#i have asked myself this question with almost every character but for cinder i was thinking abt her dustweave (?) clothing | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rae-and-mezo · 1 year

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Can you do when yn treats the house elves like their her children and the boys (ominis,sebastian, gareth,and amit) or the girls (poppy,natt,imelda, and Anne) get jealous or you can put whatever reaction!😊 please do this I'm begging 😭

A/n: I love this!! Some of them are shorter because I didn't know how to expand on their general opinion. I tried so hard to not repeat myself!

Characters: Sebastian Sallow, Ominis Gaunt, Garreth Weasley, Amit Thakkar, Poppy Sweeting, Natty Onai, Imelda Reyes, Anne Sallow

Sebastian:

Honestly, he's kind of annoyed.

Like the treatment of Elves is infuriating, sure, and he agrees with being kind obviously. But do you really have to cancel a date because Ticky the Elf wants to perform a dance for you?

And why do THEY get forehead kisses every day and he only gets them when he's sitting down? Maybe it's because he's just tall but HEY.

At first the elves are scared of him, and he hates it. He goes out of his way to show he means no harm but didn't intend to get roped into the mess.

Why do they want him to come see the room MC had them decorate in the room of requirement?

Why the hell is one asking him what MC prefers: Vanilla or Chocolate? They want to make her a cake? Okay...but he expects a piece.

Slowly he comes to love them as MC does, like a dad with a kitten.

Ominis:

My boy is...confused? But delighted.

The Gaunts had a house elf! Her name was Cinder, and she was more like a mother than Mrs. Gaunt. He always treated her with utmost respect and the way his parents treated her made him sick to his stomach.

His whole Hogwarts career he has tried to be very polite to the elves, letting them know someone cares.

And when you show him your army of elf friends, he is delighted!!

Asks them all their names and some more general questions.

One of them learned a new song or something of the like? He is listening with a patient smile on his face even though it is the worst thing he has ever heard.

They don't really understand his blindness actually. They're supporting but ask him tons of questions. I think Ominis would really like educating them about how he experiences the world as long as they aren't being patronizing.

He adores listening to you interact with the elves!!

He asks them so much advice and input on how to show Cinder he appreciates her. Like...does he give her a gift? Will this upset her? Is this too much?

Also, he remembers like everything. Tries too at least. You come into the common room late, telling him about how you were helping an Elf read a muggle book? He asks you if you've gotten to his favorite part. That particular elf tends to like the romance novels, and chapter nine is when the hero gets the girl.

In short, he loves the elves almost as much as you do!

Garreth:

He's so dumb. I love him.

Coming from a poorer family, Garreth had never seen a house elf until Hogwarts. They were strange creatures.

And then you have a whole crew?? Okay, but he wasn't expecting it.

He...he has trouble seeing them as sentient beings. I hate to say it, but he does! Of course, he respects all they do for the castle, but at first, he doesn't understand why you like them so much. He treats them not unlike a pet.

You tell them to be polite and introduce themselves, and he is so weirded out by each one introducing themselves and shaking his hand.

They pick up on his hesitation and come to you with their worries and after a lecture from you, Garreth is ready to try again. Reluctantly, but he is.

Is it possible to embarrass yourself in front of a house elf? If it is, Garreth does it. He's so scared of saying or doing something wrong that he ends up embarrassing the hell out of himself.

He grows to see them as they are: intelligent and sentient creatures that have a lot to offer. After a while he is comfortable enough to give them high fives in the hallway, or gift them things (mostly prank items, and then he has to teach them it is meant to be funny and not an attack-)

Amit:

He honestly has learned not to think twice about anything when it comes to you.

So, when you ask him to meet you in the room of requirement and you're surrounded by elves? A little strange, but it doesn't deter him from asking if you got all the notes down for DADA.

The elves scatter when he speaks, running to look like they are working. It surprises him, and even more so when you hush him as you coax them all out.

They do NOT like him at first because he comes at inconvenient times and how are they supposed to prepare you hot chocolate before bed when you're off looking at star charts??

And meanwhile poor Amit is working hard to get their seal of approval because anything you like he does too. It's very important to him!

Well one day they mention that they like the Gramaphone and the pretty music but the Gramaphone isn't working as of late. It gives you an idea, and now Amit is standing in front of a mini crowd playing his little violin heart out.

The elves kinda overwhelm him with how many there are and how needy they are to you, but it amazes him how you are so patient with them.

If there is a house elf language, he is learning it. Both to impress you and try to win over your little army.

Basically, he is slightly intimidated by the elves, but he loves you so he tries his best to get along with them. He definitely is no longer taking the food at dinner for granted, that's for sure.

Poppy:

She's so sweet.

At first, worries that the elves might have malicious intent because of how often they were pulling you away. But quickly she realized it wasn't the case.

The elves already adore her as she has always been incredibly sweet to them. Plus, in third year she saved a baby house elf which sparked her interest in them as more than servants.

She's more like their friend than parent, though, she thinks it's incredibly sweet how loving you are towards them.

Gets them ALL christmas presents. every single one. Doesn't tell you about it and holds you when you're overwhelmed by the kindness!

They will all follow her around, and she responds to every one of their jokes and makes sure she never leaves them out of conversation.

Makes funny faces at them from across the hall just like she would any other friend and it makes them feel welcomed.

After late nights in the vivarium, Poppy is dragging you to the kitchens. Even though you don't have to be dragged there. You two sit on the counter and recount your adventures to the elves while they busy themselves making you a snack. If there are dishes to be done she offers to help even if they decline.

Natty:

Always up for some adventure! Finds the elves fascinating honestly.

"Theoretically, if a master gives you a sock to wash, are you free? Can you choose your own clothes? Wait, if you can, are you allowed to shop for them? That would be so-" "Natty..." "Right, sorry."

She treats them like she would treat anybody else tbh. In her home country, she never had house elves and the concept of having someone thanklessly serving you makes her sick. So, she does her best to show her appreciation.

However, the elves will NOT take time she wants to spend with you away. They want to talk to you? Fine, but Natty is there too.

Tells you later how cute you are when you're interacting with something you love.

She gets the elves to help make you a GIANT Christmas present.

She and the elves see each other as equals and are friends!

Imelda:

Another jealous one. Omg.

Sure, elves are mistreated. It's wrong. But maybe they deserve to be kicked around a little when they KEEP YOU FROM QUIDDITCH PRACTICE!

Would never harm the elves or speak harm about them, but they have come to recognize her glare meaning "Hey, it's MY turn with my partner."

One elf in particular is pretty snippy and Imelda gets into fights with him almost every time they see each other.

Oh, the elves know to keep your broom in pristine condition. It seems to make you happy that it never needs work, and they have an agreement with Imelda. A polished, clean, and ready broom for your nightly rides means another hour where she doesn't come in and bother them.

She is NOT above coming into the kitchens just to annoy the house elves. They unfortunately know this.

Imelda would never ever see the house elves as anything less than what they are, but she doesn't hesitate to use her advantages.

She taught a group of the younger elves to swear. You still haven't quite forgiven her for it.

Anne:

I love Anne sm :)

Your relationship with the elves...doesn't surprise her in the slightest.

She doesn't understand, as Elves aren't anything special in her eyes. They're sentient creatures that have feelings and thoughts, just like humans do. Why would she treat them differently than anyone else?

The elves are very sweet, but c'mon. She was going to teach you to garden Hemlock without poisoning yourself!

Honestly, she doesn't mind that you baby them, but she definitely has sat you down and explained they don't need babied.

Admires you and how you treat them! Just doesn't understand it, that's all.

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andypantsx3 · 4 years

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in cinders | 3 | obfuscations

pairing: Todoroki Shouto / Reader

length: 24,362 words / 9 chapters

summary: You’re just trying to fairy godmother your best friend into a happily ever after. If only the prince would stop hanging around and cooperate.

tags: cinderella AU, prince!Shouto, romance, misunderstandings, reader-insert

warnings: aged up characters, eventual smut

The dress in question belonged to Lady Camie Utsushimi and you hoped she wouldn’t get close enough to notice.

It was a deep blue, almost black in certain lights, and though it wasn’t as fine as Ochako’s gown, it looked like the kind of thing that wouldn’t be out of place in a room full of nobility. In the scant hour you had to prepare, you’d done your best to temporarily alter it, quickly pinning the neckline into a different shape and ironing on spare silver ribbon lifted from Mina’s workrooms.

You’d cut a simple silver mask from the same ribbon, hurriedly stitching around the holes for the eyes and tying off the back with a thinner length. It wasn’t your best work, but then you didn’t intend for anyone to get close enough to take note.

While in Mina’s workroom, you also helped yourself to a scrap of pink ribbon and a pearl button, looping the ribbon through the eyehole to create a simple kind of a necklace. It would look too good with Ochako’s dress to pass up. You made a mental note to feed Mina more pastries in apology.

Back in your rooms, you and Ochako quickly washed down with a rough bar of soap of the type that all the palace servants used. It wasn’t as fine or perfumed with flowers like the ladies’ soaps you often caught passing through the corridors to be delivered to their rooms. It smelled vaguely of the olives that had gone into its production, but at least you smelled clean.

Once dressed, you and Ochako stole down the servant’s passages, taking care to avoid anyone carrying trays to the feast. At a quarter past the candlemark, you crept into the hallway that descended into the ballroom from an onlooking balcony. As agreed, Kaminari had left his post open for the spare minutes you needed to get inside.

“It’s not too late to back out,” Ochako whispered as you pressed open the hidden door leading into the back of the hall. The peerage was still being announced at the entry and you wouldn’t be noticed as you came in.

You grabbed her wrist and pulled her through the door, into the brightly-lit grandeur of the ballroom. At once, you were overwhelmed by the sights and smells of the reception. Bright dresses of every color dotted your vision like spots, their wearers combed and rouged to high perfection. Trays littered the tables at the fringes of the room, piled high with cheeses and sweetmeats and the other labors of Rikido’s love. At one table on the far end of the room, you spied the famous soba noodles.

All around you, the nobility swirled like currents on the sea.

“Wow,” Ochako breathed, sounding just as dumbfounded as you felt. “It’s even more than I thought it would be.”

Something pleased curled in your chest, happy you could give this to her. Even if she didn’t bag her prince at the end of the night, it would be worth it to hear the note of wonder in her voice and see her happily spinning among the party’s guests.

Speaking of Prince Shouto, you peered around in search of his tall figure. As the announcements of noble entries tapered off, you spotted your target in the corner of the room. It was hard to recognize all the courtiers in their elaborate masks, but you knew that head of distinctive red and white hair.

“What do you say you take your new dance skills for a spin,” you said, catching Ochako’s wrist again and pulling her through the splendid crowds.

She followed sedately, right up until she caught on to where you were going.

“Y/N, that’s him!” she hissed, “I can’t go over there.”

You pretended you’d conveniently lost your hearing. “What?”

“I said, I’m not going over there,” she whispered again, furiously. “I can’t look him in the face, what if he doesn’t -- oh hello, your highness! Mr. Midoriya!”

You stifled a laugh, dropping into your best approximation of a curtsy.

“Your highness,” you said, shoving Ochako in front of you. “It’s wonderful to meet you. I had hoped you might grace the Lady Uraraka with a dance. She’s quite new to court, you see.”

The man in question stared down at you, dual toned eyes burning into yours. Up close, you could see he was even more handsome than you had thought, his unusual eyes, sharp nose, and the fullness of his mouth only emphasized by the cut of his dark mask. He wore a doublet in a blue color only one shade lighter than your own gown, and the high points of his starched collar curved up towards his sharp jawline.

Over his shoulder, his valet Izuku Midoriya perked up, dressed in a green that matched his riot of curls.

“I’ve not heard of the Uraraka family,” Midoriya said, dropping into a bow. “It’s wonderful to make your acquaintance.”

Ochako seemed to blush to the roots of her hair at being addressed. “Oh, we’re um. We’re new, as my companion has said.”

Prince Shouto seemed to remember his manners as well, turning to Ochako. “Welcome, Lady Uraraka.” His heterochromatic eyes flicked over her face and he seemed to search for something to say. “I must compliment you on your choice of jewelry. Your necklace is quite unique and beautiful.”

You smothered a grin, proud of your efforts. She had his attention! Time to make your exit.

You bent your knees in a quick curtsy again. “Well, I must take my leave. I’d promised an acquaintance to find her. Please take good care of my friend.”

With that, you all but dove into the crowd, leaving Ochako at the mercy of the prince and his attendant. If the prince had any conscience at all, his chivalrous upbringing would compel him to ask her for a dance. From there, Ochako's inherent loveliness would do all the heavy lifting.

