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nanatsumu · 3 years

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HIGH SCHOOL!SUKUNA x F!READER

thinking about bad boy itadori sukuna who all the kids at school try to steer clear from because they know he’s bad news and if you get involved with him then you’re bound to be tied with bad luck for as long as he lives. well, that is everyone except for the president of the student council who so happens to be his childhood best friend turned lover.

this is mostly written for my own self indulgence and to project my fantasies of having a boyfriend onto sukuna but feel free to treat this as any other headcanon! ps i am pretty sure canon sukuna would kill a baby at any given situation, but this is going to be a revamped version of sukuna written by yours truly ;) and its a high school au so sukuna won’t be a complete menace to society and will actually have a heart heh

also i didn’t realize how long this was going to be??? this is kind of all over place too because i just wanted to throw all of my thoughts onto this post so there might be some plot holes in this LOL

i feel like sukuna would be the type of bad boy who isn’t necessarily a bad boy but everyone at school just paints him as some kind of delinquent because of all the tattoos and piercings he has.

he actually shows up to school more often than you think he would (but that’s only because you’re in most of his classes so long story short: you’re his only motivation for attending class)

“forgets” to bring his work books to class more than usual (in reality he does this on purpose so he has an excuse to be near you) so he requests to sit next to you the entire class period so he can share with you for the meantime but whenever the teachers not looking he’ll go back to admiring your face.

his older twin brother, itadori yuji, is very fond of you since you three grew up together and you both had your chances of being a victim to his antics!

exhibit a: in middle school when you and yuji were watching tv together, the show you two were watching would keep switching to some wrestling match broadcasting on a sports channel and no matter how many times you turned the tv on and off, it just would not stop. but it wasn’t until you heard snickering from the kitchen that you realized sukuna had a spare remote and was the mastermind behind the whole thing.

exhibit b: sukuna and yuji’s mom was the owner of a bakery so every now and then she would have either one of the twins come deliver freshly baked pastries to your household! oh how wrong was she to trust her youngest. sukuna was now a freshman in high school, and by now you would’ve thought that sukuna would have grown out of his childish phase, but WRONG! sukuna was still a menace in your life even past childhood. so when you bit into one of the macaroons, instead of being hit with the overwhelming taste of [favorite flavor], all you could feel was the burning sensation of wasabi kicking into your tastebuds.

yeah after the whole wasabi macaroon freak accident, you stopped accepting everything sukuna offered to you and opted to only eating pastries out of the boxes that yuji delivered to you. (sukuna eventually caught onto this and was just TEENSY bit upset but he would rather down a whole tube of wasabi than to tell you upfront)

now, how did you two even end up dating??? oh boy now that is a story

you see, yours and sukuna’s dynamic growing up was similar to that of tom and jerry’s— you being jerry and sukuna being 10x worse than tom of course

but it wasn’t until a confession after school behind the cherry blossom tree that was known for bringing good luck to successful confessions that sukuna finally realized that maybe he really did like you just a little lot bit

sukuna overheard the boy who was planning on confessing to you talking to his friend group about how “sweet and caring” you are (although sukuna could argue otherwise, you were a little brat. *LIKE HELLO?!&:&:& YOU WEREN’T THE ONE WHO ATE A MACAROON FILLED WASABI**) and obviously his ears perked up at the mention of your name. he grew up with you after all so naturally he would be interested in a conversation that revolved around you.

but then the boys started going on about how “you looked like an easy catch” and how “your body was bangin’!” yeah no, that’s where he drew the line. sure sukuna was an ass and talked shit about you most of the time (in his defense it wasn’t like he was doing it behind your back) but if he ever caught someone else talking about you like that then he would be sure to give them a hard time.

he hid behind one of the bushes near the cherry blossom tree while the boy was professing his love for you. funnily enough, for a moment sukuna forgot why he was originally there because he was too busy trying to stifle a laugh as he watched the boy stumble over his words.

“okay shows over” sukuna thought as the confession was reaching its conclusion, but just as he was about to step in and give the poor boy a piece of his mind, he stopped in his tracks when he heard you roaring with laughter.

“did you really think that i wouldn’t hear about what you and your friends said about me earlier? you’re really pathetic if you think any girl would be easy enough to fall to her knees for you because news flash! you’re a disgusting pig and you deserve to rot in hell for speaking about a girl’s worth like that.”

“it’s kind of sad too, i thought you were a nice boy and i probably would have given you a chance but it seems like you’re even worse than scum! damn it, to think there was somebody out there who’s even worse than sukuna.”

of course sukuna was not pleased to hear that last bit, but he did have a proud grin forming on his face as he watched the boy run away, flustered from your rejection and the embarrassment he was put through.

“sukuna i know you’re hiding behind the bush.”

“huh? i came here way before you got here, there’s no way you could have seen me.” he said as he stood up to his full height.

“well, your laughter isn’t exactly the quietest, plus i can spot that hair of yours from a mile away.”

lets just say, sukuna was glad you didn’t ask him what he was doing there because he wasn’t sure if he could spare the embarrassment of telling you that he was planning on ruining the confession.

after that whole fiasco happened, sukuna started to feel(!&:&::&) things

like he started to notice how you styled your hair differently one day and how you switched to a new perfume that smelled like spearmint (was that weird? for sukuna probably not. he just excuses it as being highly observant)

you weren’t dumb either, you had a feeling sukuna was there that day of the confession because he too had overheard the conversation between the boy and his friends as well (you knew he was prideful and if you brought it up then he probably would’ve denied it)

so from there on out it was just mutual pining at the point except... well.... not really??

i feel like it was just an unspoken agreement between you two that you guys were “together” but not “together together” because he started to treat you differently than he would before. like for example, he’d carry your bag for you whenever you guys would walk home (yuji was confused by this at first because if anything, it would have made more sense to see sukuna make you carry HIS bag, but he eventually caught on to sukuna��s feelings for you because they were twin brothers after all), he started walking you to class more often even though his class was all the way on the other side of the school (you asked him why but he just shrugged and said he was just “killing time” so that he wouldn’t have to go to class and then you ended up scolding him), and there was also that one time you miraculously found a $20 bill in your backpack after mentioning to sukuna that there was this cute top you saw at the mall the other day but didn’t have enough money at the time to purchase it (you asked him about this but he said it was probably yuji, but you didn’t want to pry any further since you wanted to cherish the fact that sukuna cared that much)

but eventually you got sick of this whole push and pull game that you physically had to tug the collar of his school uniform and pull him in for a kiss (he was visibly shocked at this because he never would’ve imagined you as the assertive type. not that he was complaining though)

“oya? didn’t think you liked me this much kitten.” he said laughing while you rolled your eyes.

“as if, i got tired of you being a wuss so one of us had to wear the pants in the relationship.” you snorted, causing him to irk.

to be honest, your relationship with him is smooth sailing because you both were pretty chill people and you didn’t have to worry about him sneaking behind your back to see other girls because 1. literally all the girls at school are terrified of him and 2. he knew what you were capable of doing to him if you were to ever catch him cheating on you so he wants to stay on your good side

jealous and possessive don’t exist in his dictionary because he is the epitome of those two words. remember what i said about how your relationship is smooth sailing? i kinda lied.

he’s easily jealous like for example: when you were in english class and the teacher had you guys jot down some notes, you realized you forgot to ask for your pencil back when you lent it to your friend last period.

so you asked sukuna to borrow a pencil but instead of giving you a pencil, he called you an idiot for being so forgetful.

this makes you mad so you turn to your male classmate since he was sitting on your opposite side and ask him for a pencil instead.

sukuna was practically fuming the entire class period and once the day ended and you two were back at your place, he made sure to mark you real good. (oh he also went out to buy a pack of mechanical pencils to sneak into your backpack so that next time you forget your pencils, you’ll have 10 extra pencils sitting in your backpack as backup)

he’s not a big fan of pda in public, but on the chances he will show some of it, the most he will do is wrap an arm around your shoulder or waist whenever some dude is trying to hit on you.

BUT IN PRIVATE? better buckle up because your in for a ride wink wink

really likes putting hickeys on you to a fault! but will never put any visible ones on your neck because he doesn’t want your parents to view him as some kind of animal (but he has nothing to worry about because your parents really like him and are grateful for the fact that he’s very loyal to you, and you guys grew up together so it’s only natural that your parents are accepting of him since they already know he has a good heart underneath that tough facade of his)

oh, and yuji starts learning how to knock whenever you come over (or shuts himself in his room for the meantime if he thinks it’s unsafe to step out of his room) because chances are, you’re probably making out with sukuna in his room or smth.

now onto the spicy stuff

when you and sukuna first started dating, the first thing you told him was that you weren’t ready to have sex yet because you were nervous and sukuna understood and told you that he was willing to wait for whenever you were ready.

but when you were ready though, it was kind of spontaneous and you weren’t even wearing a matching pair of bra and underwear that day

you two were chilling in your room watching some stupid (according to sukuna) animal documentary when suddenly you felt his hand on your thigh

dating sukuna and all, it was normal for him to have his hands on some part of your body (whether it be your thigh or your waist) while you two were in bed.

but you were feeling a bit bolder HORNEE than usual so you began to leave a hot trail of kisses starting from his jaw all the way down to his neck.

sukuna obviously got the memo but before those kisses could escalate into something more daring, he asked you once more if you were completely sure you wanted to do it and once you gave him the green light, he was quick to tug his shirt over his head and pounce on you.

he started getting really into it though and accidentally bit your thigh which made you loose your high and scold him for it, but he let out a hearty laugh and muttered a quick apology before getting back into business

sike i lied, remember what i said about it being spontaneous? yeah, you technically didn’t loose your virginity to him that day because after he finished prepping you, you both came to a realization that you didn’t have a condom.

oh well, there’s always next time!

i think sukuna is a sucker for pet names: his favorite thing to call you is either kitten or princess and that’s it LOL he finds calling you baby or babe is a bit too cheesy for him

but he likes it when you call him baby or babe ;)

date nights consist of either staying in and cuddling in his room, going out for a walk at night (but very very late though. there’s still lamp posts that guide your way through the streets but it gives you the heebie jeebies to be out walking outside so late. sukuna always reminds you that nothing bad will happen as long as he’s right by your side), or just spending time with you and your families.

but if you’re really down to do it, he’ll probably initiate a make out session that’ll lead to y’all fucking one way or another (he only ever does it if he is 100% sure that you’re feeling it because he knows you get easily embarrassed if he asks you straight up)

(this part is mainly written for me because i love the idea of sukuna being over at family functions, but it can be applied as part of the general hc heh) if you took him to any of your family functions as your plus one for the first time, all the aunts and uncles would be a bit wary of him at first due to all of the tattoos and piercings he has (sukuna swears he has never felt so self conscious before) but after they strike up a conversation with him and find out that he’s actually a good guy who knows what he wants to do in the future and is very loyal to you, they start to like him more.

your little cousins adore him and love it when he comes over because sukuna is a very tall high schooler which makes him the perfect candidate as a monkey bar

so when you noticed that all the little ones started to climb on his body and mess around with his hair, you were quick to react because you knew your boyfriend was easily irritable which prompted you to think he hated kids

but there was nothing to worry about because when you saw him playing around with them and even crack a smile, you felt your heart grow fuzzy at the sight and you knew right then and there that you wanted to stick by sukuna’s side for the rest of your life

and in the unfortunate circumstances that sukuna is too busy to make it to one of your functions, the first thing everyone asks is “where’s your boyfriend?” or “where’s ‘kuna? i wanna play with him!”

so you have to facetime him and let him know that everyone is wondering where he is (your phone is dead by the end of the night because after the adults get their turn at saying hi to your boyfriend, the kids snatch your phone and end up talking to him for the rest of the night)

but in conclusion, everyone is waiting for the day he gets on one knee to propose to you and your parents are itching to get to get call sukuna their son-in-law :))

also don’t forget that your parents want two grandchildren: one boy and one girl!

#sukuna #sukuna x reader #sukuna fluff #sukuna hc #ryomensukuna #sukuna x you #sukuna x y/n #jujutsu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen fluff #jujutsu kaisen hc #jjk hc #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk x reader #jjk fluff #anime #anime fanfic #jjk

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pocketsizedquasar · 3 years

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it’s been a bit now so. misc 200/end of mag in general thoughts? under a cut because this is a bit long, and i will preface this to say that i mostly enjoyed the episode but this is going to be mostly my criticisms, bc i feel like the good parts have already been well covered by people other than me. so yeah just a warning this is mostly crit

- it’s Still very hard for me to parse how i feel about this episode, but i think after sitting on it for a bit, i’ve come to the general conclusion that i am very satisfied plot-wise (in terms of tragedy/the structure of tragedies, the open-endedness of our ending, the general Writing TM), but not so much satisfied character-wise (in terms of arc and relationship resolution). I think we deserved more resolution on wtgfs -- i wanted more with them! more with melanie and jon; more with the melanie and georgie and basira’s side of the plan. more than that really small tidbit that we got at the end! and... honestly? a little bit more emphasis on the weight of Jon actually dooming other worlds in the end, and what that means for Jon and for wtgfs/basira. Especially with the context of the consequences re: the Web...won. no caveats or complications, the Web got. Exactly what it wanted.

- on that note, From a uh. Critique against capitalism standpoint I’m not sure how I feel about the ending? And I don’t really want to. Read too much into what isn’t there? But I mean mag has long been a pretty explicit anticapitalist narrative so...? Yeah, I’m not a big fan of the implications of WTGFs and basira basically just being treated as narratively right in terms of letting the eldritch evil stand-in for capitalism have whatever it wanted and feeding it and doing exactly what it asked them to do. and having Little consequence as a result of that. Obviously they’ll still face loads of hardship, but that comes from the apocalypse, not from, like,.,, doing the direct bidding of the Capitalist Monster/System/etc to be clear, i’m not like...mad they made the “wrong” decision; there was no wrong or right decision here. but I am a little upset that for all they spent 199 discussing the various consequences of each choice, we got to see very little of that actual consequence playing out...none of the survivors seem to really be carrying the guilt or even the full understanding of what they did, because they never saw the suffering they could create as anything more than a hypothetical. i feel like we could have spent just a bit more time with them dealing with that. a bit more time even with jon dealing with that, a bit more time spent on jon changing his mind. other people have said as much better than me but. yeah

- i feel like there was a lot of character stuff brought up in s5 and especially act iii that i would’ve loved to have seen more resolution of. why have that whole thing about Georgie telling jon to give melanie his last words himself, if Jon was going to come back but then never bring that up again (full disclosure this is smthn that @pronouncingitwang brought up!)? Why have Jon say he was “going to go apologize to [his] boyfriend”/Jon tell Martin multiple times that they were going to talk about their fight “later” and then not have that happen on screen? Why did we have two whole episodes of cultist interactions if they were just going to be removed off screen? Why have martin’s “I’ll get jon to destroy me like the others” decision if that doesn’t really come up? what about salesa!! why tell us melanie hating jon is a projection of her self hatred and then not bring that up again? why give annabelle all those juicy interactions with martin and then turn her into a monster when jon shows up, why give her so much character and backstory and then so thoroughly remove her agency? why have all these really cool parallels between jon and annabelle if annabelle is just going to be this monstrous and agency-less plot device with no follow-up? what happened to her!

- on that note...annabelle. They... really took this character who is a Black woman and who had so many parallels to Jon and who they could’ve like. very easily Actually made into a protagonist of color (because we only got one!! and she’s a cop!!!!) (or if not protagonist, at least smthn more sympathetic), (which wouldn’t have negated previous racial problems w tma, but would’ve shown growth from them) and made her a scary monster who just Serves her capitalist entity overlord without personal agency and then bows out when she’s no longer needed...you can have whatever diagetic/watsonian explanations you want for how 197 went, like sure she was just ~being dramatic~ and putting on a show for jon, but all that is still something the writers Decided to do in the real world, and the racial implications of her character arc are just. not great. and her character had So much more narrative potential. idk i will forever be salty about annabelle

- i Still Don’t Like the web being sentient!! i said this after 197 and i’m sayin it again! i think it makes it less frightening and less interesting! with the End being aware of its own, well, end, I actually thought that worked, and i really liked the corpse routes ep, but for some reason I didn’t with the Web? which seems hypocritical of me, I know, but, look: The embodiment of the fear of dying being aware of and welcoming its own dying emphasizes the inevitability and the truth of that fear. Which is why it works for the End. It’s still not recognizably /human/, because it is inexorable and certain, in a way nothing human can be. So its awareness of its own end DOESNT feel like flattening the worldbuilding. And using my own logic, I guess sure you could say the embodiment of the fear of manipulation and schemes being capable of scheming does the same thing but it. It rly doesn’t feel the same to me? Bc that’s rly a fear borne of human sentience & behavior. and so to give it that sentience makes it feel more human, and less interesting within the context of the horror. this is definitely just a personal taste thing as far as how i like horror and eldritch deities and such but yeah.

- i liked the statement a lot like, as a little self contained story? it was really nice to have jon give us one last story before the end. I thought that was sweet and i liked how the statement was written! on the same note though, i could’ve also gone without knowing like. the entire cosmology of how the fears came into being. again, just a personal thing, i don’t like my horror to be known, even at the end of it all when it doesn’t matter what we’re still scared of anymore. I just. I want my fears to be frightening and beyond comprehension and unknowable. it just leads me to have more questions than i really need at the Final episode? i would love to keep the jon giving us one final statement thing, and you know what? i would've loved: statement of the archivist, regarding jonathan sims. no idea what you’d do with that but it sounds cool in my head.

- very minor and very specific-to-me thing but i Don’t Like that basira got to be the Last Words...sorry y’all I just don’t like basira i can’t get behind trying to make me feel sympathetic for a cop who stood by and let people get murdered by the state for years and only felt bad about it bc fearpocalypse i just can’t. i don’t like her never have never will and also melanie and georgie are right there why didn’t they get to have the last words it would have been so much better ... why not have the person who loved jon and Knew very deeply his tendency to self-sacrifice say something or why not the person who is in-canon very similar to Jon and self-admittedly projecting her self hatred onto him say some sort of her own attempt at peace why not either of these two ahhhh

- i uhhhh. really liked jon killing jonah. jon for once getting to be angry for himself. that felt really nice. no ceaseless watcher nonsense either, just him and a knife and beating the shit out of this guy who even now continues to underestimate and belittle him. and i liked jon doing what he did in general -- i actually changed my mind on this; i really didn’t like it at first but i do now. i’m sad that it came at the expense of his promise to martin, but it makes sense and...i don’t want to say jon was right, because i again don’t think any of the decisions were right per se, but in terms of like... not doing what the “elder fear deity who wants to feed on fear and pain for literal eternity” wanted... yeah. i get it. he would never have been able to go along with that willingly. and he really shouldn’t have been, considering all that he went through being a puppet for said elder fear deity. and from a tragedy standpoint too, i actually think it’s a really really well written end for him. considering how my favorite tragedies are structured and how the way out has to be presented to us, but the tragic hero Ultimately will always fall back on their faults, yeah, this makes a lot of sense. hamlet is granted a way out and he doesn’t take it; he always always hesitates. captain ahab is granted the chance to turn and leave his chase and love instead, and he doesn’t take it. orpheus turns around. etc etc. I think it was also really lovely that jon got a twist on that, that in the end he did change, for just a moment, and chose love instead. even in the face of all the horror that that might mean. i really like that he and martin are together, wherever or however they are. that martin is allowed to feel (rightly) furious and betrayed and still so, so unconditionally in love.

idk i have more thoughts probably but again they’re very hard to parse and mostly just getting into the super specific realm which i don’t think is particularly helpful

i have a lot of feelings for jon and martin and their ending i think it was the best possible ending we could’ve gotten for those two and i Am really. I just have a lot of feelings.

#mag 200 #tma #the magnus archives #jon sims #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #melanie king #basira hussain #annabelle cane #georgie barker #tma crit #the magnus archives crit #tma spoilers #the magnus archives spoilers #quasartalks #yeah i don't know lots of mixed feelings!!#i think for me i'd go about it one of two ways:#first if i'm just redoing 200 to my own taste and not anything else #i think i'd really go for the martin kills jonah and is forced to be killed by jon somehow? or something along those lines #i really wanted a callback to his decision in his own domain #i'd likely still have them die together? idk most of their stuff felt pretty good i'd just spend more time with them AND the girls #but i think if i really had my way i'd go back to 197 #remove the web's sentience and have it be just another desperate guess of a human trying to understand their patron's wants #(which i've talked abt before so i won't rehash here)#annabelle jon team up please let's go #and then ASIDE from that i can have my own completely happy ending au in addition lmao #but i do like me some tragedy #also tbc i don't mean to imply that like. 'things that i would've done differently' and 'things that are bad' are the same thing #they're not! just bc i wouldn't have made a writing decision doesn't mean it is bad. i just wanted to get these thoughts out.

