she thought he was Prince Charming). She thinks that being the Soft, Beautiful Heroine means people will love her and everything will end nicely and neatly, but sometimes instead of “love”, people just take advantage of you. And sometimes their reaction to your beauty isn’t innocent appreciation-sometimes you end up with Littlefinger. (Or Tyrion or The Hound who...let’s just leave it at “they have their own issues,” especially book-wise.) This morphs into assuming that a fairytale-esque betrayal will befall her with every new person she meets. It’s why she defends Petyr after his murder of Lysa, and it’s why she doesn’t leave with Brienne; if she’s going to be betrayed anyway, she might as well at least stick with a villain she understands.

Ned thinks he’s the Noble Hero in a typical fantasy series. He doesn’t consider everyone else’s capacity for cruelty or the idea that honor alone might not be enough. Sometimes there are no perfect choices, sometimes mercy does not give you the end goal you envisioned, and sometimes you can try your best and that can all be undone by one impulsive, unforeseeable action. You can’t honor your way out of ruthless political conflict.

Robb thinks he’s a Romantic War Hero, and thus everything will magically work out for him. His ideals and his marriage will conquer everything. But he broke a marriage promise to a powerful family, and that has consequences. The world won’t bend to his will, not even if he is doing the right thing or has noble goals, not even if he’s had war success, not even if the people at home love him, not even if he’s in love (show) or doing the most honorable thing he can (books). He thinks that being the hero means he can make it through Westeros without having to play the game, and he gets murdered for it.

Theon thinks he’s an Underdog Outcast Hero. He’ll come up from behind with an unsuspecting War Victory, and that will earn him respect, the love of his family, and a legacy he can look back on with pride. And that mindset leads him to murder two children, to drive away any allies and good grace he had at Winterfell, and the reason that the War Victory he imagined was so unexpected is because it’s completely untenable. He gets more and more desperate and it’s increasingly harder and harder to hold onto the control he’s managed to obtain. He has reasons for wanting this that make sense, and he’s been dealt a pretty bad hand in life, and he thinks that’s and his determination to overcome his personal identity struggles is enough to not only justify his actions, but ensure that those actions will be successful. And then his plan blows up in his face, he assumes he’s been miraculously saved (probably still having something to do with seeing himself as The Unexpected Hero), and ends up at Ramsay’s mercy.

Arya thinks she’s a Badass Heroine in the making, a skilled swordslady and Rebellious Princess who’s destined for more than this stuffy life of politics and dresses and formalities. But rebelling isn’t always enough. It doesn’t help with the Mycah situation, and she still needs to rely on others’ help in getting out of the city after Ned is executed. When she does try to embrace the “fully self-sufficient sword lady” idea while with the Faceless Men in Braavos, she is told to functionally discard her identity completely. She does an unauthorized kill because she, not her assassin-persona-in-training, wants to (though the victim’s identity differs in books and show), which leads to her being temporarily blinded and prevented from going on assassination missions, and outright forced to beg for food in the show. In the show, after being reinstated as an apprentice, she is tasked with killing an innocent person, refuses (rebels), and realizes that this life is one she can’t handle. She goes home, and her heading straight for her sword is one of the things that almost completely ruins her relationship with Sansa. In the upcoming Winds of Winter release, her chapter excerpt has her prioritizing revenge over her apprentice duties, and she remarks that her new identity is ruined with this rebellious action. When you rebel, there are consequences-this doesn’t change just because your intentions are good or because you are or think you are important.

Jon thinks, similarly to Ned, that he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing, that following The Code is paramount. He thinks that, because he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing with the maximum amount of good for everyone will always be a workable option, and that the heroic option will always yield the best result. This is why he thinks proclaiming his love to Ygritte in the show will end well (because love is good and conquers everything) and is, instead, shot by her several times. It’s why he doesn’t foresee a mutiny in either medium, which leads to his (temporary) death. (Let’s be real, he’s getting resurrected in the books, too, this is the one thing I’m sure of.) Because yes, everything is tense and he’s on bad terms with the Watch, but surely they wouldn’t go that far. It’s rough going, and he has to juggle the needs of several widely different groups of people, but he’s doing the right thing and that will win out; his conviction will protect him, at least for the time being while he tries to manage the bigger threat of the White Walkers. The real fight is with them, the mysterious overarching enemy, not within his own ranks. This is a story where everyone puts aside their differences to fight a greater threat-except for the times when it isn’t.

Even Catelyn isn’t immune, as she assumes that Petyr, since he’s her childhood friend, is invested in solving the mystery of what happened to Bran when he tells her the dagger used in the attack was Tyrion’s. Lysa is her sister, she can’t possibly be suspicious. She thinks the Lannisters are evil, her instincts tell her that they were behind everything, she’s the Protective Mother Heroine, so she must be right. But although she is to a certain extent correct, that’s not the complete picture. And this slightly-misplaced confidence leads her to arrest Tyrion, the retaliation of which is Tywin siccing his forces on her homeland, one of the major first steps in the upcoming political war. Then, her continued focus on saving her children-something that must take precedence because they are her children, and this is her story-leads her to taking Walder Frey’s supposed offer of a fix-it solution for Robb breaking his marital pledge at face value, despite House Frey’s reputation, and despite this neat resolution seeming far too good to be true. She’s so focused on the Lannisters-the Obvious Endgame Enemy-that she doesn’t consider the possibility of betrayal from the Freys. She thinks that the world is giving her a break-because she is so desperately looking for one, because she deserves one, because her family deserves one, and those are reasons enough for her to have one-that she doesn’t even bother to re-evaluate the situation until it’s too late.

Melisandre thinks she’s a Religious Hero, but she ends up burning a child alive and alienating one of her few remaining allies in the process (and Davos was barely an ally to begin with). She thinks she’s Doing What Needs To Be Done to serve her savior, but it hurts Stannis more than it helps him, and he just ends up being murdered by Brienne. This is obviously in the show only (at least at this point), and I don’t know if Stannis is going to burn Shireen in the books or not. Stannis thinks he’s the Lawful Hero, and thus, because according to law he’s the Rightful Ruler, anything he does is automatically excusable; he’s just righting a wrong. And in the process, he imprisons his closest friend, has a hand in murdering his brother (when kinslaying is one of the most universally hated breaches of conduct in this fictional universe), allies with a dangerous woman that much of his own court despises, and, in the show, murders his only child and drives away most of the rest of his remaining team.

They all think that, since they are the main characters of their own stories, that they’re the main character of the larger, overarching narrative. That having understandable reasons or sympathetic qualities or even just having a clear goal that they desperately want, that’s enough to cement their importance. And they think that means that they’re justified in everything they do, that everything will work out for them, that the consequences will be lesser for them than for others, because that’s what it’s like to be the main character. The whole point is that there is not A Protagonist™ and that maybe we should examine why a story needs A Protagonist™ in the first place and what that narrative tradition tells us. When GRRM said he turned down adaptation offers because they only wanted to focus on Jon and Dany, this is why.

#asoiaf #got #asoiaf meta #got meta #most of this is directly related to everyone deconstructing the archetypes they would represent in other stories #so I'm not sure how much of this is just 'deconstructing tropes' and how much of it is 'Main Character Perception Syndrome' #also obviously this isn't every character I ran out of room and honestly some of them like davos and brienne and maybe even loras #probably don't think they're The Main Character which there's a whole other essay in there about how they're The Good People #I personally think Bran never gave off 'I think I'm the main character' energy but I know haters will disagree with me on that #like...Idk his sense of self-worth kind of went away and he spent a bunch of time trying to get it back and figure out how to get by #in a society that now thought he was worthless. and how to get enjoyment out of life when his goals were no longer reachable #it read less as 'I think I'm more Important™' and more 'I'm just trying to survive man' but also I love bran I might be a little biased lmao #cersei lannister #jaime lannister #dark!dany #sansa stark #arya stark #theon greyjoy #jon snow #catelyn stark #robb stark #ned stark #melisandre #stannis baratheon #I take my life into my own hands by putting actual names in the tags but I talk about these characters and I don't know how else to tag #this to ensure people who don't want to see it won't have to see it #also for anyone wondering where tyrion is on this list: I was too tired to delve into this phenomenon regarding him because it is ESPECIALLY #prominent regarding him. and this post was already so long and talking about tyrion in this context probably would've made it TWICE as long #there genuinely isn't enough space in here to include him but know that I'm counting him too. most definitely #behold! a creation!

[blockgamepirate]

I know the no comment policy is Quackity's whole thing and I do think in many cases it's the smartest move

But in this case I really don't think it's a good idea, I worry that it's only gonna make things worse. This isn't just a bunch of drama or some kind of public scandal, this is an actual structural problem with the project, and Quackity himself obviously knows that too

It's fine if he doesn't talk to the public but at least some kind of message to the ex-admins, even if it's just "we'll contact you later" would help so much

As well as discussing with the Solidaires; they're not the enemy unless he wants to make them his enemy

I know he's still very young and inexperienced and I guess maybe he learned in law school that you should always rather shut up than say the wrong thing, which makes sense when it comes to law, but this isn't a court case (not yet at least) and if you're gonna have a company, you need to learn to negotiate with unions, and to work with people in general

Also I know people keep saying that we can't trust what the ex-admins say because they don't know what's going on but can we at least agree that they know that they've been kicked out and that they haven't contacted since? And that's already a problem, because if they want any of the ex-admins to come back some day, surely they should involve them in some way in the negotiations, right? And if they don't want them to come back then they need to at least let them know that they won't be needed anymore and give them some sort of compensation for the inconvenience

(Also from what I can tell it's not even about the money for most of them, which is all the more reason to negotiate because it might not even end up costing him anything)

What I really worry about is that he's gonna end up making all sorts of drastic decisions out of fear, and sabotage himself and the whole project, when the best approach would be to have a genuine and respectful conversation to work things out like adults

I've seen a lot of similar independent creative projects fall into similar traps and I genuinely don't want it to happen to QSMP

I'm concerned because to me, based on my experience, this doesn't seem promising right now. Yes, I don't know everything that's going on behind the scenes, but we do know that people are being excluded from whatever it is, and that's never a good sign, it's just gonna lead to more distrust and hostility

My point is, communication is good, actually. And so is teamwork. Cheesy, I know, but it's just true. And people tend to respond very well to being treated like respected members of a team. And they tend to respond badly when they feel disrespected, whether you mean to disrespect them or not. That's just something you need to learn if you want to be a good leader

This is not me hating on Quackity, this is me saying that I think he's making a mistake, and I wish I could somehow let him know that because I want things to work out well for this server I love

(Also, seriously, the cooperative model would work so well for QSMP, I really really wish they'd try it, even if Quackity maintains some sort of veto power)

#qsmp admin situation #qsmp discourse

[trlvsn]

i’m thinking about mvk right now wtf happened to him? why is he like that? who did this to him? what do you think his tragic backstory is i know he has one and i need to know right now

oh anon you're gonna wish you didn't send this ask.

what i think people often forget when trying to understand certain characters is that characters are a part of a story first and a person second. to understand manfred and some other related things, let's look at this from the beginning, specifically, from the first "evil" major character we get introduced to (and by evil i mean someone the protagonist opposes) - miles edgeworth.