Once you were sure you were out of their sight, you looped around to one of the refreshments tables, intent on getting your evening’s worth out of Rikido’s cooking. If you had to be here, this would definitely beat the scraps you’d intended to scarf down by yourself. You planned on eating ten plates worth as you watched over Ochako from the sidelines. With the luxurious thickness of Lady Utsushimi’s skirts as cover, you might even be able to sneak twice your usual supply back into your room for later.

You were piling your plate high with barely-disguised glee when an elegant hand was held out in front of you. Your eyes followed an arm up a stylish sleeve and into the face of Camie Utsushimi herself. You froze, serving fork hanging from your fingers.

“L-lady Utsushimi!” you cried, quickly abandoning your plate. You swept into another curtsy so fast you heard your knees creak. “It’s a pleasure!”

Camie considered you with an unreadable look on her delicate features. Up close, her face was so symmetrical and pretty it almost made your eyes burn.

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, her features relaxed into something like geniality.

“I’m afraid I don’t know your name, Lady…?”

You panicked. You hadn’t planned on being addressed. Before you could stop yourself, you blurted out the first name you could think of.

“Kamiko. I’m, um, from the Ito family.”

Fuck, what were you doing giving her Kamiko’s name?

“Well met, Lady Ito." Lady Utsushimi smiled. "I must tell you that I quite like your dress. I have one just like it! It appears our tastes are quite similar, and I found myself thinking that I must make your acquaintance.”

Internally, you were screaming. Did she recognize it for her own dress? What game was she playing? Was the king’s guard going to march in here any moment and separate your head from your shoulders?

You forced yourself to calm down. “I thank you, my lady. That is a high compliment coming from you.”

She regarded you. “Do you know me? I’m sorry that I cannot say the same - I don’t believe I know of your family.”

You waved a hand dismissively. “Oh you wouldn’t! We’re, um, from the outlying provinces. We don’t really, uh, get to court much.”

Lady Utsushimi gave you a toothy grin. “Well I’m glad you could make it for Shouto’s birthday. Everyone seems to have turned out.”

You found yourself seizing on the opening she left, desperate to get the subject off of you. “Do you know the prince quite familiarly? You call him by his given name.”

She laughed. “Oh yes, Shouto and I are old friends. I only turned up tonight to give him some company should he need it. He hates these things.”

You turned back to the ballroom, searching out the prince’s mop of hair. You found him easily enough, but were startled to see a distinct lack of Ochako on his arm.

A panic seized you.

“Um, forgive me, Lady Utsushimi. I seem to have forgotten something. I’ll just--um, I’ll be right back.”

Without waiting for her response, you plunged back into the fray of courtiers, beelining straight for the prince.

Emerging breathlessly as though from a cold river, you stumbled almost straight into him. Forgetting yourself entirely, you blurted, “Where’s Och--uh, Lady Uraraka?”

He looked at you, seeming startled. “Pardon, Lady…?”

You waved him off, “Oh, don’t worry about me. Just tell me where Lady Uraraka’s gone to and I can be on my merry way.”

He turned to look at you more fully, something curious alighting in his gaze.

“Forgive me, but is it not rude to address your liege lord without the proper respects?”

You froze, blood feeling like it was icing over in your veins. “I--of course, your highness, please forgive me for any offense. I’d only wondered--um, where my friend had gone.”

You hoped desperately that your disguise as a noblewoman stood between you and the gallows.

A smirk played at the corners of Prince Shouto’s mouth.

“I believe she is with Mr. Midoriya at the moment.”

You looked up at him in shock. Was he playing with you?

“Oh, um, thank you. And where might Mr. Midoriya be at this very minute?”

His smirk widened into something dangerously close to a grin. “I do believe I’m owed a name before I will tell you.”

Fuck. Don’t give out Kamiko’s again--

“I don’t have one,” you blurted, then winced.

Prince Shouto stared at you, something a little like disbelief creeping over his features. “You don’t have a name? That’s the first time I’ve heard something like that. Tell me, are you trying to make yourself interesting?”

You flushed. “There is absolutely nothing interesting about me, I can assure you--” nothing that a royal would find interesting anyway, unless they cared about the best kind of soap to lift grease stains from a pan -- “if you could point me in the direction of your valet, I won’t take up any more of your time.”

The prince stepped nearer to you. This close, you could feel the heat coming off of his left side and smell something fresh like mint, underlaid with the tang of saddle oil and leather. His proximity went straight to your head and you took a step back, feeling dizzy.

“I will take from you a dance, then, in place of a name,” he said. His gaze burned into yours like a torch laid to a pyre.

These nobles sure asked for a lot you couldn’t give.

“Um, I’m afraid I’m not much good at dancing.” You groped around for any excuse, taking another slow step back. “I've been told it's as if I'd never learned! Lady Uraraka, though, is a wonderful dancer. I’ll be sure to add you to her dance card when I find her.”

You moved to leave, but a rough hand on your waist stopped you.

“I must insist,” the prince said, “I’ll refresh you, if you are as unpracticed as you say. You would not deny your prince on his birthday, would you?”

You regarded him suspiciously, noting the wry twist at the corner of his mouth. He was being too obnoxious not to be obfuscating. Was there some reason he wasn’t letting you follow Ochako and Midoriya?

“Your toes will pay the price for this,” you intoned, “I assure you I am not being modest.”

Prince Shouto smiled and steered you towards the floor where a dance was already underway. “Perhaps. I will be the judge of that.”

This man had no idea what he was in for.

In the interest of spending as little time in the stocks possible, you did your best to minimize the damage to his toes. You still found yourself trodding on him more often than not though, confused by the many steps and the spritely movements of the couples around you. It became clear very quickly that you had not been lying to him.

Soon enough, the prince leaned down to put his mouth to your ear. “Stand on my boots.”

You pulled back to look at him in befuddlement. “What?” you asked, stupidly.

He tugged you closer. “Step up onto my boots. No one will notice with your long skirts. I will lead you through the dance.”

Your heart pounding in your chest, you did as he asked. This had the effect of bringing you much nearer to him than was proper, and you noticed that even standing on his boots, you tucked neatly under his chin. You hid your face in his strong shoulder, feeling your face turn pink, hoping desperately that he noticed neither your blush nor the messy stitches of your mask.

“So you were not being modest,” he laughed when you’d spun another few rounds, this time with much less difficulty. You could feel it rumble in his chest. “I, too, would guess you had never learned.”

You cringed. “One of many faults, your highness.”

A calloused thumb smoothed your back. “You do not have a name and you do not dance. What do you do with your time?”

Scrub pots. Wash the vegetables that go into your supper. Clean the fireplaces.

You wracked your brain for something suitable to tell him. What did noble women do that men found duller than dirt? What could you give him that he would not ask more about?

“Embroidery, your highness. I am skilled with a needle and thread.”

“With that mask?” he huffed a soft laugh. “Tell me honestly.”

“Well,” you declared, nose feeling hot, “what do you think I do?”

Prince Shouto looked almost delighted by the question, the blue of his left eye shining at you through his mask.

“Let’s see. You write to the Lady Uraraka, seeing as you are such good friends--”

You nodded. Writing, that was something that ladies could do.

“--and you make your own soaps--”

You looked up at him, startled. “What?”

He leaned into your hair, and you could feel him take a deep breath. Your mind felt like it was melting a little. “Your hair, it smells faintly of olives. Most ladies order florals. I’ve never smelled anything like this before.”

Well, it’s not as though he went around sniffing the help every day. All the same, he was too observant.

“Um, what else?” you prompted, trying to reroute him.

His right hand fell from where it clasped yours to gently encircle your wrist. “And you alter your dresses after they’re ordered for you. Do you not find the current fashion satisfactory?”

To your horror, he plucked at the loose silver ribbon you’d ironed on to the hem of your sleeve. It came away easily, clutched in his long fingers.

You opened your mouth to reply -- though what you might have said was a complete mystery to you -- when a blur of pink and green came rushing at you.

Ochako popped up almost between you and the prince, Izuku hot on her heels.

“Your highness,” Izuku sketched a quick bow, “my apologies for interrupting, but your father has need of you.”

Prince Shouto’s hand tightened on your back for a moment, then fell away as he stepped out of your space.

“I see,” he said quietly. He bowed deeply towards you. “I will look for you later, Lady No Name.” And then he was gone, followed closely by his green-haired valet.

Ochako gaped. “Y/N! That was--!”

You hissed, grabbing her hand and rushing off the dance floor. “I know! We have to get out of here before he comes back.”

She looked at you in concern and you held up the sleeve where he had pulled off your ribbon. “Another couple minutes and he’d have figured me out.”

Her eyes grew round with distress. “Do you think he--?”

You shook your head. “Not if we leave now.”

She nodded, and led the way out of the great hall. Once back in the halls of the castle, the two of you ducked towards the doors to the servant’s hall, stealing quietly through the drafty passageways. You kept to the shadows in the kitchen, creeping carefully down the short staircase that led to your shared room.

When you’d finally made it inside, you let out a deep breath, peeling out of Lady Utsushimi’s dress and stowing it carefully under your pallet to return to the laundry rooms at your earliest opportunity.

The two of you changed and collapsed into bed, laughing wildly at the night you’d had. Ochako wouldn’t share more than a word or two on where she’d gone with the prince’s attendant, but you guessed she might have rushed off too embarrassed to dance with the prince and Izuku may have followed to make sure she was well.

Still, it was clear she’d loved being able to go to the ball in her pretty dress, and you smiled, thrilled that you could have given that to her.

Eventually, she stilled, the sound of her breathing becoming heavy. You eventually drifted off as well, feeling the ghost of the prince’s hand at your back and his breath at your temple.

#todoroki shouto #bnha #todoroki shouto x reader #fanfic #bnha x reader #todoroki x reader #boku no hero academia

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wu-sisyphus-gang · 3 years

Text

Motion Sickness Chapter 48

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It was a cold long ride to Atlas. Cold. And long. I said nothing to the pilot and he said nothing to me. I just sat with my luggage on my lap in the back of the plane. I had nothing but my thoughts to keep me company as I got closer and closer to my home kingdom.

I sat and worried. What if the General didn't let Ruby and the others join Ozpin? My fears weren't as dissuaded as I wanted them to be.

The worst part was I was an overthinker. I over-thought about it the whole way there. It was an eight hour flight, no less. And I had nothing but depressing thoughts to keep me awake and aware.

"Atlas ground control to unidentified vessel. Please identify," came through the radio.

"This is XTR-niner-niner-ought-two. Callsign ought-five-six-six-niner-eight. We've got Weiss Schnee onboard. Requesting permission to land."

"Granted. Did you say Weiss Schnee?"

"Affirmative."

"We roger that XTR. We'll have company waiting for you."

We came in low over the floating city and swept in for a landing near Atlas Academy.

The plane hovered to a stop and descended. With it descended my stomach. I was alone and hundreds of miles from Ruby.

The back of the ship opened. I stood with my things and departed at once.

"Weiss? You're alright." An even voice availed me.

It was my sister surrounded by armed robots and waiting near the airstrip. She was as tall as ever with crystal blue eyes and snow-white hair.

My sister sounded relieved.

"Winter." I acknowledged. "It's good to see you again. I've got a special message for General Ironwood. It's urgent."

"For Ironwood?" She asked. "What could you possibly need to talk to him about? Weiss the general is a busy man-"

"It's about the maidens. And the relics. He'll make time for it. I am sure," I hedged a working bet. My sister was in a position to know about Ozpin's secrets. I was willing to bet that she did, now that I knew myself.

The only beings within earshot were machines and they'd never tattle on us to anyone. Winter's eyes widened with something like shock.

"Oh. Then you must come with me immediately." She led the way into the academy. "How do you know about the relics Weiss? And the maidens?"

"Ozpin told me. But like I said I have to talk to Ironwood. I have a message for him. It's the only reason I took the ship ride here."

She swiped a key card on one of the doors and led me all the way to the headmaster's office. I'd been there before. I knew the way. It was back from when I considered Atlas Academy as an alternative to Beacon and I was given a tour of the place.

"General, my sister says she has an urgent message for you. It's why she came. It's about the relics and maidens."

The general turned to look at me. He looked as I remembered. Maybe a bit more grey hair. The stress of Beacon afflicted him, giving him a bit of Marie Antoinette syndrome. He was tall and half metal with a long sleeve over his metal side.

He was sharply dressed as I'd ever seen him. His arms were crossed behind his back, looking crisp.

"I'm supposed to tell you the 'king has castled.'" I told him. His face shifted. Growing at once more interested from confused.

"What? Where?" He demanded.

"Back in Argus with Qrow."

"Ozpin and Qrow…" he murmured. "I'll send a ship there immediately. What's the status of the relic of knowledge?"

"We don't know. We think Salem has it," I answered. "Leonardo Lionheart turned on us. He betrayed Ozpin to Salem."

"That's terrible news." The general steepled his fingers.