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olivia-anderson-fanfic · 3 years

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Soulmarks, Part 12

First part

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Tim was separated from the only two people in the country he knew within seconds of the lunch bell ringing.

Marinette had been called up by the teacher. Apparently, she was class president last year and she held the duties until the next election. She gave a tiny sigh as she released Tim’s hand and gave both him and Adrien kisses on the cheek before heading out with Mme. Bustier.

Adrien, at least, was still in the room. Unfortunately, though, he was completely surrounded by his classmates, who were all clamoring for pictures of his notes.

He crossed his arms over his chest awkwardly as he stood outside the door, waiting for either of his friends to appear.

The door swung open and out walked Lila.

Damn it, he’d held Marinette’s hand too long and her bad luck had rubbed off on him.

He sighed. “What do you want?”

She smiled sweetly at him, twirling a lock of her hair in her fingers. “I just wanted to show the new kid around some.”

“Wouldn’t that be Marinette’s job as class rep?”

Lila sighed and shook her head slowly. “Oh, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but… I wouldn’t get too close to Mari.”

He raised his eyebrows. A little late for that, but he supposed he may as well ask: “Why not?”

“Well, for one thing, she’s a bit of a bully.” She looked at the ground. “Did she ever tell you about all the times she tried to ‘prove’ that I wasn’t actually disabled? Just because she didn’t like me? We hadn’t even talked, she was just mad I was talking to Adrien!”

A frown made its way across his face. Sure, it wasn’t at all like the Marinette he knew, but how well did he know her? He’d never seen how she interacted with people she didn’t like… and hadn’t he seen just how ruthless she could be when she wanted to that first day with ‘bowling’? In the way her expression hardened when Joker or Harley were mentioned?

He leaned against the wall. “There are other things?”

Lila’s head jerked up in surprise. “Huh?”

“You said ‘for one thing’. That implies more.”

“You’d think bullying would be enough…” Said Lila with a frown, but she continued: “Secondly, I think she’s a gold digger.”

His mind wandered to the few times Bruce had tried to buy something for her. How she’d ended up hiding money around for him to find so he couldn’t force it back into her hands. He gave a soft laugh. No, he wasn’t concerned about that. “Well, I can say she isn’t.”

Besides, if anyone here was a gold digger, it was probably Lila. Her eyes had lit up at the Wayne name. Projecting much?

She didn't seem all that convinced. “I just think it’s a little suspicious that she goes after you, Kagami, and Adrien. The girl has a pattern, and it’s money.”

He snickered. “Okay, and what about Chloe Bourgeois?”

“Chloe?” Said Lila slowly. “How do you know about Chloe?”

He frowned. “She’s in our class, right?”

“Well, yes, but they don’t talk or anything. How’d you know about her?”

“Simple: I’m her soulmate.”

Lila blanked. There was a few moments where she apparently rebooted, and then she scoffed. “Are you sure about that? Marinette likes to lie. A lot.”

“Pretty sure. Unless you know some other designers, who live in France, who bakes a lot, who carries a yoyo in their pocket, who also happens to love her parents.”

She finally stopped twirling her hair, shoving her hands in her pockets as she mulled this over. “Congrats on finding your soulmate,” she said in the same begrudging tone that siblings use when their parents make them apologize to each other. “But…”

“But…?”

Lila leaned forward conspiratorially. “I think she might be working for Hawkmoth.”

Don’t. Laugh.

He shook his head, pursing his lips together tightly to stop himself from laughing. When he was sure that he could keep a straight face, he mumbled a “yeah, no.”

She shrugged. “Don’t believe me? She disappears during every akuma and she’s never been akumatized. I’m telling you, she’s working with him!”

He couldn’t help it anymore, he snickered. Sure, the girl had gathered some pretty good evidence, but she’d come to the complete wrong conclusion. Before he could really come up with a reason for why he was so convinced that she couldn’t be working with him, he spotted Marinette running back to the classroom.

Tim watched her eyes narrow when she spotted Lila and raised his eyebrows. Sure, three out of four of Lila’s points were wrong, but the first one still concerned him.

Marinette gave a forced smile as she came to a stop beside him. “Ready for your tour? I even got special permission to take you out of school for lunch today,” she chirped, holding up two tiny slips of paper.

He smiled faintly. “How’d you manage that?”

“I let it slip to the principal that I was showing around Tim Drake-Wayne. They practically begged me to keep the school food away from you.” She winked, then her eyes found their way to Lila. Her smile lessened. “Lunch is almost over for you, Lila, you should get something to eat. What with your weak immune system and all, we wouldn’t want you to get sick, would we?”

He narrowed his eyes slightly and glanced at Lila, who sighed like this was a regular occurrence.

“Fine, Mari, I’ll leave. I know when I’m not wanted.” She leaned up and kissed Tim on the cheek before he could really react. “A presto,” she said, sending a grin over her shoulder as she walked off.

He gave a tiny wave and then glanced at Marinette.

“You’re crumpling the papers.”

She snapped out of it and frowned, looking down at the passes. She loosened her grip and started smoothing them out with her fingers. “Right. Sorry. Let’s go.”

She should have warned him about Lila. She had no clue what the liar had said about her, but it clearly was affecting Tim. Earlier he’d been holding her hand and now he would barely even look her in the eyes.

She stared at the empty cup of coffee in front of her as they waited for the waiter to come back with their food in silence.

A tiny part of her was tempted to just let Lila have him. She’d managed to get everyone else, had picked off all her friends one by one. Even Adrien would usually eat with Nino. At this point, she was starting to think it would be easier to just let go of the hope that she could really have friends while she lived in Paris. It would certainly feel better than grasping onto him desperately only to lose him…

She pulled her yoyo from her pocket and started messing with it.

One attempt. She’d give herself one attempt.

“What did she tell you?”

He looked at her. Finally.

“She obviously told you something. What was it?”

He finished off his coffee and set down his cup. “She said you’re a bully.”

“Well, she’s a compulsive liar.”

“She said the same about you.”

She cursed as her yoyo tangled itself and started fixing the string. “And you’re going to believe her over me?”

He reached across the table and gently pulled the yoyo from her fingers and started working the knots out. “Normally, I wouldn’t, but…” He sighed lightly. “Would she really have a reason to fake an illness?”

Marinette blinked, then shook her head. “That wasn’t the first lie I figured out. The first one was --.” She cut herself off and gave the waiter an awkward smile as he set down a plate of waffles.

The teens mumbled their thanks and he left.

She switched to English for her next sentence: “She lied about being friends with Ladybug.”

He raised his eyebrows.

She frowned. He didn’t trust her. Great. She had proof, at least. She scrolled through the Ladyblog for a while before handing over the video of Lila claiming to be Ladybug’s best friend.

“So... she lied once to seem cool to her new classmates and you decided that was enough to never trust her again?”

She wanted to kick something. Seriously? She pulled her yoyo back from him and started pulling on the string as hard as she could. She needed her yoyo back. She needed to calm down. She needed --.

Her eyes spotted a black and purple speck on the horizon and she squeaked.

Fuck. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t get akumatized. She wouldn’t be able to fix things if she was akumatized. She couldn’t let someone die because of her --.

Tim followed her gaze and cursed quietly. “Listen, Nette, I’m sorry! I believe you!”

“I’m not stupid, Tim! I know you’re just saying that!” She hissed.

Angry tears formed behind her eyes. All the emotions she’d been holding back since Hawkmoth had begun his reign of terror were threatening to fall through and she couldn’t let that happen. God, she was feeling so much and she couldn’t handle it and she couldn’t allow herself to even try and someone was letting the akuma in and --.

She shut down.

Her emotions went from feeling like they were suffocating her to being practically nonexistent. She sunk in her seat, barely even paying attention to all the people scrambling for cover as fast as they could. She didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything at all.

The akuma paused inches away from her yoyo and she watched with a blank face as it slowly turned around and fluttered out the way it had come.

“Nette?” Said Tim quietly, his eyes not leaving the akuma.

She closed her eyes.

One attempt, she told herself. One last attempt.

“I’ll admit, I definitely didn’t like that Lila was getting close to Adrien and it made me more bitter and skeptical about everything she said than I should have been… but I still caught her in actual lies. About who she knows, about the things she’s done, about her illnesses, about everything. And I called her out on it every time, it’s why she’s so determined to keep everyone away from me. With more lies, of course, but they always have just enough truth that everyone believes her and nothing I do ever seems to be enough to convince them.”

Tim said nothing for a moment…

And then she felt his hand rest over hers.

“I believe you… but --.”

She groaned. “Great. I tried. Want a tour before we stop talking to each other forever?”

“Not like that. I’m just saying… for all of her lies, she was projecting: bullying, gold digging, lying…”

She nodded slightly. “Sure. So?”

“She also accused you of working for Hawkmoth.”