miles edgeworth is introduced to us as the demon prosecutor, the guy who uses dirty tricks in court, is famous for being ruthless and thinks everyone should be punished, a guy who strives for perfection is his job as a prosecutor. that brings us to a point where we think miles edgeworth represents something the justice system overall should not be - biased, devoid of empathy, driven by a perfect record and a desire for a good career instead of the genuine desire to find the truth. the story could as well have made us defeat edgeworth because of that - that approach is not needed in the court, so we expose him for some kind of crime and get him fired, goodbye, who's the next character going to be? however, the writers make the decision to humanize him, make him not just a character that represents a wrong idea but a person who has a backstory and some good in his heart, a person with a pretty good moral code, actually, a nerd, a friend, a man. this is where we start to question what exactly made him like this - this is why miles gets a tragic backstory. he is meant to be explained, he is meant to be human, he is meant to be more.

so manfred von karma becomes the answer. he is the reason, he is the influence, the part of miles's life that made him like this and the part that he starts to oppose. manfred von karma is an asset, a tool we are given to understand edgeworth better and draw some conclusions: "hey, maybe the guy wasn't, like, evil and demonic, he was manipulated as a kid, you know". manfred is like a mirror of edgeworth, which is a tool one can see frequently in ace attorney writing. there are characters that represent one character trait of another character, hyperbolized and extended. damon gant is edgeworth's authority mirror, representing what could happen if miles went from cutting salaries to grabbing more and more power to himself. manfred is miles's perfection mirror (self-explanatory).

what do we get from this, then? manfred von karma is undeniably linked to a more important character, appears for one single case (if we don't count aai) and serves one purpose - get the idea across. "don't get too focused on perfection, kids! this is a job that determines other people's lives, and to manipulate the verdict in order to serve your own selfish purposes is yucky!". manfred is a symbol first, person second, that's why he doesn't get a backstory.

manfred von karma is not just a man - it's what every prosecutor could become. a prosecutor gets a high salary, which the game establishes, and that salary depends on the amount of cases won, or, if i'm wrong, one's reputation depends on that, and the reputation causes bias. in such an objectively terrible system any prosecutor would slowly go from "i'm going to find the truth!" to "i'm going to win", and manfred went there a little too much. manfred's backstory is his habitat, he is the product of the system. with every case won and every close call, every paycheck earned, with all the competition in the field empathy and common sense leaves him - it gets to a point where a penalty causes him to commit murder. he is not a sane person at the moment of the crime - he is quite literally delusional thinking it was some kind of fate that the gun was there. he is what happens when a man loses himself in his career, what happens when the law is about money and success and not fairness, what can happen to anyone and should not happen.

so, to me, manfred does not need a backstory, apart from the one i mentioned above - he on his own is one.

but let's imagine this is the real world for a second and ignore the fictional, ideal aspect of it all. it's quite definitely possible manfred was somehow abused, but do i think it HAS to be so? no. a person does not need to be traumatized or a victim to grow up shitty. he could simply be spoiled, actually, with all of the wealth he clearly has. to prove my point, imagine a scenario where you raise a child with nothing but praise. you give it all the love and care, feed it, cherish it, but a child is curious by nature. eventually, it will do something bad, like pinch you or hit another child. you, the universally loving parent, still give it love and feed it candy after it does the bad thing, and you continue to do so. with nothing but love and care, the child will grow up with a defected sense of right and wrong, selfish, entitled, unempathetic.

point is - i don't find a tragic backstory to be a necessary thing for manfred's character. i don't think he needs a backstory at all.

however, that is not to say i'm somehow trying to prove anon wrong. theorizing and coming up with explanations IS fun and good. i'm just giving my personal view of his character here.

#ace attorney #raysanswers #turnabout goodbyes

[ncfan-1]

Here, have some semi-disorganized thoughts, because the more I think about what’s implied about Lambert and Patricia’s relationship, the more I find myself side-eyeing… Lambert, actually.

(And to be clear, I consider Cindered Shadows and the information that arises from it questionably canon at best, but when it dovetails with what we already know from base 3H, it makes sense to include it. And when you’re talking about Patricia and Lambert’s relationship, you can’t really avoid Cindered Shadows, so here goes.)

First of all, as a disclaimer: I do believe that Lambert was genuinely infatuated with Patricia/Anselma. I’m not denying him that. It’s just… everything that comes after it that feels questionable. Because that doesn’t feel like why he married her, based on what comes next?

[That said, maybe don’t read if you have a particularly rosy view of Lambert. I don’t characterize him as a monster, not by any stretch, but like I said, I side-eye him hard.]

So you’ve got this banished former Imperial consort living in Kingdom territory. And she’s a woman of high rank (at least formerly, but her being the mother of one of the Emperor’s children is still going to be true, regardless of whether or not she is still regarded as one of his consorts), and upper-class Fódlan society as a whole is extremely heteronormative with all of the subordination of women that implies. So on the one hand: she needs to be kept according to her station, and that involves having her married so she can reside over a noble household once again, but the only man of high enough standing to marry her, a former consort of the Adrestian Emperor… is the widowed king. And on the other hand: she can’t be allowed to potentially run amok causing political strife in the Kingdom by trying to regain her old position (we don’t know precisely why Anselma was dismissed and exiled, but based on what we’ve seen of the Imperial nobility, it’s not unreasonable for Lambert and the Kingdom nobility to assume that she would be putting a lot of time and energy into trying to regain her former position, and it’s equally reasonable to assume that they’d want to stop her from doing that in Kingdom territory, since it could cause strife between the Kingdom and the Empire that they absolutely do not need), and the best way to keep her from doing that is to tie her down to a husband who can Control Her, but again, the only man of high enough standing to marry her, a former consort of the Adrestian Emperor… is the widowed king.

This does not feel like a spur-of-the-moment love match. It feels more like Patricia is equal parts charity case and quasi-political prisoner in Fhirdiad, with all of it smoothed over by having her marry Lambert, so that they can both avoid drawing ire from Imperial factions who wouldn’t want them sheltering Anselma in the Kingdom in a position of such high honor as being a part of the royal court (likely a large part of why she changed her name to Patricia in the first place, or perhaps why the decision was made for her that she’d be changing her name), and so they can avoid drawing the ire of Emperor Ionius, who by all accounts loved and favored her, by shutting her up in genteel imprisonment. Give it all a gloss of ‘new queen consort’ to appease the emperor, and give it a gloss of ‘her ties to her homeland have been heavily severed with this new marriage, to the extent that she’s even been stripped of her old name’ to appease those in the Empire who don’t want to see her come back. Patricia’s primary consolation is that her new husband is genuinely infatuated with her, and thus is likely to treat her well.

At least, that must be how it seems to her at first.

And I say all of this because some stuff that we learn about Lambert and Patricia’s marriage just does not make sense if you assume that this was a spur-of-the-moment love match?

First of all, Dimitri says outright in his and Hapi’s B support that “for all intents and purposes, [his] stepmother was completely cut off from the outside world. Suffice it to say few knew that [his] father had taken a second wife.” So first off… that doesn’t sound right for a normal marriage. At all. Even Dimitri acknowledges that the union between his father and stepmother caused a great deal of speculation; even Dimitri, who has a history of white-washing his past to make it all seem a lot rosier than it actually was, grasps that there was something not quite normal about this marriage. You would expect a queen to be engaged in charitable works across the Kingdom, you would expect her to leave Fhirdiad on pleasure trips, either with her husband or alone, but instead, it seems as though her movements were heavily curtailed.

Second, Dimitri states in his and Hapi’s A support that “although she was the queen consort, in truth, [his] father and stepmother were not even allowed the dignity of being alone,” further asserting that Cornelia constantly inserted herself between them. So you’re telling me that Lambert is so ineffectual that he can’t even ask, or use his authority as king to order, that Cornelia leave the room so he can be alone with his own wife? That doesn’t sound right for a man assertive enough to plan sweeping political reforms against the protests of a wide swath of his own nobility. What sounds a bit more like right is that Lambert doesn’t particularly care if he and Patricia are left alone together, and what suggests about the nature of their marriage is that Lambert is perhaps less her husband than he is her quasi-jailor.

Third, Dimitri will eventually admit that Patricia was fairly cold towards him. He states in his B support with Hapi that it was his stepmother who raised him, and Hapi notes that he shares many of her mannerisms. While it’s not fair of Patricia to be cold towards Dimitri, regardless of what the true nature of her relationship with Lambert may or may not be, if her marriage with Lambert was equal parts charity case and genteel imprisonment with a ‘queen consort’ coat of paint slapped on over it, I think it might explain her coldness. Patricia’s feelings towards both Lambert and Ionius are up in the air, but without a doubt, she loved Edelgard, her child. But not only has she been separated from her daughter for good and trapped in a gilded cage called “marriage” clear on the other side of the continent from her, she’s now had her quasi-jailor’s kid foisted upon her to raise, as well. Like I said, it wouldn’t be fair for Patricia to let her resentment regarding her position spill over onto Dimitri, but it’s still a pretty human reaction, and if things are as I think they are, then it unfortunately makes perfect sense that she has little to no interest in being a warm stepmother to Lambert’s son.

That brings us on to Edelgard’s time in Fhirdiad. We know that Lord Arundel, Patricia’s brother, abducted Edelgard and brought her to Fhirdiad during the Insurrection of the Seven, though the reasons for his abduction of his niece are murkier. Dimitri frames it in the Childhood Memories scene in ‘The Cause of Sorrow’ as Edelgard and her uncle being in exile together, and goes so far in his A support with Hapi as to state that Lord Arundel had sought asylum in the Kingdom. Edelgard herself frames it as an abduction, something that was done to her without her consent, let alone her father, the emperor’s, and again, though her uncle’s reasons for doing so are murky, I am inclined to think that Edelgard is in a better position than Dimitri to know if it was an abduction or not, so I am characterizing this as an abduction as well. Even if Lord Arundel was seeking asylum with his niece in tow, he did still kidnap her to do it, and we don’t know his exact reasons. They could be altruistic—Arundel trying to save Edelgard from being experimented on like her brothers and sisters—or he could have done it to seize an advantage over Ionius, as Edelgard was one of only a small handful of his children to have a Crest. We just don’t know.

We know from the Childhood Memories scene in ‘The Cause of Sorrow’, from Dimitri’s own lips, that he and his father visited Lord Arundel and Edelgard when they were living in Fhirdiad. But we know that Patricia didn’t find out that her brother and niece had been in Fhirdiad until after they were both long gone.

What?

Dimitri and Hapi’s A support frames Patricia’s predictably furious reaction as being all Cornelia’s fault. That Cornelia had planted the idea in her head that Lambert had deliberately withheld this knowledge from her, and that in reality, Lambert had been just as in the dark about Arundel and Edelgard’s true identities as Dimitri was. But I don’t buy that? Dimitri states that Arundel was seeking asylum in the Kingdom, and in order to be assured asylum, he would have needed to explain who he and Edelgard were, and spin some story to make this look less like an abduction. Edelgard is stated to strongly resemble her mother, as well; surely Lambert would have noticed.

And even if you believe that Arundel could have lied about who he and Edelgard were and gotten away with it, there’s still the fact that Dimitri found out that Edelgard was A) the girl he had known in Fhirdiad years ago, and B) his step-sister, before he entered the Academy, which would indicate that Lambert had known about it at the time. Again, Lambert is painted as being a very politically savvy man. At no point is he painted as being a dunce. So Lambert absolutely did know who they were, and he absolutely did conceal that information from Patricia. No tricks by Cornelia required! Likely all she had to do was voice aloud the thoughts already fulminating in Patricia’s own mind.

Dimitri dismisses the idea that he did this on purpose on the grounds that he can’t think of what his father would have had to gain from purposely concealing the knowledge from Patricia, but I can think of a few things. Dimitri doesn’t want to see it, because again, it contradicts the rosy picture he’s painted of his past.