"The relic here is safe though, isn't it? Ozpin was worried about this one next."

"It's secure." He said so quietly I had to strain to hear him. "What about the spring maiden?"

"She fell. Cinder Fall, the new fall maiden became the new spring maiden. She's very powerful now."

"That's even worse news."

"Yes… sir, about my friends with Ozpin… will you allow them into the country?"

"They know about the relics and maidens as well?"

I nodded crisply. I felt almost like I was a young girl talking to my father. It was frightening.

"Then it can't be helped." He nodded. Lights on his implant flickered. "You did well to bring me this information. We'll see about getting you set up in a room within the academy. You should rest easy, now. I'll handle things from here."

I exhaled a sigh of relief.

"There's more, sir." I began. He'd begun to turn his attention away from me and hesitated. "We were betrayed by a student too. Ozpin suspected he was a sleeper agent. A man named Jaune Arc. I'm not sure if that matters to you but it's something to be aware of. He's the one with the relic of knowledge. We think he's bringing it to Salem. He's very dangerous. I also have the identities of two more of Salem's agents. A Tyrian Callows and Hazel Rainart, I have their fighting styles, weapons, and a description of them both."

"You've been through a great deal…"

"No more than anyone else since Beacon's fall and Black-Out day," I dismissed.

"Even still I had hoped to keep people as young as you out of the conflict. I wasn't so successful myself. You know Penny Polendina."

"It became a necessity. Ozpin was out of options after he died. He's in a body called Oscar now. And yes sir, I know her. She's alive?"

He smiled and nodded. "You can tell Winter about Salem's agents. It's good to hear from Ozpin. I'd been worried. I must arrange for his and Qrow's extraction," he phrased it like a kind of order and I had to resist the urge to give some kind of salute. My own military background having been raised in Atlas at the forefront of my mind.

"And my friends." I interrupted. It was a bit of a sticking point for me, I overcame my desire to salute and intruded anyways.

"Yes, of course," Ironwood agreed. He seemed to sense my anxiety about it. His voice was unusually gentle.

"Come with me Weiss," Winter said. "I'll tell you about the winter maiden and the staff of creation, if that's alright, sir?"

Ironwood dismissed us with a curt nod and Winter snapped off a salute before gently pulling me away.

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Winter led me beneath the school to the vault. There the staff of creation hung and suspended with it was the massive chunk of earth and ice the city floated on top of. "So the staff is what keeps the city floating? I always thought it was dust."

"That's the official story. But Ozpin showed the previous headmaster how to use the staff to levitate the city."

"How's this possible?" I was still tired from the flight but I had energy enough to be amazed at one of the relics in action.

"The staff is an unlimited source of power. Although it's limited to one task at a time. It and it's vault are set up in a circuit with the engines to help the city hover."

"That's amazing. It costs nothing and keeps the city safe. The relic of knowledge was similarly incredible."

I was able to look out and see gondolas on guide wires to the lower city.

"Oh?"

"It allows the user to ask any question of the lamp. Only three questions every one hundred years. We're afraid of what Jaune will do with it."

"Your friend who turned on you?"

"Yes." I breathed. "It's been hard."

"How are you holding up with that knowledge?"

"It's been difficult. My best friend was in love with him. Is in love with him. His betrayal came out of nowhere."

"Are you sure the rest of your friends can be trusted? You were rather insistent that your teammates join us here."

"I trust my teammates with my life."

"As you trusted this Jaune?"

"As Ozpin trusted Leonardo. Mistakes happen," I defended.

"Leonardo was a coward," Winter turned her nose up. "You could smell it on him."

I walked up and pressed a hand against the vault. The staff of creation was a beautiful object. A blue crystal wreathed in gold and mounted on a pillar of bronze, it was gorgeous. I'd only gotten a glimpse at the relic of knowledge but it was similarly intriguing.

"My teammates aren't cowards. And neither was Jaune. He was obsessive. That was his downfall."

"You defend him in this?"

"My partner and I think Salem did something to him." I stepped away from the crystal of the vault.

"Your partner who is in love with him?"

"That's right," I was adamant. "I know it sounds crazy. I know it sounds like an entangled mess of emotions but there are things about it that don't add up. Inconsistencies in his betrayal and personality which make no sense. I believe in her. I believe in him."

"You're right. It does sound like an entangled mess."

I glared at my sister. "Jaune was obsessive and one day he was killing and dying for us and the next he was turncoat."

"Traitorousness is the hardest to wrap our minds around because it often comes from those we least suspect. Betrayal is by its very nature unexpected."

"Maybe. Do you want to hear about Salem's other agents?"

"You've yet to give me a description of Jaune Arc."

"Tall, blonde, and muscular, blue eyes and about six-foot-one, maybe six-foot-two. He uses a broadsword that can turn into a shield with a longsword."

Winter sighed. "Weiss…"

"His semblance is called Limit Breaker. It's a charge which let's him elevate to a form where he is stronger and faster. He can do all manner of things with the charge. Fly, for example. And spend it on an attack or movement."

"Weiss it sounds like you, too, are muddled in this."

"I'm doing alright."

"Are you?"

"I-" I hesitated. "I liked him. As a person. The personality he developed. Who he became. The sacrifices he was willing to make for us. I got comfortable. It took me by surprise. Caught me off guard. He used to fancy me and I always felt like a good judge of character. He changed between Beacon and when I saw him again. I liked what I saw in him."

"And your friend?"

"She's hurting but we can get through it together."

"It's as I said. You're ensnared. You're too close to the issue. You need to look at things dispassionately."

"I don't know if I can do that with this. Could you do it if it was someone you cared about?"

"I have my duty," Winter insisted.

"Easy for you to say now." I sounded tired to my own ears. I didn't believe Winter. Maybe she never let herself get close to someone. It would be easy to do if you never had to try, I suppose. "I thought I'd be able to do it too. Now that it's happened to me it's clear that I can't. I have to stand with my partner."

"You're in pain."

"That's life." I pulled at my ponytail and tightened it.

"I hate seeing you like this. It sounds like you're not letting it go."

"I can't release it that easily. Jaune had a partner who died. He talked about getting revenge for her against the agents of Salem. We even talked about how he wanted to be able to let go for her. I think I understand what he meant now."

"I see. You're unwilling to compromise on this issue."

"I am." I agreed. "If time heals all wounds then I need more time."

"Tell me about the other agents of Salem."

"You already know of Cinder, the spring and fall maiden. She fights with glass and dust woven into her clothes. She's incredibly dangerous. Even before she added the spring maiden's power to her own. Jaune fought her before then. His power made him nearly as lethal."

"We have records of her. You keep coming back to Jaune."

"He's intertwined in my story," I dismissed easily. "Tyrian Callows is a scorpion Faunus. He fights with clawed submachine guns. His aura is purple. I fought him at Haven. His eyes are gold and his hair is brown. Hazel Rainart is eight-foot, maybe taller. He fights with his fist and by infusing himself with dust. He has brown hair and brown eyes."

"Do you know either's semblance."

"When I fought Tyrian I didn't catch it. Ozpin said Hazel's was a pain-numbing agent. It allowed him to infuse himself with more dust than your average person could tolerate."

"You've been through a lot since you left father's estate."

"You have no idea. You mentioned the winter maiden."

"I did."

Winter led me back through the Atlas Academy. We arrived at a medical facility. We passed armed guards, security cameras, and robots. A door slid open before us and she gestured inside. I followed her direction and looked down through what I could only assume was a one-way mirror.

"This is Fria."

She pointed down at a woman in a cot. There was a sink and kitchenette in the room as well as two tubes with cables between them.

"She's the winter maiden." I identified.

"She is. She could pass any day now. Until that happens I'm the only person she's allowed to see."

"Then Ironwood's chosen you. You'll be the new winter maiden. Cinder will come after you."

"You believe she won't stop at two?"

"She didn't stop at one. Why would she slow down now?"

"I suppose…" Winter mulled that over.

"How long have you known?"

"Since Beacon fell."

"And that doesn't bother you? Ironwood groomed your entire military career just for the purpose of becoming a maiden. Don't you feel like you never had any choice? And you want to lecture me about things getting muddled? Jaune mentioned to me that Ozpin was probably looking at me and my team to be maidens and it set off red flags for me. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized he was right. My team and I are ideal candidates. Powerful, talented, and already armed with knowledge."

"It did bother me at first. But the more I thought about it, the more I saw it as a privilege. It's a chance for me to do some real good for Atlas, for Remnant."

"I think you're ensnared by the general. Closing the borders down rather than helping the rest of the world, what is he thinking?"

"I-I'm not sure if I'll be allowed to tell you. There is a greater plan in play, I assure you, Weiss. Things are not as short-sighted as they may seem."

"I should hope not. Ozpin said he was worried for Ironwood next. If Ironwood starts going against Ozpin's orders things will be bad to say the least. Closing the borders is only frustrating things between Atlas and the rest of the world. Ironwood had better have a plan, and it had better be a damn good one."

"I'll see about getting clearance to talk about it with you."

"Thank you."

"I agree with the general's plan. I hope that you will too. Now I must ask what you intend to do?"

"What do you mean?"

"You're in Atlas. You're a huntress and from the sound of things you're never going back to live under father."

"Never again. No," I said, quiet but sure.

"So what will you do?"

"I'll do what my team and I have been doing. Protecting and serving the people of Remnant."

"How?"

"There's bound to be no shortage of jobs for those of us in the know. The Grimm are always coming. Salem's agents are at the gates at all times. My team and I have seen them. Those real monsters of humanity."

"You won't go back to school?"

"If I went back to school it would only be to teach. And even then…" It wouldn't be anytime soon. I wanted to fight.

"That would be a good career choice for you." Winter smirked.

I nodded. "For now, though, I just don't see it."

"Very well. I'm sure the general will be happy to have you and your team aboard."

"I'm sure he will be. Team RWBY is a force to be reckoned with."

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-WG

#winter schnee #james ironwood #rwby #ff7 #ffvii #cloud strife #cloud!jaune arc #sephiroth!Jaune arc #jaune arc #weiss schnee #ruby rose x jaune arc x weiss schnee #war of the roses #white rose #whiterose #whiteknight #white knight #lancaster #ruby rose

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helihi · 4 years

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Thoughts on RWBY Vol. 7

Quarantine day 20: I finally force myself to re watch volume 7 instead of doing my French homework.

Spoilers ahead for RWBY and How I Met Your Mother (yes).

Volume 7: The Story of a Broken Narrative Kingdom

The day has come where I finally sit down and watch the whole season again. Some of you wondered why I didn’t simply do a The Good, The Bad, and The Dirty review on the last episode of the volume like I did with the previous ones. The answer is the same reason why Ozpin’s speech at the end of the volume encapsulates the volume’s theme as a whole: finales affect the way you look at shows, comics, movies, and books. It provides a framing.

Did any of you watch How I Met Your Mother? For those of you who didn’t, it was a often called the show “which could replace Friends”. Something that you may not know is that fans of the show renamed it something among the lines of “How I should date your Aunt Robin” after the last episode aired. You see, the ending of the show changed the way most viewers see the show in the present.

The show had main character Ted Mosby narrate to his children how he met their mother. However, the story doesn’t begin during the day that encountered happen; no, it starts years before, when Ted declares he wants to settle down and find the love of his life. In that very same episode, he meets Robin Scherbatsky. In the end it’s revealed that the mother (the character we spent years speculating about) is dead (which I expected), and Ted asks his children if they give him the blessing to date their Aunt Robin. Originally, the fans could excuse episode 1 centering around Robin because it was the instance where Ted decided he wanted to settle down, but after the veil was lifted; there were no excuses, this whole story was a Ted’s way of convincing their children he should marry Robin, the main woman in his life during the whole show (even if we spend the last season on her wedding with one of Ted’s best friends).

Perhaps the ending of Volume 7 didn’t destroy the character development of 3 main characters, but it drastically changed the way I felt about the volume.

“The Kingdom of Atlas will remain safe, that’s my promise”- James Ironwood, Volume 7, Episode 1.

If you go back in my blog and read my reviews for most of the volume, you will find glowing ratings and stars. Anyone that knows me, knows that I love a good politics game in the shows/stories I read, so I was really excited when the writing team started developing that during the first half of the season.

Our gang (RWBY+JNOR+Q+M) reach Atlas after finding out that Oz is a fraud, that Salem cannot be beat (by Oz), and that Cinder almost took another maiden’s power. They quickly realize that Atlas is in a state of chaos and Ironwood is consumed by fear taking authoritarian measures, which keep the kingdom divided.

The stage is set:

Ironwood, Winter, and the Ace Ops.

Robyn, the Happy Huntresses, and Mantle.

Watts, Jacques, and Tyrian.