Her eyes snapped open.

~~~

Next part

“I can’t wait to see what Lila does”

Me, staring at my outline, which just says “Lila but better but also stupid”: yeah me too buddy

Taglist

@pawsitivelymiraculous @golden-promises @salty-fang @kitsunebell @sassakitty @octobitch @glastwime859 @miyla-lokidottir @onlyabatfan @ira-sairain @2confused-2doanything @ultimatetornshipper @ladybug-182 @laurcad123 @we-want-mini-mini @roguishredaxion @just-reblogs-by-h @futursworld @magic-miraculous @nathleigh @smolplantmum @vroomtaka @emimar7 @toodaloo-kangaroo @charme-de-malchan @spicybelladonna @fusser90 @indecisive-mess-named-me

#timinette #timari #marinette dupain cheng #ladybug #red robin #tim drake #soulmarks #maribat #adribat

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wildfey · 3 years

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Anon from yesterday back again! About the set-up, a post on twitter explained the theory much better and I gotta look up the name. The gist is that Phoenix could've proved that he was set up. He did not have the time to have a forgery done since he got the job for defending Zak only the day before. Plus the money. Instead, there is no evidence at all he even tried. Why? Because he'd seen the courts' corruption before and decided it didn't matter anymore, plus too dangerous.

(continued) You could even point at his reply to the Judge's words and wonder if Phoenix has nothing to say because he knows it's useless to argue. Hidden powers have already decided that they will attack him and try to drag him down.

okay, okay, hello again anon, good to see you back with another excellent ask.

I always think that there are two ways to look at Phoenix's disbarment:

a) that the problem was straight-up with bringing forged evidence into court, no matter what the circumstances were.

b) that the problem was that Phoenix was assumed to have created the forged evidence and bought it into court intentionally.

Ace Attorney really flips around on which of these is true in universe (it's a plot point to some extent in 1-5, 3-3, 4-1, and 4-4) but considering that Phoenix gets his badge back almost immediately after it's proved that the second wasn't the case, I'm going to assume that presenting forged evidence accidentally is either not an issue or less of an issue. This tends to be the fanon majority stance too. (It's worth noting that Edgeworth is implied to have pulled some strings irt getting Phoenix's badge back. Ymmv and so on.)

With our framework safely in place, the question arises: If Phoenix could have avoided punishment, or at least public shaming, by revealing the set-up, why wouldn't he? As you point out, the forgery doesn't make sense once you start to look into it and we know that Phoenix did put a lot of these pieces together. Hell, he could have made these arguments when Misham testified during the Gramarye trial. But he doesn't. (Warning: this is a more headcanon-y meta than my last one, because the 7yg is... a gap and we have very little concrete info on what the fuck Phoenix was up to. He got a kid, worked on jury trials, played good poker + bad piano, and had some sort of frenemyship with Kristoph. That's pretty much all we've got).

Firstly: Corruption. The AA court system is ridiculously corrupt, and at the point that Phoenix is disbarred, he becomes emblematic of this - he's a man with a history of revealing injustice - notably Von Karma & Gant, but even without them he still won some high profile cases - and once he's disbarred, it's implied that the narrative is flipped, turning him into a figurehead for that which he fought against (dark age of the law, etc). The obvious conclusion is that his disbarment was a convenient way to discredit him - powerful and corrupt figures (and in AA there are many) don't need to fear Phoenix Wright if he isn't a lawyer and his reputation is ruined. The counter argument is that Phoenix... has always done some questionable things with evidence (1-5, 2-4, and 3-3 stand out to me). But no more so than anyone else in this fucked-up universe. Either way, Phoenix has always worked in a system stacked against him, and it's very possible that he suspected there to be manoevering behind the scenes (and there was! We know Kristoph existed and was purposefully working against Phoenix.) HOWEVER, I don't believe that any of this would stop him on it's own, because it's been long established that Phoenix Wright does not give a shit about bad odds.

So, what would make him accept it? Anon, you mention danger in your ask, and I do see that as partially true - Phoenix isn't concerned about danger to himself, but he has a kid to care for. I would say, however, that especially when we come to Kristoph, as much of a bastard as he is, Phoenix had no evidence that he could be violent to the point of murder until 4-1. Before that, his influence was long-distance life ruining, rather than active threat (though long-distance life ruining is pretty scary on its own when you're raising a small child with low funds). I do see that as a cause, but one of many, and this is the point where I'd like to go back to the conversation on motivation.

I am going to make the argument here, as I did in the other answer, that Phoenix, in the 7yg and possibly elsewhere, is depressed, and that one symptom of that is a loss of motivation. It's implied by the game itself, and makes more sense than most of the alternatives.

(I won't get too personal, but the years of my life where I dressed like this... not good years lol)

My headcanon has always been that by the point that Phoenix had sorted out his guardianship of Trucy and got himself out of that initial low that came from having his life ruined, it was too late to fix his disbarment and he had to change tracks, and that's when he became interested in MASON. (Not to self-promote, but I'm realising that a lot of what I've said here is rephrased ideas from The Path Once So Clear, so if you want 15,000-ish words on the subject, it's there). Of course, when talking about Phoenix's 7yg depression, I think it's also important to mention that Phoenix in AA4 is very much implied to be putting on an act (which is pretty common in AA4 in general. Most characters in that game have both a public and private face). Being 'Beanix' - eg. the piano/poker player with no prospects who works in a shitty restaurant and takes nothing seriously - is a convenient cover while he works on the things that he doesn't want to be targeted for (and here we come back to the corruption angle).

As to how far the depression helps that act... well, that could be a whole conversation on its own. Once again, I'm very much coming into headcanon here, but I'm reminded of the phenomenon where someone with depression will deliberately exacerbate it, either as a form of self-harm or as some attempt to fit a role (artists are especially prone, due to the 'depressed artist' stereotype. I see it most in the emo scene). Beanix has always seemed to me as someone who is deliberately messing up his own life - he repeatedly provokes Apollo, essentially sabotaging their relationship, he puts himself into dangerous situations for no real reason (this is a general Phoenix trait), and despite the fact that we KNOW Maya and Edgeworth were supportive of him during this period, we never actually see them around, presumably because he's keeping them at a distance. How much of this is for the act, and how much is real?

Again, we've come very much off topic (whoops) but I see a lot of this as another aspect of Phoenix's low self worth - is there a difference between the image he projects of a man who has given up due to being disbarred, and the real Phoenix who is still actively working behind the scenes but is very obviously not doing well because he can't 'save people' - the thing which so much of his identity relies upon? I think there is, but I also think the image too often becomes the reality, and AA4 does carry this underlying theme of how wearing these masks of a public persona can affect your 'true self'.

As always, I genuinely love to see other people's takes on this, either in the tags, in reblogs, or via asks. This one is very headcanon-y, and I know there some entirely different perspectives out there, some of which I really like. (Also this one got to be heavy. Look after yourselves guys.)

#my post #ace attorney meta #Ace Attorney #Phoenix Wright #depression cw #a big one too #and minor mention of #self harm cw #Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney #replies

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spacetimewithstuartgary · 3 years

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NASA’s Webb to Explore Forming Planetary Systems Planetary systems take millions of years to form, which introduces quite a challenge for astronomers. How do you identify which stage they are in, or categorize them? The best approach is to look at lots of examples and keep adding to the data we have – and NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope will be able to provide an infrared inventory. Researchers using Webb will observe 17 actively forming planetary systems. These particular systems were previously surveyed by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), the largest radio telescope in the world, for the Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP). Webb will measure spectra that can reveal molecules in the inner regions of these protoplanetary disks, complementing the details ALMA has provided about the disks’ outer regions. These inner regions are where rocky, Earth-like planets can start to form, which is one reason why we want to know more about which molecules exist there. A research team led by Colette Salyk of Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, and Klaus Pontoppidan of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, seek the details found in infrared light. “Once you switch to infrared light, specifically to Webb’s range in mid-infrared light, we will be sensitive to the most abundant molecules that carry common elements,” explained Pontoppidan. Researchers will be able to assess the quantities of water, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, methane, and ammonia – among many other molecules – in each disk. Critically, they will be able to count the molecules that contain elements essential to life as we know it, including oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen. How? With spectroscopy: Webb will capture all the light emitted at the center of each protoplanetary disk as a spectrum, which produces a detailed pattern of colors based on the wavelengths of light emitted. Since every molecule imprints a unique pattern on the spectrum, researchers can identify which molecules are there and build inventories of the contents within each protoplanetary disk. The strength of these patterns also carries information about the temperature and quantity of each molecule. “Webb’s data will also help us identify where the molecules are within the overall system,” Salyk said. “If they’re hot, that implies they are closer to the star. If they’re cooler, they may be farther away.” This spatial information will help inform models that scientists build as they continue examining this program’s data. Knowing what’s in the inner regions of the disks has other benefits as well. Has water, for example, made it to this area, where habitable planets may be forming? “One of the things that’s really amazing about planets – change the chemistry just a little bit and you can get these dramatically different worlds,” Salyk continued. “That’s why we’re interested in the chemistry. We’re trying to figure out how the materials initially found in a system may end up as different types of planets.” If this sounds like a significant undertaking, do not worry – it will be a community effort. This is a Webb Treasury Program, which means that the data is released as soon as it’s taken to all astronomers, allowing everyone to immediately pull the data, begin assessing what’s what in each disk, and share their findings. “Webb’s infrared data will be intensively studied,” added co-investigator Ke Zhang of the University of Wisconsin–Madison. “We want the whole research community to be able to approach the data from different angles.” Why the Up-Close Examination? Let’s step back, to see the forest for the trees. Imagine you are on a research boat off the coast of a distant terrain. This is the broadest view. If you were to land and disembark, you could begin counting how many trees there are and how many of each tree species. You could start identifying specific insects and birds and match up the sounds you heard offshore to the calls you hear under the treetops. This detailed cataloging is very similar to what Webb will empower researchers to do – but swap trees and animals for chemical elements. The protoplanetary disks in this program are very bright and relatively close to Earth, making them excellent targets to study. It’s why they were surveyed by ALMA. It’s also why researchers studied them with NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope. These objects have only been studied in depth since 2003, making this a relatively newer field of research. There’s a lot Webb can add to what we know. The telescope’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) provides many advantages. Webb’s location in space means that it can capture the full range of mid-infrared light (Earth’s atmosphere filters it out). Plus, its data will have high resolution, which will reveal many more lines and wiggles in the spectra that the researchers can use to tease out specific molecules. The researchers were also selective about the types of stars chosen for these observations. This sample includes stars that are about half the mass of the Sun to about twice the mass of the Sun. Why? The goal is to help researchers learn more about systems that may be like our own as it formed. “With this sample, we can start to determine if there are any common features between the disks’ properties and their inner chemistry,” Zhang continued. “Eventually, we want to be able to predict which types of systems are more likely to generate habitable planets.” Beginning to Answer Big Questions This program may also help researchers begin to answer some classic questions: Are the forms taken by some of the most abundant elements found in protoplanetary disks, like carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen, “inherited” from the interstellar clouds that formed them? Or does the precise mix of chemicals change over time? “We think we can get to some of those answers by making inventories with Webb,” Pontoppidan explained. “It’s obviously a tremendous amount of work to do – and cannot be done only with these data – but I think we are going to make some major progress.” Thinking even more broadly about the incredibly rich spectra Webb will provide, Salyk added, “I’m hoping that we’ll see things that surprise us and then begin to study those serendipitous discoveries.” This research will be conducted as part of Webb General Observer (GO) programs, which are competitively selected using a dual-anonymous review system, the same system that is used to allocate time on the Hubble Space Telescope. The James Webb Space Telescope will be the world's premier space science observatory when it launches in 2021. Webb will solve mysteries in our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency. TOP IMAGES....The researchers will use NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to survey 17 of the 20 nearby protoplanetary disks observed by Chile’s Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in 2018 for its Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP). ALMA delivered excellent data about the outer disks, but Webb will detail the inner disks by delivering spectra, which spread light out into a rainbow, revealing the chemical compositions of each object. Credits: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), S. Andrews et al.; N. Lira LOWER IMAGES....The James Webb Space Telescope’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) will deliver incredibly rich information about the molecules that are present in the inner disks of still-forming planetary systems (known as protoplanetary disks). This simulated spectrum, which produces a detailed pattern of colors based on the wavelengths of light emitted, helps researchers take inventories of each molecule. This spectrum shows how much of the gasses like methane, ammonia, and carbon dioxide exist. Most of the unidentified features are water. Since spectra are teeming with details, they will help astronomers draw conclusions about the system’s contents as planets form. Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, Leah Hustak (STScI)

#space #science #Astronomy #physics #news

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izlaria · 3 years

Text

Someone you like (part 1)

This work is inspired by the animatic called Someone you like by honestlyprettychill. I don’t know if I’ll have the energy to do all of the povs showcased in the video, but I just really loved the idea that Lance would eventually come to like Pidge, a romance born from years of friendship. Friends to lovers is my jam.

I’m posting this on tumblr in case I never finish it, because I just wanted to share what I’ve written so far. I might upload the whole thing to AO3 later.

I made some changes to the video’s initial idea, because I wanted to follow canon ages and I didn’t want a 14-year-old to fall for a 12-year-old. At that time, it’s a pretty big difference in development. So I wanted to establish the basis for Lance to eventually romanticize their first encounter, despite not having been attracted to young Katie.

Spanish to English translations at the end.

14 years old

The truth was that Lance went to Space Camp because Veronica could be a little pest. She knew their parents wouldn’t let her go alone and so had enticed her younger brother with the promise of travel and foreign girls and no parental supervision.

Veronica had obviously left out the fact that they were essentially going to school on steroids for a month, smack in the middle of their summer break. Cool as Miami might seem, Lance wasn’t exactly excited for all the extra work the camp would entail.

“No es un acampamiento,” his sister repeated for what felt like the thousandth time. He wasn’t listening anymore. “Tú sabes que el campo de explotación espacial no está muy desenvuelto en Cuba. Si realmente quieres trabajar con eso, entonces simplemente cállate y no insultes a nadie.”

“¿Cuando he insultado a alguien?” he shot back, defensive. Veronica didn’t dignify that with an answer.

As much as Lance might like to think himself very smooth, there were still times when he stumbled over his words, especially in English. More than once he’d meant to pay someone a compliment and had accidentally started an argument of some kind.

Veronica looked impatiently at her watch. “Mira, tengo una reunión con mi orientador. Y tú tienes por lo menos dos artículos para leer para las clases de mañana, ¿por qué no vas a la biblioteca para trabajar un poco? Prometo comprarte una hamburguesa después.”

Lance pouted at her, arms crossed over his chest. “Me debes más que una hamburguesa y lo sabes, Ronie.”

His sister snickered, but it was as much of an acknowledgement as he was going to get. Veronica pressed a quick kiss to his hair, already turning to go into the main building.

“¡Gracias, hermanito! ¡No te arrepentirás!”

In all honesty, Lance wasn’t as irritated as he made Veronica believe. He knew that a summer program in Miami was a really good opportunity, especially if he wanted to get into the Garrison in the following years. It was just difficult.

He was diligent and studious, but not as naturally gifted as some of the other kids. Besides, he hadn’t been to the US in a couple years, since his parents had mostly settled down in the family farm, which meant he still had to fall back into his English, a task made even more frustrating by the xenophobic comments from one of the boys in his AP geometry class.

The teacher had put an end to it right away, but the words stuck with Lance, for some reason.

With how much humanity had progressed in terms of technology, one would think they would be able to get past petty rivalry between nationalities and usually that was true, but the influx of foreigners following the establishment of the Galaxy Garrison in the US desert still annoyed some people, despite its existence as a multinational center for space exploration. It irritated Lance to no end, especially when so many of these scientific advances came from international collaboration.

If only he could shrug off the inadequacy that now grew in his chest.

Straight ahead, there was a path that led to a green area in the middle of the campus. The other students had taken to calling it the Woods, though it was more of a middle-sized park, with benches and picnic tables where anyone from the Institute could go to relax. That’s where Lance went, mind too full to really focus on homework.

He wondered if people would react that same way if he ever made it into the Garrison. He didn’t know how Veronica dealt with it all, especially when she was alone in Arizona most of the time. Barely a week had passed and Lance already missed his parents, the tenderness of home-cooked food and well-intended lectures.

No, he had to believe that Billy Underwood was an exception. The other kids hadn’t joined in on his taunts, even if no one had moved to defend Lance. It was still too early to make conclusions on his colleagues, especially when everyone had seemed so charmed by him before then.

Lance was so lost in thought that he didn’t realize he had been standing in front of one of the benches until a new voice broke through the peace of the park.

“Are you just gonna stand there?”

The words were somewhat harsh, but when Lance lowered his eyes to their source the girl winced, grimacing. She seemed to have spoken impulsively.

“Hmm, yeah.” Lance blinked at her for a moment, before finally sitting down on the bench. He made sure to leave space between him and the girl, not wanting to make the situation even more awkward.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you,” the girl said after a moment of silence. She looked at him sideways and her brown eyes seemed almost golden in the sunlight. There were freckles spread across the bridge of her nose and across her cheeks, and the green ribbon in her hair swayed in the wind. It was a soft sight, a contrast to the steeliness of her posture and gaze.

“It’s fine,” Lance hurried to assure her. She looked young, but so did he, and talking to complete strangers never failed to make him nervous. “Nothing like a little girl yelling at me to bring me back to earth.”

He gave her his best grin, the one reserved for first impressions and fancy parties. It was supposed to project confidence and kindness, even though Luis said he ended up looking a bit smug.

“I didn’t yell,” the girl pointed out with a light frown. Then her eyes shifted into a more calculating look. “You’re a bit of a goofball, aren’t you?”

“I prefer the term good-humored,” he replied jokingly.

She continued to stare. Lance got the feeling that the girl did this a lot. She had an untamed intelligence to her that Lance couldn’t completely understand. It was the sort of air that teachers sometimes carried, as if they could see something deeper in you if they looked long enough.

“It didn’t seem like you were feeling all that good-humored just now.” She tilted her head to the side, letting the words hang between them.

“Yeah, I suppose that’s true,” Lance found himself saying.

“Do you… want to talk about it?” She looked so doubtful that it almost made Lance laugh. The feeling, however, was overcome by the relief of finally having someone who would listen.

He had spent the week trying and failing to explain to Veronica what was truly making him feel down. She was too busy or too happy for Lance to tell her the truth, especially when it left him so vulnerable. After all, Veronica had taken to her work on the Institute like a fish to water. Lance was supposed to be more adaptable than this.

With the rest of his family away in Cuba, he felt unbearably lonely.

“Yes! Thank you!” Lance shifted in the bench to face the girl. She was taken aback by his enthusiasm, but didn’t move away. “There’s this cabrón in my class, who thought it was a good idea to mess with me, just ‘cause I said fábrica instead of factory in our first day here. He hasn’t really left me alone since…” he whined. “I speak two languages but somehow I’m the uneducated ass here!”

The girl nodded, eyes downcast. “I know what you mean.”

“You do?” He eyed the fairness of her skin and the almost ginger of her hair. “Sorry, but you look white.”

Lance’s comment must have taken her by surprise, because she actually laughed.

“I am white. I’m also Italian.” She rolled her eyes, but there was amusement in the tug of her lips. “I can be both.”

“That’s true.” Lance grinned sheepishly. It was good that she wasn’t offended by his lack of filter. “You don’t have much of an accent, though.”

“Neither do you,” the girl bit back, no real animosity in her tone.

He shrugged. “My family spent a lot of time in the US when I was younger. It used to be second nature to me. Now, I keep feeling like I have to hold back the instinct to roll my R’s.”

“I get that. My parents moved here right after I was born, but we used to speak Italian in the house.” There was a pause here, something that she couldn’t bring herself to say. “I think it’s cool that you can speak Spanish. It’s useful.”

“Yeah?” Lance sat up straight, feeling suddenly boastful.

“Sure!” she continued, encouraged by his interest. “The Bouman Aeronautics Research Institute really values multiculturalism! It is a hob of different nationalities and perspectives, created to foster new minds from around the world! Or that’s what my brother says, at least, and he is rarely wrong.” She gave him a smirk that quickly shifted into a grimace. “Don’t tell him I said that or he will never let me forget it.”

“Older brother?” At her nod, Lance smiled. “I got older siblings too. Sort of the reason I’m here in the first place, actually. One of them was accepted as a researcher and she tricked me into applying too.”

“Same, actually.” She seemed startled for a moment, pulling out her cellphone. “Freak, I have to go! I completely lost track of time while reading.” She got up to go, collecting the book she’d apparently put down to talk to him. It was a thick volume with numbers on the cover, but it didn’t look like math.

Another green ribbon fluttered to the ground, having escaped the pages of the book. Lance bent down to pick it up.

“Here.” He stretched it out to the girl. “Wouldn’t want to lose its pair,” he said with a wink.

“Thanks for reminding me!” She grabbed the ribbon hurriedly, then paused, turning back to Lance. “And for the conversation, I guess.”

Lance grinned at her. She was a little awkward but in an endearing way, like she wasn’t used to having the attention of others on her. Given she empathized with his circumstances in the Institute, it wasn’t that big of a leap to assume that she had trouble making friends.

“Bye bye, Italian girl.” He waved, glad that he could spend these few minutes with her.

“Farewell, Spanish boy.”

Lance meant to correct her about his nationality, but she took out running, clearly late for something. He laughed at the way she stumbled across the uneven ground, careless like a little kid. It was a strange juxtaposition: the thoughtfulness of her earlier words and the childishness of her smile now.

He settled back into the bench, feeling much more content than he’d been earlier. It was nice to talk to people outside of class, for a change.