The absolutely kindest explanation I can think of is that Lambert is perfectly aware that this is a political powder keg he has on his hands. Regardless of whatever story Arundel spins to him on why and Edelgard are in Fhirdiad, this is an abduction; it was done without the consent of Edelgard’s custodial parent, and thus he has a kidnapped Imperial princess in Fhirdiad. He has to be very careful about how he handles the situation—he could all too easily spark a diplomatic incident between the Kingdom and the Empire if he handles it wrong. It’s possible that he did not want to introduce Patricia to the powder keg out of the fear that she could be the spark that ignited it by understandably demanding that her daughter be given over into her custody.

But even this kindest explanation demonstrates that Lambert doesn’t consider Patricia an equal partner in their marriage. That’s probably not so unusual for noble marriages in Fódlan—again, upper-class Fódlan society is excruciatingly heteronormative, with all of the subordination of women that that implies—but he’s not even thinking about it in terms of introducing her into the situation to try and ferret out the truth of why Arundel and Edelgard are in Fhirdiad, not even thinking about the fact that Patricia’s brother and daughter might let something slip to her. Not only does he not consider her an equal partner, he doesn’t even consider her a useful tool.

And that’s the kindest explanation. Others include that he just straight-up never took her feelings into consideration, that he never stopped to consider her feelings on the matter for even a moment. Others include that he deliberately concealed it from her because he didn’t want Patricia to be reminded of her old life in the Empire, because he did not want her to reestablish her bonds with her old life. Whether it was because he didn’t want her causing political strife that could endanger the Kingdom, or because in his infatuation with her he simply didn’t want her to leave, that’s not clear. It could be some combination of the reasons I stated above. It could be something else altogether. It could be all of them at once, stitched together into some monstrous leviathan of the ways women are disregarded by their husbands in societies like these, and all of the suffering that derives from it.

This was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I used to think that Patricia had to be extraordinarily stupid to still trust Cornelia enough to go to her for help after she saw what she was doing to Hapi and was cognizant enough to be horrified by it, but nowadays, I think it’s more emblematic of how desperate she was. She wanted to be reunited with her daughter, and if she wanted that, if she wanted to be Anselma again, then Cornelia was the only person she could turn to for help. She had no support network in Faerghus. Equal parts charity case and political prisoner, she had none of the normal recourse against mistreatment. She couldn’t look to her husband for help. He had already demonstrated that he had no interest in reuniting them. Their marriage was a farce, after all.

And no matter where she lived, Anselma was never more than a pawn on somebody else's gameboard.

#Fire Emblem Three Houses #Fe16 #Meta #Anselma von Arundel #Lambert Egitte Blaiddyd #hello to the absolute hellscape that is Fodlan #and the tragedies that can arise from not treating other people with care and respect

[princess-of-the-corner]

Amnesia!Dabi: Twice (and assorted random thoughts)

I like to imagine that Jin ALSO ends up living with the Todorokis, or at least under their protection. Hell, maybe he stays at U.A.. Maybe Magne comes out of hiding to give them a hand. Who knows. But, like. Like, the Hero Commission absolutely want to throw him in jail. Like. A Hero Student got kidnapped. All Might has retired. The LoV is still at large. The recent upheaval - Kamino, the Togas trial, Toya, maybe a few information leaks - have really hit their public image. They are probably suffering a drop in public trust, and need a win (or a scapegoat). And like. I imagine they give it their best shot.

However:

1) By the time the HC get wind of it, Jin is at U.A., being treated by Recovery Girl. On paper, Jin has “surrendered” to U.A., just like Himiko and Dabi did, an incident the HC largely let U.A. handle independently. Like, did they want to get involved? Oh absolutely. But one of those villains was Endeavour’s kid, the other was a malnourished fifteen-year-old, they know to pick their battles. However, it’s created a pretty obvious precedent that U.A. can use.

2) Their big argument would be that Jin’s Quirk, combined with mental instability, makes him highly dangerous. Well, guess what, his Quirk is GONE. And they can’t claim ignorance, because there’s a pretty recent precedent for that too - Ragdoll. Her medical records probably shows her Quirk factor being damaged or something, and Jin matches (or might even be WORSE). They also could have Monoma try to copy Jin’s Quirk, to prove its really gone, cause he can’t copy what isn’t there. 

3) They still try to make an argument for mental instability. However, with U.A. in the way, they’d definitely need to take this to court, get a proper ruling on Jin’s mental health, prove that he’s a danger to others. Not only is he NOT a danger to anyone right now (except himself) the Hero Commission wants to avoid that as much as possible. Why?

Himiko’s trial.

Cause this is happening right in the middle of the Togas fighting U.A. about Himiko. And that Trial is making all kinds of waves. Like, I imagine part of the reason Dabi went public with his identity as Toya Todoroki, got himself declared “not dead”, was so he could testify in court. Like, yes, he probably could have as Dabi, but it’s most likely EASIER as Toya, if that makes sense? So not only is the public getting “Pro Hero Phoenix Rises From The Ashes!” they’re also getting “Toya Todoroki to testify in upcoming abuse case”. There’s media attention on what would otherwise be swept under the rug. It’s getting a LOT of publicity, and I imagine that the Hero Commission aren’t coming out looking too hot. Why?

So I mentioned some info leaks, right? I like to imagine that the mission Toya went on where he “died” wasn’t just any old mission. It was issued by the Hero Commission. Now, do I think anyone in the HC was part of AfO’s plan to yoink Toya? No idea, but not the point. Those info leaks were about that mission, so now everyone KNOWS that the HC sent Toya on the mission where he “died”. They also have the follow up stuff, which when looked at all together, seems pretty sketchy? Like, why this decision? Why send him alone? Why these heroes, they wouldn’t be great for search and rescue? Why only this long of a search? Hold up, is this autopsy dated the day BEFORE? Shit like that.

(Now, besides the autopsy, I imagine most of it at the time could be explained by “Enji is panicking, grabbing whoever is closest, and not really thinking straight”, but looked back on by the public who don’t have context, it seems REALLY SUSPICIOUS.)

So, there’s all of THAT, but I also imagine that the HC did, at some point, try to get an … “interview”, with Himiko. Like, to ask her about the League. I imagine Himiko, wanting desperately to please the Todorokis (they’re all heroes, if she cooperates, will they keep her?) says sure, she’ll do it.

It goes REALLY FUCKING BAD.

I don’t know who they send to ask questions, but whoever it is, is used to dealing with hardened criminals, not emotionally damaged teens. The “interview”*cough*interrogation*cough* ends with Himiko in a panic attack, Dabi ready to burn a motherfucker to death, and Enji ready to help him. The HC back off so fast they leave tire tracks, and are trying their best to mitigate the situation. Only maybe, perhaps. Himiko’s parents are just rich enough, just influential enough, to know some people in the HC. To find out about the interview.

WHICH THEY DECIDE TO BRING UP IN COURT TO PROVE THEIR DAUGHTER IS A CRIMINAL - I MEAN, THE HC THOUGHT SO, RIGHT?

The Hero Commission is scrambling to fix this, and to do that, they need a win. Or a scapegoat. But they also realize that it’s 50/50 whether taking Jin to court would even work for them right now. So, eventually, they back off, and Jin moves into the Todoroki spare room.

(Please note, all of this is just random thoughts, not sure how well any of this would work?)

*And now, for something, completely different*

So, in the manga, they state that (at least physically) Magne hasn’t transitioned yet. Just … hasn’t been in a place, financially or socially to do that yet, was the impression I got? I like to think that Magne, after leaving the LoV, still in some of her “fuck this shit” phase, decides you know what? I am stuck in a weird place, have no idea what I’m going to do with my life, but I want to be happy. Now’s the time to transition. When she shows up properly at the end to help fuck shit up, Katsuki takes one good look at her, and goes “oh. THAT’S what I want”.

*

If Miruko is already dating, or at least friends, with Fuyumi, what if that’s how Hawks gets pulled in to the Dabi/Toya thing? I like to headcanon that the two are pretty good friends (youngest proheroes, both have animal Quirks, both get a lot of shit from similar places), so when Miruko needs another Pro, she calls him, like, “K, I need your help, but you can’t ask any questions, you can’t tell ANYONE, and aren’t allowed to arrest anyone.”

-

Hell yeah hell yeah HELL YEAH

I just LOVE the Commission being hoist by their own petard.

We can also end up with some bonus info reveals when Dabi eventually remembers The Thing™. Because the Commission tried to cover that up and then cut their involvement when they realized it was a lost cause even though the problem technically continues.

Swinging to the Hawks and Miruko thing:

I think they both got dragged in differently because like. They’re friends but also the social circle is a circle if that makes sense? Like yeah they might’ve told each other, but Hawks got involved because he’s on the list of Heroes that Enji trusts to deal with this sort of thing. (And also in a more personal way Enji was slightly projecting and seeing Hawks as another kid, so  it’s like ‘ah yes tell the family he’s also family’. The Dabi situation quickly turns this into a ‘the only reason I’m not filing adoption papers is because he’s a future in-law now’)

But also Hawks and Miruko get along great and definitely talk about many things.

#submission #amnesia!dabi

[bullet-prooflove]

Long Distance: Peter Stone x Reader

Tagging: @plaidbooks @misscharlielulu @caracalwithchips @storiesofsvu @magic-multicolored-miracle @htariq @readingbookelf @cosmic-psychickitty @crazy4chickennuggets @im-just-a-mississippi-girl @1234-angelika @mysoulisasunflower @luckyladycreator2 @kabloswrld @xoxabs88xox @bport76

“You could come with me.” You whispered against Peter’s lips as you lay tangled up together beneath his sheets. His fingertips caressed the line of your jaw, his thumb chasing over the apple of your cheek as he looked into your eyes and spoke.

“You know that I can’t.”

New York was a step back for him. He had spent his whole life running from his father’s shadow, from the burdens the other man placed upon his shoulders. When he had moved to Chicago, he had been burying his childhood memories, reinventing himself. To go back would be undoing all of his hard work.

Choosing to be a prosecutor in Chicago felt like he was openly defying his father, an example of how the older man could have done better. He had always had a strong sense of justice, he wanted to prove that you didn’t have to play the politics, that there were other ways to help the people that needed it. His decisions were always focused on the law, he never shirked the guidelines and his conviction record spoke for itself. He played hardball in court, he knew that defence attorneys dreaded facing him because it meant they had to work harder, be smarter about their cases.

In the past you had told him that his dedication and fierce intelligence had been what attracted you to him in the first place. He didn’t settle for second best; he came out swinging from the get-go and you admired that. At the end of the day, he could hold his head high and say he had done his job to the best of his ability. He could sleep ay night knowing that, and on the nights that he couldn’t when the cases he lost haunted him…

He called you.

“I always like to check.” You whispered, your lips grazing across the corner of Peter’s mouth.

You didn’t make your desire for Peter to return to New York a secret, secrets had a way of festering, and you were always honest with him. You hoped that one day he would, but you didn’t apply any pressure, it was the way the relationship worked. Your career was important to you and Peter would never try to push you into moving to Chicago.

Peter watched as you slipped out from underneath the sheets and sauntered towards the bathroom. There wasn’t a part of you he didn’t adore, everything from the scars that adorned your skin to the freckle on your left ass cheek. You were confident in yourself, in your decisions, your choices and Peter craved that. It was one of the things that had attracted him to you in the first place. You didn’t give a shit what anybody else thought, you were true to yourself, and Peter craved that. He collapsed back into his pillows and stared at the ceiling as he heard the shower turn on. You were leaving in just a few hours, and he knew he would miss you fiercely. Maybe it was time to consider his options.