I thought the way everything was set was fantastic, I loved the political drama, and I thought the writers were taking their time properly. Even now I give huge kudos to the Schnee storyline, which is my favorite. The volume showed us how flawed Winter’s coping mechanism is, how Weiss is still susceptible to her father’s gaslighting and manipulation, and how the household isn’t just broken by Jacques (Willow apologists, pls read this).

However, the cracks started showing during the first episodes and I noted that on my reviews. We have characters used for exposition dump: from the Robyn supporter, that explains what we could’ve learned by the normal progression of the story, who gets killed as soon as he returns home, and other characters like Maria talking about Pietro while he’s standing right there.

In contrast to that, we get wonderful montages which show the passage of time. The kids interact with one another and the Ace Ops, they train, they help with Ironwood’s plan. It seems weird to have 2 different tools one after the other.

Also, it it weird for anyone that Qrow and Winter only interact 1 time during episode 2 when in Volume 3 a clear rivalry was established? Winter’s storyline was supposed to follow Penny’s, while Qrow was supposed to grow attached to Clover. Because these 2 characters had to reach a certain point in the story, they are not allowed to deviate from the interactions needed for the plot to advance.

Another thing occurred to me while re-watching the season again... Why is Ironwood so fixated in protecting Atlas when it’s floating in the air away from Grimm? Yes, we know that some Grimm can fly, but by the many times we see Mantle in chaos, you would think Ironwood would repair Mantle’s wall to keep it safe?

That’s the theme, guys, girls and nonbinary folks: a kingdom divided.

Just like the Atlas kingdom falls apart, the narrative of Volume 7 has a specific breaking point that marks the decline in quality (you can see that in my reviews). The moment everything went downhill starts in Episode 8, with the dinner at the Schnee Manor.

We spend much time developing the political tensions of the volume for Jacques to be promptly arrested and taken away from the scene in a second.

While Ironwood, Winter, Penny, and Clover are shown doing plot relevant stuff, team JNOR does that ridiculous gag to get Whitley out of Weiss’s hair. The rest of the team do jackshit, and we don’t hear anything from them until everything is over. Again, the writers reached the plot point and forgot about everything else.

Also, Ruby looks sadly at Weiss when Whitley mentions that Klein was “let go”, yet Weiss has never talked about him to Ruby on screen. Claiming Weiss could’ve done that off screen strips away the possibilities of Weiss bonding with Ruby the same way she did with Yang when talking about their pain during Volume 5.

Such a large table, and only 4 council members, isn’t that kind of stupid? I mean, if Ironwood had 2 seats, numbers wise it makes sense, but who are those other 2 supposed to represent? Why haven’t we seen them before?

Robyn is told by Yang and Blake that Ironwood doesn't know who to trust. She proceeds to pressure him in front of people he clearly doesn’t trust. This is the first instance of OOC Robyn.

The walls crumbled, and everything became obvious as a viewer. Some other notable flaws:

Tension jojoing. The people in mantle will revolt! Except they aren’t. This happens in Episode 5, 6, and 9. The only real uprising is the last one. The other two were silly cliff hangers that make no sense when you watch the show again. (they didn’t make sense before either and I complained).

Hey there, Watts! You may have an interesting backstory, except it’s only implied you are pissed off Penny got chosen as a major project instead of whatever yours was. Also, Paladin incident? What? If he is the main villain of the Volume, why not expand on him? I shouldn’t be surprised, Hazel and Tyrian are not that complex. And Cinder? It’s been 5 volumes and we barely know anything about her haha.

Robin! I love how civilized and smart you are when the volume started, choosing to observe and talk instead of acting against the main characters. How awful is it that you forget to keep your calm when a Serial killer is on the loose. It would be a shame if someone were to... die.

I already gave my 2 cents over Clover’s death, and I’m not going to repeat myself. I am sorry to all the Fair Game fans, I’m afraid bury your gays is till alive and well.

The nail on the coffin is the final episode: after making a speech about how Salem wants to divide people and how the only way to go is to remain united, James does the exact opposite thing the moment something doesn’t go according to plan. Don’t get me wrong, his PTSD regarding the queen chess piece was foreshadowed, but the moment team RWBY offer an explanation and identify the person behind it, he’s to far gone. Then, Salem shows up, and goes for Team RWBY when Ruby gets under her skin. This shows that Salem has a weakness and that Team RWBY can be trusted when it comes to defeating her, yet that is promptly ignored.

Also, Ironwood might be hurt about Yang and Blake talking to Robyn, but after everything, they were proven right: Robyn is to be trusted, Ironwood was making a mistake.

The whole setting up a trap to attract Tyrian wasn’t Ironwood going “mad with power” or something. Robyn knew he has lying and allowed Ironwood to catch someone who could hack everything. Not only that, but the camera zoomed in on Ironwood, so nobody could see Robyn’s handy Semblance going red. Or... maybe I’m looking too much into it and the writers expected you to forget.

Sorry, I guess James Ironwood had to take a bunch of stupid pills.

“I wish it didn’t have to end this way.” - Clover Ebi.

“It doesn’t have to, but the writers need that Branwen angst.” - Qrow Branwen.

Volume 7: Part 1 of the Atlas Arc

Have you ever heard of Checov’s gun? It is a dramatic principle that states that every element in a story must be necessary, and irrelevant elements should be removed. Elements should not appear to make "false promises" by never coming into play. Let’s play a game called the false promises of the volume that may carry over to volume 8?

Renora: Nora sides with Robin, Ren sides with Ironwood. They do not communicate with one another and the tension builds throughout the volume. They kiss, nothing gets resolved. Ren cries when Neo turns into Nora.

Training: Ren is shown to throw himself into the enemy as a flaw, he repeats the same mistake when fighting with Neo. Oscar’s Semblance is questioned, nothing comes out of it. Ruby’s Semblance is questioned, nothing comes out of it.

Cinder got beef with Atlas? For some reason, Cinder talks about Atlas hoarding power when speaking with Winter. Bitch, where the fuck do you come from? Who are you? Do I know you? Sorry, the writers forgot to write a growth arc for you. My bad.

Nora, daughter of Atlas? Can someone explain to me why she became a SWJ (/s) during this season? We never get a backstory of her previous to Kuroyuri and for some reason Nora is super attached to the people of Mantle. The daughter of Atlas title was thrown around, why?

It’s so nice to see tea FNKI back! Too bad they are there for 5 minutes and never show up again, not even when Mantle is supposed to be defended by all huntsmen. I guess this was fan service.

What’s the purpose of the Happy Huntresses? Isn’t it funny how the only one who got wounded by Tyrian is the only character who could see in the dark, but didn’t tell Robin that Penny wasn’t guilty? Hi Fiona, I don’t know why you exist.

Marrow: the butt of the joke. Since the first episodes, Marrow is shown as the outsider inside the Ace Ops: his teammates don’t take him seriously, Ironwood doesn’t think Marrow is up to the challenge of some missions, and he’s the only Faunus, the only one that seemed to sympathize with Robyn at the end. Too bad he wasn’t allowed to break his mold.

The World Building looks pretty, but it doesn't play the part.

I have to praise the art direction of this season. I was blown away by the aesthetics of Mantle clashing with Atlas, the details in the backgrounds, the world building by back messaging, screens, and posters. My favorite scene of the volume is the penguins in the tundra.

However, you have to walk the walk, and the writing team failed to deliver.

Racism: hey, I know you guys kinda messed up the White Fang’s internal struggles and opportunity to expand on Adam’s power grab and Sienna’s leadership, but maybe don’t skip the racist elements of Atlas? All we get are Faunus mine workers looking angry, that drunk dude who yelled at Blake and Marrow making a simplistic comment about politics. What...? What’s the point of acknowledging u are bad at writing racism and then do nothing about it? Did none of the new writers know how to tackle this?

In-World Continuity: Hey, wasn't the Vytal festival broadcasted to the entire world? When I saw that camera focusing on Yang on episode 1, I thought there would be a call back to what everyone saw her do during the finals, but nope. Let’s not bring that up again. ever. The only important thing about the Vytal Festival is the tower, move on.

Weapons upgrade: We were told that weapons were an extension of each huntsmen; too bad none of our gang actually work on them. Pietro makes all the modifications and repairs. I remember the bumblebee fans eager for a scene of Blake repairing Gambol Shroud, don’t tell me you’re not disappointed.

Atlas ball: not found. Hey! We have Jacques Schnee celebrating his fake victory on the elections! It would be a perfect moment to showcase the disconnect between what’s happening in Mantle and what the people in atlas thing. Too bad we didn’t wanna make extra character models.

Closing thoughts

I wanted to re watch the whole season again to see if the bitterness left on my lips after watching that chaotic finale went away, but it only grew. There are so many character choices that made no sense, so many scenes where characters stood around in the background doing nothing.

WHY THE FUCK DID OZPIN ONLY APPEAR AT THE END?

Oh, I’ll tell you why: he needed to give a speech about themes to justify the stupidity that happened during the last episodes to get to that cliff hanger.

I am disappointed in volume that seemed to be doing so good at the begging, but hey... at this point we shouldn’t be surprised, should we? Interestingly enough, the people who dreamed about the ball and the scenes of Blake fixing Gambol Shroud grew quiet after the episodes aired...

Almost as if criticism wasn’t allowed on the RWBY tag.

AN: The titty window isn’t justified Salem, your ex is now a child that’s PEDO—

#rwby #volume 7 #rwby7 #RWBY review #Me #The good the bad and the dirty

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basementsushi · 3 years

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Cinderella - movie reviews

Movie: Cinderella (1950)

Would I recommend: Yes - it’s another classic that’s still quite enjoyable today!

Had seen before: Yes (but couldn’t remember it)

Main movie, prequel, sequel, or midquel: Main movie

Theater or straight to video: Theater

Keep reading below for fun facts, my thoughts, and origin details (contains spoilers)!

Also further below are my reviews for the sequels!

Thoughts:

Why do all the mice and birds have clothes? BIRDS DO NOT NEED SHOES

Cinderella’s rant at the clock tower truly shows the universal hatred of being woken up by a clock in the morning

Cinderella certainly has more attitude than I remembered! It’s wonderful

I can’t help wondering why the prince’s baby portrait shows him as a blonde, and from a toddler on he has black hair

What’s going on with the fever dream bubbles? What was in that tea…

I love how much the mice care about Cinderella, they truly do everything they can to help her prepare for the ball

There’s a lot more humor in the movie than I remembered - a lot of it is a bit subtle, I think some may have just gone over my head when I was little

I love the prince’s attitude (hiding a yawn while meeting some of the ladies, and rolling his eyes at the step-sisters)

The king is a bit creepy, he’s so obsessed with having grandkids, to the point that he says some of the ladies must have potential to be great mothers (before correcting himself to say wives)!

It’s wonderful that Cinderella is so appealing to the prince because she’s not fawning over him or his position - he first notices her because she’s admiring the palace beauty instead of trying to gain his attention, and becomes more fascinating with her later when he realizes she’s interested in him (she doesn’t even know he’s the prince at the time!)

While spending time with the prince why does Cinderella splash her GLOVED hand in the fountain?

The poor grand duke.. He may be my favorite character, he’s so sweet and trying so hard. I feel so bad when he’s so panicked about telling the king Cinderella has disappeared (though of course he’d be panicked, the king threatened to kill him if anything went wrong!)

Another reason to love the grand duke - he is literally the only character who acknowledges the very real concern that the slipper may fit many women!

I have noticed that Cinderella wears a black choker both with her ball gown and with her wedding gown. I don’t know what to do with this knowledge.

Fun facts:

Cinderella’s prince is the one known as “Prince Charming”

While the Brothers Grimm wrote a tale about “Cinderella”, the Disney movie draws inspiration from Cendrillon (Cinderella, or The Little Glass Slipper), a tale by Charles Perrault, first published anonymously in 1697 in Paris (over a century before the Brothers Grimm tale, which differs in many ways) - for my research I read both versions, and highly recommend you do the same! The movie stays mostly true to Perrault’s tale, though personally I prefer the Grimm version.

Cinderella was originally going to be a short, but the ideas were too complicated to fit, so instead they made it into a movie

Origin: (Cendrillon, or The Little Glass Slipper, Charles Perrault tale) In this tale a gentleman, who had an incredibly sweet and good daughter from his first wife, married again, this time a haughty woman with much pride. She showed these traits almost immediately after the wedding. The step-mother disliked the man's daughter, especially since her goodness made her own daughters pale in comparison, so she made the girl clean and do the most horrible of tasks and sleep on a horrible straw bed, while her daughters had only the finest of things. The girl dared not tell her father, for he was completely under the influence of her stepmother.

Her step-sisters began to call her names, among them Cinderella, because she would sit among the cinders and ashes.