And, well, Italian girl was pretty. A bit young-looking for him, but he thought guys her age should be tripping over their feet for a chance to talk to her.

“Hey, you’re Lance, right?” A boy had approached while Lance observed the girl disappear from sight. He was tall and robust, with shortly cropped hair, but his expression was friendly. “You’re in my Analytics class.”

It took Lance a second to place him. Analytics was one of the classes Lance struggled with the most, so he hadn’t had as much opportunity to joke around there.

“And you’re Hunk!” Lance snapped his fingers, smiling. “Sit down, man! What can I do for ya?”

Translations:

“No es un acampamiento.Tú sabes que el campo de explotación espacial no está muy desenvuelto en Cuba. Si realmente quieres trabajar con eso, entonces simplemente cállate y no insultes a nadie.” - “It’s not a camp. You know that the field of space exploration is not very well developped in Cuba. If you really do want to work in this area, then simply shut up and don’t insult anyone.”

“¿Cuando he insultado a alguien?” - “When have I insulted anyone?”

“Mira, tengo una reunión con mi orientador. Y tú tienes por lo menos dos artículos para leer para las clases de mañana, ¿por qué no vas a la biblioteca para trabajar un poco? Prometo comprarte una hamburguesa después.” - “Look, I have a meeting with my coordinator. And you have at least two articles to read for tomorrow’s classes. Why don’t you go work for a bit in the library? I promise to buy you a burger later.”

“Me debes más que una hamburguesa y lo sabes, Ronie.” - “You owe me more than a burger and you know it, Ronie.”

“¡Gracias, hermanito! ¡No te arrepentirás!” - “Thank you, little brother! You won’t regret it!”

Cabrón - Bastard

#plance #flirtyrobot #Pidgance #Lidge #Cyance #voltron #vld #vld lance #pidge gunderson #katie holt #voltron legendary defender #vld fanfiction #lance mcclain #vld syl verse

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whentherewerebicycles · 3 years

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i have to wonder if there's an implication that can be drawn the other way around wrt playfulness and stress - not that un-playful individuals experience stress more acutely, but that people who experience stress more acutely become less and less playful. i have intense, disproportionate shame/fear reactions due to Childhood Trauma(tm) and it's inhibiting as fuck - my work with my singing teacher to relax and (though i've never framed it this way) play(!) w/out embarrassment has been (1/3)

one of the most healing things for me... so i think there's this nexus of inhibition & confidence/security & perspective/scale & playfulness & resilience. to be playful you have to be a bit silly and vulnerable and willing to take a risk on doing something "wrong" i.e. not take yourself too seriously, but if you feel chronically unsafe you'll take yourself & everything else too seriously and want to do it "right" so you minimize the perceived risk of harm. going back to my singing teacher (2/3)

the most important thing she did for me was create an explicitly safe, non-judgmental environment where it's not only ok but even desirable to "fuck up" and "look/sound stupid" and to reinforce that message multiple times. so anyway that quote just made me think that "don't take things/yourself too seriously" sits at this interesting intersection between increasing playfulness & coping strategies for emotional damage. sorry to ramble about it in your ask box lol! (3/3)

yes I think this is so so true!! all of this, lol, but especially the part about how acute stress can make it increasingly difficult to be playful. i have written a lot about working through internalized shame here in the past, and especially about the ways that shame causes you to both physically and emotionally shut down parts of yourself. (i actually gave a talk about this subject recently! it was like, a layman’s intro to the neuroscience of shame, with a specific focus on how shame responses affect people’s ability to learn & to connect socially with others in learning spaces.)

i do just want to clarify that the excerpt i posted was from a study that was very narrowly focused on answering the question: “is there a link between playfulness levels and positive/adaptive coping mechanisms in responding to stress?” the study wasn’t designed to answer larger questions about what kinds of life experiences might produce higher levels of playfulness vs. make it difficult to be playful (such as past trauma, not having one’s basic needs for security met, etc.). in the conclusion the authors note that their findings (i.e., that playful people seem to be more able to readily access and use positive coping mechanisms) means that we should be doing more research on how to cultivate playfulness and how to help people unlearn maladaptive coping mechanisms like self-blame. so the point of the study was not to blame individuals or place the responsibility on individual people (“if you could just lighten up, you wouldn’t be so stressed / unhappy / bad at coping!”). it was more like, an attempt to establish that playfulness (as a way of engaging with the world) seems to be associated with all of these positive ways of coping and managing stress, and so we might want to research playfulness more deeply and/or focus on cultivating it in college students.

so i think you are absolutely right that when we talk about playfulness it’s important not to think of it as something that something people just “have” or don’t have (detached from any consideration of people’s backgrounds, lived experiences, etc.). and we also want to avoid pathologizing its absence (“if you don’t have a playful attitude then there’s something wrong/flawed/messed up about you that needs to be fixed”). my research is focused on understanding how we can better create learning environments like the one your singing teacher has created for you -- i.e., spaces where people feel more secure and less vulnerable to scathing or hypercritical judgment; where failures and mistakes are encouraged & normalized as a natural, healthy part of the learning experience; where instructors are modeling self-compassion and deliberately not using shame-based methods; and just in general, where students are getting the kind of gentle, compassionate, consistent messaging you describe receiving from your teacher. basically I’m interested in creating classrooms that provide the stability and consistency people need in order to learn adaptive coping mechanisms that will serve them well outside of those learning spaces.

i think these questions are so important because most college instructors are VERY aware that our students come into our classrooms carrying many different kinds of trauma—whether it’s the more extreme forms that we tend to think of when we think about trauma (childhood abuse, sexual assault, trauma experienced by combat veterans or refugees from warzones), or the forms of pervasive lowgrade trauma associated with financial precarity, racialized stress, etc., or even just the “lighter” or harder-to-classify forms of trauma that rachel naomi remen calls “the cultural shadow” (i.e., the toxic dominant culture that many of us grow up immersed in). and anyone who has taught at the college level (or taught any age level) knows that as a teacher you often have to at least temporarily play aspects of counselor / social worker / person adept at navigating university bureaucracy to help keep students in crisis from slipping through the cracks. (that is obviously NOT ideal, as those roles should be filled by trained professionals! but we have all been in those situations, where you are the first line of support for a student in crisis, or sometimes the last line of support because they have slipped through the giant holes in our country’s social safety nets.)

i think there’s been a shift in recent years towards “trauma-informed pedagogy,” but the slightly watered-down version of this approach many instructors receive tends to be very focused on mitigating harm in the classroom (ie, avoiding certain things or framing material in certain ways so as to avoid re-traumatizing students). this work is obviously HUGELY important (and my own research project is v much informed by it!). but i sometimes feel like these approaches are very damage-centered, ie very focused on understanding how students are “damaged” by their experiences and how we can “prevent further damage” in the classroom space. again, wanting to adopt teaching practices that avoid retraumatizing students is a good thing!!! but i think what i am hoping my work can do is suggest that we can and should strive for more than just limiting damage. to put this another way: i’m looking for ways to go beyond asking “how can we avoid re-traumatizing students in our classrooms?” to thinking more broadly about how we (as teachers, mentors, etc) can design learning environments and learning experiences that help students grow into healthier, happier, more emotionally resilient versions of themselves—and hopefully help build a foundation of social-emotional skills that they will take with them into their adult lives.

play is not the sole "answer” or solution! but i think that for me, it’s been one useful way to think about things like trauma-informed teaching, restorative practices, and social-emotional mentoring strategies, in ways that center a more positive, joyful understanding of what happy and emotionally well-adjusted adulthood can look/feel like. does that make sense?? i think about cultivating playfulness as just one angle onto answering these questions, or as one approach or set of strategies that people could have in their toolkits as they think about how we design learning environments. it won’t work for all students or all teachers or all learning environments, and it won’t solve all of the problems in higher ed (or in a culture where traumatic experiences are so prevalent and yet are so often left unacknowledged and untreated). but i think for me at least it’s been one generative way to reimagine some of the common structures and norms that structure higher ed learning environments.

anyway sorry to use your ask as a springboard into a long “thinking aloud” post!! but i really enjoyed reading your thoughts and i feel like it’s prompted me to articulate some thoughts that have just been sort of murkily floating around in my mind for the last couple weeks. i am also so glad for you that you have a space in your own life (and a trusted teacher figure) where you feel secure & can practice and explore being vulnerable, making mistakes, being silly/playful, etc. it sounds like she is a really wonderful teacher, and it’s so cool too that you are able to describe the ways in which that learning space has felt healing or healthy for you.

#long post #to think further #!!#playfulness project #play project #mw #teaching #mentoring #edit to add: i know that trauma-informed pedagogy is also thinking about these things & i don't mean to suggest that this is #the first time anyone has ever thought of this lol #but i think a lot of young instructors especially (or older instructors who don't do a deep dive into trauma-informed practices)#do tend to get that watered-down version that focuses more on damage and less on restorative / reparative practices

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smolbeandrabbles · 4 years

Text

I Know Places - Director Orson Krennic x Reader 4 (Rogue One)

* I was originally going to use this song for Patience. So. It’s come full circle!

Finale to I Think He Knows / Hero / Protector

@wltz-bby @happyskywhale

Author’s Note: We’re here! We are concluding my 4 part Retcon / AU Krennic request series! @purebloodwitch I can never thank you enough for giving me the opportunity to write this! I know it’s taken me almost a whole year to finish it! 🙈 But I do hope you’d forgive me, and I hope you enjoy my conclusion! 💙💜

I Know Places - Taylor Swift Ah, we begin and end with Taylor and also similar titles!

Disclaimer: Rogue One characters not mine / Star Wars plots etc not mine (might have slightly screwed up a little here but...) / lyrics & gifs not mine

Premise: Your relationship is shaky now, how can it not be? Orson’s career is in ruins, and you have strategic battles to win. There’s a lot on both your minds, and in trying to protect each other from The Empire, wires get crossed...

Words: 9834

Warnings: Swearing / Basically constant ‘threat’ / AU/Retcon

______

You stand with your hand on my waistline It's a scene and we're out here in plain sight I can hear them whisper as we pass by It's a bad sign, bad sign Something happens when everybody finds out See the vultures circling, dark clouds Love's a fragile little flame, it could burn out It could burn out 'Cause they got the cages, they got the boxes and guns They are the hunters, we are the foxes and we run Baby, I know places we won't be found And they'll be chasing their tails trying to track us down 'Cause I, I know places we can hide I know places, I know places Lights flash and we'll run for the fences Let them say what they want, we won't hear it Loose lips sink ships all the damn time Not this time Just grab my hand and don't ever drop it, my love They are the hunters, we are the foxes, and we run Baby, I know places we won't be found And they'll be chasing their tails trying to track us down 'Cause I, I know places we can hide I know places They take their shots, but we're bulletproof And you know for me, it's always you In the dead of night, your eyes so green And I know for you, it's always me

---

Orson didn’t have too much time to get totally depressed about it, not really. You were back in the air and had a job to do. But you clearly weren’t his favourite person; when he requested a room of his own aboard the Resolution it stung. But you couldn’t grant him his wish, due to lack of availability. So even though he was in your room he wasn’t sleeping with you, and any time you tried to broach the subject with him he simply pushed you away. You had to give him time, and as much space as this ship, and your quarters, were able to provide. He had to know that you never wanted this. He had to know that your only option was to save his life, again. If the Empire managed to tear you apart over this, then you were about to have serious doubts over how genuine this relationship was.

You were sure he hadn’t been black listed, considering his tablet pinged on occasion and you couldn’t think it would do that for any other reason than work. But Krennic would stare at the message and then sigh and turn it over again. You had thought about leaving him to collect himself on Coruscant but, if you did that, he would likely run into people that would ask a lot of uncomfortable questions of him. Let alone, with the tensions between you, the arms of someone else… he still had that reputation. You were also wary of the potential for just about anyone to come for him again - and at least Krennic agreed that he was safer with you.

You weren’t really sure how you were supposed to tell him that he looked so good out of uniform though - you thought he’d get angry if you did that. It was freedom, you thought. Yet not freedom he wanted. Still, button up shirts and smart black pants were his new uniform of choice and he was easy on the eye.

Today you were sprung into action by an emergency alarm - the Death Star was under attack and your assistance was urgently required. Part of you debated ignoring orders - Tarkin got himself into this; he could damn well get himself out. However, you knew you were already on thin ice you’re your superiors, and it was Orson’s baby. Like it or not that Tarkin was in charge now - you weren’t sure you’d forgive yourself if Krennic found out you’d disobeyed these orders.

You turned to your bridge, after weighing it up and sighed gently; “Okay, Sayra-!” “Yes m’am!” She stood to attention, but it looked like she was already three steps ahead of you. “Make sure that what we’re doing is broadcast ship wide... Tell Tarkin the Resolution is on its way. Alarms on, battle stations, prepare for the lightspeed jump. Don’t wait for my signal, take it as soon as you’re able.” You turned to Jerod, “You think Tully will be there?” “Without a doubt.” “Great - with me, we need a strategy...” Jerod got a little closer than necessary. “This better not be a plan for treason!” “You think I wanna help Tarkin?!” “I think your partner thinks you’ve done enough-!” You scoffed, “All he needs to know is we’re going to ‘protect’ his project.” Jerod smiled knowingly - you still weren’t talking; “I knew you broadcast ship wide like that for a reason.” ** Tully stared at you (probably rightly) like you were insane, “You’re lucky they don’t monitor this-! Are you crazy-!?! Hasn’t Tarkin done enough to you!?” “If he thinks I’m just gonna bend to his will from now on, he’s got another thing coming. I wanna get out of this alive Tully, don’t you!?” “Staying on the edge of the battle is going to look like what you’re saying it is. Y/N, we’re gonna have to really milk this for it to not look like further treason on your part!” “Treason!?” You laughed, “We’ll be helping out.” “Barely...” Tully placed his fingers to his lips for a moment to consider it, “you trust me?” “Of course I do.” “Then we go with your plan. But if he asks me to do more, Y/N-” You held your hands up to stop your fellow Officer from panicking, “I’m not expecting you to follow through when Tarkin starts screaming, don’t worry.” “Why are you so adamant about this?” “I dunno. Part of me thinks I’d feel better, at least, if I saw that thing blown out of the sky.” Tully laughed, with a wink as he signed off, and you heard the rumblings of his ship breaking out of lightspeed. “Be careful what you wish for!”

By the time you were up on the bridge you were also preparing to drop out of lightspeed. “Shields up, get ready to fire on all cylinders. But careful, this Rebel Alliance is tricky. We’ve seen what it’s capable of on Scarif and I’m sure none of us want a repeat of that.” Especially not you. And you were right of course, they were being very tricksy. Exactly what you wanted; time to execute your plan: “I want fighters in the air. Keep a few of our teams on standby. I would expect that the rebellion has more to the fleet and they’re holding back right now... I don’t want us running low before we can even make a dent.” You flipped a plethora of statistics up onto your main viewing screen and studied them thoroughly; the less of your crew that had to suffer the better.

It was all going fine until there was commotion at one end of your bridge, you turned to see officers barring none other than Krennic from entering: “Ranked officers only on the bridge, Sir!” “Sir!?” He spat, outraged, “Ranked officers only-!!? Don’t you dare-” “Stand down lieutenants.” Your voice carried across the bridge and they stood back, “It’s okay. If there’s anyone here that knows anything about this station, it’s him.” Krennic brushed off his shirt and gave them both a smug smirk before he approached you, taking the steps up to your command platform. “General, if I may...” You motioned him to follow you to the window, “You may not be a Director, but in my eyes you certainly still are. Your advice here would be greatly appreciated.” His voice lowered considerably, “The rebellion?! They’re coming for the Death Star and you and I both know why.” You stared back at him pointedly, “The flaw.” “Yes. Now what are you... looking for them to exploit it?” “Yes. And giving them as much time as necessary whilst looking like I’m backing it up.” “Who else is in on this?” “Tully.” “TULLY!?” “Orson, I trust him. My question should be to you, if the rebellion somehow exploit Galen’s one in a million flaw... do you care?” He looked out across the expanse of space, at the orb just floating serenely in the chaos of the dog fights that surrounded it. Krennic was hesitating: and you knew that it was a big decision, it was his life’s work. He might have muttered to you that he didn’t care now it was Tarkin’s, but everything he’d worked for was there - Orson had to decide, and quickly, if he was alright with it being blown up right before his eyes. “No. You do what you’re doing. Do not get this ship in trouble.” You smiled, “That’s my job.” Then nodded to him, “Thank you, Krennic. You are dismissed if you do not wish to stay, and I’d understand that.” “No.” He turned to you. “I’m here.” Then very slowly he slipped his hand into yours and linked your fingers, “We’re going to see this through.” Your smile grew, and you were happy that he was back with you here. Maybe he’d even forgiven you. “I’m glad you’re here. I need you.” Orson’s smile was sincere to match that look in his eyes, “I’m with you, Y/N. I always have been.” *** The dog fights along the surface of the Death Star had you mesmerised, and you kept glancing to Krennic every time his hand tensed in yours. He knew what he was looking for; you didn’t. What you did know was you were losing far too many TIE fighters. “Are we about to fire on the rebel base?” Jarod looked from the planet to you, “Well, yeah.” But then tapped the screen to show the base was obviously shielded. “So why aren’t we getting involved here…” You apologetically slipped your fingers from Orson’s and approached your assistant, “Why can’t we all fire on it, why does it need to be the Death Star?” “You want to get in range of that-!?” “Well, they didn’t exactly care on Scarif.” “Scarif was single reactor ignition, just like Jeddah was. When they blow the planet you’re gonna be glad we’re out here!” You looked back to the orb, “…What are they waiting for?” “What do you think they’re waiting for?” You turned back to Krennic, fingers to his lips, looking worried, “…Hopefully we don’t get to find out.” You cleared your throat and turned back to your communications team, “Pull our fighters back, we are losing far too many in stupid circumstances, I’m not having it. They’re getting too careless.” Sayra blinked at you a few times, “You… actually want me to say that?” “Yeah. I’d rather not have to completely replenish my ranks!” Krennic chuckled from behind you, making you turn to him, “Something to say?” “No.” But he was amused, even with his eyes still on the expanse of space, “Damn, I see why they gave you this job.” Suddenly Krennic’s smile faded and his hand shot out in an urgent need to call you over, turning back to make sure she was relaying your order, you strode over to him. “What?” “See this- this one!” He pointed out the X-wing to you, “That’s a pilot.” “Yeah?” That was not the only reason he’d called you over. “The run they’re making…” He paused, but not insignificantly. Making your own eyes widen as you turned to him, “The flaw is-?” You didn’t have the opportunity to finish your thought, let alone your sentence as the sudden flash of the explosion lit the darkness of space. Everyone on your bridge who wasn’t already on their feet suddenly stood, and gasping and yelling of all kinds was present. The three of you on your platform were stunned into momentary silence as the battle station ignited, and all that was left in front of you was debris. The shock waves carried enough to rock your ship, causing you to grab Krennic to steady yourself. Shield’s whining at the strength. “Pull us back a little, I don’t want any more dents in her!” “Shields are holding General!” “I still err caution!” You stumbled towards the viewing window still staring at where the Death Star should have been, Krennic joined your side. “You’ve heard of poetic justice, right?” “Yeah.” “I think we might have just witnessed it.” “Don’t let anyone else hear that!” Jerod’s screen filled with notification after notification – urgent contact messages, and all for you. Sayra and he looked to each other in sudden realisation and he called you. “General, what is our next move!? The fleet wish to know!” You couldn’t have looked more confused as you turned to him, “The fleet!?” Orson’s voice was much quieter, “Tarkin just got taken off the board, General. You’re the highest ranking officer here now.” Jerod nodded encouragingly to Krennic’s explanation and you swallowed hard as it hit you: Tarkin was gone - too late to help your lover, perhaps. But not a second too soon for your liking. Turning to Krennic your eyebrows raised, “We’re the only ones who know about the fault… we control the narrative!” He nodded encouragingly, making you in turn nod to Jerod, “We just lost our most important battle station – that’s a strategic loss! We’re in sight of the rebel base; who knows what the hell they have down there that can wipe out the rest of our fleet. We’ve just lost our highest ranking military official, and our edge.” You were assured in your stance, “We need to regroup before they can catch us off guard. Lose the battle, win the war. Pull everyone off the field Jerod. That’s an order!” *** You weren’t exactly commended for the battle – but your quick thinking, and quite frankly bullshit excuse, to get away from the rebels was appreciated. Now you were back on Coruscant – and without a super weapon the Empire was in disarray. Not something you wouldn’t bounce back from, but it left you restless. And no one was giving you a promotion to Tarkin’s position. Which annoyed you no end. “They won’t give you what you want, if they did you could reinstate me. Right now, they have you where they want you and unable to assist me.” You turned to Krennic from looking out over the city, “Well then it’s a good thing you still have your architecture.” He shrugged, “It’s still quiet, people are still cautious. Except Lexrul. Which is okay, but… I didn’t exactly grow up on a planet that can afford… me.” Walking across the room to you, Krennic gathered you in his arms and you melted into him, head on his chest. “I’m worried, Orson. This isn’t the end. The Empire will want revenge, but the Rebellion has the upper hand. It’ll get worse before it gets better – I want to be involved in what’s going on.” “And you will be, but you know more than anyone you need to be careful…” He pressed a tender kiss to your hair, “I can’t lose you out there.” “Really? I was under the impression that you’d rather lose your life than those plans of yours.” Krennic tensed suddenly, making you raise your head, “What? What is it?” “They still have my work. Vader will keep you on a leash that’s for sure, but my work.” He took a step back, hands on your shoulders, “Y/N, they will hold me over you as long as I’m breathing, you know that.” “You better not be suggesting anything stupid,” You growled, pulling him back by his shirt collar, “not after what we’ve just been through!” He tried to release your grip on him, to no avail, “If they can’t make those plan’s work-” “Stop it.” That caused your hands to tighten. “They’ll drag me back into it, only I won’t have rank.” “They CAN’T have you. They made their choice. If they think they can take you away just to break you again-” you stopped, and then narrowed your eyes, “Wait. Are you talking about a SECOND Death Star?!” It all seemed fairly obvious to Krennic, “After all why not. Why stop with one!?” “It took you years to get it up and running.” “Yes. But now they have a complete works. Give it 3 or 4, maybe 5 and we’ll have another. I doubt the Empire will fall in that time with people like you leading the fleet.” “Orson…” “Well only one of us will be privy to it, Y/N.” “What if they do?” “…Well, we must prepare for such a situation.” “And the Empire?! You can’t talk about it falling and not-” “Hush.” He placed a finger to your lips, “Don’t think on that one just now.” “Orson!” “Don’t… You’ve done enough. This time you really have…” You let his collar go as he drew you back to him, “No matter what happens, Y/N, I love you.” “Stop talking.” “But-” “You’re scaring me…” You mumbled, burying your face in his shirt, inhaling his scent. Tonight it wasn’t comforting. “Baby, you’re scaring me…” ***