“Are you going to join me?” You called out from the bathroom.

Peter thought of you stepping underneath the heated water, your hands pushing your hair back away from your face as the water cascaded over your curves. He wanted this, he wanted to experience this each and every morning instead of snatched pieces of time over weekends, the two of you had off. Which, by the way, were becoming few and far between.

He stared at the closed bathroom door, and he knew he had to make a choice.

Love Peter Stone? Don’t miss any of his stories by joining the taglist here.

Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

#peter stone imagine #ada peter stone #peter stone x reader #peter stone #peter stone x you

[tamlinsimp]

Rhysand’s Manipulation 101:

Orange Highlight - Asking her to be the bridge between him and Tamlin to get SC to work with him is using Feyre as a pawn. He is using her for his own advantage. And Rhys inducing Feyre into an emotional state that makes his option a better choice and making her feel bad about herself is manipulation. 

Peach Highlight - People who say these things, “I know you more than you think,” make me wanna vomit. This is often used to establish a connection that isn’t there. To make their next “suggestions” more credible and valid. To make somebody think that they ultimately have their best interest in mind. No, Rhysand, you do not know her here. Because prior to this, you didn’t know her as a human. She hasn’t even figured out herself as a fae so how could you possibly know her? 

Tamlin, in fact, did not sit on his a/ss for 49 years. Never mind that he actively worked to break the curse, protected his land and people, fought Amarantha’s cronies and took refugees from other courts. He absolutely sat in Spring court listening to the birds sing. And again, Rhysand, the constant need to one-up and/or make Tamlin look bad is so obvious. Both he and Feyre knew Tamlin couldn’t do anything. He was stabbed with ash wood. His wound was healing very slowly because he didn’t have his full power. I doubt Rhysand forgot that, but it was convenient to selectively leave it out to make it believable that Tamlin did not do anything to save or help Feyre. Fake News, Rhys.

“Do not try to delude yourself that any of the fae will give a s/hit about your family across the wall” and here we go again with Rhysand devaluing Tamlin’s actions. Tamlin actually cared for her family much more than the other faes did. He warned and informed them as best as he could about the potential threat heading to the human land (Amarantha) and instructed them on what to do and where to go - all while Prythian was under oppression. I find it hard to believe that Tamlin wouldn’t have protected them if it came down to that.

Yellow Highlight - it wasn’t even officially established in this part, just yet, that Feyre had all of the HL’s powers, but I love that Rhysand was already working his way to use Feyre. You know, like a pawn.

Blue Highlight - that d/amn “choice.” Instill fear then give her a choice. Instill guilt then give her a choice. This isn’t a fair freedom of choice. The constant “it’s your choice” is emotional manipulation especially if it’s attached with strong emotional pulls & with the intention of establishing a sense of everyone else making decisions for her when that isn’t the case. 

Purple Highlight - Feyre framing herself as the ultimate victim. Let me explain why. When she brought up the whole title conversation to Tamlin, he asked her if she wanted a title. She said no. She doesn’t feel comfortable with people calling her a High Lady. Conveniently enough, right after that talk, Rhys kept pushing the idea to her that Tamlin sees her as inferior to him. Then he **magically** brought up her becoming a High Lady. That she CAN be a High Lady if she wants. WHOOSH. Smooth. Not really. You get SJM works here. 

This whole passage is Rhysand blatantly and skillfully manipulating Feyre. He presented several events that were emotional triggers all while she was vulnerable. This takes away any rational deliberation approach. He is casting doubt about her position in Tamlin’s life while inducing guilt should she ever choose it. He is misinforming her about what actually happened UTM to reinforce his negative perception of Tamlin, further discrediting his decisions as a HL. He is also exerting pressure by using her weakness (family and the mortal world). All to sway Feyre towards his given “choice.” Why couldn’t he reach out to Tamlin diplomatically without using Feyre as a middle? Why couldn’t he involve Tamlin in the decision making in needing Feyre’s help to find what HE needed, which was going to be used to fight Hybern anyway? It only makes sense to include him since he’s also a HL and Feyre’s partner. And if anything, Hybern as a threat should have been discussed with all the HLs before Feyre.  Nothing in this proposal is logical strategically and politically — and nothing suggests that it is with the intention to help Feyre. In fact, it comes off as a plan to eventually get Feyre. 

#anti rhysand #anti feysand #anti feyre #anti sjm #pro tamlin #acomaf

[lemonhemlock]

I'm a 'Martin won't ever publish another ASOIAF book' truther but in addition to King Bran being profoundly idiotic, Martin has major structural issues that are now too 'big' to 'fix' imo. Namely, the ages of the characters are ridiculous and are all wrong for where their arcs need to go. The characters on the show were aged up and even the younger ones grew up on screen so Bran and Sansa and Arya were at least into late teens/adulthood at the end of the show - one is 13 and other is currently 11 and Bran is like, what, 8 in books? sksksksksk Just absolutely disastrous.

The characters should have been in their mid to late teens at the start of AGOT, at minimum. Especially because Martin essentially treated them, and has them act, like adults. I'm sorry, but I don't think that man has any understanding between the mental and physical developmental differences between, say, a 14 year old girl and a 17 year old girl. Every character appears and acts like they are anywhere from 3 to 5 years older than they are.

Also, the POV structure, while interesting, has also been disastrous in actually getting the story moving because certain characters have to be in certain places for things to happen while others are just sitting around killing time.

Hmmm, I don't really agree about the POV structure. It functioned fine for three books and offered compelling court drama, battles, magical elements and intriguing plot-twists. AGOT / ACOK / ASOS are pretty well paced and I've even seen someone making the case that the series could even have ended in that point and would have been one of the best fictional fantasy experiments. I found myself agreeing and disagreeing. I think the ASOS ending would have still distinguished ASOIAF from other fantasy series in its toppling of the good-guys-win-everything type of wrap-up, but it would be way less ambitious than what GRRM ended up pursuing.

The pacing problems came about with AFFC/ADWD. And I'm not one to talk here, because I'm an AFFC truther and it's always been my favourite of the series, so my two cents on this is that Dany's Slaver's Bay plotline is too damn long. Tyrion is also taking too damn long to get to her. It's a drag. In the book she is supposed to solve the Quaithe riddle,* escape Vaes Dothrak, get herself an army + navy, make the decision to leave Slaver's Bay AND sail to Westeros, so that in TWOW she can fight Young Gryff, face-off the Others, become a mask-off tyrant AND get deposed? It's a lot.

I honestly think he should just give up the 7 book compartmentation, admit defeat and just add another damn book to the series to get Dany to Westeros and fit in his fAegon plotline. It's not like he doesn't have the pages. No one's gonna care if there are 8 books instead of magic no 7. But my guess is that he's hung up over some decisions he's made in the past and kept trying to make the gargantuan plot fit inside this neat box he envisioned - 7 books, King Bran, Caesar!Jon etc. It would explain why he tried a time skip between ASOS and AFFC and had to scrap it - it would make more sense for the Stark children to be older. But he characterized himself as a gardener-style writing who doesn't plan everything in advance and lets the story grow organically. In that case, he should make allowances if the story grew in a direction he did not initially predict and make the required changes! Maybe King Bran made sense when he first wrote the initial three-book outline, but that was a long time ago & many other plot points changed.

My advice is to just stop trying to make the plot fit the previous designs, stay true to the way the characters evolved and respect the themes you've painstakingly developed over the course of nearly 30 years. Otherwise what's the point? If your original ending doesn't fit anymore, think of another ending ffs. The show is irrelevant at this point, so what if the endgame will be different? IDK, I'd be thinking that this is my life's work and I have every right to do it justice. Perhaps that's what he's thinking too and why it's taking him so long.

I agree that the ages of the characters are ridiculous, but if a time skip really, really can't fit anywhere, it's better to compromise on the age issue and leave off with a teen monarch than it would be to impose a surveillance state in Westeros as the solution with all-seeing, all-knowing Bran. That's a starkly dystopic ending, if you ask me.

Not to mention that it clashes directly with the end of magic - how is Bran supposed to be the Tree of Sauron if there's no magic anymore and everything goes back to normal? On what basis does he even get to be king at all if he's just a regular boy? How will he even survive being pulled out of the weirwood net if magic leaves the realm of men?

*“To go north, you must journey south. To reach the west, you must go east. To go forward you must go back, and to touch the light you must pass beneath the shadow.” JFC, if Dany has to get to Asshai, I will fucking scream.

#ngl i think visiting asshai would be so cool but. do we have time for this??? #ask #anon #asoiaf #grrm #anyway whether he ever gets to publish TWOW nobody can say #but in any case he 100% will have extensive notes on how he planned the novel out #so whatever happens. we'll know sooner or later #also i'm like. this is his life at the end of the day #he has the right to write as little or as much as he wants #i'm sure there must be pages of correspondence with his editors about this or that #so the ending of asoiaf will not remain a mystery realistically-speaking #which is why i'm not a fan of prioritizing our own demands as readers #most 75-year-olds are in retirement not churching out thousand-page books

[synergysilhouette]

I miss Fictif, but it was far from flawless

I actually got into this series because of "The Arcana" (plus romance games don't often let you play as anything other than a female lead), but I found that even though I liked it's potential, it fell short a lot of the time, either romantically or story-wise. I'm obviously disappointed that I can't customize my character's appearence, but I think I'm in the minority with that one. Allow me to list my grievances and nit-picks with the app.

In general--Female routes are short and underdeveloped. I don't even romance women IRL, but this was just sad. Anika, Tess, Valentina, and Celia are the only female love interests to have solo routes while the rest are in one-route stories--and Valentina didn't even get a route before Dorian took over and effectively stopped updating the app!

"Two Against the World"--As much as I love Nicky, this story turned me off as a gay male player. The writing feels female-coded, and no acknowledgement of the stigma of two men being in a relationship in 1920s New York is ever mentioned. It'd make more sense if the setting was INSPIRED by 1920s New York, but in reality was a completely different location--but that wasn't the case. It felt like a big mifire in storytelling.

"Heir to Love & Lies"--I cannot overstate how much of a disappointment this story was. In both Sergio and Chava's route, Chava starts off very friendly and sweet before becoming aggressive and secretive. This doesn't really make any sense since he's your childhood best friend and (spoiler) he doesn't kill La Dama Rosa in either route. Plus in Chava's route, Aurora becomes very cruel and blames us for getting her family (re)involved with the cartel, even though in actuality she involved us--a point Chava tells us to let go, and then we apologize. For what?! And the end of Sergio's route is confusing, as you go through a dream sequence where he either kills you and takes your money or you get him arrested for killing La Dama Rosa. I think it's supposed to represent your fears and mistrust of him and symbolize how you need to let your concerns go if you wanna marry him, but it feels uncomfortable since it's not explained well at all. It felt like we just saw the future and we said "I don't care." Plus he asks us stuff about kids, our wedding, and where we'd live, and he took NONE of my decisions into account for the final chapter.

"Roadkill"--I was SO confused on what was the result of the wish and what wasn't. Did Douglas' wish create werewolves, vampires, and witches along with zombies? Or did they already exist before the zombie wish? If it's the latter, there's no need to involve zombies. Plus Howie's amnesia arc in the last chapter was rushed and unnecessary, while Poe came off as judgmental and snarky and Tess' route was short and rushed.