It then was that the king's son announced a ball, and that many young ladies were invited. The step-sisters were quite excited to attend, and spent much time planning their appearance, and Cinderella, in her goodness, helped them prepare. On the day of the ball Cinderella saw them off, then began to cry. Her godmother, who was a fairy, saw her crying and came to see what was wrong. When Cinderella told her she too wished to attend the ball she said that she would make it so.

She had Cinderella bring her a pumpkin, six mice, a rat, and six lizards, which she transformed into a fine, gold-gilded coach, fine horses, a coachman, and footmen. When Cinderella asked her about a dress she touched her with her wand, transforming her rags into cloth of gold and silver, covered in many jewels. Her godmother warned her before she left to leave before midnight, when everything would transform back into what it was before.

When Cinderella arrived all were stunned by her beauty, and admired her grace when they saw her dance. A fine meal was served, and Cinderella surprised her sister's by sitting near them and giving them some of the fine fruit the prince had given her (they did not know it was her). Shortly before midnight she returned home, and when her step-sisters returned home they told tales of a beautiful and kind princess who had been in attendance.

The following evening she attended again, dressed even more magnificently. She was having such a wonderful time she nearly forgot to leave before midnight, and had to hurriedly flee as the clock began to strike twelve. In her hurry she left a glass slipper behind, which the prince found. By the time she returned home she was once again in her dirty clothes, with the exception of her single glass slipper.

A few days later the prince announced that he would marry whomever could fit into the slipper. Many tried, including the step-sisters, but no matter how hard they tried none fit. Cinderella, watching all this amused, said they should see if it fit her. The gentleman whom the prince had set agreed she should try, as the prince had given him orders to let everyone try.

The slipper fit her perfectly, and her step-sisters were astonished, even more so when she pulled the matching flipper from her pocket. At that moment Cinderella's godmother came in and touched her wand to Cinderella, dressing her in things more fine than she had ever worn before. Her step-sisters, now recognizing her, threw themselves at her feet begging forgiveness. She raised them up and embraced them, forgiving them completely.

Cinderella was taken to the prince, and after a few days they were married. Cinderella, in all her goodness, gave her sisters homes in the palace as well, and that same day matched them with lords in the court.

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Movie: Cinderella II: Dreams Come True (2002)

Would I recommend: Yes*. You can definitely feel the ideas/influence from when this was going to be a TV show, it feels closer to three separate episodes rather than one overarching movie plot. *Overall it’s not as good as the first movie, but if you enjoyed the first and want some silly stories about events that take place after this may be a fun watch.

Had seen before: No

Main movie, prequel, sequel, or midquel: Sequel

Theater or straight to video: Straight to video

Keep reading below for fun facts and my thoughts (contains spoilers)!

Thoughts:

Cinderella is still rocking a choker with all of her gowns

Ball gowns are Cinderella’s Clark Kent glasses - with a gown on everyone immediately recognizes her, with no fancy gown she blends and no one recognizes her as the princess

I like that Cinderella questions many of the customs at the palace - that she shouldn’t make her own breakfast, that people can’t just choose where they sit at dinner, or wondering about essentially same colored napkins - it’s quite relatable

WHY DOES PART OF THE PLOT INVOLVE JAC BECOMING A HUMAN

There are color changing strings of lights at the Spring Festival - historical accuracy be darned

The fairy godmother needs the get “bippity boppity boo” embroidered on her sleeves or something, it’s her only spell and she still manages to forget it half the time

Well the movie has mice romance sub-plot, now all it needs is the kitchen sink… [edit from later in the movie: LUCIFER AND POM POM? That’s it, they’ve covered every possible love sub-plot]

Quite a 180 from the first movie, I actually am liking Anastasia (one of the step-sisters), and the other begins to seem better as well

Fun facts:

This was originally going to be a TV series, but it got cancelled, and the ideas adapted into a movie instead

----------

Movie: Cinderella III: A Twist in Time (2007)

Would I recommend: Yes - it’s certainly a fun sequel to the original, I’m finding myself debating whether I like it or the original better, and honestly, I think this one might be winning!

Had seen before: No

Main movie, prequel, sequel, or midquel: Sequel

Theater or straight to video: Straight to video

Keep reading below for my thoughts (contains spoilers)!

Thoughts:

I’m not 100% sure, it’s pretty subtle, but I think from the opening song this movie takes place a year after the first one

Lady Tremaine is so much more evil in this one! It shows in her use of magic too, hers is green, while the fairy godmother’s and Anastasia’s are white/blue

I love how much more independent and clever Cinderella is in this one - she’s taking control of her life, a true fighter!

SHE WEARS A SIZE 4.5? What is she, a fae?

Aww, Anastasia reminds the king so much of his wife (who I can tell through inference as passed away)

It’s amazing how some genuine kindness and care changes Anastasia’s personality and outlook, I sympathize with her so much in this movie - it really shows how much she just wants to be loved and appreciate for who she is

Good prince, questioning the weird animal interactions

OMG the prince is dramatic as heck, when told he was forbidden to take another step down the stairs he just yeeted himself out the window instead

#cinderella #movie #movie review #charles perrault #brothers grimm #sequel

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electronicyarn · 4 years

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NOT Live Blogging RWBY Vol. 7

Guess who has two thumbs and finally finished watching RWBY Volume 7? This gal! So I decided I’d post my thoughts on the volume. I’m kind of disappointed I didn’t get to properly live blog it, but I guess right now this is the best I can do.

(So is…is tumblr still a thing? Or has whatever company that owns it now finally run the site completely into the ground. Maybe the question I should be asking is: does anyone still follow my blog?)

I think in the interest of not rambling too wildly I’m going to organize my thoughts into broad categories. So, here we go.

Visuals

If nothing else, this volume was a feast for the eyes. I’m impressed that RWBY continues to noticeably improve its visuals with each Volume. Honestly, at this point I don’t see the need for further improvement. The character models are appropriately stylized, the backgrounds are gorgeous, and the last of the kinks have (finally) been worked out of the animation.

What I’m less enthused about is the costume design. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not bad. It’s just not great. Penny’s new design works. Ruby’s outfit is virtually identical to her last one, so she gets a pass. Weiss’s is close, oh so close. I like the basic design, but I think the colors needed some more tweaking. Blake’s outfit is…. Well, I don’t know. I think I’m going to call it mildly nonsensical. I’m digging the haircut though. (Same goes for Jaune!) Yang and Neo’s new clothes are so-so at best, and Cinder’s are downright awful. Strangely enough, it’s Team JN_R that wins the best-dressed award in my book. They’re new outfits look far better than Weiss’s, Blake’s, and Yang’s by a mile.

I guess I should count my blessings. After Neo and Cinder’s new outfits debuted at the end of Volume 6 I was afraid that everyone might end up looking like lampshades. Or maybe fetishists not fully committing to the part.

Story

Up until about Episode 10 I was going to call this volume the good twin to Volume 4’s evil twin. A volume of RWBY that lacked the high-highs and the low-lows that are so endemic of the franchise. The difference between the two being that Volume 4 was painfully mediocre, while Volume 7 was pretty good. But it turns out I was wrong. The entirety of Volume 7 was, in my opinion, nothing more than a build-up to the big finale. And what a finale it was! But maybe I shouldn’t get ahead of myself.

The first episode really won brownie points with me for basically doing the bad part of Volume 6 (Team RWBY spitting in the face of authority) except doing it right. It turns out that authority figures aren’t always “whimsical” caricatures masquerading as antagonists. (Sorry, I really hated Caroline, and not in a good way.) It also turns out that sometimes the authorities aren’t utterly incompetent. In many ways the Ace-Ops arresting Team RWBY reminded me of a less extreme version of the ending of the fourth Hunger Games movie. Specifically the part where Katniss and company decide to storm the castle and utterly fail. You know, the part where the movie transformed from an uninspired parody of itself to the absolute highlight of the entire franchise?

And then a bunch of stuff happened, some of which I’ll discuss in the next section. And then there were some really great fights. Oh yes, and then Salem shows up. Bye-bye Atlas! You. Are. Outta here!

Honestly, the only thing I didn’t much care for story-wise was Penny becoming the new Winter Maiden. It’s not because I don’t like the concept; it’s because it feels like they didn’t put any thought into the idea other than “let’s make Penny the Winter Maiden”. I’ll withhold judgment for now. It’s only fair that I wait and see where they go with it.

Characters

Believe it or not, I don’t have much to say about Team RWBY themselves in this section. Development-wise this volume was almost exclusively focused on other characters. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, although it wouldn’t be my first choice if I had my druthers. Honestly, Weiss, Blake, and Yang’s character arcs have largely been concluded at this point. Only Ruby’s left with outstanding issues regarding her mother. So…yeah. Maybe that bodes poorly for the franchise’s future now that I think about it? Or at least my own personal enjoyment of it? Eh, I’ll worry about that later. I should talk about all the other characters!

Team JN_R – I was a bit surprised at the lack of Jaune-related content this volume. They didn’t even deign to make him suffer much. But with a cast as big as RWBY’s, it’s not the first time we’ve seen a character take a volume off as it were. The big news here is that they actually attempted to give Ren a character and bring him into conflict with Nora. I…. Well, I don’t really think they succeeded, to be honest. As is a common problem in RWBY, there really wasn’t enough time to let the idea be fully realized. But I appreciate the effort.

The Ace-Ops – Oh, I had these guys pegged as the volume’s final bosses from the get-go. And I was not disappointed. As one-off antagonists, they worked. I can’t remember any of their names though. Except for Clover’s, and I’ll talk about him and Qrow in the section below.

Penny – It’s about time she came back. We all knew that was going to happen, right? And while I’m on the subject, Pietro was a nice side character too.

Oscar – He was there.

Robyn – I’m not sure what to say about her, to be honest. She was a good enough character, and played her role in the story well. But I never felt like she rose above her role.

Neo – You know who my favorite RWBY character is? It’s Yang, obviously. And do you know who the most strongly characterized RWBY character is? It’s the late Roman Torchwick of course. But do you know who takes second place in both of those categories? Neo. Kind of ironic for that second one given that she doesn’t speak. Neo did not disappoint this volume. She never disappoints. And I’ve said it before, on this very blog I think. In terms of raw-skill, Neo is one of the most dangerous characters in the RWBY-verse. Team JN_R vs. Neo? No contest. Although I am amused that Jaune got the only real hit on her. I’m even more amused that it somehow felt appropriate.

Cinder – Again I continue to really like post-Volume 4 Cinder. No matter how hard she tries, the universe just won’t stop kicking her in the teeth. And it just fits her character so well. Bravo Rooster Teeth!

Winter – Winter’s battle might not have been the most fun. That goes to Neo vs. some bush leaguers. It might not have been the most creative. That goes to Team RWBY vs. the Ace-Ops. But by God, no one put in more effort than Winter. She has my utmost respect.

Weiss’s Mom – Hey, she exists! Nice!

Dr. Watts – So much smarm. So much arrogance. I should hate him, but I really don’t. He’s just great.

Ironwood – And the best for last. Oh my. Oh my, oh my, oh my. His arc this volume was absolutely perfect. It was given enough time to be believable, amazing for a show like RWBY, and every step along his journey made sense. He’s become my absolute favorite kind of antagonist, the kind that believes what they’re doing is right. And here’s the thing, I can’t say that Ironwood is wrong. I don’t think he’s right, but I can’t say that he’s wrong. Give me an Ironwood over a Tyrian any day of the week. Please give me an Ironwood over a Tyrian.

The Gay Agenda

*singing* Qrow has a boyfriend….

Er…. Qrow had a boyfriend. And then Clover got Bury Your Gays’d. I’m kind of disappointed, but I’m kind of not. After all, the universe has long since ordained that it is Qrow’s lot in life to suffer.

To tell the truth I’m deeply divided on how I feel about RWBY’s take on the gays. The homoromantic subtext between Yang and Blake has reached levels equivalent to Season 3 of Xena: Warrior Princess. And Qrow and Clover were about there too. On one hand, I’m happily drinking it all up. On the other hand, I want to call Rooster Teeth a bunch of cowards. It’s not 1999 anymore. You can make characters gay. RWBY has made (side) characters gay. At best I’m expecting them to pull a Legend of Korra and only make things “official” at the very end of the show, a resolution I found deeply unsatisfying. But if I were running the show, would I do things differently? Well, yes I would. But would it be the correct decision from a revenue perspective? I’m assuming that RWBY is a, let’s say, important show for Rooster Teeth. I base this assumption on the fact that they announced three RWBY-adjacent spin-offs just after Volume 7 finished. Perhaps they feel they can’t take any risks with something so popular? Perhaps they don’t particularly care. Again, I don’t know how to feel about it.