What Krennic had said was deeply worrying, and it weighed on your mind heavily for a whole year. You tried not to let it show, and sometimes you almost forgot, almost but never quite until someone said something that would bring it flooding back. People always liked to ask you what Orson Krennic was doing these days. You made a mental note to distrust everyone that did – and you kept him as close as possible. Luckily, as it appeared the Empire wouldn’t keep to their black listed word, his client base picked up and Krennic became happier. But you didn’t let him out of your sight, and as the Empire sent you away time and again with the Resolution to extinguish pockets of Rebels, he came with you. It was nice sometimes, to return to him after a hard day of ordering people around in some of the most bogged down space battles you’d ever endured. He always took care of you when your nerves were frayed, and it was just as nice to wake up tangled up with him in your sheets. You’d learned that Krennic didn’t so much like being called Director anymore, but the way that General spilled from his lips was still rather pleasing. If only you could command your ship from your quarters, you would stay with him all day. It wasn’t possible; but you would let him make you as late as he wanted. The Empire could keep on blaming themselves for that. These fights were more frustrating than anything else. You never seemed to get a straight answer from the lofty heights of command – now apparently Vader and the Emperor working through others, but you never answered to either of them directly. They were being strategically shifty with you, sending you to far off battles that didn’t mean much - and you knew this - but were apparently ‘important’. You thought all they were doing was wasting your time and resources, and sometimes you felt command wished the Rebels would get lucky and take you out as a problem. It never happened; they should have known better. It was starting to get tiresome for you, and on occasion it was obvious that – despite your rank – the chain of command hardly cared for you. You got a higher frequency of conflicting messages the more you were sent out. To which you’d always turn to Jerod. “So, which one is it?” “Any of them?” “Screw this, we’re doing it my way. What’s the point of this damn bar if they’re gonna control me!?” “Well. The Resolution follows your lead, General.” Apparently no one cared about that either, because you were never hauled into offices for doing things that were quite frankly dangerous. You came to the conclusion that it can’t have been because the Empire was in such disarray – but because they wanted you to make such a big mistake you’d be disgraced or killed in action. You were smarter than that; you didn’t get here on blind luck and you refused to lead good people into a battle without straight orders. Better to ignore them and follow your own intuition and instincts – they hadn’t let you down yet. Besides, you had an ex-Director to advise if necessary – and Krennic was a great card to have up your sleeve. The Empire didn’t see that either. On yet another jaunt across the galaxy, Orson did the unexpected and refused to go. “WHAT!?” You backed him against the old senate building, furious, “Are you insane!? They will kill you if I’m not here!” “Tully is staying, I’ll be fine with him.” “You think I’m going to fall for that-!? You’re coming with me!” Tully cleared his throat, “The Excelsior is in for repairs. Krennic is welcome to stay with me whilst we see to them. I’ll keep an eye on him, Y/N.” You scowled at him, “And what about if you get called off planet!?” “I’ll take him!” Your eyes narrowed, “Y/N, you know I’ll send you coordinates and you can retrieve him.” “I don’t like this.” “You leave him alone when you’re at meetings, right? You know he can fend for himself…” Tully pulled you away from Krennic for a moment, allowing Orson some breathing space and to straighten his clothes. “This could be good for you.” “I’ll just worry-! Tully this is not a good idea!” “Focus on your job for the Empire. What they think you ought to be doing. You already know what they’re trying to make happen here. I’ll watch out for him I promise. You do what they hired you for.” You took a deep breath looking back to Krennic, who was clearly trying very hard to lip read you both. Tully turned you away, aware of this too, “You both almost died on Mustafar. I know you don’t need reminding of that – but they reinstated you. Stay in favour and play it smart. Be the General who is defending her Empire. I think there’s some important strategic meetings coming up about a certain battle station that I could use some intel on, if you follow me.” You turned back around, understanding completely, eyes sorrowful as you looked to Krennic – and yet knowing what you must do. You nodded, swallowing thickly before looking at Tully hard. “Protect him. Or I SWEAR.” “I’m dead. More than dead. I get it.” You gave a firm nod before crossing back to Orson, taking his hands in yours, “Stay alive.” “I’ll try.” “You better!” You brushed your lips to his, “I’ll be as quick as I can.” “Go. I told you before, didn’t I, they’ll follow you anywhere, Y/N. You’re the Empire’s only hope.” You chuckled, letting him go with one last quick kiss, “I think there’s no hope for the Empire you’re thinking of. That went up in flames when they hurt you.” Krennic was good at keeping himself hidden – years as an intelligence operative had sharpened those skills enough to mean that Tully didn’t need to keep as much of an eye on him as expected. Orson busied himself with his work and kept to himself. Except at today’s briefing, where Tully had brought him down to the senate – he would have to impart all the information he heard to Krennic very quickly, and he didn’t think he could retain it on the journey back to his apartment. They both had an inkling on what this ‘breakthrough’ briefing could be about. Tully hurried through the building a lot quicker than he should have to where Krennic would be waiting – almost the very first to leave, Tully had to be extra careful not to look to shifty. Orson swept from his hiding place and in step with the General, as if he’d always been there. “Are we correct?” Tully nodded, “They’re certainly making one.” “And?” “Well your name hasn’t been mentioned yet, but it’s only a matter of time before it is... then god only knows.” “Why has she not been informed?” It may have been obvious, but you still out ranked Tully, to Krennic it made no sense for them to exclude you. Besides, they could still hold Orson over you. “I assume because once they do mention your name, if they decide they need to drag you off to force you to work on it, she can’t tip you off and have you half way across the galaxy...!” “What do they think she’s going to do? I’ll compromise her no matter what!” “Well, what are your suggestions!? They’ll make sure there’s no way to blow it up this time – however the Rebels did that…” “She’s too limited with me alive.” Krennic stopped on the steps and turned to Tully, “There are no more moves to make with me still on the playing field.” “You’re NOT suggesting you die!? After what you two went through!? And how?! Do you KNOW what she’ll do?” “We need a plot. It’ll have to be well planned, complicated and elaborate but… Tully I need to die. Imagine what she can do when they can’t threaten her with my death.” “Complicated is one word for it, how about impossible!” The younger man’s look was sharp. “Not impossible. You and I know enough about the weapons division to know it’s possible… Tully, consider this. There’s a way out of this for all of us!” “Then can we both agree on something, before we think of enacting something so CRAZY!” The General hissed, eyes wide. “Yes.” Krennic blinked, ready to hear something at least a little level headed. “She isn’t going to like this one bit!” Krennic’s face fell, but then he chuckled nervously, “No… she’ll probably kill me herself!” There was an abnormally long silence – and Tully and Orson both knew this was bad even by your standards. You sat listening and all your face went through was varying stages of dread, before your head finally sunk into your hands – and you’d remained in this position after they’d finished. Finally you removed one hand from your forehead and waved it between them; “Which of you idiots do I have to thank for this!?” Orson was defensive: “It’s my idea. It’s the only way this is going to work.” “You think me waltzing into the senate and declaring you dead is going to work, do you!?” There was far too much buzzing around your head about what exactly could go wrong, for you to be polite about it. “There’d have to be witnesses-” You shot Tully a venomous glare, “You?! You think that’d be good enough? They know we’re friends Tully. It’s not exactly evidence is it!?” “Then there needs to be something solid.” Krennic’s eyes fixed to Tully, the two of them thought they’d come up with a good solution. “You have to kill me. To make sure they can’t ever use me against you again.” “-WHAT?!” Your anger at the idea reached its peak and Orson could see the flare behind your eyes that was about to have him met with a string of curse words. Instead he cut over you. “The weapons division will have something somewhere that will look like blaster fire. It’ll probably hurt like hell. Give the illusion that I’m really dead. But I’ll be fine. And it has to be YOU, Y/N, for them to believe you’re back on side. That what happened on Mustafar was more than just you betraying me-” Krennic paused to indicate he knew that wasn’t what happened, “-but was to get you back on track. You and I are done. You used me… whatever anyone wants to call it.” Your eyes flicked back to Tully who nodded to confirm that such weaponry was available. “Well I don’t trust just anyone… What if they deceive me and I end up really killing you?! In fact, I barely trust anyone in the Empire now. It’s getting harder to trust my own crew. It doesn’t surprise me that some of them think I’m losing it…” Not those most loyal, but those on the edge… those amongst the crew who shunned the once great Director, now he’d been stripped of everything. “See-! All you need to do is shoot me. And I can think of a billion times I’m sure you’ve wanted to.” “That’s not the same as really doing it…” You tapped your fingers against your lips, “They need footage. That’s what you’re saying.” “Yeah.” Tully stepped forward, “As for the ammo itself. Don’t worry, I know a guy. I think we can pull this off.” You stood, crossing to your partner, “And then what? When you’re “dead”?” “We win the war. I lay low on some far-off planet. And you come back to me.” “Leave you alone?” He gathered you in his arms, “We all have to make sacrifices for this to work out.” Your gaze fell back to your friend, “I hope you know what you’re doing.” Tully gave a deep nod. “I’ll set it in motion.” He left abruptly with a bow, so as not to overstay his welcome. “You trust him?” Krennic’s ask was quiet, and you scoffed – hadn’t they just planned all this out together? “Tully may be more loyal to the Empire than I am, but he’s a good man. Better than most. I trust him with my life – it’s whether or not I trust him with yours.” “And do you?” Although you didn’t answer straight away, you did smile: “I do.” Krennic didn’t respond with words, instead pressing his lips to your forehead, before looking back over the city. It was now dark, and the stars winked in the night sky. Krennic tried to commit all the architecture to memory – so much of it was his, so much he’d had a hand in. It was never something he thought he’d leave, and yet looking at it now he knew he would be saying goodbye soon. He swallowed hard, hoping against hope that these plans wouldn’t unravel. He needed this to work, for your future together – for you more than anything, Krennic desperately needed this to work. He looked back to the stars exhaling, only luck could save you both now. *** Just when you thought the Empire might be getting back on track, balance tipped. Too many whispers about the return of the Jedi had you thinking they were true and the Empire was just trying to squash them. The Rebellion had hope – the people living under the flag of the Empire who wanted rid of it were gathering in vast numbers. The only thing on your side was your kindness and mercy – but it wouldn’t save you. Anyone taking one look at your rank would have you tried for war crimes at the very least. Krennic, with everyone in fairly good spirits (and seemingly excluded from the second Death Star), had done some travelling to smaller planets where his services were wanted. He’d re-grounded himself on the pretences that perhaps people would think that an unprotected ex-Director’s death would have the same impact on the Empire as a high profile General. He didn’t need that weighing on your mind too. It was only supposed to be a fake death, after all. But the whispers didn’t stay whispers, and people freely and openly talked about defying the Empire – about what the Rebellion was planning. Where once he would have run straight to High Command with this information, maybe even would have run to win back their favour, now Orson only thought of you. Included amongst them – a Rebel fighter who had a good shot at you would only see high ranking official. Not everything else you’d ever stood for. Orson wouldn’t allow it to happen. He COULDN’T allow it to happen. Which is why he sprinted from his shuttle back home. You were just finishing an important holographic meeting as he flung the doors wide and you turned, surprised, as the blue holograms flickered out. “Orson, wha-” “We need to do this. Now.” “Do what?!” “Enact the plan. You need to call Tully and we need to do it NOW.” He pulled your sleeve towards the communications pad. “Orson, Orson, calm down. What’s wrong?” “You know the Empire is falling apart, the Rebellion grows stronger every second we stand here talking. We may not show it on the outside, but there are cracks, you know this.” “Yes, I just got off a call that said something fairly similar. Hey-!” You turned his face towards you with your fingertips as he began punching in Tully’s calling card number. “Slow down a minute. What does that have to do with our plan?” “Everything!” You pulled his hand and sat him down, hands firmly on his shoulders you slid yourself into Krennic’s lap, “Darling, elaborate.” Carding your fingers through Orson’s hair you brushed your lips to his, “And please, calm down.” He took a deep shaky breath, and nodded, “It’s you.” “Me?!” “I mean it’s likely the Rebellion would want to kill me out of spite. I did build the Death Star, but you. You’re a High General. You’re as high up as it gets without being in the… I mean you should be up there. If they don’t KILL you, they will try you and THEN kill you – probably. Prison for sure. If we enact this fake death thing… What if I never get you back?” “What if the Empire pulls through and we have nothing to worry about.” “Yeah, alright. Call this new disarray fixable, if you will. It doesn’t change your role here. If we enact this now, we can get you out of here too.” “Orson, I’m not running from the Rebellion. I’m not leaving my crew and my friends. Not until there is no other choice. But I need to get you out of here and soon, that much is true.” You kissed him gently, “Mark my words, I will return to you. Leave Tully to me. If you panic you will make mistakes; we can’t afford to put a foot wrong here.” Krennic obviously glared at you for insinuating he ever made mistakes – but sometimes he did let his emotion get the better of him. “Besides, Krennic, as if I didn’t before – I definitely outrank you now. I won’t lose you.” You stood, “I need you to trust me with this. I’m trusting your plan will work. You need to let me do my job and finish this fight with the Rebels. Whether the Empire comes out on top or not.” The look on your face was firm, and Krennic knew the only thing he’d get himself into was another argument. He stood with you, and took yours hands. “Return to me. PROMISE me, that no matter what happens you will come back to me.” “You mean more to me than anything, Orson. How could I promise you anything else? I won’t ever leave you. Don’t you know that by now?” He couldn’t help but laugh at that, yes. Of course he did.

Tully’s message just read ‘ready’ - it was dark, and you’d waited up on the pretence of working. Orson wasn’t allowed out after nightfall, that was a rule. Needless to say he wasn’t impressed and whined that you were no fun – obviously to have you prove to him otherwise – but rather that than he wind up dead in some back ally either by Rebel or Imperial hand; or whoever else he’d managed to piss off in his long career. So you’d sent him to bed early – how often did he even think of that, let alone do it? – and sat up with your tablet watching him. You almost missed the message for thoughts running around your head observing him: this wasn’t exactly a new activity for you, but now you were here you were thinking of how much you were about to miss this. His silhouette lit by the harsh lighting of Coruscant’s cityscape, softened by the organza curtains. There was a gentle breeze tonight, cooling, and the light kissed his bare shoulders and arms; highlighting his muscle structure – more battle-hardened warrior than you thought the Imperials would ever give him credit for. Never afraid to get his hands dirty – Krennic had enough smaller marks on him to tell all those stories on their own, you liked running your hands over them as he recited the accounts again and again. You’d never get bored of him; you’d never get enough of him. You tucked your tablet away and pulled on a dark cloak. You walked to the door to leave but paused, turning back to the bed with a gentle sigh, you rounded him. Positive that he was in a deep sleep – you had to be; you knew he slept with that blaster under his pillow. You never mentioned it, but you knew it was there. Such were the times these days. You ran your fingers gently through his hair and bent to kiss his cheek. Orson mumbled incoherently, but didn’t stir. You stood, knowing that you were on a time limit now, but you couldn’t help but smile – once you did this, he’d be safe. That was all that mattered to you now. When you caught up to Tully you unravelled your cloak from your face with an impatient sigh: “Is there a reason we’re sneaking around like this!? I feel like I’m some kind of Rebel intelligence operative!” “If people figure out what we’re doing we have BIG problems. And Krennic being dragged off as a slave to the Death Star is the very least of them. These weapons are probably illegal.” “NOW you tell me.” “Look, do you want to save him or not!?” Tully pulled the blaster out of his jacket – it looked just like something standard issue. You supposed it, or its ammunition, had been highly modified. “So, is this gonna work? He’s gonna be fine right?” “Well... it’s gonna hurt, but it won’t kill him.” Your pause was lengthy; you weren’t sure that you wanted to hurt him, but you supposed it needed to look authentic. If it was painless it would be fairly obvious you were firing blanks. “Are you SURE!? Shit, Tully I can’t risk it on one shot-!” “Look I tried my damn best, I’m not a miracle worker-!” You sighed, tucking it under your cloak, “Well it’ll have to do, you’re a damn sight better than anyone else.” Tully pulled you back, “Just, word of advice, don’t aim for his heart.” “HELPFUL!” You very nearly hit him. “If it goes wrong, we want this to be fixable!” You rolled your eyes, he was going the right way about having you question this completely. “Okay, okay. No heart.” “Are you gonna tell him when you do it?” “No. He knows enough! I want it to be as close to as surprise as it can be…” “Well, I better be there too.” “Why?!” “Well, you gotta move a body and make sure that this doesn’t all fall into the wrong hands.” “MOVE A BODY!?!” Tully waved his hands to quiet you down, “Yeah, what part of ‘act like he’s dead’ don’t you understand, he can’t walk out of the situation, Y/N. That defeats the point.” “Fine. I’ll give you a call by the morning. To set up the where and when.” He nodded, “Then I’ll leave you to it.” You gave a nod, eager to now return to your partner on what could be one of your last nights together for a while. Certainly one of your last nights together on Coruscant. This time when you turned away, cloak hood up Tully didn’t turn you back, and you placed your hand over the blaster to make sure it was still there. What the hell were these men about to get you into-!?

***

It wasn’t so hard to convince Krennic to wander outside, just as it wasn’t so hard for Tully to ‘just happen across you’ and decide to take the same walk. You both knew that not only did Orson need to be shocked at the situation he found himself in – diva he might have been, but there was always the threat of overacting it – but he also needed to say all the right things, in case there were any other witnesses who heard or saw anything. You hoped not, leading him to a relatively quiet part of the city; if there was such a thing. You had coaxed Krennic on this walk with a simple “I want to show you something!” – always a phrase to pique the curiosity of an architect and engineer. There were always new buildings going up on Coruscant, some tucked out of the way, designed by new and upcoming architects that Orson would always take an interest in. He was clearly excited, walking just a little ahead of the two of you, eyes darting around and trying to find whatever it was you might be showing him before you introduced him to it. Tully was watching your face and the way you walked, placing a hand gently to your back. “Steady,” he murmured, “Just breathe. It’s all going to work out.” “I know. But with the whole idea, it’s hard to believe…” “You got this, Y/N… you’re a good shot!” He was shot himself, with a sharp look, “Shut up!” Before you reached back for your modified blaster. Time to put all your trust in the man beside you – and hope that Tully really was a friend, and wasn’t simply playing the longest game you’d ever seen. “Where are you taking me!?!” Krennic stopped in the middle of the small plaza, hands on hips, turning left and right on the spot. He’d run out of ideas, although this wasn’t familiar to him, nothing stood out as worth showing him. When he turned back, the puzzlement turned to shock. It would; you were pointing a blaster at him.

A million thoughts raced through his head. Orson knew what was about to happen; you’d talked about it as a group, and planned it. But he thought he might be more involved in the where and when! Oh. Shit! This is it-! He hadn’t got to say goodbye to the view here, your house, pieces of architecture he was particularly fond of, the last night he would get to hold you in his arms on Coruscant, to friends and acquaintances he’d likely never see again… You swallowed hard, “Sorry, Krennic.” There was hardly emotion behind your words – probably because if you let them flood out, you’d be in tears. “This is the end of the road.” He stared you down, one step back with a smallest head shake, his chest heaved. Upset but unwilling to show it in the face of death. “Y/N. After everything-!?” “Especially after everything! You almost cost me my role in the Empire! They don’t trust me even NOW because of you. Seems they don’t need you for the second Death Star project, so you’ve outlived your usefulness.” There was a flicker of apology in your eyes, you didn’t mean it. Krennic knew that – but he still looked shocked and upset; thank god this wasn’t real… “Tully…” His eyes flicked to your friend, “There must be a way to work this out?” Tully gave a shrug, and there was something scarily icy about him – one of Tarkin’s protégés alright. “You ask me she should have done this a long time ago. Should have given you up far earlier. No hard feelings, Krennic. With your plans in our hands… well, you know how the Empire is. You gotta get ahead.” “You’ve held me down far too long.” You affirmed, taking the safety off. Tully, if this doesn’t work…! Krennic’s time here was ending, and yet he was still only looking at you, “Y/N… Please… You don’t need to do this.” Your voice broke over your next sentence, and you couldn’t stop the single tear from sliding down your cheek, “Yes, I do.” Breathe… Just breathe… You pulled the trigger and the red blaster bolt shot across the plaza with one hell of a kick, jarring your arm, hitting Krennic square in the chest (a little too close to his heart for your taste). He grunted like the shot was real, and with his clothes smarting as he tumbled to the floor, you could hear Tully’s ‘I TOLD you not to aim for his heart-!’ resounding in your head. Only then did you breathe; it was a little choked out, but then you breathed deeper. That was unnervingly easy, you waited a few seconds, but Orson didn’t stir - making you look to the weapon – did it work? It must have. Now to figure out how to get him out of here. Tully seemed to have the details worked out on that more than you did. He was running the operation. Even though you’d just shot the man you loved, you couldn’t help smiling, turning to your friend; “Huh--! That worked!” Immediately colour drained from you and your blood ran cold. You were facing a blaster of your own, and there was absolutely no way you were raising yours without getting shot. You let those tears run now. “Tully, no…” You whispered it. Tully gave a shrug, like it was just business, “Sorry, Y/N.” Your eyes widened, adrenaline spiked and suddenly you couldn’t breathe for an entirely different reason. Was this him betraying you!? After everything you’d been through together, he was betraying you!?! Wait! Then what had you just shot Krennic with?! A real blaster bolt!? Had the man in front of you just convinced you to murder your partner? You were outraged, scared, alone. Tully’s finger pulled the trigger back and all you could think of was Orson. “This is for the Empire.”