"Catch Me in Miami"--I couldn't get into Miguel because he was so obviously a bad boy and I don't do bad boys. Maybe if he was more coy about it like Nicky than being obvious about it, I'd be into him.

"For the Love of Gods"--Great potential, but rushed and I DESPISE how we're forced to romance everyone. Why can't I just choose how many people I'm interested in?

"Ghosted"--Probably my least favorite story. Jesse's ghost story does sound interesting, but his personality and how rushed it was ruined it for me.

"Hollywoodland"--Rushed, but it had great potential.

"Snow Falling in Love"--It felt like a waste not to tie this with "Roadkill" due to Sawyer's involvement, and Elise was CRAZY obsessed with us.

"Courting the Crown"--Beautiful Potential, but again, rushed, rushed, rushed.

"The Last Legacy"--Probably the best plot of them all, but Felix and Sage weren't my type physically or personality-wise; I'd rather go for Felix's dads.

I didn't include other stories because they either weren't finished or I didn't complete them.

#fictif #dorian #nix hydra #the arcana

[earlgreytea68]

I Read West Virginia v. EPA So You Wouldn’t Have To

I told you I hadn’t forgotten these!

People have been referring to this as the climate change case, basically, shorthanding it that the Supreme Court made it more difficult for the EPA to manage climate change. I think that this is true, but it’s a case that is reasoned in such an incredibly byzantine way that the reason it’s harder for the EPA to manage climate change is because this opinion is so impossible to comprehend that the EPA no longer has any idea what it can and cannot do.  

At issue in the case is a rule that the EPA established in 2015 known as the Clean Power Plan. Under the plan, the EPA was trying to shift from coal-fired plants to natural-gas-fired plants, in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, as we all know is important for climate change. This would be expensive for coal plants, of course. If they couldn’t convert to better standards, they’d have to close down. People could lose their jobs. The rate of electricity could go up. We also might save the planet, but, you know, details.  

Almost as soon as the EPA established the rule, the Supreme Court blocked it from being enforced, in a move the dissent calls “unprecedented.” And then Donald Trump was elected and we decided to destroy as much of the environment as possible so the Clean Power Plan went away. The way it went away was the EPA suddenly decided that it did not have the authority to establish the Clean Power Plan. So the EPA tossed out the Clean Power Plan in favor of a different rule that would allow coal-fired plants to happily keep puffing along.  

A bunch of states complained. They said the EPA shouldn’t have tossed out the Clean Power Plan. They said they didn’t understand why the EPA had suddenly decided it wasn’t in their authority. So they went to court. The court said basically, “What the hell is the EPA up to?” and told the EPA to get its act together. It told it to go back and reconsider the Clean Power Plan. Then Biden was elected. The EPA didn’t actually put the Clean Power Plan back into effect. Instead, it was thinking about coming up with a completely new plan. (Part of the reason for that is that the power-source-shifting kind of happened a great deal already in the years that squabbling was happening over the Clean Power Plan, so the EPA was kind of like, “…we don’t need that plan anymore because its goals have been largely accomplished.” [It wasn’t super-revolutionary, despite how the Supreme Court characterizes it.] However, we don’t learn all of this stuff about the success of the “Clean Power Plan” while it wasn’t even implemented until the dissent tells us. The majority opinion makes it sound like the Clean Power Plan is so incredibly radical it must be stopped. It’s…already done.)

Enter the Supreme Court…somewhat weirdly. In fact, the first part of the Supreme Court’s decision is dedicated entirely to justifying the fact that it’s even making this decision. Like, the whole time the Supreme Court has been WEIRD about the Clean Power Plan. GEE, I WONDER WHY. I bet it doesn’t have anything to do with a bunch of conservatives who don’t believe in climate change being on the Court, though! Basically, this entire opinion seems to be just setting up the Supreme Court as the ultimate authority in what the EPA can do to affect climate change.  

So, anyway, the first part of the decision is explaining why the Supreme Court is allowed to make this decision. The Government argues that nobody has “standing” to bring the case. Standing is a legal concept that states that cases can only be brought by people who have some kind of interest in them. That makes sense, of course! You wouldn’t think that very often people would go to court who don’t have some kind of interest in the outcome, after all. But, anyway, the court system (all of them, not just the Supreme Court) just likes to make sure that you’ve got a reason to bring this case and you’re not trying to do something sketchy. So that’s the Government’s contention here: that no one has any reason to bring this case and this is all kind of sketchy. Basically, the Government’s like, Look, the EPA has decided not to go ahead with the Clean Power Plan, so why is this Court deciding anything about the Clean Power Plan??? It’s irrelevant.  

And therein, the Court claims, lies the problem with the Government’s argument: it’s not a standing argument, it’s a mootness argument.  

………Really?????

Yup, it’s a technicality. The Government argued standing and should have argued mootness. I think. But, lest you think the Government totally messed up here, the Court says the case isn’t moot just because the EPA has said it’s not going to implement the Clean Power Plan. The Court thinks this is just a ruse and once the case is dismissed, the EPA will immediately implement the Clean Power Plan.  

It is true that sometimes courts really worry about that possibility, but other times courts are like, …well, only an idiot would come in and lie to me about this. Like, if the EPA did exactly that, I would have to assume the Supreme Court would listen to any complaint that comes from it. They’ve certainly been extremely interested in suppressing this Clean Power Plan so far. And anyway, there is literally no reason for the EPA to say it’s not going to implement the Clean Power Plan and then turn around and implement it because...THE CLEAN POWER PLAN’S TARGETS HAVE ALREADY BEEN ACHIEVED. But we don’t learn about that until the dissent. The majority makes it sound like any minute now that dastardly EPA is going to twirl its mustache and admit that it was lying the whole time and it’s going to put the plan back into effect.  

Anyway, the Court here says: no standing issue, and not moot, I can totally make this decision.  

And the decision is: The EPA did not have authority to establish the Clean Power Plan.  

Okay, a little admin law: Federal agencies have authorizing statutes that set the parameters of what they’re supposed to be doing. This is to make sure that agencies don’t run amok. Like, the Federal Communications Commission should not be passing environmental rules, and the Environmental Protection Agency should not be regulating the internet. So, there are all these rules about making sure that agencies don’t overstep their boundaries. I have to confess that I didn’t take admin law in law school, so this is just everything I’ve gleaned over the years.  

The Supreme Court says that this is a situation where what the EPA has done is so extraordinary and of such significance that it can’t possibly be the case that Congress meant for the EPA to be able to do that. This is called the “major questions” doctrine. The EPA would have had to prove to the Supreme Court, under the doctrine, that Congress had clearly intended for the EPA to be able to do something like what it tried to do with the Clean Power Plan. And the Supreme Court says, …nope.

Okay, that’s the basic outline but the rest of the opinion is so esoteric to me, I really struggle to follow what they’re saying. It’s something about how the EPA used to understand that its job was to reduce pollution by causing existing power stations to operate more cleanly, and not to reduce pollution by shifting away from existing power stations toward cleaner ones. And that means that the only way Congress has authorized the EPA to reduce pollution is by maintaining coal power plants, apparently? Because the problem is that there is nothing coal power plants could do to put them into compliance with the Clean Power Plan; the point of the plan is to reduce their existence, and that, according to the Court, goes beyond what Congress intended the EPA to be able to do. 

The problem, to the Supreme Court, is the EPA’s plan is “broad” and “forward-thinking.” And we can’t have any of that, now, can we! The Supreme Court thinks the EPA’s mission is not to reduce pollution but rather just to regulate our existing pollutors, basically. They can regulate them somewhat, but not in any way that would be too upsetting to them. When the EPA tried to reduce pollution in a way that threatened coal power-plants, that was too revolutionary for the Supreme Court to handle.  

The Supreme Court says that, in shifting the power grid, the EPA is trying to get around Congress. Congress is the entity that should make the decision to shut down coal, not the EPA. And, here, the Clean Power Plan is apparently a plan that Congress failed to pass several times. So the Court’s like, If Congress can’t get it done, the EPA’s not allowed to just get it done by itself.  

The EPA argues, though, that, under its authorizing statute, Congress has ordered it to come up with “the best system of emission reduction.” And the EPA says that it’s done just that. There’s nothing in the statute that “the best system” has to maintain existing power plants.  

The Court says, no, actually, the Clean Power Plan isn’t a system of emission reduction. 

Just because it’s a system to reduce emission does not mean it’s a system of emission reduction. I honestly don’t know what to make of that Dr. Seuss sentence. And it’s the end of the paragraph! So apparently the Court doesn’t think it needs further elucidation, Idk. Like, this is why I said that this is such a byzantine case, because I don’t really understand how the reasoning goes. The key provision is Section 111, which never seems to get quoted in full for some reason so I can only “read” it through how it gets selectively quoted. (I could go track the statute down, but I think Supreme Court opinions should be understandable without me having to track down other sources.) As best as I can figure, Section 111 tells the EPA to make “categories of stationary sources” that cause or contribute to dangerous air pollution. After making these categories, Section 111 then tells the EPA to create standards of performance for these sources of air pollution. Under Section 111, these standards should be developed by looking at the “best system of emission reduction” (which the Court shortens to BSER), which will take into account cost.  

Okay, that seems to be it. According to the Supreme Court’s actual majority opinion, the goal of Section 111 is to keep air pollution regulated by the best system: 

Alright, so, having read the statute, we can now see that the EPA decided that the best way to reduce air pollution was to shift from coal to other less harmful means of power production. But then – Section 111(d) suddenly comes into play. Again, it’s never quoted in full, but I think that it seems to allow the EPA to regulate existing power plants? Because apparently the rest of the Section 111 is only about new power plants? I think it has to do with…if we figure out that something is dangerous and we didn’t know it was dangerous, the EPA can set standards about it, but…only for new sources of power????

Honestly, I keep reading this and re-reading this and I don’t think I’m being helpful at all. This clearly requires someone who’s an actual environmental attorney who understands this stuff who can explain what’s going on here. According to the Court, the EPA has only regulated existing power plants, like, five times in the past fifty years???? How can that be???? Is that true???? I mean, I guess that’s why our environment is such a mess, because if you’re an existing power plant apparently the EPA just…leaves you alone???? Honestly, I do not understand this system as explained by the majority at all.  

But I think I’m right in my reading of it, because then the Court explains that, in the Clean Power Plan, the EPA had decided to regulate carbon dioxide emissions (I guess we didn’t do this until 2015?????? God, I have no idea, this is all unbelievable to me) and once it decided to do that, it had to set standards – different standards, apparently, for new vs. existing power plants. 

Okay, so, the EPA looked at existing coal plants and was like, You know what? These are basically as clean as we can make them. We can’t get them to be much better about carbon dioxide. And we need them to be much better, because coal plants are releasing too much carbon dioxide into the air. So, because natural gas plants would produce much less carbon dioxide, the EPA said that the existing coal plants would need to shift to natural gas plants. The next step was to then shift the natural gas plants to wind or solar. This, the EPA says, was the best system for reducing emissions.  

It would also, obviously, be very disruptive to coal plants. The expressed goal of the program was to get rid of coal power plants, period, end of story. As soon as the EPA proposed the program, as I mentioned above, the Supreme Court shut it down, then Trump got elected. The EPA under Trump decided that the Clean Power Plan went too far because shifting the electric grid away from coal wasn’t a “system for reducing emissions.” A “system for reducing emissions” could only be, like, a new design for a building? Or something? Anyway, the EPA replaced the Clean Power Plan with the Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) Rule, which would upgrade equipment at coal power plants to help make them more efficient but wouldn’t try to shift the electrical grid over to less polluting sources. This would not really reduce carbon dioxide at all, as the majority opinion just bluntly says.  