Conclusion

Homoromanticism aside, (Never!) is Volume 7 the best volume ever? It might be. Only Volumes 1 and 5 can contend with it for consistent high quality. If I had to declare one volume as the best overall, this would probably be it. That being said, I doubt anything will ever supplant the Yang and Blake vs. Adam fight in Volume 6 as my favorite part of RWBY. I still can’t believe they paid that off so well. Three years of anticipation and they fulfilled my every expectation.

Wait, what was I talking about again? Oh yeah. Volume 7. It was good.

#RWBY #Live Blogging #Volume 7 #Spoilers

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lucytara · 5 years

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1/2 Hey I don't know if you have seen Eruptionfang's video about Bumblebee but I have question to you now that I saw it. I know people don't like him but I thought that video was not hateful and he explained himself well. But looking at the video and comments people are saying B&Y never got the same narrative development as B&S. And in someway I agree. Like B&S spend a lot of time outside of school together and obviously the two volumes as a whole. And I think we can admit Blake had a crush on

2/2Sun for a while. But I think they ignore the manga where we see B&Y relationship in school. In the animation we don’t see them as much interact like that but the manga makes it clear in my opinion that they have a close relationship and spend time together but it seems like a lot of people think contrary, as they have only seen the animation. But I don’t know seeing those comments made me doubt how much I watched it the way I wanted it. Do you think the narrative was there?

fair warning that this ended up turning into uhhhh…..a long post so welcome to rwby: a bumbleby vs black/sun narrative analysis

so i haven’t watched it, and in regards to it being not hateful, i think you first have to look at the intent behind it. first of all, it’s not his place to discuss this topic whatsoever. this story isn’t being written for him. it’s not being written for men. it doesn’t matter what y’all think about it, quite frankly, because it’s not for or about you: it’s about us, people who have never in history seen the kind of representation rwby is giving us with blake and yang. that’s something anyone who wants to “have an honest opinion about bumbleby” should think about. he didn’t. he ignored that, ignored the tons of wlw who love this portrayal and relationship. that tells me really everything i need to know about him as a person. the intent of his video is to bring people around to “his side” of things, his perspective, here’s why bumbleby was done wrong, b/s was done right, etc whatever. the intent behind him creating and posting this video is hateful. let’s be very clear about that.

the problem with people trying to claim that bumbleby came out of nowhere or that black/sun had a ton of now-pointless development is that their claims are almost always viewed through a heteronormative lens. they look at blake and sun on-screen together and they think it’s development. they think blake being visibly annoyed with sun for the entirety of volume 4 is romantic. they think his total lack of understanding her character but pushing her boundaries anyway is romantic. they think blake owes him her own feelings in return for his, just because he feels them. they think that because it’s a narrative that’s been popularized by media for literally…well…ever.

from a wlw perspective, for those of us who ship bumbleby, did not read sun and blake’s relationship as “development” in a romantic direction. i’ve always said that sun was a red herring. he appears - another faunus - at a time blake is desperately looking for someone to understand her. except he can’t! sun had a great life, so it seems! he thinks the white fang are nuts! he has nothing to do with any of the hardships blake has faced throughout her entire life. sun never understands her and he doesn’t, at any point, relate or empathize with her. he moves on very easily with his life after the incident with the white fang and torchwick. he tries to ask blake to the dance. she says the one line that lets us, the audience, know what she’d hoped from sun and wasn’t receiving: “i thought you of all people would understand that.” he doesn’t understand. but an episode or so later, someone does understand blake, and that person is yang.

this is really the Big “oh” moment for me. blake was looking for someone to understand her in sun, but she was looking in the wrong place. yang comes in unravels blake in the span of a single conversation. she understands blake perfectly, understands where she coming from and why, and most importantly, understands how to get her to stop. how to put things in perspective. burning the candle was honestly all the narrative we needed in regards to sun/yang/blake as a starting point. sun isn’t who blake wants him to be and this is where she’s started to realize that. this is where we, the audience, are also supposed to realize that.

sun and blake have then, what, one moment in v3? where he flirst with her in a stadium full of people and she blushes? sure, whatever. i’m not denying that on some level i think blake wanted to be interested in sun. i don’t really buy that she fully was, but i think she wanted to be. however, the last half of the volume, blake’s entire focus is on yang: yang, who she watches attack mercury, and rather than believing her immediately, finds herself shaken and reminded of adam. in this conversation, we’re told a couple of things: one, that yang and adam are parallels. blake is comparing them herself. the implication is that yang is also someone very dear to blake, and blake’s afraid of the same thing happening. but she ultimately believes yang when yang looks her in the eye.

then - a quick telling moment - blake’s eyes narrowing when hearing cinder describe yang attacking an innocent student. she immediately realizes yang was set up, and she was wrong to not believe her. this is important because imo this weighs on blake from the finale onward.

if we use some critical thinking skills, we can infer that blake and yang have spent quite a lot of time together up until the v3 finale. they’re literally partners, teammates. they share the same dorms. they’re together almost all the time, for - what - like 9 months or so? we can imagine they know each other pretty well. blake picked her to begin with. they’re close; we don’t have to know every single detail, especially considering the format rwby is presented in.

v3 finale - yang finds weiss, who tells her ruby’s still missing and so is blake. sun? also right there. doesn’t go look for her. yang makes the decision to prioritize blake and goes after her. we all know what happens now - adam takes one look at blake’s face and to yang and knows she’s someone blake loves. yang loses an arm and almost dies trying to protect her, blake almost dies trying to protect her immediately after. blake holds her hand and tells her she’s sorry while sun looks on at their joined hands.

like, there’s the narrative set-up. all of it. it’s right there. yang/adam are paralleled and yang immediately loses to him. he gives them both scars that link them together forever. they’re never going to be able to take that night back. they’re bound by it. they have the literal. scars. to prove it. and sun plays no role in it. people who ignore this in favor of the very surface-level development bs get are doing extreme disservices to the characters and the show itself.

i came in at the end of v3. i was elated all throughout volume 4 because blake literally was not interested in him, she wasn’t interested in his advances, and her heart was clearly elsewhere. she spent all of volume 4 upset that sun had followed her. she even has one last-ditch moment on the ship - where sun says “i knew exactly what you were doing” and she perks up for a moment before he hits the final nail in the coffin and completely misinterprets why she ran. like, that’s the end for bs romantically, right there. when sun still proves after all this time and everything that’s happened, he fundamentally doesn’t understand blake.

they had zero romantic interactions all throughout volumes 4 and 5. what they did have? friendship development. blake and sun essentially started over their entire relationship with blake finally in the right mindset to process it. she didn’t like sun, she never really liked sun, they’re incompatible and now she really sees that. so they work their way to a friendship, which is exactly what myself and most people in the bb fandom saw. blake wasn’t interested. it doesn’t matter how much sun was. both people need to be equally invested or a relationship is nothing. blake wasn’t interested. there is no way to retcon that or get around it. she doesn’t like sun romantically. she makes it explicitly clear, and i don’t respect anyone who chooses to ignore that. heteronormativity in media has taught us forever that what a girl wants/how she feels doesn’t matter as much as what the boy does, that perseverance is key, but that’s a fucked up narrative and i’m happy to see it subverted here.

anyway. during this period of time that blake and yang are apart, they’re constantly on each others’ minds. blake voices it once or twice; yang snaps one time and breaks down about it. we can infer that what hurt yang the most wasn’t losing her arm, it was that blake ran. yang wanted to be there for her. yang carries a photo of her around, so worn in the middle that it bend automatically, used to being grasped on blake’s side of the frame. these are details meant to imply certain things. yang misses blake and thinks about her more than she ever dares to say it aloud.

all of this builds both to them reuniting and volume 6. weirdly enough (not), a majority of the fandom predicted blake and yang’s dynamic this volume. we predicted exactly how blake would act, how yang would reciprocate. we predicted this accurately because we understand exactly the story crwby is telling and how it plays out. we knew blake and yang spent however long apart thinking about each other. we knew blake felt enormously guilty and sorry and regretted ever running in the first place, and we knew she’d promise yang she’d never do it again. (this was slightly more split, but) plenty of people predicted yang would forgive her instantly, because all yang wanted was to be by her side. we knew this because this story is being told to us and for us.

sun says it himself: it was never about romance where he and blake are concerned. she’s with who she’s supposed to be with now, and it’s not him. the show told us all of this.

someone’s inability to view a narrative through a different perspective than their own skewed one does not make it a bad narrative. rwby has done exactly what it’s intended to do with blake & yang, and if all of us - as our fandom is mostly comprised of wlw - could pick up on that perfectly, then the narrative is not the problem. the problem is the homophobic/heteronormative lens with which you are viewing the show through.

#bumbleby

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justalittlelitnerd · 4 years

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By A Thread by Lucy Score

We weren’t touching. But it felt like the space between us was charged with something. It was acting like a defibrillator on my heart.

This book had everything I want in a romance: a sassy, non-damsel heroine and a hero with soft boi vibes (I am a complete sucker for assholes covering up soft, warm centers).

Don’t let the office romance aspect dissuade you (it’s obviously a common, but controversial trope in romance b/c power dynamics and whatnot), this is not ~in my experience~ a conventional office romance.

First, Ally only ends up working at Dominic’s company after he gets her fired and his mom (who’s also his boss at the magazine she also owns) makes the job offer in reparation.

Second, in addition to the two characters being completely at odds from the first meeting (he got her fired after all), Dominic is staunchly against an office romance not only because of his own values and awareness of power dynamics but because of his father’s history of sexual harrassment and assault. When they eventually fall into bed together (because duh this is a romance) he immediately offers to quit his job so the power dynamics of the office wouldn’t be an issue.

That being said Dominic is an overbearing, and at times straight up controlling, son of a bitch (sorry as Ally would say his mother is lovely) and it made me want to throat punch him sometimes, but at the same time so did Ally’s stubbornness and pride.

Score has a talent though for balance because any time Dominic started to get out of control, Ally wouldn’t hesitate to go head to head with him and speak her mind and the honesty and directness was refreshing.

The ending felt a little bit rushed because clearly Dominic was trying (although in ways that were grossly overbearing and were exactly what Ally didn’t want him to do) and she made it clear that she couldn’t forgive him and I wanted more of a conversation or thought process to why she finally did aside from “that’s what love is.”

This book was fun and funny and sarcastic and their banter made the story flow and is definitely the main reason I would consider rereading this romance.

Keep reading for some top notch quotes!

It wasn’t out of the kindness of my heart. I had neither kindness nor a heart. I considered it atonement for being an asshole.

Clearly, she wasn’t intimidated by an asshole in Hugo Boss with a haircut that cost more than her entire outfit. I basked in her disdain. It was miles more comfortable for me than the terrified glances and “Right away, Mr. Russo”s I got in the hallways at work.

It had been too long since I’d squashed a disrespectful underling. I itched to do it now. She looked not only like she could take it but that she might even enjoy it.

“Fine. But if she poisons me, I’ll sue her and her entire family. Her great-grandchildren will feel my wrath.” My mother sighed theatrically. “Who hurt you, darling?” It was a joke. But we both knew the answer wasn’t funny.

I knew he felt it, too. That unexpected jolt. Like taking a shot of whiskey or sticking a finger in a light socket. Maybe both at the same time. For one moment of pure insanity, I wondered if he intended to take me over his knee and if I’d let him.

I’d assumed they’d all get used to me. Apparently I’d assumed incorrectly. I was the beast to my mother’s beauty. The monster to the heroine. When they looked at me, they saw my father.

Her tone was steely and anger all but crackled off her. I hoped she got the guy’s balls in the divorce.

“You know, you’d be a lot prettier if you smiled once in a while,” she mused, fluttering her lashes. No wonder women hated it when men said that.

It was fucking cold. February was right around the corner, and if there was anything colder and damper than January in New York, it was fucking February. Of course, fashion didn’t heed below-freezing temperatures. No. Fashion made its own rules outside of time and space and temperature.

I, on the other hand, didn’t trust myself to survive even basic contact. Ally was only safe, my soul was only safe, as long as I didn’t touch her.

He was looming over me, but rather than threatening, it felt intimate, careful, almost safe. Like I wanted to be exactly here with exactly him.

Tell me the top five things you hate STAT. (This is the secret to finding out just how bad a person is in case you need it for interviewing future wives or human sacrifices.)

Somewhere along the line, she’d started talking to me like we were friends. As if that moment of honesty in the bar, those emails exchanged, had somehow made us friendly. And while I craved her next confession, I also couldn’t handle the intimacy. I was ripped down the middle. Torn between wanting to know everything there was to know about this woman and wanting to forget she existed.

I hated it when she walked away from me. It always felt like she took the light and heat with her. I added that to my Hate List.

Those blue eyes weren’t cold now. There was a victorious fire burning in them. And I was acutely aware that I was in immediate danger.