*** Your head was pounding so hard that even your eyes hurt and that made you unwilling to open them. Even cracking one open and letting the light flood in was blinding. You squeezed them shut and groaned. Your body felt stiff and as you stretched, your joints cracked – complaining at you for having to do something. When you were certain your body might actually obey you, you opened your eyes again, and were faced with a bright white and yellow ceiling. You could feel a breeze too, and curious, you pushed yourself up on your elbows. “Aw, she’s back! Sorry that was probably a little stronger than the one you used on him.” You froze, turning your head slowly to one side, met with the grinning face of one General Tully, relaxing on the bed next to yours, book in his hands. “Welcome to the land of the living, Miss Y/N! Course I can’t call ya General now. You’re officially dead!” You blinked a few times, utterly confused and stared down at the rest of your body, now dressed in a soft white button up shirt and pants, this was very reminiscent of a hospital – but there were no machines or medicine in sight. Turning to him quicker and ignoring your head spinning, you glared: “You’re lucky I don’t KILL you!!!” All he did was laugh, and you had to put a hand to your head, closing your eyes to stop yourself from throwing up; “What the hell was in that?!?” “A decent amount of Tranq. Don’t worry you’ll be fine.” “Geez. Remind me never to ask you for a favour again.” You managed a chuckle, rubbing your head and turning to the bed next to you, half expecting to find a woozy Krennic waking up. Panic seized you when the room was empty. You weren’t in a position to stop it from crossing your face, but Tully soothed you. “Don’t worry, he’s fine!” You looked back to your friend; “Was this your idea!?” Tully shook his head slowly, eyebrow raised: “You don’t think he wanted to keep you safe too?” “Son of a-!” You lay back flat on the bed and sighed deeply. Tully was the only one in on everything, you were glad Orson trusted him that much. With both of you ‘dead’ – both of you were safe. And you assumed now far away from the Empire. It was well orchestrated, you’d give the General that. You bit your lip, a wave of sadness overcoming you at the consequences of a plan you hadn’t been aware of; “I never got to say goodbye to my friends...” “Don’t contact them yet. When whatever happens is over, they’ll find out you’re safe. If you trust them, they can know the truth.” “My ship...” You loved the Resolution. Everyone on it – what about Jerod, he was a great assistant. He didn’t deserve this… Sayra, always ready to go along with any of your ridiculous schemes and communications. Without her you’d never have got Krennic back on Scarif. You owed so much to them, just leaving like this wasn’t fair on either. “Sorry, Y/N. It was the only way.” You wiped your eyes and sniffed, swallowing hard, “I’ll reach out in due time. So they know the truth, those you want to know. But you can’t disclose your location.” “Do they know you did it!?” “No. Tragic rebel accident - don’t worry they were caught and killed. Unfortunately, your civilian partner also died. Guess some rebels saw the Director and didn’t care.” “And the rest of the Imperials?” You wondered how some people would take the fact that Tully had to announce your ‘deaths’, when he’d clearly been the one to kill you as a High General. At a time when the Empire would need people of your ranking most. “I’m sure you know that you’re not favoured amongst them. All I had to do was find the ones who would want you off the map... and get their blessing.” “You’ll be okay?” “Yeah. Found a good planet, got them on board and dressed them as flight crew. Easy to move and dispose of the bodies. Cleanly.” He indicated around the room, and you guessed that it must have been their planet that you found yourselves on now. Tully wasn’t staying, that was obvious, he’d go back to the Empire and do his job. No questions, no answers. “I feel like it’s good we’re friends. Remind me never to get on the wrong side of you! No wonder Tarkin liked you so much!” He laughed again, “Well, you know... luckily you’re the good sort.” When your body had calmed again you sat up and this time your look around the room was more pointed – searching for clues as to if there was a third person here somewhere. Nothing, though. To stop you potentially fretting over whether or not you might have accidently killed him, Tully nodded towards the open door, “Go on, go outside!” You turned questioningly to him, but he just gave you a smile like you didn’t need to ask, and turned back to his book. With clearly no more conversation coming from him you slipped off the bed, your legs immediately buckled from having to take your weight. You heard Tully snort from behind the pages, making you glare back at him, before you stood straight again and continued walking forwards. How long was I out!?! You stumbled a few more times but could catch yourself, and by the time you reached the door you were walking perfectly normally. Your breath caught momentarily, the planet was beautiful. The particular part you were on like a small cluster of houses on a resort. Bright sunshine and tropical plants, not a beach, but a resort you might expect to find on one. Standing at the end of the (alarmingly orange) stone pathway, arms folded and studying the sky, was Orson. You leant against the door, suddenly incapable of calling him, but overcome with happiness. Your plan had somehow worked. You had both made it. Stepping down onto the path was a little hotter than you expected – and you exclaimed your surprise before tentatively placing your bare foot down again. Krennic turned at this sound, instantly smiling and watched you careful navigate down the steps, only raising your head when you got to the bottom – when you beamed. “Tully said it might take a while. I woke up on the way here. Took me a few days to function fully… so be careful.” You weren’t about to heed that, of course, and ran the rest of the way to him, throwing yourself into his arms. “We made it.” “We did… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.” “Oh, you’re in SO much trouble!” You giggled into his shoulder, loving that you could hold him close. If you’d stuck by the original plan, you might have been leaving him on such a planet and returning to war – this way you at least got to keep holding him. Krennic wound his arms around you, “We’ll stay for a little, but I’ve already learned much. This planet is unable to support us fully. There is a ship docked with enough fuel to take us to the outer rim. I suggest we find a planet and stick to it. Tully already says we ought to change our names, I’d like to think it will be temporarily.” “Well look at you, doing all your research.” “Not much else to do. Figure out how to rebuild from scratch. A challenge, but a fun one.” “You’re an architect and an engineer. You built a whole damn battle station that people named – and subsequently proved was – a planet killer. I think building a new life somewhere will be no trouble.” He chucked, a little bashful, “Perhaps. We shall see. I have you too, that’s more important than any of that.” You grinned, pulling him closer, “Ah, you old romantic.” Lips to his, Krennic wound his arms around you. Now you had the whole galaxy and the rest of your lives. You were safe, for all intents and purposes you were dead - ghosts, whispers across the galaxy. It was time to start again, bigger and better. And you could build this better future together.

*** It took a shockingly short amount of time for the Empire to fall to the Rebellion and their Alliance. But it also took longer than necessary for the news to spread across the galaxy.

The war is lost. The Emperor is dead. The Empire is broken, the Rebels win. One short transmission, heralding the arrival of something much more important. The Imperial Cruiser looked out of place so far from home. In the skies above a far, far, far outer rim planet. Out here they hardly even knew what the Empire was – Krennic wasn’t a name people had heard, beyond the skills of a certain architect who was making quite a name for himself. And his wife, a skilled Engineer – and tactician; if you needed something planned out or strategized for you, she was your woman. They had come from relative obscurity, to escape the Empire, and now lived in solitude on the far side of the planet they decided to inhabit. House fronting onto a private beach, there wasn’t another soul for miles. And yet everyone who wanted to, knew exactly where to find them. The Imperial Cruiser that landed on your beach front was, however, not an unwelcome sight. You and Orson stood in the doorway both smiling. “Is he an idiot?” “Think they’ll get shot out of the sky around here?” “Aren’t we supposed to be hiding? A well-intentioned missile and they’d be toast.” “Who around here would know how to do that?!” You raised an eyebrow at him, thinking that he already knew the answer to that question, before jumping down onto the beach and heading towards the cruiser, now opening its door. Orson followed you slower across the beach, but was the first to wave as Tully hopped out onto the sand – in civvies. “I see you’ve dropped your rank bar, General!” “Well, gotta survive somehow!” He grinned, as if it hadn’t been so long. As if the last time you saw each other wasn’t him hurriedly boarding his cruiser to head back to Coruscant, before you and Krennic had even decided on what you wanted to do. “I’m glad to see you, Tully. I’m happy you’re alive.” “It’s good to get to see you. Got a little sticky at the end there…” He ran a hand though his hair, “We got out. We’re okay.” Tully nodded back to you, “Lot changed?” You laughed, “Well, married now.” “Shit-! Really? Congrats! Nice house.” “Well, marry an architect and… his work becomes…” You waved in the direction of the house, “I’m very proud of him.” Tully called back to Orson, “She’s talking like you aren’t here!” “She’s very welcome to if it’s all compliments!” At first they shook hands, but then it became more of a hug, “Now we’re all civilians I suppose things can start… becoming more normal for us.” “We can hope.” Tully grinned, “I still can’t decide, part of me wants to join the Alliance, the Republic. Defecting – maybe but, I know where my strengths lie… Or live a quiet life like this…” Krennic scoffed, “You’re young. You have time.” “I do. We all do.” Tully turned back to you, “I have some people for you to see.” Your eyes widened, “You do!?” “Mhm.” All three of you turned back towards the ship as Jerod descended the ramp with a sheepish grin, holding his hand out to help Sayra hop down after him. “Hey, Y/N.” “J-Jerod!!” You ran to him and you embraced, “Holy- Oh my- I’m so- I’m so sorry, I-!” You were nearly in tears as you hugged Sayra tight too, “Hey, when Tully got back, he told us everything we needed to know. I get it.” “The Resolution, I-!” He grinned and Tully howled with laugher, both of them had made a bet on how long it would take you to mention your beloved ship, “Well, she, survived. Right until the end. But we never did find a captain quite like you. She’s holed up on a star base. Decommissioned. Sad but beautiful. You’d be proud of her and her crew, Y/N.” “I always was.” You smiled, grateful that everyone you cared about was here, and safe. Hopefully they could make lives for themselves in this strange new world, just as you had. Krennic cleared his throat, “Well, much as we could stand out here on this gorgeous beach all day, you’ve have had a long flight. Can we offer you a drink, of any strength?” Tully immediately grinned, “I’m here for it.” “5 o’clock somewhere!” Jerod agreed, Sayra beamed, “Besides, you’re really into wine, right?” “You’re lucky I like you enough to break out a good bottle.” Krennic’s humour was dry but still raised laughs and you nodded along. “Come on, you three should rest up, get comfortable.” “Yes M’am!” They grinned in unison and you couldn’t help but beam back. Orson held his hand out for yours as you all made your way back across the sand, and somehow that beam became stronger. A ray of sunshine; both of you free from the constraints of the Empire – you’d grown in ways that neither of you had ever dreamed. And you’d done it together. It was time for your friends to do the same, and you were looking forward to seeing it. You caught his eyes, and Krennic smiled to, squeezing your hand a little tighter. Who would have thought you’d end up here? From glaring at him in his pretentious classes (you’d always stand by that), to ordering him around as his superior officer, to a romantic relationship seemed far-fetched enough. Now you’d been through hell and back and faked your own deaths… on to marrying out here, so far from all you’d ever known. Yet, you knew there was so much to come. You pulled yourself into him, winding your arms around his and resting your head gently on his arm as Orson continued to banter with the others. Whatever there was yet to face, in this strange new world of the Republic, you’d do it together. Stronger than ever.

--- Thank you very much for requesting this from me! I hope the conclusion was worth the wait! Thank you for reading! 🥰💕

#181 #Ben Mendelsohn #Director Krennic #Orson Krennic x Reader #Director Krennic x Reader #Orson Krennic #I mean He's not a director anymore but here we are...#Linzi Writes #Linzi Writes Requests #Smol Bean Drabbles #Basically played Levitating by Dua Lipa on repeat to write the back half of this.#Which is funny cuz i'm giving it to Keller BUT it would work for Krennic.#Anyways that's beside the point #Ya'll be sleeping on everything but ITHK - ya'll all love that #and I'm like /theres 3 more! C'mon!/

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paragonshep · 3 years

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Happy N7 Day, friends and ememies, and welcome to an unplanned stream-of-consciousness thought experiment I like to call

The Bare Fucking Minimum

What is this, you ask? Well I am, once again, thinking about Jacob Taylor. Specifically, I’m thinking about the complete shitshow that was Jacob’s story arc. What were the themes, the overarching concepts? And were they deliberately trying to piss off everyone who romanced him?

In honor of the announcement of a remaster that will almost certainly do nothing for him, I’m here to ask: if we assume that all the major story elements must remain the same, what’s the minimum that could be changed to bring all of his everything from a major shitshow to a minor shitshow?

Let me preface this by saying that 1) I am not a writer, and 2) I am not black. The scope of this post is fairly limited, and mostly relates to tidying up the themes and emotional arc while keeping the actual events largely unchanged. I’m fully aware that Jacob’s loyalty mission, for example, is absolutely steeped in racist tropes, and that a lot of people out there would prefer to just throw the whole thing out and start over. I get that, but that’s not something I’m equipped to do, so if that’s what you were looking for, this post probably isn’t the one for you.

This is also pretty much spun right off the top of my head. I didn’t draft this, I’m not really digging too deep. I’m just collecting and laying out some thoughts I had floating around in my head, so this is gonna get pretty disjointed. Feel free to throw out your own thoughts in the notes. I may or may not dive in and chat with y’all, since this is mostly just to get these thoughts out of my head and on a page. We’ll see once things get going.

Anyway let’s start at the top.

1. What’s it all about, when you get right down to it?

So, Jacob’s whole arc is a complete fucking mess and feels like they just threw a bunch of random shit at it to see what would stick, but ultimately I think it’s about masculinity and Jacob’s conception of what makes a man. I think the key to Jacob as a character is understanding what traits embody masculinity, and which people he thinks have missed the mark. There’s clearly things like strength and integrity, but follow-through, duty, and keeping promises seem to be major elements in his definition of masculinity. Put a pin in that, we’ll come back to that later. Unfortunately, it’s time to talk about...

2. The Loyalty Mission

Oh boy. Welp. Let’s get this over with, I guess.

So obviously this is racist and really shit and really Bioware should just throw the whole thing out, but again, that's not what we're going here. This is the part I've given the least thought to, so it will probably be short and not come to many conclusions. anyway let's grit our teeth and look for the theme that ties in into Jacob's greater narrative arc. Specifically, if Jacob's whole thing is "what makes a man", then we need to look at how exactly his father missed the mark.

Spoiler alert: it's duty.

Ultimately, his father was captain and it was his obligation to get the crew home, even if it was personally inconvenient. It was his duty as a father to try to get home himself for the sake of his family. It was about obligation, oaths and promises he broke. Can I get some uhhhhhhhhhhhh fucking themes. Dive into that shit more.

I’m too tired to get more into it bc I’m actually writing this section last, but it’s interesting to note that even afterwards Jacob’s feelings about his father are complicated. Like, he hates the guy and thinks he’s despicable, but he still feels a need to try to find that things he got even half right. He can’t bring himself to write off everything the man ever was. That feels like a rich vein they could have done something with, but they didn’t.

3. The Romance, ME2

This one is an absolute fucking mess.

So there are two threads running through the core of this romance arc: the kink/powerplay element and the time element, and a major problem of the romance is that it doesn’t really know which one it is.

So, I know a lot of people dislike the whole kink element just on principle, but I’m not here to do that. Not everyone is into soft vanilla stuff, and it’s a little irritating how much of the fandom (and the world) tries to paint kink as inherently evil or unhealthy. THAT SAID, the kink here is inefficient in terms of storytelling, it’s sloppy writing, and the whole time I played the romance I was thinking “What’s the point of this?”. The problem with that element, and the fact that the ME2 love scene focuses on it, is that it does not serve any overarching narrative, either in terms of romance progression or Jacob’s whole character. It feels slapped on. It’s just not good storytelling. (and while i’m generally for kink, I am also side eyeing Bioware for slapping this on ME’s first black character and only him. not offensive in and of itself, but feels like part of a greater racist picture)

I’m honestly shocked they didn’t lean harder into the whole theme of time, and specifically time running out, because it seems like the obvious choice. It’s built into the whole main plot of ME2, and it’s an element of multiple other romances. You’re all heading into a suicide mission, there’s a serious chance you’re all going to die, and you don’t have enough time. Like what the fuck! That would have been emotionally satisfying!

Imagine if the final romance scene had featured Jacob coming to see Shepard and having this whole speech/rant about how he doesn’t like to rush into things, how he likes to take it slow and really get to know each other, but now there’s no more time and you both might die tomorrow, and he might regret this choice if you live but he knows he’ll regret not making it if you die!!!!!! That’s some real shit! it completes a narrative arc! It ties into shit we know about Jacob outside his romance!!! Why the fuck didn’t they go that route!!!!!!! Can you tell I’m still angry!!!!!

4. ME3

So Jacob’s role in this game is pretty minimal, so there’s not a lot to work with and not a lot to change. Good thing I can fix like 90% of its issues with one change:

It’s not his child Dr. Cole is carrying.

Like that alone you can use to fix a bunch of issues without changing the core themes of his character arc! It works in a romance and non romance playthrough! You can still do a fatherhood “doing better than my own father did” arc even if Jacob didn’t contribute the sperm, Bioware!!!!!

So here’s how I picture it: The stuff about meeting and getting to know Jacob can stay the same. The father of Dr. Cole’s child is someone we never meet who is generally out of the picture. Possibly one of the other scientists she was working with who were killed when their part of the project was complete. Her partner disappears, she goes to Jacob for help, and Jacob promises to help her and her coworkers get out and keep them safe. Remember that shit I said back under point one about keeping promises? Boom! Narrative arc complete. This would also serve as an excuse to keep Jacob from coming back the the Normandy, since he made a promise to Brynn and he’s going to see it through. This works even with a romanced Jacob, because he can love Shepard and also note that she’s not the person who needs him most right now! Is this a perfect solution that would please every player? By no means! But I bet a lot of us would be less absolutely livid about it!

In conclusion,

I realize actually implementing these changes would actually be a whole lot of work, and this is not, in fact, a simple quick fix. My point is mostly that this did not require changing any actual plot beats, just recontextualizing them, and that Bioware and the writer(s) responsible could have saved themselves a lot of angry players if they’d just picked a coherent theme for this character and stuck to it. There’s no excuse for Jacob’s writing being as incoherent and terrible as it is.

I could probably write a lot more about this, but since I’m basically illiterate this took me pretty much all day to write and I’m tired. Bioware Stop Being So Racist Challenge, and Happy N7 Day.

#mass effect #ME #ME2 #ME3 #Jacob Taylor

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homestuck-info · 5 years

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The Homestuck Epilogues: Bridges And Off-Ramps

Andrew Hussie has released a massive explanation of his intents behind the Epilogues and plans for the future of the franchise. Fitting to his theme on subverting delivery of content, its in the newest episode of Pgenpod.

You can listen to the full episode here, with the message around the 1 hour mark, or read the transcript below:

The Homestuck Epilogues: Bridges And Off-Ramps ; By Andrew Hussie:

The history of printed version of The Homestuck Epilogues is also the history of The Homestuck Epilogues themselves, because I originally envisioned releasing them only as a book like this, to even further emphasize their conceptual separation from the main narrative. If you know anything about the epilogues, you probably already understand that conceptually distinguishing themselves from the story by their presentation as "fanfiction" is an important part of their nature and what they are trying to say. In the form of a book (which you can read from one side, or flip upside down and read from the other) it somewhat carries the feeling of a cursed tome. Something which maddeningly beckons, due to whatever insanity it surely contains, but also something which causes feelings of trepidation. There's an ominous aura surrounding such a work, probably for a few reasons. The sheer size of it means the nature of the content probably isn't going to be that trivial. The stark presentation of the black and white covers, its dual-narrative format, the foreboding prologue combined with an alarming list of "content warnings", and even the fact that an "epilogue" is delivered with a "prologue" first, all adds up to a piece of media that appears designed to make the reader nervous about what to expect from it. Such is the nature of a cursed tome retrieved from a place which may have best been left undisturbed. It is also the nature of any creative inclination to reopen a story which had already been laid to rest - a reader's desire to agitate and then collapse the bubble which contained the imagined projection of "happily ever after", simply by observing it. There exists inherent danger in a reader's eagerness to collapse that bubble, or to crack that tome. There is also danger in a creator's willingness to accommodate that desire. It's a risk for all involved. It should be.

Obviously, it wasn't released as a book, until now (the plans for printing it had already been made, but were just delayed until well after its release on site). We decided to just release it all on the site so everyone could read it right away if they wanted. There was a long tradition of making all content freely accessible on the site, and we just produced one utterly enormous update which we were perfectly aware would cause a massive amount of discussion and agitation in the fandom. Overall it was probably better to just get it out there, let people read it relatively quickly, form their opinions on it, and then begin discussing it critically. In other words, people were going to feel something from all this, so it seemed better to just let it out there, allow the maximum number of people feel whatever it would cause them to feel, give people time to process those feelings, and then move on to whatever comes next.

But what comes next? That's a good question. I feel like the work does a lot to suggest it's not merely following up on the lives of all the characters after a few years, but also reorganizing all narrative circumstances in a way that points forward, to a new continuity with a totally different set of stakes. In this sense, I think it's heavily implied to be a piece of bridge-media, which is clearly detached from the previous narrative, and conceptually "optional" by its presentation, which allows it to also function as an off-ramp for those inclined to believe the first seven acts of Homestuck were perfectly sufficient. But for those who continue to feel investment in these characters and this world, ironically the very elements which could be regarded as disturbing or depressing are also the main reasons to have hope that there is still more to see. Because, as certain characters go to some length to elaborate on, you can't tell new stories without reestablishing significant dramatic stakes: new problems to overcome, new injustices to correct, new questions to answer. There can be no sense of emotional gratification later without first experiencing certain periods of emotional recession. And by peeking into the imagined realm of "happily ever after" to satisfy our curiosity, we discover that our attention isn't so harmless, because the complexities and sorrows of adult life can't be ignored. Nor can the challenges of creating a civilization from scratch, when several teenagers are handed god-status. It turns out the gaze we cast from the sky of Earth C to revisit everyone isn't exactly friendly, like warm sunlight. It's more like a ravaging beam, destructive and unsettling to all that could have been safely imagined. Our continued attention is the very property which incites new problems, and the troublemakers appear to be keenly aware of this. So they spring into action, and begin repositioning all the stage props for a new implied narrative. But "implied" is all it was. There was no immediate announcement for followup content, and I'm not announcing anything here yet either. More time was always going to be necessary to figure out what to do next, including what form it takes, the timing, and all those questions. For now I think it was alright to just let things simmer for a while, and give people an extended period of time to meditate on the meaning of the epilogues and why they involved the choices they did. But regardless of anyone's conclusions about it, I can at least confirm that it WAS designed to feel like a bridge piece since its conception.

Is it this way because an epilogue SHOULD be this way? No. It is this way because I thought that was the most suitable role for an epilogue to play in the context of the weird piece of media Homestuck has always been. The story experiments a lot with the way stories are told, and in particular messes with the ways certain stretches of content get partitioned and labeled. Playing with the labeling I think has ways of bringing attention to those labels, what they actually mean, and how they affect our perception of the events covered under certain labels. It can even get us to wonder why certain labels exist at all, and can expose "flaws" in the construction of stories which include them. For instance, "intermission" is such a label. But perhaps another way of saying intermission is, "whoops, the story is getting too long, here's a break from the real story with a bunch of dumb shit that doesn't matter". It's seemingly a tacit admission to a problem. And by continuing to toy with that label as the story rolls along, you start to unpack the nature of that problem by implicitly asking questions about it. If you have one intermission because the story got long... can you have two if it gets longer? Can you have even more than that? Once you have a multitude of intermissions, don't you have two dueling threads of content, one supposedly "irrelevant", and the other important? And if that's true, then is it possible for the "irrelevant" thread to accrue more importance, throwing its entire identity as "optional content" into question retroactively? And if that can happen, is it possible the two threads can flip roles, with the intermissions becoming more important than the main acts? Then once the story goes through the motions of answering "yes" to all of this, isn't it also fair to ask, why bother with this examination at all? Was it pure horseplay and trickery? Actually, yes, sort of. There is a trick involved. The gradual realization that intermission content is nontrivial forces the reader to reevaluate their perception of the material, which was originally influenced by a label presiding over that material, and what they believed that label meant. It relies on the reader's presumption about the label's meaning to disguise certain properties of the content (like relevance), and therefore disarms the reader initially, leading to the potential for subverting expectations about the content later in surprising ways. In other words, you can use whatever it is the reader already presumes they know about stories in order to control the perception of what they are reading, just by gradually shifting the boundaries of whatever it is they've been well trained to expect from certain elements.