Now, a number of states who were worried about climate change immediately protested and wanted the Clean Power Plan back, pointing out that this new ACE Rule wasn’t going to do much of anything at all. The lower court said that it didn’t know why the EPA thought it couldn’t shift the power grid, that was definitely allowed under Section 111. Then Biden got elected. The EPA said basically, “Hang on, we’re looking things over and trying to figure out where to go next.”  

…And then the Supreme Court, for no real reason other than they want to make it very clear how much they don’t believe in climate change – or don’t believe in administrative authority – or don’t believe that agencies should act unless the Supreme Court has personally approved them – swooped in.  

And the Supreme Court said yeah, always every other time, the “best system for reducing emissions” was just helping power plants operate more cleanly. This is the first time the EPA has announced that it can change the type of power plant. And the Supreme Court thinks that’s just too much. The Supreme Court says that Congress wanted the EPA to focus on technologies to improve air pollution, and not address the causes of the air pollution themselves. The Supreme Court thinks Congress should decide whether the power grid shifts and how.  

And it’s true that what the EPA is proposing is a “system,” but that doesn’t mean it’s the right kind of system. But I…don’t understand why. Idk, you can read for yourself and see if you get farther than I do. 

I mean, I think, if I’m reading that right, that the problem is that they don’t think Congress really meant to give the EPA the ability to establish a system. Even though…that’s exactly what the statute said. The Government argues, hang on, I don’t understand then. Are you saying, Supreme Court, that the EPA can only come up with systems that keep coal power plants in existence? And the Supreme Court says, We’re not answering that question. We’re only telling you that you can’t do this.  

Apparently, the Supreme Court wants to be able to weigh in every single time the EPA makes a decision to say what it thinks about it. The dissent points out, like, this is really restrictive of the EPA, because it gives them no guidance and makes everything subject to Supreme Court review. And the majority opinion spreads its hands out innocently and says, What?! Are you accusing me of interfering with the EPA?! You’re saying that I haven’t told them a bunch of stuff they can’t do! How can that be restricting them?  

This is so disingenuous, and we know that, because we don’t allow vague laws because we know people will over-police their behavior when they’re not sure what they can and cannot do. And that’s exactly what the Supreme Court does here. It gives zero real explanation what its definition of “system” is, just that it’s not this system.  

A standard feature of the liberal dissents over the past term is that they actually talk about, like, facts, and the present day. The Supreme Court’s majority opinion mentions climate change, like, twice. Which is a feat given it’s an opinion about environmental regulations. But, anyway, the dissent is pretty straightforward: We’ve got climate change, so we implemented a statute for the EPA to deal with it using the “best system.” Ta-da! Here it is. I mean, that’s really all I need to summarize what the dissent says. It backs up its argument with lots of citations, of course, but that’s basically the argument. The dissent notes that other sections of the EPA’s authorizing statute limit what the EPA can do to just fiddling around with technologies. So, if Congress wanted to put that limit into this part of the EPA, it knew exactly how to do it. This is a rule of statutory construction, meaning that it’s generally accepted that this is how we interpret statutes: If they did it somewhere else and not here, that must mean they didn’t want it here. The dissent points out that the majority doesn’t really explain why that rule of statutory construction doesn’t apply here.  

There’s a lot of stuff in this case about this “major questions doctrine.” The majority says it’s a doctrine they have that basically lets them interpret statutes differently, ignoring the usual rules of statutory construction / interpretation (sorry, in law “construction” and “interpretation” mean the same thing and can be used basically interchangeably, which is probably confusing outside of law oops). The dissent says there’s no such thing as this major questions doctrine. I really don’t know who’s right (but my money is on the dissent). But, at any rate, the dissent just doesn’t think the EPA is doing anything wild with the Clean Power Plan: It’s trying to regulate the environment, which is its whole job. 

That’s how the majority opinion characterizes it. But the dissent says, eh, that’s not really true. It actually wouldn’t have had any impact. The Clean Power Plan never went into effect, but the industry still exceeded the target it had set, all on its own, shifting the grid away toward clean power sources. In fact, the dissent informs us that the power industry itself is on the side of the EPA. Which means that this case isn’t even about trying to make money, because surely the power industry wants that. But the power industry agrees with the EPA’s Clean Power Plan! They’re not complaining about it! This case literally just seems to be about wanting to be cruel and vicious.  

The problem with this decision is its incredible vagueness. Its main justification for its ignorance of all of the usual rules we use to handle these questions is how revolutionary the Clean Power Plan is, which the dissent says isn’t even true. But then it follows that up, after throwing all the rules out the window, with zero actual helpful guidance as to what the EPA is allowed to do. For instance, the dissent points out that the majority says the Clean Power Plan would put coal plants out of business, and that’s not allowed under Section 111. But that’s not the majority’s holding. The majority doesn’t say, “The EPA is required to keep coal plants in business.” The majority says, “The EPA can only regulate technology to help make coal power cleaner.”  

But the dissent says, what if the way the EPA regulates the technology makes it so expensive to comply with that coal power plants would be forced to shut down? Is that allowed under the majority’s reasoning? Strictly speaking, yeeeees, it’s the EPA regulating technology, just as the majority said they should. BUT the majority was offended that the EPA might put coal power plants out of business, so it seems as if they would block the EPA doing that. And they would do that by coming up with some other weird reading of the statute that would probably narrow the definition of “technology” or something. The point is: Who knows what the EPA can and cannot do anymore?  

#long post #law #west virginia v epa

[the-savage-garden]

Nitpicking ACOWAR Ch 18

This chapter is just a continuation of the dinner from the previous chapter. More info-dumps and repeats like before. Messy and confusing worldbuilding. This is also where I realized why Nesta is such a hot button for Feyre stans (even though Feyre just blatantly tells Nesta she wants to use her trauma with Hybern for political gain in front of everyone, yikes).

Chapter 18

-[“Please don’t say we need to go to the Court of Nightmares,” Cassian grumbled around a mouthful of food.] I’m having bad flashbacks of that writing mess from ACOMAF. Ugh.

-[“What is the Court of Nightmares?” Nesta demanded.] Why is Nesta demanding to know this exactly? I’m guessing so that we can awkwardly explain the backstory.

-For some reason Lucien answers Nesta’s question. The rest is just the other characters info-dumping about the Court of Nightmares.

-Nesta is confused by all of this and I relate to that.

-Mor looks upset when her father is brought up and Azriel is hung up on her reaction.

-Excuses for why the NC can’t order around the Court of Nightmares. Rhys says his ancestor made the decision that the Court of Nightmares remain in that mountain and can’t bother the NC and also have the right to decide to assist them in war. I know it’s stated that they’re ‘subcourts’ but this almost reads like they were 2 distinct courts before, not sure if that’s the intent though.

-[“The steward of the Hewn City is legally entitled to refuse to aid my armies,” Rhys explained to Nesta, to me. “It was part of the agreement my ancestor made with the Court of Nightmares all those thousands of years ago. They would remain within that mountain, would not challenge or disturb us beyond its borders … and would retain the right to decide not to assist in war.”] I’m copy-pasting the quote just in case.

-[“And have they—refused?” I asked. Mor nodded gravely. “Twice. Not my father.” She nearly choked on the word. “But … there were two wars. Long, long ago. They chose not to fight. We won, but … barely. At great cost.”] Keeping note of this.

-[“We leave in two days,” Rhys said. “He’ll say no,” Mor countered. “Don’t waste your time.”] Wait, didn’t Rhys injure Keir in ACOMAF? Why exactly would he listen to Rhys at all?

-[“Then I shall have to find a way to convince him otherwise.” Mor’s eyes flashed. “What?”] I don’t like where this is going already.

-[“He fought in the War,” Rhys said calmly. “Perhaps we’ll be lucky this time, too.”] Which war? 3 were literally brought up, why just write “the War”?

-[“There will be new rules.” “You will not be in a position to make rules, and you know it,” Mor snapped. Rhys only swirled his wine again. “We’ll see.”] Rhys is both an asshole and an idiot.

-[I glanced to Cassian. The general shook his head subtly.] If Cassian is friends with Feyre why is she internalizing him as ‘the general’?

-[The shadowsinger held her stare, his face unreadable. Considering. I tried not to hold my breath. Defending the female he loved or siding with his High Lord … “It’s not my call to make.”] Is… is this the reason we’re getting this argument in the first place? Because of relationship drama?

-[“That’s a bullshit answer,” Mor challenged. I could have sworn hurt flickered in Azriel’s eyes, but he only shrugged, his face again a mask of cold indifference. Mor’s lips pursed.] And it continues.

-[“You don’t need to come, Mor,” Rhys said with that calm, even voice. “Of course I’m coming. It’ll make it worse if I’m not there.” She drained her wine in one swift tilt of her head. “I suppose I have two days now to find a dress suitable to horrify my father.”] This doesn’t make any sense, why does Mor even feel compelled to go at all? And why would her not being there make it worse?

-Apparently Mor’s comment about horrifying her dad is a joke because both Amren and Cassian laugh about it.

-[But Rhys watched Mor for a long minute, some of the stars in his eyes winking out. I debated asking if there was some other way, some path to avoid this awfulness between us, but … Earlier, I had snapped at him. And with Lucien and my sister here … I kept my mouth shut. ] Ugh, this dinner is all over the place.

-[Well, about that matter. In the silence that fell, I scrambled for any scrap of normalcy and turned again to Cassian. “Let’s train at eight tomorrow. I’ll meet you in the ring.”] Back to having an awkward change of topic.

-[“Seven thirty,” he said with a disarming grin—one that most of his enemies would likely run from.] Why would a disarming grin make his enemies run from him? I know it’s just a me thing but I hate the way this is written, it comes across as awkward and unnecessarily edgy.

-Feyre asks Nesta if she wants to join, Nesta says no. Honestly really relating to Nesta here.

-[Then I said to none of them in particular, “I want to learn how to fly.” Mor spewed her wine across the table, splattering it right across Azriel’s chest and neck. The shadowsinger was too busy gawking at me to even notice.] Some manufactured humor now. I’m also really confused by this reaction.

-[Cassian looked torn between howling at Azriel and gaping.] Another point of me hating Cassian.

-[My magic was still too weak to grow those Illyrian wings, but I gestured to the Illyrians and said, “I want you to teach me.”] I still don’t understand the magic system. Now, I don’t expect a detailed magic system or anything, but when shapeshifting is equated to ‘growing’ I’m going to be confused how that works.

-Apparently Feyre didn’t tell her friends that she can shapeshift. Lucien now understands why she had wings from ACOMAF.

-[“I can—shape-shift,” I admitted. “And with the oncoming conflict,” I declared to all of them, “knowing how to fly might be … useful.”] How exactly does having Feyre learn to fly be useful in a conflict? Wars are very different from a 1v1 fight. Ugh.

-[Cassian whooshed out a breath. “I don’t know if it’s technically even possible—time-wise. You’d have to learn not only how to fly, but how to bear the weight of your shield and weapons—and how to work within an Illyrian unit. It takes us decades to master that last part alone. We have months at best —weeks at worst.”] How exactly can someone fight in mid-air? I don’t think even SJM knows how difficult that would be.