My heart was trying to blast its way out of my chest. I didn’t know where the organ had gotten actual sticks of dynamite, but that’s what was happening. My insides had turned to lava… or magma, whichever metaphor was most appropriate.

“Lots of people dance for money. Prima ballerinas, Jane Fonda, Laker Girls, back-up dancers, Rockettes. All women who make money by moving their bodies. There’s nothing remotely shameful about it,” Faith insisted. “You aren’t doing anything wrong. And anyone who tells you that you are is—” “Part of the patriarchy.”

I hoped to God security was up to the challenge tonight. Because if anyone laid a hand on her, one single finger on her, I was going to lose my shit.

I wondered if I was leaving a trail of body glitter behind me like I was a Questionable Life Choices Tinkerbell.

If mystery bothered him so much, this son of a bitch—wait, no. His mother was a lovely human being. This alphahole was going to suffer. I’d make sure of it.

I wanted to believe in my bones that he was doing this as some stupid mind game, that he got off on playing puppet master with my life. But deep down, I was worried that it was something much, much worse. Dominic Russo was trying to take care of me.

I was so pathetically happy that she was speaking to me in multisyllabic words I would have let her slap me across the face with the folder.

I walked back into the room feeling like Cinder-freaking-rella. If Cinderella’s fairy godmother had given her a sexy, skin-hugging gown the color of crimson or, as I liked to think of it, Dominic Russo’s crushed heart.

Everyone was hitting the open bar like it was last call, and those little appetizers were doing nothing to soak up the liquor. It was entertaining, but I had a feeling this is how bad things happened at office Christmas parties. Inhibitions lowered, tongues loosened, and shit went down.

Oh, boy. I’d heard rumors of Drunk Dominic. But they hadn’t prepared me for the reality of him. He was adorable… and in no way capable of functioning as creative director right now. I needed to get him home.

Damn it. My shattered broken heart was trying to knit itself back together just so it could fall for him all over again.

I hooked my pinky around his and tried not to fall in love with the idiot when he pressed his lips to our joined fingers.

Nights like these changed lives and were retold as stories for years to come. But I didn’t know what my story would be. Would it be the time the up-and-coming designer made me temporarily semi-famous? Or would it be the night I finally realized my heart belonged to a man I was never going to be with?

Tacos and home renovation supplies with an entrepreneur, a male exotic dancer, and a drag queen on her day off. Just another glamorous day in the life.

I spent the rest of the day on the couch, which delighted Brownie. We watched the entire first season of The Great British Baking Show and then three episodes of Queer Eye. I was inspired to order and to eat an entire sponge cake from the bakery three blocks over and pondered growing a beard. Then I pondered what Ally thought about beards. And the shame spiral began again.

“I’m not hiding this,” Dom said quietly. “I don’t think I could even if you asked me.” Okay, coming from Dominic Russo, maybe that was kind of a swoony thing to say. It wasn’t a declaration of love, but it was real. These feelings felt real.

“I don’t need to be saved.” Dalessandra and I blinked at each other as the words came out of both our mouths in unison.

I wanted to take care of her. I wanted to take her worries and concerns and problems and solve every last one of them so she could focus all of her attention on me. And Brownie of course. I wasn’t a completely selfish monster.

I didn’t want her drawing lines when I wasn’t thinking clearly enough to redraw them properly. She would live here. She would have anything and everything she needed. No one would ever take advantage of her or lay a hand on her ever again. End of fucking story. I was her Prince Fucking Charming.

“Dom, of course people are going to talk. Trying to avoid being a topic of conversation is a pretty lame way to live life. Sometimes, accepting the discomfort is how good things are earned.”

It was disconcerting to wake up one day and find myself… well. Here. Making plans for two instead of one. Looking forward to sharing things like beds and weekends and closet space. I’d dated before. But I’d never gotten this deep, this fast. I’d never made space in my home for a woman before. Change was happening, and I didn’t know how I felt about it.

Ally didn’t bitch-slap, but Faith did it like it was an Olympic sport and she was a gold medalist.

“Everyone has baggage, Russo. Most of us are just smart enough not to hurl full-sized suitcases at the people we love.”

But sometimes an inch might as well be a mile. And I didn’t know how to cross it. I didn’t know how to ask him for what I needed. Because I didn’t know what I needed.

#by a thread #lucy score #romance #adult romance #romance books #love #office romance #grumpy boss #enemies to lovers #books #book quotes #quotes #book blog #booklr #book post

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rwbyconversations · 6 years

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Why I think some fans don’t like Ruby

A good protagonist can make or break a story. You can have an incredibly detailed world and setting, fill it with the most fascinating lore and and have an encyclopedia’s worth of information on every street, but if the person you’re following in that world is uninteresting or just dull, the audience will never let that slide. Watch Dogs is a competent game but Aiden Pearce is such a dull scumbag that it taints the entire setting. Echo from Dollhouse was perhaps the dullest character in the main roster, making the show more interesting when she wasn’t around as it gave the much more varied supporting cast a chance to shine.

This is unfortunately a problem that people have with RWBY’s Ruby Rose as well. Ruby is a do-gooder with aspirations to become a Huntress and help people and that’s basically it in terms of explicit character growth. For a variety of reasons over the past two years since Volume 4, Ruby has become a far more divisive character than was ever intended. With Volume 6 now on the horizon, I’ve decided to look into our inarguable main protagonist and to answer the question of why I think some people don’t like Ruby.

(also before anyone jumps down my throat I don’t hate Ruby, I think she’s a weak character but I don’t want her removed from the show. Also, yes, she is the protagonist, we’re not having this conversation)

1) Ruby’s development in Volumes 4 and 5 is lackluster at best and actively shunted at worst

To be quite blunt, Ruby’s not interesting in her current form and she hasn’t truthfully been since Volume 3′s conclusion. Ruby started out as a fine character, with some good early development from Ozpin about what it means to be a leader, development which had a payoff when Ruby then shared this lesson with Jaune during the Jaundice episodes. “We have to put our teammates first and ourselves second.” Back then Ruby also had several more facets to her personality- she was a naive child brought to Beacon two years early and a lot of her dynamics, especially with Weiss in particular, reflect this in the early volumes. Volume 1 also gives Ruby her overly romanticized view of Huntsmen and Huntresses, further emphasizing her naivety regarding the wider world which is challenged multiple times in the first three volumes- most notably with Roman’s “The real world is cold!” speech in Heroes and Monsters.

Volume 3 set out to tear those perceptions down, as Ruby bears witness to some horrifying actions in the back half of the Volume- Penny’s dismemberment, Grimm swarming Vale, Roman being eaten alive and Pyrrha being shot and incinerated right in front of her. Ruby breaks from this, Volume 4 was touted as a recovery volume. And yet Ruby’s development is a phantom for Volumes 4 and 5. She puts on a bright smile and other than a few nightmares which exist for very little reason- especially since RTX 2017 confirmed that Ruby was having dreams about Pyrrha because she overheard Jaune’s night-training and not because of other circumstances- Ruby doesn’t ever confront the trauma she faced like Yang and Blake did over their arcs in Volume 4. The one time she tries taking responsibility in the back half of the volume... Jaune shuts her down, literally cutting her off so he can tell her she’s inspiring, which she agrees with blindly, her inner conflict having been forgotten and blown away like leaves falling off a tree in October.

You know I mentioned this in my Jaune post but it bears repeating that the one time Ruby really tries to get development this season, Jaune literally steals the spotlight and tells the audience, rather than shows us, how far Ruby’s come

Most of the other RWBY girls get scenes on their own during Volume 4- in fact, the other three members all have moments of solitude in their first episodes. It shows how the Fall of Beacon has separated them and scattered them across the world. Ruby gets no such moment of isolation. Ruby not having this doesn’t give her character any moments where she has to confront the events at Beacon, and that lack of isolation or ability to reflect harms her. The one time her facade breaks away in Volume 4, Jaune swoops in to prevent her from having a realization and the problem is smoothed away like it never happened.This also has an adverse effect on our ability to sympathize with Ruby- her not blaming herself despite Jaune’s act of kindness makes it difficult to identify with her struggles and any growth she might have experienced.

I think that half of Ruby’s dialogue in all of Volume 4 comes from her reading her letter to Yang in the finale is a fairly harrowing example of where Ruby’s focus is not going.

Volume 5 did take a step towards addressing this by having Oscar ask Ruby how she remains so cheerful- a scene I firmly believe should have happened a year earlier with Jaune instead of handing it off to the farmboy who never before or after this scene addresses the stresses of the shadow war with Salem. The scene is fairly obviously damage control for Ruby’s lack of reaction to Volume 3 but this scene has no payoff. Ruby just admits she’s sad, we get a traditional hero speech about moving forward and then the status quo resets for Ruby’s next adventure in sitting around a house.

To cut this rant short, Volumes 4 and 5 do very little with Ruby and the opportunity for development that the Fall of Beacon presented. Rather than having a hopeful naive child face reality, something Roman was trying to do with his dying words, Ruby just backtracks and almost flanderizes into this upbeat chipmunk who spews out inspirational speeches. Ruby’s never allowed to grow in 4 or 5 and her character stagnates as a consequence. A pivotal moment for Ruby should have been her confrontation with Cinder at Haven (something I’ve written about before) and seeing Weiss get stabbed, but Cinder refuses to acknowledge her for the entire battle and she’s unconscious when Weiss drops. Two moments that should have defined her character... and Ruby sidesteps both of them and the challenges therein.

If I may repeat myself, half of Ruby’s dialogue in V4 comes from her letter to Yang in the finale. Half of her dialogue is in the finale of the season. If that doesn’t speak about bad agency and character handling I’m afraid I don’t know what does.

And all of this leads us into...

2) Ask about the eyes! (or: Ruby’s lack of agency)

I’m sure if you’ve been a part of the fandom you’ve heard this a thousand times, so I’ll keep this quick:

Ruby’s eyes are supposedly the key to stopping the Grimm and the only reason Cinder was defeated at the end of Volume 3, and will almost certainly play a role in fighting Salem. Despite knowing about them thanks to Qrow and spending a significant amount of time with Qrow and Ozpin, people who knew her mother (a fellow Silver Eyed Warrior) intimately well, Ruby never asks about the eyes during the month she spends with Ozpin and Qrow in the Mistral House. There’s no logical reason in or out of the narrative for her to not immediately ask about this when she reached the house and when the eyes manifest again in the Battle of Haven, no fuss is made about them and they don’t get acknowledged for the rest of the volume.

... OK that was relatively quick. But put bluntly, Ruby not asking about her eyes or Summer has crippled her development. Summer’s death would be an almost childishly simple way to give Ruby a personal stake in the fight against Salem, since it’s all but been confirmed (”We’ve dealt with their kind before”) that Summer was slain by a member of Salem’s cabal. It speaks poorly about Ruby’s priority levels and the agency of herself, Ozcar and Qrow that Ruby never stops to ask either of them about the eyes and instead decides to ask Ozpin if his cane is the Beacon Relic.

There is however a meta out of universe reason, in that Miles and Kerry aren’t ready to ask about the eyes yet. In my post about why the birds twist failed to land, I mentioned this as an aside that Miles and Kerry have a particular fondness for cliffhangers and plot twists, and while this works sometimes, it means that it can take a fair while for them to answer questions that would otherwise spoil their little tricks and twists in advance. Ruby asking about the eyes would ruin whatever twist is tied to them- be it that they steal life energy or have the risk of blinding her- so she... doesn’t. And there isn’t even a throwaway line about her referencing the existence of her Silver Eyes.

If V4 or 5 had just had a scene of Ruby about to fight a Grimm like say, the Geist and trying to manifest them or just having a scene where she explains she’s trying to activate the powers, it would at least show initiative on her part- she would be at least trying to activate her powers since she knows they pose a threat to the Grimm and Cinder. But she doesn’t. In fact, Ruby herself never even says the word “silver” after Volume 3. At this point any explanation of the Silver Eyes is going to feel... almost too little too late. It wouldn’t feel natural anymore, since the information was held back because it would make for a better twist or some nonsense.

3) The Squeak

I mean no offense to Lindsay Jones, she’s a capable actress and by all accounts an all-around good person. I love Kimball from Red vs Blue and Lindsays’ other appearances for Rooster Teeth have proven she has great comedic timing and dramatic chops. But that said... Ruby’s voice was awful in Volume 5.