So now the label "epilogue" has been toyed with in a similar way, and also in a manner which exposes an apparent flaw with the label. Or actually, just by using the label "epilogue" at all, it seems the story is admitting to an apparent flaw. If another way of saying intermission is "whoops, story's too long, here's a break", then an alternate way of saying epilogue is "whoops, I forgot some shit, here's some more". And we know right away this label will be subject to the same kind of trickery, since there are two story paths of eight epilogues each, prefaced by a shared prologue. It's already an unhinged implementation of the label before you even read it, which means it's probably time to get nervous about whether it satisfies your expectations about what the content existing under such a label should provide. Before you read it, it's already an invitation to start questioning what an epilogue even is, and whether it's kind of a silly idea even if applied conventionally. Take a 50 chapter novel with an epilogue, for example. Why isn't the epilogue just called chapter 51? Why was the choice made to label that content differently? Should we consider it an important part of the story, or should we not? If it's not important, why are we reading it? And if it is important, why is it given a label which is almost synonymous with "afterthought"? Is it a simple parting gift to the reader, to provide minor forms of satisfaction which the core narrative wasn't built to provide? Is it actually important to deliver those minor satisfactions? If it really is important, why didn't that content appear in chapter 51? And if it isn't, why bother at all? What are we even doing here?

By going down this path of questioning, it sounds like we're assembling a case against writing epilogues altogether. But actually, there's really nothing wrong with them. It's a perfectly reasonable thing to include in any story. It's just that the more you ask questions like these, the more you are forced to think about the true nature of these storytelling constructs, the actual purposes they're meant to serve. And with something like Homestuck, where issues like this are heavily foregrounded, like what should be considered "canon" vs. "not canon", or even more esoteric concepts like "outside of canon" or "beyond canon", then the issues you uncover when you ask such questions about an epilogue can't really be ignored. My feeling is, there's almost no choice but to turn the conventional ideas associated with epilogues completely inside-out, because of the inherent contradictions involved with crossing the post-canon threshold and revealing that which was not meant to be known. Stories end where they do for certain reasons, answering the questions which were thematically important to answer, and leaving some questions unanswered for similar reasons, and the reader is left with the task of deciphering the meaning of these decisions. Under the "whoops, I forgot some shit, here's more" interpretation of an epilogue as a flawed construct, by reopening an already closed-circuit narrative, what you're really doing is introducing destabilizing forces into something which had already reached a certain equilibrium, due to all the considerations that went into which questions to answer, and which to leave ambiguous. And these destabilizing forces became the entire basis for the construction of an entirely new post-canon narrative, for better or worse.

These are the types of things the epilogues let you to think about, along with a few other ideas. Like the fact that all narratives have perspectives and biases, depending on who is telling the story, even in the case where it's unclear if the narrator has any specific identity. The suggestion that all narratives are driven by agendas, sometimes thinly disguised, other times heavily. There's also stuff to think about just due to its presentation as fanfiction, and that it's the first installment of Homestuck which included other authors (contrary to some speculation I've seen, every word of all seven acts were written by me alone). By deploying it as mock-fanfiction, and including other authors, I'm making an overt gesture that is beginning to diminish my relevance as the sole authority on the direction this story takes, what should be regarded as canon, and even introducing some ambiguity into your understanding of what canon means as the torch is being passed into a realm governed by fan desires. If the epilogues really prove to be the bridge media they were designed to feel like, then I expect this trend to continue. The fanfiction format is effectively a call to action, for another generation of creators to imagine different outcomes, to submit their own work within the universe, to extend what happens beyond the epilogues, or to pave over them with their own ideas. And I believe the direness in tone and some of the subject matter suitably contributes to the urgency of this call to action.

I also think many of the negative feelings the story creates isn't just an urgent prompt for the reader to imagine different ideas, or ways to resolve the new narrative dilemmas. It's also an opportunity for people to discuss any of the difficult content critically, and for fandom in general to continue developing the tools for processing the negative emotions art can generate. Sorting that out has to be a communal experience, and it's an important part of the cycle between creating and criticizing art. I think not only can creators develop their skills to create better things by practicing and taking certain risks, fandom is something which can develop better skills as well. Skills like critical discussion, dealing constructively with negative feelings resulting from the media they consume, interacting with each other in more meaningful ways, and trying to understand different points of view outside of the factions within fandom that can become very hardened over time. Fandoms everywhere tend to get bad reputations for various reasons, maybe justifiably. But I don't see why it can't be an objective to try to improve fandom, just as creators can improve their work. And I think this can only happen if now and then fandoms are seriously challenged, by being encouraged to think about complex ideas, and made to feel difficult emotions. I believe when art creates certain kinds of negative feelings in people, it can lead to some of the most transformative experiences art has to offer. But it helps to be receptive to this idea for these experiences to have a positive net effect on your life, and your relationship with art.

So now I'm looking to all of you on the matter of where to go next. Wherever the most conscientious and invested members of fandom want to drive this universe, as well as the standards by which we engage with media in general, that will be the direction I follow.

#homestuck #epilogues #andrew hussie

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not-terezi-pyrope · 5 years

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Andrew Hussie writes into Perfectly Generic Podcast about the Homestuck Epilogues

Transcript below comes from Reddit as well as the PGenPod wiki.

The Homestuck Epilogues: Bridges And Off-Ramps

by Andrew Hussie

#homestuck #upd8 #homestuck epilogues #andrew hussie

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iron--spider · 5 years

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Okay, I just saw FFH

I’ll say right off the bat, it was a million billion times better than Endgame, despite the lack of Tony Stark. I’m already planning on seeing it again. But I do have both positive and negative feelings, which I will discuss in full spoiler openness, under the cut.

It’s very strange. I did....I would say I liked it a lot. Almost loved it. But it also makes me feel strangely empty. I guess this links with the fact that I feel very separate from an MCU that doesn’t contain a living Tony Stark. It feels very, very weird to think he’s not alive anymore. My brain still doesn’t compute it even though I know it’s a stone cold fact, and it’s like I’ve built a glass wall between myself and this new world they’re living in. I see it, but I don’t feel like it’s the same world I’ve been in love with for eleven years. And while I can say it was a very good movie, it’s hard for me to connect with it the way I previously would have.

I’m gonna do pros and cons, and start with the cons, so I can end this post on a positive note. But I do have more pros than cons! So that’s good.

CONS:

- I know the MCU is not known for its nuance or it’s emotional content, but I would have liked a lot more personal details about Tony from Peter. We know they were close. A few lines would have done it. - Brad. We didn’t need a love triangle, and he added nothing to the plot. - What EDITH stands for. I think I’m the only person who thinks that’s out of character. It feels like what people believe Tony is, that facade he puts on, but it’s not who he actually is. Maybe we can take it as he’s making fun of what people think of him? I don’t know, but it felt off to me. - The timing of the MJ/Peter romance. There will be more about them in the pros section, but the timing still feels wrong. I don’t know why this sudden romance needed to be the focus of this movie. I understand that he was distancing himself from his grief, but the grief felt.......barely present. It was good, when it was there, but it wasn’t there enough. I wish we had gotten more friendship between MJ and Peter, or at least a rundown of what they’d been through in the year we missed? And am I getting that right? Did a year pass? Is that what they were telling us in the beginning bit? - Going off that, I wish we had seen Peter deal with losing five years like....at all. Even a little bit, lol. He was essentially dead. That would have been an amazing focus, along with dealing with losing Tony and his want for a normal life/girlfriend. Why can’t they balance this shit? - I wanted more about the world and what was going on, obviously. But I knew we weren’t gonna get that. - Peter shouldn’t have walked right by that one gorgeous Iron Man mural with the candles. He didn’t even spare it a glance and that was weird to me. - I really wish we had been able to see Peter’s actual face during the horrifying Iron Man illusion. I love the Spidey suits but I really wanted to see his face. - Take off your clothes scene was very uncomfortable lol, and it was even worse because PETER was uncomfortable.

PROS - Tom. Tom Tom TOM! He was just......incredible. He does so much with what he’s given, he brings everything to the next level and he’s our best Spider-Man. I can’t even say enough about him. I love his face, I love his inflections, I love how he moves, I love his expressions, I love every single thing about him. He has wonderful timing. He’s the best. - Happy. He was so great. He added to every scene he was in. I loved his interactions with Peter’s friends, especially when they were hiding with the crown jewels lol. I loved him handing it to “Nick” in the end, saying Peter would call him :) - MJ. She got so much more to do in this and it really makes me wish we had seen more of her in the first movie. - Going off that, MJ and Peter. Despite the terrible timing of their romance, it was surprisingly cute. I really liked how MJ was softer and changed when she was alone with Peter. They felt genuine and I wasn’t expecting it and I really enjoyed it. They were sweet together. I will say I preferred when they were physically together as opposed to Peter talking to Ned/Mysterio about her. - Ned. Amazing, as always. So funny, so sweet, the best friend. I loved his and Peter’s hug. - Betty and Ned. Really funny kind of critique of teenage romance, lol. - Jake G. I wasn’t really feeling him, but then....THE TURN. He was incredible. One of his best performances, for real. - And going off that....he was so insane. So, so insane. All the music cues helped too. I don’t think Tony’s legacy or character is tarnished AT ALL because this dude was so, so cuckoo bonkers. He was ordering hits on kids and nonchalantly talking about casualties and he was just a LUNATIC. I’m not worried about Tony. And anyone who uses Beck as their source for their Tony hate? Doesn’t look good, fam. He had his crazy eyes on from the bar scene forward. Insane person. He was willing to kill all his pals. He was the worst, lol. - Annnnddd in relation to that, MJ giving Brad the business in the end and specifically using the phrase about how “Peter isn’t here to tell his side” or whatever it was. I think that totally was meant to go along with all the Tony/Beck stuff. It felt purposeful. - I liked the ‘I Will Always Love You’ tribute - The Tony murals in every damn city? They were gorgeous. I hope they release images of those because I wanna see them lol. He was so loved. - I’m glad they had May talk about ‘blipping’ back into her apartment and someone else was living there. They actually addressed something! - Peter having a panic attack at the beginning when Tony was mentioned? Really good. Really sad. - I like that Tony trusted Peter enough to give him the glasses. It shows just how much he trusted him. And this is nothing like project insight, because Tony isn’t Pierce. He has good intentions. It is for protection. People need to chill, lol. Peter was acting like a bit of a moron on the bus, but I believe by he end he has a handle on it and will be much, much better about it. Him jumping out of the bus and destroying the drone was cool. - Bar scene was really good. I know Peter saw Tony in Beck when he put on the glasses :( And his self doubt is so painful. Tony had such trust in him and Peter just can’t believe it. HURTS. - The illusion scene had such magnificent visuals. I want to see it again in 3D, but it was awesome. I said earlier I wanted to see Tom’s face, but he did a great job with all his body movements. He’s just so great, lol. - Iron Man zombie shook me, made me jump, got me upset. As did Mysterio’s taunting in that moment. What an asshole. - I liked the “stakes” in terms of how Peter got so, so messed up in this movie. Poor thing. He was still limping in the scene at the airport! Seeing him get hit by the train was so hard. - The plane scene was my favorite part of the whole movie, from the tulip field to the suit getting built. I loved the hug, Happy trying to be soft and dealing with Peter’s outburst. Peter crying, their talk, “i miss him so much”, Tony never, ever second guessing Peter. THE ONE THING. That hurts so bad lol. And Happy watching Peter make the suit, fondly, seeing Tony in him. It makes me cry thinking about it. Peter carries Tony with him always, because he’s part of him, he’s in his heart, he was his protege and even if he doesn’t believe it, Tony believed in him. He knew he was the best of them. GODDAMN THEM. I love seeing Peter and Happy interact as they did here because they really remind me of Happy and Tony. Peter’s Tony’s kid. There’s no denying it at this point. - MJ and her mace. Chef’s kiss. - The whole final battle was fucking amazing. Some of the best shit in the MCU. I loved seeing Peter get to be a BADASS, get to show his smarts and his strength and use that Spidey sense. He was amazing. - Stopping Beck from shooting him? Incredible. One of my favorite Marvel shots. I loved Peter angry and standing up for himself here. So good. - The kisses were pretty cute. The holding hands was definitely cute. Swinging was very cute, as was how excited Peter was about it. - I really like Happy and May and I hope it goes somewhere. C’mon May! - I’m of two minds on the reveal. It pisses me off that fucker did this. He was obviously planning it and now he’s painted a target on a 16 year old’s back, and once again, anyone who tries to use him as a source is a SOCIOPATH. I feel so bad for Peter, and it makes me really sad because this would be an amazing thing for Tony to be involved with. Peter definitely needs Tony right now, and I hope SOMEONE reliable helps him. I know Happy will, but he needs a powered person too. PLEASE. I worry about where they’ll take this. It could be cool, possibly seeing him on the run, but if they have any ideas about killing May or any of his friends because of this, I’ll kill them. - Skrulls thing was funny and it also explains why Fury felt so off. SLJ did an amazing job with that, lol.

In conclusion, I really loved a lot of what they presented to me. Mostly because Tom is truly spectacular. But a world without Tony Stark will always have a certain amount of emptiness to it, and I won’t be following any other Marvel films save for Spider-Man. I’ll follow Spider-Man because I love Peter/Tom. But it’s always gonna be really painful knowing Tony is gone and they’ll never give us the amount of emotional content that we deserve when it comes to him.

But I will recommend FFH. I give it an 8/10, and I think I’ll enjoy it even more on a second viewing. For being in ‘the bad timeline’, this was a good film.

#spider-man #spider-man far from home #ffh spoilers #far from home spoilers #peter parker #this got long af and i probably left some shit out lol #now i gotta answer all those asks.

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knifeonmars · 4 years

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Capsule Reviews - May 2020 - The Cape Stuff

I read a lot of comics in May. Here’s what I thought of some of the superhero and superhero-adjacent comics I read.

Arms of the Octopus

A nostalgia pick, the collection of several annual issues containing a crossover between Superior Spider-Man, The Invincible Hulk, and the All-New X-Men. It is an artifact of a very specific and bizarre time in Marvel Comics, when Doc Ock was Spider-Man, the Hulk worked for SHIELD, and the original five teen X-Men were stranded in their own future. For a pure, relatively straightforward crossover romp, it's quite enjoyable. Spider-Man is a jerk, the Hulk fights a robot, the X-Men are befuddled by the present, all of the major beats for that particular moment in the Marvel Universe are there, and it's got some really great art. Jake Wyatt, during his regrettably short-lived stint with Marvel and the great Kris Anka unfortunately overshadow the other contributors, but it's all very good, if not the most accessible comic.

Maxwell's Demons

I came to Maxwell's Demons having heard a lot of critical buzz and with my expectations set rather high. I did not care for this book at all. Ambitious is the best word for this series, and that's not a bad thing. It's got ideas, about the craft, about the genre, about philosophy in general. It never quite manages to carry things off though; it's not as smart as it wants to be, and the high-minded ideas are never incorporated in particularly elegant ways. Three of the story's five chapters are essentially extended monologues in which the main character rambles on about some glorified shower thought for 20-plus pages. The first and second chapters are the exceptions to this pattern, and are quite solid as far as pointedly derivative superhero riffs go, even if the second chapter's riff on "What if Miracleman #17 was significantly less intelligent" is more than a little shameless in its lack of originality. The fourth chapter, by contrast, is the nadir of the series, easily the most embarrassing Manic Pixie Dream Girl tripe I've seen played straight in literal years. I'm reminded a lot of Translucid, another superhero pastiche, which essentially sought to do for Batman what Maxwell's Demons seeks to do for Lex Luthor. I warmed to Translucid significantly on my second read and I wonder if the same will end up being true for Maxwell's Demons, but I find that Translucid simply did a better job of incorporating original ideas and stating its themes in ways less stupefyingly clunky than Maxwell's Demon's ever manages. I hate to call a book pretentious, especially an ambitious one, but at present that's how I feel about this book.

Twilight

Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Howard Chaykin's Watchmen-for-mid-century-space-heroes epic. It's good. Fabulous art, some really interesting ideas and a great premise. It's also more than a little Chaykin-y, with most of the male characters having fraught but amiable relationships with their much-too-good-for-them-and-they-both-know-it ex-wives. It has this particular brand of low grade misogyny that idealizes women but in doing so denies them interiority and, ultimately, humanity. Leaving that aside, though it is a major point to leave aside, it’s story of humanity rotting over eons of immortality, mad space gods, and humanity’s proclivity towards colonialism and genocide, it's great. It’s not an altogether pleasant book, it can be nasty and strange, in ways both intentional and unintentional, but it’s original and engaging and decidedly well made. Something of an overlooked classic of that era’s DC output.

Green Lantern: Earth One

Literally the only one of DC's Earth One graphic novels that's worth a damn. Where most of the other Earth One books choose to start things off in a world resembling our own, Green Lantern starts off in a scifi future resembling something along the lines of Ad Astra or The Expanse, with Earth controlled by an only alluded to totalitarian government, humanity colonizing and mining the solar system, and Hal Jordan as a spacefaring roughneck who dreads the prospect of returning to Earth. Earth One is the rare Green Lantern story that manages to make Earth as interesting as the rest of the universe. The bulk of the action leaves this behind to focus on unearth the lost legacy of the Green Lanterns and refits their mythology in a clean way which will be unsurprising for anyone with a passing familiarity with the original comics but is still satisfying ad fresh. Fabulous art, fun take on the mythology, I'm left both wanting more and being satisfied with what we got.

Spider-Man: Life Story

In a just world, Chip Zdarksy, one of Marvel’s best writers these days, would be writing both Spider-Man and Fantastic Four, instead of having been relegated to shortlived spinoffs. Because life just isn’t fair sometimes, instead he was given this admittedly ambitious project, his all-encompassing take on the Spider-Man story as played out in real time. In the end it’s bold and engaging, but more than a little clipped in execution. Each issue is a snippet of Peter Parker's life as we catch up to him in a new decade so readers only get a quick glimpse of the action and are left to fill in the substantial gaps by drawing on our knowledge of continuity. The obvious comparison is John Byrne's Superman/Batman: Generations, but where that story really only took the broad strokes of those characters' continuity into account in writing its decades spanning story, Spider-Man: Life Story is dedicated to the remixing of Spider-Man's publishing canon. So it can’t just take an archetypal view of Spider-Man and play that out to its logical conclusion, instead it’s stuck trying to incorporate version of prominent Spider-Man stories like Kraven's Last Hunt, Venom, and Civil War. The result means that there’s a ton of exposition in each issue, and frequent use of shorthand to gloss over things which have happened since the previous issue, and it never manages to explore the series’ original ideas in detail. Also, I'll die mad that Michel Fiffe, the genius behind COPRA and one of my favorite cartoonists, public pitched basically this exact story a year or so before this project was announced, and even if Marvel didn't actually steal the idea, I'll forever pine for Fiffe's take on this premise.

Star Wars: The Crimson Empire Saga

Long before the Disney's take on Star Wars, with their codified takes on the mythology and careful curation of the franchise, there was the old Star Wars Expanded Universe, where seemingly anyone could tell any story they wanted using the mythology of Star Wars. While it resulted in some good stuff, like Timothy Zahn's fondly remembered Thrawn books, the vast majority of it was workmanlike or even bad. Crimson Empire falls firmly into the category of bad, a dumber than dirt story about an extremely cool space guy and his code of honor. It's the kind of story where multiple characters say "He's just one man!" right before or right after seeing their legion of anonymous flunkies getting demolished by the hero. It's got an inexplicable and bad love story. In the three miniseries collected here it spends about two pages total dealing with the idea that maybe, just maybe, the fact that it's main character is dedicated to the lost honor of Emperor Palpatine, a space fascist, maybe his code of honor is completely fucked. Of those three miniseries, only the first story is anywhere near something that could be called good. I wouldn’t called Crimson Empire utterly abysmal, but it’s not unironically good. If the name Kyle Katarn means anything to you, you might get something out of this as a nostalgia trip, but otherwise it has no redeeming qualities.

Deathstroke: Legacy

The first of the New 52 Deathstroke stories, which was never well regarded until Christopher Priest took it over with Deathstroke: Rebirth, I was driven to read this by a conceptual fondness for this era's Deathstroke basically looking and acting like an action figure. Through that lens, it's quite enjoyable. It's not as obviously in on the joke in the way that the classic Taskmaster: Unthinkable is, but it's over the top, has fun designs and baddies, and Joe Bennett (years before his career best heights in Immortal Hulk) provides consistently good art. As a pure action comic, it's good.

Wolverine MAX: Permanent Rage

Here's the thing about Wolverine: There are very few good Wolverine solo stories. Wolverine is a genuinely good character, but most of his solo stories are dumb action affairs, and there's literally never been a Wolverine comic that's even halfway as good as the Logan movie. Permanent Rage, the first storyline from the Wolverine MAX series though, is actually pretty decent. It plays out a lot like you might imagine a Wolverine movie made around 2004, with no superheroes, a Japanese setting that allows for some distracting orientalism, unrelenting violence, and a noir-inspired storyline. The present day storyline is all well and good, not great, but solid and relatively low-key, but what makes the book is the presence of Sabretooth as the main villain. His relationship with Wolverine, fleshed out through flashbacks drawn by some really talented artists, is probably one of the best takes on that relationship that Marvel has ever put out. The casting of Wolverine and Sabretooth as two lonely immortals, bound together by hate and the knowledge that they are each other's only true companions, absolutely makes this book. Is it great? No, but it's got enough interesting things going on that fans of dark superheroes stories would probably find something to enjoy. Subsequent volumes of Wolverine MAX moved even further from the character’s superhero trappings and supporting characters, which is a pity, but this one remains readable and enjoyable on its own.