-[“Then we’ll teach her what we know until then,” Rhys said. But the stars in his eyes turned stone-cold as he added, “I’ll give her any shot at an advantage—at getting away if things go to shit. Even a day of training might make a difference.”] I almost want to give credit to Rhys here for considering it as a way for Feyre to escape out of a fight but this sounds like he’s bringing her into the war and that’s stupid.

-[Azriel tucked in his wings, his beautiful features uncharacteristically soft.] I will continue to not get over how often SJM uses the word ‘beautiful’ to describe people. It’s also odd that it’s done in Feyre’s POV.

-Azriel says he’ll teach Feyre how to fly. Apparently Cassian and Rhys were taught to fly when they were too young they barely remember it.

-[But Azriel, locked in his hateful father’s dungeons like some criminal until he was eleven, denied the ability to fly, to fight, to do anything his Illyrian instincts screamed at him to do …] Azriel’s ridiculously edgy backstory. This was also info-dumped back during the awkward dinner from ACOMAF.

-[Darkness rumbled down the bond. Not anger at me, but … as Rhys, too, remembered what had been done to his friend.] I hate the way this is written.

-[It was an effort not to look at the brutal scars coating Azriel’s hands.] I completely forgot he has scars on his hands, I also don’t remember how he got them either.

-[“We’ve taught plenty of younglings the basics,” Cassian countered.] Whenever younglings are used I’m just going to think of Star Wars, I doubt I’m the only one either.

-[Azriel shook his head, shadows twining around his wrists. “It’s not the same. When you’re older, the fears, the mental blocks … it’s different.”] What does that have to do with flying?

-Azriel tells Feyre he’ll teach her to fly after she trains with Cassian and then tells Lucien he’ll meet him after lunch. Lucien doesn’t react to Azriel’s shadows.

-[I swallowed, but nodded. “Thank you.” And perhaps Azriel’s kindness snapped some sort of tether in me, but I turned to Nesta.] What does that mean?

-Feyre immediately changes the subject again to the King of Hybern. Tells Nesta about the Cauldron. Amren says she’ll help train Nesta tomorrow morning and tells Rhys the both of them will go to the Court of Nightmares so they can use objects of power there.

-“There may be opportunities to practice. Let the girl get a feel for what something like the wall or the Cauldron might be like.” Keeping note of this.

-[I waited for her outright refusal, the cold shutdown of all hope.] Why does Feyre assume this about Nesta?

-[But Nesta only asked, “Why not just kill the King of Hybern before he can act?”] Yeah, why aren’t we planning for this instead?

-[Amren said a bit softly, “If you want his killing blow, girl, it’s yours.”] What does she mean by that? Like the King is somehow too strong? As far as I know he’s not even a High Lord, couldn’t the other High Lords just kill him? Or poison him?

-[“What happened to the human queens?” I blinked. “What do you mean?” “Were they made immortal?” This question went to Azriel.] I find this interaction funny, like Nesta just wants to know what happened to the human queens but Feyre seems confused by this so Nesta moves her question to someone else.

-[Azriel’s Siphons smoldered.] How does this make sense?

-Cassian questions Nesta for asking about the queens. They gaze at each other while Nesta explains her motivations to everyone. She’ll only help if they kill the King and human queens.

-[“Fine,” I said. “And we might need your assistance during the meeting with the High Lords—to provide testimony to other courts and allies of what Hybern is capable of. What was done to you.” “No.”] Wait, why would this help at all? I can see why Nesta says no, it doesn’t make sense for her to do that.

-“People’s lives might depend on your account of it. The success of this meeting with the High Lords might depend upon it.” HOW? Ugh.

-“You have no idea what it was or was not. None. And I am not going to grovel like one of those Children of the Blessed, begging High Fae who would have gladly killed me as a mortal to help us. I’m not going to tell them that story—my story.” Huh, something I actually like.

-“The High Lords might not believe our account, which makes you a valuable witness—” How exactly does telling the High Lords about the King using the Cauldron help in getting them on your side?

-“Then it is not my problem if you’re unreliable. I’ll help you with the wall, but I am not going to whore my story around to everyone on your behalf.” Nesta is getting quite interesting.

-[“And if you even dare suggest to Elain that she do such a thing, I will rip out your throat.” Her eyes lifted from mine to sweep over everyone—extending the threat.] Ok, so I don’t exactly get why Nesta is so protective over Elain but doesn’t extend it to Feyre. Is it because Feyre is the reason that Nesta and Elain got in this mess so now she’s angry at Feyre? I remember in the 1st book when Nesta told Feyre she went out in the woods to rescue her, so this development is interesting to me.

-Mor gives Feyre a wine bottle and says she can drink from it directly.

-[“I’d say Nesta rivals Amren for sheer bloodthirstiness,” Rhys mused hours later as he and I walked alone through the streets of Velaris. “The only difference is that Amren actually drinks it.”] I find this kinda dumb honestly, because I’m pretty sure Feyre is far more bloodthirsty than Nesta. Feyre has literally upended the Spring Court just because of what Tamlin did and Nesta has only said words.

-Feyre and Rhys take a stroll down the Sidra river. Feyre notes there’s still destruction from what happened in ACOMAF. They reach some restaurant they’ve dined at before and apparently it was left untouched during the battle, what a coincidence.

-[Something tight in my chest eased as I beheld the untouched building, the potted citrus plants sighing in the river breeze. And on that breeze … those delectable, rich spices, garlicky meat, simmering tomatoes … I leaned my back against the rail along the river walkway, watching the restaurant workers serve the packed tables.] The grammar for this looks so messy to me.

-[“Who knows,” I murmured, answering him at last. “Perhaps Nesta will take up the blood-drinking habit, too. I certainly believe her threat to rip out my throat. Maybe she’ll enjoy the taste.”] It kinda bothers me how the story treats Nesta like this, her lashing out at her sister is apparently seen as some unforgivable crime and I find that weird.

-Rhys says Nesta is difficult. Feyre admits to making a mistake in asking Nesta publicly. Even though I’m pretty sure the problem is that Feyre told her sister that she was going to use her trauma for a political advantage but whatever.

-Feyre asks Rhys how he can balance between High Lord and family. He reassures her that it’s never easy.

-“I should have considered that telling strangers what happened to her in Hybern might … might not be something she was comfortable with. My sister has been a private person her entire life, even amongst us.” That too. And no duh.

-[“Earlier today—at the loft,” he said, pulling back to meet my eyes. Unflinching. Open. “I didn’t mean to insult her.” “I’m sorry I snapped at you.”] He doesn’t even use the word ‘sorry’ but then Feyre does.

-[He lifted a dark brow. “Why in hell would you be?...] Is… is hell a thing in this world? It’s jarring to see it every time the story uses it.

-“I didn’t mean to … undermine you.” That doesn’t even make any sense.

-[“I get why, though. A solid, unified front is important.” I scratched at the smooth wood of the rail with a finger. “Especially for us.”] Does this even make sense or is it just me?

-“We can make whatever rules we want. You have every right to question me, push me—both in private and in public.” I could swear Feyre had called him out before but now that she’s in a relationship with him, she doesn’t anymore?

-[“We can question each other through the bond if we’re around people other than our friends,” I said.] That is so lazy and boring.

-Overexplaining about calling each other out. They talk about Keir and Mor.

-[I considered. “The last time we went to the Court of Nightmares, I played your whore.” He winced at the word.] I will forever hate this.

-[“To get Keir to agree to aid us … Any tips on what mask I should wear to the Hewn City?” [...] “You’ve seen how I am there—how we are. It is for you to decide how to play into that.] Even more plot I hate.

-[“I doubt he’ll come, given that he is Hybern’s ally and knows we’d kill him.”] Assumptions being made on Tamlin.

-“The meeting will occur with a binding spell that forces us all into cease-fire. If someone breaks it while the meeting occurs, the magic will demand a steep cost. Probably their life. Tamlin wouldn’t be stupid enough to attack—nor us him.” I know this’ll be relevant later.

-Explaining why Tamlin is invited. Talks about the other High Lords. I get the impression that all this talking is more for SJM in trying to figure out her own world than to help the readers.

-[Rhys’s brows lifted. “Right now? Your work ethic puts mine to shame.” I hissed, “Tomorrow, smartass.”] Something I found actually funny.

-They talk about Lucien then Hybern. They’re literally talking about the same things again. Feyre doesn’t know if she trusts Lucien, she also doesn’t like using Elain as a pawn. They attempt to have a touching moment in between boring conversations.

-[“We deserve to be happy,” he said, his eyes sparkling enough to tell me that he recalled the words I’d given him on the town house roof after the attack.] No, you don’t.

-[Too much. He had given too much already, and still seemed to think it was not enough.] Haha, so funny. He’s a dick.

-“When you told Sevenda that you felt awake while eating her food …” Keeping note of a minor character’s name.

-[... when we’d heard that music he’d sent to my cell Under the Mountain.] I find this funny that Feyre had found that touching.

-[Let the debate over who’d give the most in this war rest for now.] Ugh.

-[“Walk with me—through the Rainbow.”] I’m sure SJM thought she was being real slick about this corny shit.

-[I linked arms with him before saying, “You and this city helped wake me up—helped bring me back to life.”] Uh huh, right. I still hate how Velaris exists just for Feyre to have a safe space while spitting on worldbuilding at the same time.

#anti sjm #anti acowar

[ellesliterarycorner]

Writing Morally Grey Characters

Spoiler Alert for ASOIAF, Six of Crows, and A Court of Thorns and Roses: 

Well written morally grey characters are some of my favorite characters to read and write. Seeing them walk that fine line between good and evil, the smallest hint of a tragic backstory, and seeing the loyal friends and lovers who keep them from going full blown dark side. They’re also some of the hardest characters to write because of that fine line. Too far to the good side and they aren’t actually a morally grey character. Too far to the evil side and you get a problematic character dressed up as the hero *cough* Rhysand *cough*. But, today we are making sure that we don’t do that, so here are some tips that I like to keep in mind when I write morally grey characters. 

One Bad Thing = Three Good Things

This is one rule of thumb that I like to keep in mind. You don’t actually have to make them do three good things for one bad thing, but generally for every bad thing your character does, they need to do a better thing. Here comes the spoiler for A Song of Ice and Fire: in A Game of Thrones, Jaime Lannister throws a kid out of a window. Now, we all know that that is a very bad thing, but pretty much for the rest of the books in the series, we slowly start to understand Jaime, and he does good, admirable things to make up for all of the bad that he’s committed. We obviously don’t forgive him for yeeting a child out of a window, we slowly start to like him and understand a little of what brought him to that point. Thuy, moving him from terrible bad guy to a morally grey character we can root for. It’s almost like the character needs to balance out their karma, but karma is the reader’s opinion of them. 

Are You Actually Morally Grey or Just a Shady Person?

There is a big big difference between a character who is actually morally grey and a character who the author says is morally grey. People may think it’s not a big difference, but imho, it is. My favorite examples are the differences between Kaz Brekker and Rhysand. Some people think these two are comparable, but they just aren’t. Kaz is actually morally grey. He has his little murderous tendencies and occasionally says or does things that might make him unlikeable, but then we see him rescue Inej without any real payoff or really any scene the two of them share, and we see the good inside him. People love Kaz because even though he can be ruthless, he never goes too far, and we constantly see the soft, likable side of them. Then we come to Rhysand... Before SJM pulled a 180-switcheroo on Rhysand, for most of the first ACOTAR book, he was a pretty good morally grey character. I couldn’t tell where his head was at, he was scary, and while everyone else was playing checkers, Rhysand was most certainly playing chess. Then, we come to the faerie wine roofieing scene where Rhysand commits an unforgivable, s*xual assault. All of that goes right out the window. Rhysand says he did all of that to protect Feyre, but common sense tells us that is not the case. The author tells us Rhysand is morally grey, but his actions and the textual evidence in the book do nothing to support that fact. Which is why Kaz is actually morally grey, and Rhysand is just a shady person.

Peel the Onion

Think of your morally grey character as a little onion. When you cook an onion, you need to peel it back and reveal all of the layers underneath. The character development for morally grey characters (and all characters really) is the same. Characters bend when you put them under pressure and show a side that people don’t normally see. Show your reader what happens to your character when they are: 

Angry 

Vulnerable

Forced to make a hard decision 

Forced to partner with the bad guys 

Protecting someone they love 

Proven wrong about something 

Fail at a task or lose a battle/competition/etc. 

In which of these situations does your character’s morally grey side take over their actions, and in which do they reveal their softer side?

They Need a Friend

Or a love interest, or a dog, or even a parent really, whatever floats your boat, the storyline, and the personality of the character. The point is all characters especially your morally grey characters need someone they trust and love. Like I said earlier, a huge part of Kaz’s story is him showing hsi softer side with Inej and becoming a better person due to his love of her. She brings out his softer side which helps make him a more likable character. This person could also be someone they meet for the first time and grow to trust or love over the course of the story. Your morally grey character should interact with this person in a different way then they do with the other characters in the story. They should be the first hint that the character can be redeemed and show the character acting in a way beyond their usual morally grey actions. 

Looking in the Opposite Mirror

One of my most popular personal opinions is that all main characters need characters who have opposite trails from them. This isn’t a new idea, and these characters are called Foils. A lot of time they’re put in the story to show what the main character could have been given different circumstances or cast doubt on a character who believes they should be more. Especially for morally grey characters, it’s great to have a character who acts as a foil and contrasts specifically with a certain morally grey trait or aspect your character has. This foil can highlight the negative attributes of the morally grey’s characters particular trait or show the positive light that the morally grey character needs to work to. This Foil could be the villain of the story, but they don’t have to be because their presence in and of itself provides conflict for your character wether that be internal or external. 

To Each Their Own 

I mentioned this when I discussed problematic characters, but my main gripe with both problematic and morally grey characters (because no they are not always the same thing. see Kaz and Rhysand example) is that a lot of authors, especially in YA, don’t trust the reader to form their own opinion about the characters, so they feel the need to retcon or sugarcoat their actions. Not everyone will like your morally grey character, or any of your characters for that matter. The best part, imo, of morally grey characters is debating and discussing the nuances of their personalities and wether or not they really are morally grey. Don’t just tell your readers that a character is morally grey. Show them that character walking the line between good and evil, making the hard choices or even the wrong choices. Let the reader form their own opinion because if you do everything else right and make a complex and intriguing character, readers will be interested in them!

#writing #writers #writers on tumblr #writersofinstagram #writers of ig #writer #writing tip #writing tips #writing advice #morally grey characters #character development #writing reference #writing resource #writing resources

[ukrfeminism]

hey! about that article for children conceived through rape- is there any mention on how this would affect abortion and/or custody? like, i’m not sure how to explain it- but would it have any limitations to women who were raped? would they be forced to carry to term? sorry if this didn’t make sense! just curious

Hi Anon,

I can’t comment on the new law from any expert legal position, but I have found this article which covers it in more detail:

Children born as a result of rape will be officially recognised as victims of crime and receive better support under changes announced by the government today. 

It follows a campaign by organisations including the Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) to introduce what they called Daisy's Law.

Amendments to the impending Victims Bill will give people born as a result of rape access to support from criminal justice agencies, such as the police and courts.

The Victims Bill intends to improve victims' experiences of the criminal justice system, according to the government. 

The provisions in the bill will affect all victims of crime, but it is anticipated those most affected will be victims of serious crime, including Violence Against Women and Girls and Domestic Abuse.

What is Daisy's Law? And how was the legislation named? 

The proposed legislation was named after a woman known only as Daisy, who was  conceived as a result of her 29-year-old birth father raping her 13-year-old birth mother.

Speaking to ITV Central, Daisy explained the trauma of what happened to her birth mother has followed her, her entire life.

"Birthdays really weighed heavily on me because that just marks the day I came into the world," she told ITV News.

"No one was celebrating my arrival - I arrived in the world as evidence of a rape and a child that needed to go into the care system because of that."

Before today’s law change children like Daisy, who were born of rape are considered an ‘aggravating factor’ of the attack, not as victims in their own right. 

Therefore, if a rape-conceived person decided to report a suspect to the police, as Daisy did, their complaint is unlikely to be investigated. Nor would the victim have any legal right to request reasons for or a review of, the decision not to investigate further.

How has legislation changed for a person who was born out of rape? 

The law will now acknowledge bereaved families and children who have witnessed domestic abuse and people born of rape as victims.

Although Daisy's birth mother reported what had happened at the time, her rapist denied everything, and police in Birmingham took no action.

For four decades, he continued his life as normal.

But Daisy began campaigning for officers to reopen the case.

“I have the DNA - I was walking proof that he had raped a child,” she said.

“My birth mother didn’t want to reopen that trauma, which I totally understand.

“And they wouldn’t open an investigation without the victim speaking up. And I don’t count.”

Carvel Bennett was found guilty of the historical rape in August 2021, in part due to ‘Daisy’, who is now in her 40s, allowing her DNA to be used to convict him. 

Justice Secretary Dominic Raab said: "No child born in these horrific circumstances should be left to suffer alone, which is why we must ensure they can access vital support whenever they may need it.

"Our Victims Bill will amplify their voices and boost support for all victims at every stage of the justice system."

[notjustanyannie]

It turns out that the Supreme Court doesn’t have the same kinds of ethics rules that most public servants must abide by. The theory seems to be that, given their elevated position and scrupulous judgment, they can police themselves. The one requirement that does exist (which was recently strengthened) mandates disclosure of certain kinds of hospitality, which would certainly include flights, but Thomas didn’t disclose even that—which is arguably illegal.

But whatever the legality, the real problem here isn’t about disclosure. The real problem for our democracy is the fact that these excessive gifts happened at all. It’s one more example of how wealthy and powerful people buy access to government; how rules don’t seem to apply to people at the top; and how terribly broken and in need of reform our Supreme Court has become.

In response to the revelations about these gifts, Thomas has offered tepid, predictable excuses about why his conduct was somehow OK, largely centered around the fact that Crow is among his “dearest friends” from way back when Thomas was a spanking new Supreme Court justice. (The friendship, notably, started after Thomas’ appointment, when he already held power potentially of use.) Crow, for his part, has denied trying to influence Thomas. Can’t two guys just be buddies? But this is about more than a strange and seemingly inappropriate friendship. It’s also a window into how decision-making can get warped by money, especially when those making the decisions are removed from the lives of regular people.

Reporters and lawmakers should comb through Crow’s business dealings and their relation to court jurisprudence over the last 20 years to figure out the extent to which Crow’s sumptuous offerings affected Thomas’ decisions in cases. Indeed, Democrats in the Senate Judiciary Committee are urging the court to conduct an internal ethics investigation and are planning a hearing in the coming days “regarding the need to restore confidence in the Supreme Court’s ethical standards.”

“It is well past time for the Supreme Court to align with the rest of government in a proper code of ethics,” the Democrats on the committee wrote in a letter addressed to Chief Justice John Roberts.

There is a question that needs to be answered in the most linear and literal sense: Did Crow in any way have a direct financial interest in a case that’s been heard by the court? But more broadly, the damage has already been done. The Supreme Court has certainly ruled on issues of great interest to Crow over the years. (Most obvious, perhaps, is the Citizens United decision, which, in the words of the Brennan Center, “ushered in massive increases in political spending from outside groups, dramatically expanding the already outsized political influence of wealthy donors, corporations, and special interest groups.”)

[horizon-verizon]

It is said that Viserys decreed that Alicent and her sons would return to court with him, while Rhaenyra would be confined to Dragonstone with her sons. Even now it is Ser Erryk and no longer Harwin who would serve Rhaenyra. The paragraph makes it very clear that it was Viserys who ordered Rhaenyra to stay in Dragonstone. Not her who confined herself there, although I think that decision must have helped her, because she was already living there almost full time anyway. But it wouldn't make sense for this paragraph to mean that Rhaenyra chose, since it's talking about Viserys' orders specifically.

That's very annoying of Viserys.

A)

Paragraph you refer to:

To prevent further conflict, and put an end to these “vile rumors and base calumnies,” King Viserys further decreed that Queen Alicent and her sons would return with him to court, whilst Princess Rhaenyra confined herself to Dragonstone with her sons. Henceforth Ser Erryk Cargyll of the Kingsguard would serve as her sworn shield, whilst Breakbones returned to Harrenhal. ("A Question of Succession")

If we use "self" and "her" together, it seems that Rhaenyra, as you said, decided to stay behind at Dragonstone.

The "whilst" lets us know that two separate events occurred at the same time and that while they may correlate, it's not necessarily a relationship of causation.

But in this case, they are.

B)

And like you said, anon, at this point, Rhaenyra had already stayed, ruled, and lived in Dragonstone for 5-6 years. Viserys didn't have to tell her to stay at Dragonstone -- it was her home and territory more than the Red Keep was and there would be no point in him doing that at all if she has literally nowhere else to go to be, especially to find some peace. So why tell her to stay behind?

To talk away from the book a little, in the show, Rhaenyra actually has only been there for perhaps a few months. Laena's funeral was at Dragontone, and they would not reasonably leave her charred body to rot for so long and then put her in a coffin for the sea. So it's likely that from the time Laena dies in #6 to her funeral in #7, it's been just maybe two, three, four months (and four is pushing it). Which just reduces Rhaenyra's experience once again aside from not having her develop a strong bond with Laena before her death just as she did in canon.

C)

Other than that, we do see how Book!Viserys never castigated her for traveling to the Red Keep for his hand injury or even mentioned any sort of confinement, her bringing Gerardys to heal him. And there was no mention, at all, of the court or council expressing surprise or wonder or any sort of thought to any sort of order of confinement.

......................................

Conclusion

If it wasn't for the fact that this paragraph does list events as from Viserys making commands and arranging new persons into places, I'd have disagreed with you. But I can't. It does, still, make me very frustrated with Viserys. Because the order for Rhaenyra to specifically confine herself is a nothing order that contradicts itself, more punishing than deserved. An attempt to appear "fair".

As for Rhaenyra choosing not to press Viserys to change his mind maybe through a letter, that would mean that, yes, Rhaenyra decided to use the opportunity to stay at Dragonstone because that is where her strength was and her family needed to recover from the ordeal away from the perpetrators. And/or her pride after what happened between them being bruised and at Viserys seemingly taking Alicent's side. (These are royals, but they are also family, and family tends to be resentful of each other esp when there's been an imbalance of adjudication or treatment or whatever.)

We remember that:

one of her sons' life was just threatened and he could have lost an eye if Alicent got her way...and he was present for Alicent to say this

the Red Keep is also where Alicent had been undermining, harassing, and provoking her since she was 10

Then it is more than an issue of acclimation and habitation for her and her family.

#asoiaf asks to me #vhagar claim #viserys i #rhaenyra targaryen #rhaenyra in dragonstone #rhaenyra and alicent #alicent hightower #rhaenyra's characterization #viserys i's characterization #fire and blood characters #fire and blood comment #asoiaf #fire and blood