Marshal Law Omnibus

A collection all of the non-licensed and non-text-only Marshal Law stories. It's weird, it's punk, it's violent, it's sick of superheroes but self-aware about it own silliness in a way that Garth Ennis' work like The Boys has never been (Incidentally, the fifth story contained here, Super Babylon, is just every self-righteous complaint Ennis made about superheroes in The Boys but presented with a modicum of good humor). It's quite fun as a mean-spirited anti-superhero romp, but anyone who is particularly invested in the moral rectitude of, like, the Flash, might find it an unpleasant read so I would advise avoiding it if that's you. It's also not perfect, even for what it is: it's approach to sex work and kink is very dated, it relies on sexual violence a little too much, and by the time you get to the final story, Secret Tribunal, it's come to revel in its previously ironic fascist and misogynist imagery and characters just a little too much. The third installment, Kingdom of the Blind, is for my money, the strongest of the lot, featuring both the most straightforward premise and the most incisive satire the collection has to offer.

#capsule reviews #words

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izlaria · 3 years

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Someone you like (part 1, updated)

After uploading the first part of my plance fic here, I ended up writing more on that same period of time. It’s not much, but I thought I would add it anyway.

This fic is based on the “Someone you like” animatic by honestlyprettychill. Their work is super bomb, so I ask you guys to go check it out and give the artist some love. With this update, I’m hoping to have wrapped up on the pre-Garrison time period, and I have already started writing Pidge’s pov of their time as students, so you’ll have that to look foward to, if you end up enjoying this fic. My other post has more disclaimers, so you can find it here. This story is also available on AO3.

The part I added comes after the -- that I used as a page break.

Thanks to everyone who has liked and reblogged this verse. Feel free to add comments in the tags or to straight up come talk to me. I love feedback.

Spanish to English translations at the end.

14 and 12 years old

“¿Cuando he insultado a alguien?” he shot back, defensive. Veronica didn’t dignify that with an answer.

Lance pouted at her, arms crossed over his chest. “Me debes más que una hamburguesa y lo sabes, Ronie.”

His sister snickered, but it was as much of an acknowledgement as he was going to get. Veronica pressed a quick kiss to his hair, already turning to go into the main building.

“¡Gracias, hermanito! ¡No te arrepentirás!”

The teacher had put an end to it right away, but the words stuck with Lance, for some reason.

If only he could shrug off the inadequacy that now grew in his chest.

Lance was so lost in thought that he didn’t realize he had been standing in front of one of the benches until a new voice broke through the peace of the park.

“Are you just gonna stand there?”

The words were somewhat harsh, but when Lance lowered his eyes to their source the girl winced, grimacing. She seemed to have spoken impulsively.

He gave her his best grin, the one reserved for first impressions and fancy parties. It was supposed to project confidence and kindness, even though Luis said he ended up looking a bit smug.

“I didn’t yell,” the girl pointed out with a light frown. Then her eyes shifted into a more calculating look. “You’re a bit of a goofball, aren’t you?”

“I prefer the term good-humored,” he replied jokingly.

“It didn’t seem like you were feeling all that good-humored just now.” She tilted her head to the side, letting the words hang between them.

“Yeah, I suppose that’s true,” Lance found himself saying.

“Do you… want to talk about it?” She looked so doubtful that it almost made Lance laugh. The feeling, however, was overcome by the relief of finally having someone who would listen.

With the rest of his family away in Cuba, he felt unbearably lonely.

The girl nodded, eyes downcast. “I know what you mean.”

“You do?” He eyed the fairness of her skin and the almost ginger of her hair. “Sorry, but you look white.”

Lance’s comment must have taken her by surprise, because she actually laughed.

“I am white. I’m also Italian.” She rolled her eyes, but there was amusement in the tug of her lips. “I can be both.”

“That’s true.” Lance grinned sheepishly. It was good that she wasn’t offended by his lack of filter. “You don’t have much of an accent, though.”

“Neither do you,” the girl bit back, no real animosity in her tone.

He shrugged. “My family spent a lot of time in the US when I was younger. It used to be second nature to me. Now, I keep feeling like I have to hold back the instinct to roll my R’s.”

“Yeah?” Lance sat up straight, feeling suddenly boastful.

Another green ribbon fluttered to the ground, having escaped the pages of the book. Lance bent down to pick it up.

“Here.” He stretched it out to the girl. “Wouldn’t want to lose its pair,” he said with a wink.

“Thanks for reminding me!” She grabbed the ribbon hurriedly, then paused, turning back to Lance. “And for the conversation, I guess.”

“Bye bye, Italian girl.” He waved, glad that he could spend these few minutes with her.

“Farewell, Spanish boy.”

He settled back into the bench, feeling much more content than he’d been earlier. It was nice to talk to people outside of class, for a change.

And, well, Italian girl was pretty. A bit young-looking for him, but he thought guys her age should be tripping over their feet for a chance to talk to her.

It took Lance a second to place him. Analytics was one of the classes Lance struggled with the most, so he hadn’t had as much opportunity to joke around there.

“And you’re Hunk!” Lance snapped his fingers, smiling. “Sit down, man! What can I do for ya?”

“No, I promise you, she’s a cutie!” Lance exclaimed, hands waving around in the air. Hunk chuckled at his exuberance.

“I believe you, Lance.” His friend’s tone was fond and amused, which brought a smile to Lance’s face. “You’ve told me about Italian girl a hundred times already. Why don’t you just approach her again? You said you saw her on campus.”

It was true, he had seen her: running across the woods with her arms full of books; sitting by the big windows in the cafeteria, papers spread across the nearby seats; standing under an oak tree with her face turned towards the wind, her long hair escaping from where she’d tied it back.

Lance pouted at Hunk. “She hasn’t spoken to me since…” he mumbled.

“Well,” Hunk scrunched up his brows in thought, “you did say she seemed younger than us. She’s probably just embarrassed about venting to a stranger out of nowhere.”

Lance threw himself onto his bed so that Hunk wouldn’t see his face contort in a grimace. He hadn’t meant to twist the story so badly, but he had already started talking about Italian girl before he realized he didn’t want to share his insecurities with the other boy. Hunk was almost excessively easy to talk to, but they’d known each other for too short a time.

“She didn’t seem like the shy type,” he retorted, arms spread over his head. “Too snipy.”

Hunk had gotten up from his place at the desk and moved to sit on the bed, shaking his head at Lance. He had kind eyes, something that Lance hadn’t really noticed on that first week in the Institute. Some things just got lost amid the noise, he reasoned.

“For someone who feels no shame hitting on random girls, you sure are hung up on this one.” Hunk poked him on the ribs and Lance recoiled, twisting away.

“It’s not like that!” Even as he said it, Lance could feel his neck grow warm. He wasn’t really attracted to the girl, but there was something pleasant about her that did leave him faltering. “Seriously, dude, she’s probably the same age as my little sister!”

Hunk hummed in acceptance. “If you say that’s not it, then I believe you. You just talk about her a lot for someone who you only met once.”

Lance sat up to look Hunk in the eyes. It was true that his mind kept drifting back towards that girl, but he didn’t think the emotion she awakened in him was romantic.

“I’ve just never clicked with anyone like that,” he confessed, bringing his knees up to his chest. “And maybe that’s also why I haven’t talked to her again. ‘Cause what if it was a hoax?”

“So you don’t want to ruin the memory of it?” Hunk put a finger to his chin in a considering motion. “That’s fair.”

There was more to it, but Lance didn’t feel like explaining himself further. Several times he had gone by Italian girl in the library, even stopped to look at her, considering, but whenever she raised those amber eyes to meet his, Lance froze. He blushed and blustered and eventually left.

It was nice to see her smiling, though, even if it was at his expense. She was always alone when Lance saw her and it reminded him of how isolated he’d felt before befriending Hunk.

Italian girl was clearly smart, probably smarter than almost anyone in the institute, given how fast she went through those complicated-looking books. She also spent a lot of time in the library, because it was where Lance most ran into her. It was always her and her astronomy books and her ribbons.

Maybe he was projecting. Luis said he did this a lot.

“I just hope she found a friend here,” he said, more to himself than to Hunk, “someone who will also end up a little late just because they want to hear her out.”

Hunk studied his face, making Lance shift his position in discomfort.

“Who could have known?” the boy started teasingly. “You’re actually a good guy behind all that arrogance.”

Lance used his elbow to push Hunk off the bed, complaining more dramatically than was truly warranted. His friend laughed as he got up, only to throw himself back onto Lance to mess up his hair.

“What the hell, dude? Going for my hairdo?” He tried to free himself from Hunk’s arm around his neck. “Friendship over! We are no longer rooming when we get to the Garrison!”

Hunk didn’t let up and the two continued to laugh well into the afternoon.

Their time in the Institute would end in a little over a week, and Italian girl would drift to the back of Lance’s mind to become a lovely memory, just the afterimage of someone who could have meant more to him.

Translations:

“¿Cuando he insultado a alguien?” - “When have I insulted anyone?”

“Me debes más que una hamburguesa y lo sabes, Ronie.” - “You owe me more than a burger and you know it, Ronie.”

“¡Gracias, hermanito! ¡No te arrepentirás!” - “Thank you, little brother! You won’t regret it!”

Cabrón - Bastard

#plance #flirtyrobot #Pidgance #lidge #cyance #voltron #vld #vld lance #pidge gunderson #voltron legendary defender #vld fanfiction #lance mcclain #vld syl verse

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bonnieisaway · 4 years

Text

i got so brave, drink in hand

sneeze i’m sorry this is so late i- i just couldn’t work on this chapter. i promise the next one will be better..

chapter 1 | chapter 2 | wattpad link

Aiura knew that red strings were common in people.

Sure, a little pointless since, as far as she knew, she was the only one who could see them, but common. The problem was out of the eternity of PK Academy she'd only seen three.

And she saw the third on the day (L/n) transferred to her class.

°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.

Saiki and (L/n) both sigh as they set their bags next to their desks and sit down. Saiki turns to see (L/n) yawning before turning to Saiki. Bags lined the underneath of her (e/c) eyes.

"Oh...hey Saiki.." She smiles drowsily. Saiki feels his face heat up at the cute action but is eliciting to ignore it. Nope. Not happening at all. He's not sure what you're talking about.

"How late did you get home last night?" He asks.

"Around 10.." (L/n) shrugs. "I stopped at a store on my way home and then I was up doing homework for while... But it's alright! I had some...caffeine earlier.."

"I'm sorry." Saiki apologizes. He wasn't even sure why he was apologizing. For keeping her out late? For making her take care of him?

"Nah, don't apologize. It's alright." She gives a heartwarming smile and Saiki- for once- thanks god that Teruhashi has joined the two to interrupt the conversation.

"(Y/n), are you okay?" Teruhashi asks worriedly. "You seem tired."

"Yeah." (L/n) nods. "I just..got to sleep a bit late.."

"How late?" Teruhashi asks.

"Ehehehe.... 4am...?" (L/n) laughs awkwardly. Teruhashi looks unamused.

"(Y/n)..!" She begins to reprimand.

"Kokomi!" (L/n) mocks her tone. "I had a lot of homework."

Teruhashi sighs and shakes her head. "You need better time management. How much of that did you spend playing on your phone?"

"..Ehheheh.." (L/n) begins to awkwardly laugh again. The poor girl obviously needed sleep. School started at 7am, she probably barely got 2 or 3 hours of sleep.

Before anyone else can reprimand the poor, sleep deprived girl, the teacher walks in the room, settling the students as they return to their seats.

"Good morning, class." The teacher begins.

"Good morning.." The class responds. Saiki only gives partial attention as she begins her lesson. He turns and sees (L/n) with her head in her hand and eyes half lidded as she drifts off. Saiki sighs as he nudges the girl under the desks with his foot. She snaps awake confused.

"Stay awake, idiot." Saiki reprimands, but there's a small grin on his face. (L/n) squints her eyes at him.

"Fine. Because you asked so nicely, Strawberry." She mutters under her breath, just loud enough for him to hear.

"...with that, you and your partner will choose a book from PK's library to report on.." The teacher continues to speak, as she writes on the chalkboard. "..due within two weeks from now. I have assigned your partners." Saiki feels the dread in his very soul. Ever since (L/n) showed up it felt like there were a lot of fanfiction cliches showing up and he wasn't sure how to feel about it.

The teacher begins listing partner pairs. "Kuboyasu and Kaido. Teruhashi and Yumerhara." She goes down the list of convenient pairs. "Mera and Hairo. Saiki and (L/n)." Ah, there's the cliche money maker. The teacher continues listing the names of background characters. Like Takahashi and Saiko. We don't care about Saiko in this fanfiction.

Anyway, (L/n) sleepily turns to Saiki as the teacher finishes her list and lets the partner pairs discuss. "So...what book are we doing?"

Saiki shrugs. "What kind of books do you read?" He asks. He's only doing this because its a normal conversation. With a normal girl. Who he is not growing fond of what so ever. Stop jumping to conclusions, reader.

(L/n) shrugs. "Any, really.." She hums for a second. "What was that one book..."

"Hm?" Saiki hums curiously.

"I don't remember the title.." (L/n) leans her head in her hand. "But I remember a quote. It was something like.. "'I see two lovers looking over the cauldron of hell. Are they contemplating a double suicide? This means their love will end in hell." I couldn't stop laughing.'"

Saiki thinks for a moment. He'd probably heard the line before due to telepathy.

"It's Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto." Saiki responds after a minute.

"Yeah, that one!" (L/n) snaps her fingers. "Have you read it before?" She asks.

"No. I just.. I've heard of it, before." Saiki lies. No, he has not read it, he just used his powers to find the book for the poor girl.

"It's probably in the library, wanna do that book?" (L/n) asks. Saiki nods. "Cool..cool.."

𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖𝕤𝕜𝕚𝕡

The homeroom bell rang and Saiki had no chance to go anywhere else before (L/n) starts dragging him by the sleeve to the library. "Come on! Better to start this now." (L/n) weakly beckons as they walk into the library. "Now where the hell is that book."

Saiki shrugs as (L/n) walks off to look for it. He could use clairvoyance and- yep, already found the book. Saiki walks over and grabs two copies of the book- one for him and one for (L/n).

"Alright, let's go." Saiki sighs. (L/n) snaps around with a 'are you fucking kidding me' face.

"I- oh what the hell. Let's go, Strawberry." (L/n) yawns, because clearly sleeping through the entirety of mathematics class was not enough for the poor girl. Saiki can't help but feel a small grin come across his face as the shorter girl takes a copy from his hand and begins walking to the librarian.

After the very rushed library trip begins a trek home with Nendo, Kaido, and Kuboyasu trailing along. Three annoyances and one tolerable girl.

"Hey, we should go get some ramen!" Nendo offers, as he does every day.

"Nah..I'm exhausted.. plus, I don't have money on me." (L/n) smiles.

"You want to get ramen every day, Nendo. Plus, I have homework and cram school." Kaido rolls his eyes.

"I've got to go...meet with someone." Kuboyasu excuses, which is code for "something that's entirely delinquent related that the author does not want to write."

"Damn.. okay. What about you, partner?" Nendo asks. Crap, he didn't have an excuse.

"I-"

"Actually, Saiki was gonna head over to my place so we could work on that book project." (L/n) excuses him, setting a hand on his shoulder as she looks up at Nendo. Saiki looks at her with adoration for a second- thank whatever God sent this girl to be the saint she is.

"That's not due for like, two weeks." Kuboyasu points out.

"We're not going to college for another year and Shun's still got his applications filled out." (L/n) comments.

"H-Hey! You know that's cause of my mom!" Kaido argues, face bright red. Saiki found the usual bickering to be quiet boring.. he figured he should entertain himself.

Hm.. maybe..

"Yeah, I know, I know." (L/n) grins. "Still funny."

Saiki looks at Kuboyasu. With boredom he's decided to see everyone's likability for (L/n). ..Huh. Solid 54. Not bad. He turns to Nendo next.

"Haha! Tell me, what college are you going to, runt?" Nendo asks. ..Hm. 58. Not too far off. He turns to Kaido.

"Shut up!" Kaido tries to elbow Nendo yet it does absolutely nothing. As per usual. ..94. Jesus. Saiki knew the two were close by some miracle but jeez. Only person left in the group was him, and he was confident in his emotions...

"Hey, this is where Saiki and I gotta split. See you guys!" (L/n) waves as they turn a corner.

"See you around."

"See you, partner!!! See you, friend!!!"

"Bye Saiki, (Y/n)!"

Saiki turns to the girl who stares off into space as they now walk quietly. Her (e/c) eyes were half lidded with exhaustion and she was beginning to fall asleep while walking she was so tired.

"Hey, Strawberry..." (L/n) starts, dragging out his nickname.

"What is it, (L/n)?" Saiki sighs.

"I'm tired... wanna carry me..?" She grins half-assedly. Saiki rolls his eyes.

"No."

"Come oooon."

"Absolutely not." Saiki refuses. (L/n) pouts cutely and crosses her arms for a second, deep in thought. 'Well, I could just..' Oh no. (L/n) falls out of Saiki's line of vision for a second but he isn't necessarily surprised when the girl just jumps on his back without warning. He sigh heavily as he stops walking.

"Hah, can't avoid it now, Strawberry!" (L/n) grins over his shoulder.

"I could just drop you." He sighs.

"Please don't."

Saiki rolls his eyes into oblivion and continues walking with the sleepy girl on his back. She's quiet but her thoughts roll on. 'Hm..his hair is soft. And he smells like vanilla."

Saiki's face warms up. For some odd, unrelated reason. No sir, not related to that at all. Not sure what you're talking about. Out of the corner of his eye, he spots a..number..?

Ah, that's right, he was using the likability to see how everyone felt about (L/n). The tracker floated in the corner of his vision, a solid "70" written on the board of it. Weird. The last person around (L/n) was only Saiki.

It must've just glitched out. Don't get happy here. His powers have just been.. wonky lately. That's it. As he continues to walk, dismissing the totally glitchy meter, the girl on his back slowly begins to drift off.

𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖𝕤𝕜𝕚𝕡

When you woke from your sleep, not even realizing how comfortably you dozed off on the poor boy, he was standing in front of your apartment building. "Will you get off now?" He asks impatiently. You giggle and slide off his back, landing hard on your feet.

"Thank you for the Uber." You grin. He gives you a less then amused look and you can't help but laugh at the unamused face t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶h̶a̶d̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶a̶d̶o̶r̶e̶.̶ "Sorry, sorry. But really. Thanks for tolerating that."

Saiki thinks to himself for a second. "It's...alright. There's more annoying people I know." He sighs. You look at him for a second- did he just compliment you? Did Saiki Kusuo, the ever done-with-your-shit tsundere, just give you a backwards ass compliment?

No.

Don't lie to us, Saiki.

You smile at him after a second. "Well- I have to tend to..something. I don't know. I probably have work to do, so.. bye!" You smile, waving as you walk into the building. He waves slightly before walking away. You climb the stairs up to the second floor, and unlock your door, popping in and kicking off your shoes. You drop your bag at the door.

"OH my god FINALLY." You scream to yourself. Yes, you lived alone, parents...parents and siblings long gone. You shook the thought of them from your head as you wandered through your apartment to your kitchen as you hummed some American song from the 2000s to yourself. Opening the kitchen cabinets revealed..

..well, not much. Shit. You sigh to yourself. You hadn't gone shopping in forever, which, was a given since you'd found yourself so busy. Life seemed to become hectic since you met Saiki but that was alright. You thought he was cool. You pause as you close your cabinets.

The thought of his eyes crossed your mind. They weren't special, if anything bland, but there's nights where the purple color is all you can see in your head. You weren't necessarily sure why. His eyes were just.. pretty. You should tell him some time. You shake the thought from your head as you walk to your bedroom, choosing to change out of your school uniform.

After having chosen a comfortable outfit that fit your style, you grabbed your keys, wallet, phone and put on your shoes. It's shopping time, baby. There was a convenience store you usually went to about 20 minutes away from your apartment. So you went down the stairs, nearly falling on your face quiet a few times, and exited your apartment building and began the trek to the store.

As you walk, your thoughts begin to wander. You'd never think before that at 16 you'd be living alone in your own apartment. Thinking back to the events that lead you here...

Well, you didn't like to think of it much. The thought that truly, you were the last person in your family alive. In some fucked up way, it could remind you of that one game...What Remains of Edith Finch? You push the thought from your head, chosing to hum whatever song comes to mind first.

You didn't really like dwelling on the depressing things of it all. Of course, sometimes, it couldn't be helped, but if you had the choice..

You enter the store as you clear your thoughts, arriving at your destination finally, and hopefully avoiding the author's shitty monolouging. You walk through, grabbing the necessities, and by necessities I mean junk foods that would definitely disappoint Hairo if he saw this. But he is not here, so you are free to grab an extra package of coffee jelly and an extra box of pocky.

You check out with only a slight judgmental look from the cashier and begin your trek home. We're just speeding through this chapter! As you walk along you feel something soft brush against your leg. You look down and what do you see? A cute little cat!

The white cat has violet eyes that cant help but remind you of Saiki and a collar with the label 'Sai.' You bend down, setting down your two bags, and pick up the cat. "Why, hello there!" you smile.

Sai stared back deadpanned. "Well, you remind me of someone I know an awful lot." You snort, setting the cat back on the ground and petting its head before picking up your bags and continuing to walk. After about 5 minutes, you notice the cat is still following you. You stop to turn to it for a second as it stares back up at you.

"You're awfully persistent, huh?" You smile. "I'm sorry, kitty, my landlord doesn't allow cats." You continue walking.

..And so does this damn cat. He's persistent and every time you tried to lose him in a doorway he'd dart in seconds before the door shut and nearly scared the shit out of you every time. Which is why he is now sitting patiently on your living room couch.

°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.

Okay, look, first of all, Saiki has a PERFECTLY good explanation. And second of all, this is not his fault. At all. He wasted his precious time to turn into a cat because Amp was bothering him once he got home. Shenanigans happened, and Amp got mad at him and he lied that he was going home, and that he didn't live at his house, so that Amp would stop bothering him. Amp would not believe him so to sell the story he just followed (L/n) home because she wouldn't kick a cat to the curb. Thankfully, she didn't but now Saiki is here.

The problem is that (L/n) won't take her eyes off him so he can't just teleport and she's not opening the door any time soon. Which is an issue because Saiki would like to get home and play his game. But no. He gets stuck in this situation. Fuck you, Author.

(rude.)

(L/n) turns and picks up Saiki, or should I say Sai, and he can't help but sigh and curse Amp for leading him into this situation. He can't move much because he can't control his strength well like this and generally it'll just end badly. So he can't.. really do much as (L/n) sets what she assumes to be a normal cat in her lap and pets him gently. All he can think right now is 'please kill me.'

"Hm.. you've gotta belong to someone. I haven't seen you around before, kitty, are you lost?" She asks, as if the fucking cat would respond. Saiki is very bitter right now. And does not want to be pet. He squirms out of her grip and winds up across the couch. "Yikes, okay, I got it."

She sighs. "God, I can't go finding some cat owner.. I've got homework and shit.." (L/n) runs a hand through her hair as she turns around. Fuck it, that's all he needs.

°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.·°¯°·.¸.

You turn back around. "We- What the fuck?!" The cat was gone. You snapped your head around, he didn't even seem to be in the apartment before. What- what the actual fuck?? Were you hallucinating??

..Yeah.. We'll call it hallucinating. You sigh as you flop at your kitchen table. You had homework.. and commissions.. and you were supposed to reread Kitchen. You glance at the book tossed to the side on your table. You'd read it once but that was years ago, when you were practicing Japanese. You were, simply put, stressed and tired as hell. It'd be another late night for you and just..

You'd think that through later, you told yourself, as you pull some bullshit math worksheet from your bag, pencil tapping as your eyes scan the problems. You were stressed but life was good. It was odd...

This stretch of happiness couldn't last long.

__________________

tl;dr, go read kitchen.

#sorry #i know it's. really bad #saiki k x reader #saiki k #saiki kusuo no psi nan #i havent posted in a while #saiki kusuo #my writing

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