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Lindsay has always been on the record as disliking how Ruby sounded in Volume 1- too much like herself, far too old sounding for a 15 year old girl, to the point where she’d like to go back and re-dub Volume 1. I get that, especially hating how your voice sounds since I work in radio and I know that pain, and I think how Lindsay evolved the voice over Volumes 2 and 3 was a great place to keep Ruby’s voice until she grew up and went back to the Volume 1 voice. The problem is that in the above video, Lindsay evidently never stopped upping the pitch. Ruby now sounds almost like a caricature of herself and one that steadily worsens each passing volume- I’ve made my dislike of “This is my fight too!” plain as day on various occasions on Discord. I don’t want to harp too much on this, like I said I deeply respect Lindsay’s other work, but this is a list of why the fandom is cold on Ruby and unfortunately for Miss Jones... her voice is one of those reasons, however petty it may seem. If you do ever read this Lindsay:

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(still gotta support Lindsay for being the only person in RT at the moment who seems to want Ruby to have a breaking point because moooooooooooooood)

4) Decreasing skill levels

More than any other character, Ruby was the one most hit on a fighting-level by Monty’s passing. In hindsight having a weapon such as a scythe was going to spell trouble for Ruby’s fight scenes- scythes are hilariously impractical weapons in real life and aren’t made for fighting. There’s a reason most farmers didn’t bring their scythes with them when they went to war and were taught the spear.

With Monty, Ruby was still given flashy choreography and her scythe’s recoil was used to make it slightly more practical in a straight fight. In the opening to Ruby vs Neo and the Red Trailer she looks lethal with the thing.

The problem lies in how Ruby’s skills have waned since then, thanks to not only the general nerf everyone took across the board, but Ruby’s scythe took in particular. Ruby’s only seriously used her scythe once, in the V4 Character Short. Otherwise, she hasn’t gotten to cut loose in the show since then, meaning Ruby’s been reduced to running around and sniping or doing... this...

You thought I was done bitching about the weapon spinning but joke’s on you, I’m never done bitching about the weapon spinning

This has been Ruby’s fights for the past two years. In a show that prides itself on fights, Ruby’s last good fight being more than two volumes ago paints a poor picture in the eyes of many, especially in light of the Death Battle team admitting that they can’t have Ruby fight Maka from Soul Eater until Ruby gets a few more feats to be judged by (which still reads to me like “we need Ruby to do some more bullshit feats so we can BS a win for her” after the whole Yang/Tifa debacle). This also ties in with Ruby’s lack of activity in the Battle of Haven- it’s Raven, a low-rent villain, who gets the standout fight in the volume, while Ruby’s left headbutting Mercury. The protagonist of the show is left with little of the agency.

And speaking of Mercury...

5) The hand to hand “plot”

Like the Silver Eyes part I’ll keep this quick- Ruby’s hand to hand weakness, while set up in Volumes 1 and 2, still comes out of nowhere as a random flaw for her to overcome this volume and feels like a poor attempt to give her something to do during Volume 5. Her headbutting Mercury required Merc to take a massive dive in intelligence and skill, and ultimately was her only significant moment in the Haven Battle outside of getting smacked over the head. The worst part of this “arc” to me is how no one else gets anything from it- you could genuinely make an arc of each member of RNJR teaching Oscar something (Ren with Aura and CQC, Nora with strength training, Ruby with weapon repairs, etc). Why not tie in the conversation about Semblances by having Ruby train to use her speed semblance in close quarters? With her speed, Ruby would be nearly impossible to dodge in a fist-fight, or she could engage in lighting fast strikes while withdrawing before the opponent and counter.

Also while I’m offering suggestions, let me point one thing out. Ruby has a lot of leg strength. Like, a lot. Why not skip teaching her to use her hands and train Ruby in kickboxing or another leg-based martial art? Yang already has the punchy-punch category fairly locked down, so giving Ruby a kick-based style would make for more dramatic fights in future.

It would certainly have been more dynamic than this abomination that I am loathe to call “the conclusion of an arc.”

In conclusion, Ruby as a protagonist is... flawed. She’s a character I want to like more than I do, the simple soul who knows the world is cold and dark but aspires to change it herself. But various conflicts hold her character back, most primarily the writing team’s own refusal to let her have agency by making her refuse to acknowledge her special powers or her dead mother. Add in lackluster performances fighting wise and an absolute slog of a “training arc,” and Ruby fails to stand out. Volume 5 reached the point where Ruby was an absolute blank slate of a character, content to make bland speeches about companionship at the pitch of a chipmunk addicted to helium while the mystery of her dead mother and special heritage practically slapped her in the face.

I am very much aware that over the Volume 5 hiatus, much has been said about Ruby and her lack of growth/dive in popularity. Hell I’m even linking to some at the bottom of the post as recommendations for further elaboration on my points and alternate perspectives. I know I’m at a well that has been well and truly dried of content. But with Volume 6 on the horizon I think it’s worth keeping Ruby’s agency/lack thereof in mind with the premiere looming. Ruby is a problem that the show does need to fix, especially after Volume 5 and the numerous story opportunities that were presented and never followed up on for Ruby- Weiss’s stabbing, Cinder’s return, Summer, etc. Her big character moment in the back half of Volume 5? Saying “I’m angry.” They really did pick the perfect character moment for Ruby.

Ruby has been said to take a more direct role in Volume 6, and Lindsay has implied that Ruby will finally have her breaking point this volume. If this turns out to be the case, I genuinely look forward to see Ruby regaining the charm that made her likable in the original volumes. But if all the talk about Ruby getting more focus turns out to just be hot air or fails to fix any of the cracks in her character that have been present for two volumes in a row now? I’ll be tragically disappointed, partly at the show and mostly for myself in jumping the gun in writing this. I want Ruby to be more than a glorified cheerleader in her own damn show. She’s what got people hyped back with the Red trailer. Let her be that heroine again Rooster Teeth. Ruby inspires people in the show, now let’s see her inspire hope in the fans.

Thank you for reading.

Additional recommended sources:

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#rwby #rwde #ruby rose #rwby analysis #silver eyes #crtq #jaune arc #cinder fall #character analysis #ozpin #roman torchwick #roman was such a good foil for ruby in hindsight

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frostiifae · 5 years

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Part 2: Top 5 Favorite Characters to Write.

Sighhh. You really do know how to make me happy, don’t you?

1. Eirika.

"Tana will not stop talking about you," Eirika hissed. "She has been miserable, you know, and she goes on and on about you like you're the only thing in her life worth living for. 'O Eirika, if only you could have seen what I saw! She showed me such beauty in the heat of battle and I fear I will never see it again! O Eirika, do you think she will become the greatest fighter in Magvel? I wish I could learn alongside her!'"

Marisa lowered her arms. She tried to speak, but words didn't come to her, and she trailed off; Eirika stopped, panting, glaring.

"Is this what you are afraid of?" Slowly Eirika caught her own breath, too, calming herself. Her bangs had drifted back into her face, meaning her hair was surely a mess by now; still she brushed it aside. "That Tana will try to kill you?"

"Every employer has," Marisa mumbled, looking down and crossing an arm over her stomach. "It is only a matter of when."

"That is..." Eirika trailed off, despairing. How could anyone live like that? "Marisa," she said, softly and seriously. "On the honor of Renais, and the power of the Sacred Stone, I swear that you will always be a friend and ally to Renais and welcome within her borders."

A little while back, I was scrolling through my works list on Ao3, and I noticed that I write about Eirika an awful lot. She’s in a third of everything I write! Eirika is fun to write about for two reasons; one, she’s a fully-formed character as she is, a wonderful and likeable person, who still has a lot of personal growth to explore. There are so many different ways you can interpret her character and different forms of growth to explore, but despite that, you’re still starting from the basis of a very charming, charismatic, kind-hearted woman who honestly wants to do the best she can for everyone around her.

Secondly - well, she’s very charming and charismatic, she’s very elegant, and yet not without those adorable little flaws here and there. It’s fun to write about Eirika being a gay mess for Julia in Cinders. It’s fun to write about her treading the line of depravity in HTL (and other things). The sequence I quoted here is at the end of a sword fight she has with Marisa to try to help Marisa open up about her feelings. She’s so multi-dimensional and adapts so well to so many situations, where you get to explore both how she responds, and how other people respond to her own influence - in fact, she’s so flexible that I had a really hard time picking a single segment to show here! I just love her, and part of me wonders if I’ll ever stop writing about her. Thank you so much for showing her to me.

2. Phobos.

"You don't need me," Emily promises. "And I don't need to be saved. I've survived long enough now."

Naomi is stunned - so much so that she almost doesn't react, as Emily turns and steps forward. Her panicked cry is late, her lunge towards Emily is late. But Phobos is not stunned, and Phobos acts much quicker and moves much faster than Naomi.

She - she, the horde of spiders, the Outsider, the concept of Fear - she does not think, she does not hesitate; there is no internal resolution or promise being upheld. This is an instinct, nothing more or less. But when Emily teeters, on the verge of giving away her balance and allowing gravity to take hold of her fate, she looks down, and what she sees is not the ground far below her. What she sees she can't quite understand. Her brain tries and fails to arrange it in shapes she recognizes; there are pieces there, pieces of things that look like they might have been familiar, but altogether it can't be parsed.

What she sees is Phobos lunging beneath her to try to catch her. What she sees is an infinite yawning cavern of twisting, tangled webs, bursting from one another in fractal patterns, growing unimaginably large and shrinking unimaginably small. What should have been a fall of a few hundred feet becomes an abyss light-years deep, stretching before her, around her, past her, behind her, encompassing her. There are legs. There are eyes. She can't count them. They're all watching her. They're scrambling in her way. That is Phobos, to Emily's eyes. That's all she sees before her mind can't take anymore.

Of course my OCs are some of my favorite characters to write about, and - once I’ve established them all better - I’m sure they would all overtake my top 5, which may or may not be kind of boring.

But so far, Wishes is a story about Phobos, and I fucking love Phobos. I have always adored her, even before she took this shape, even before I committed to “fear” as the axis around which her character evolved. There are so many things I want to say about her that I can’t just yet, but for those of you who have been reading Wishes, I’m sure this comes as no surprise. Phobos is wonderful and I’m excited to do so much more with her.

3. Rei.

Rei is pursing her lips. She tries her best to take this all in, and parts of it do process. That Rei has to succeed, so that the deaths of the rest of the world are not in vain; yes, she knows this. That Naomi was meant to die, and Rei violated that destiny... she knows this too. But...

...but no, she can't accept the rest of it. She shakes her head. "I won't let them die for nothing," she whispers. "But that's not enough for me. I won't let anyone die at all. I won't let you, or Eliza, or Gwen, or anyone else from the Seed - they've all come this far, even if they can't wake up on their own anymore, and I won't let any of them die."

"Y-You can't..." Naomi laughs brokenly. "Rei, you can't..."

"I'm not a child!" Rei shouts, her fingers digging into Naomi's shoulders. "This has been my goal from the beginning! This is why I saved you, Naomi! Not so you could throw your life away in service to me here, because I love you and I want you to live! If you die there's no fucking point to any of this!"

"Rei," Naomi breathes. Her voice is faint, a trace of her laughter still lingering in it, hanging in bittersweet awe. Rei is aware she is tearing up too. She has to consciously stop herself from saying what comes to her lips next - Naomi does not need to know that she's died before - that's - it's not important, it's not important because she's going to save this one.

"I'm not like you," she is hissing, not sure whether she's angry or sad or terrified or relieved, but whatever it is, she is so full of it she could burst. "I was raised for this! This is my life's purpose! If I die to achieve it, I will die happy! I didn't survive twenty years of knowing the world was about to end just to make compromises and half-measures at the final moment, Naomi, I swore to myself that I would save everyone and I'm going to save everyone, okay?! That includes you! ESPECIALLY you!"

...*sighs dreamily* I love Rei...

Rei is the culmination of half of my favorite things that any character can be. She is responsible. She is kind. She is ambitious. She knows in her heart that she is going to save the world. And she is so, so not ready for what will happen to her when she does.

I don’t want to say anything more than that, but hopefully the snippet above - technically a spoiler - helps illustrate who she is and why I love her so much.

4. Ahri.

But that wasn't new for Noxians, they did a lot of things that Ahri didn't understand, and there was nothing that bothered Ahri as much as not understanding humans, even though she revelled in how strange and mysterious and unique they could all be, because it gave her hope that she could be her own different brand of human, a special human with ears and tails that reminded her of an unhappy past she had overcome, she liked that, and she liked to believe that she didn't have to be perfect or normal, or to make sense to other people, but it was hard to be convinced of that when other people laughing at you hurts so much, and although she could build herself up all she liked when she was alone, and although she got so much encouragement from Wukong, who said that being a human wasn't very special and that Ahri was wonderful for being Ahri, he was such a sweet nice person and she was very happy to know him, but when you're in the moment, excited to be normal and to do normal things and humans just scoff and laugh and push you aside, it hurts in a way that nice words can't fix, it hurts in a way that breaks your hopes like glass, and you try to cobble them together again but you just cut your hands and look foolish.

And then there were the Noxians, who were a whole different kind of unusual, where Ahri was strange in a way that made people laugh and ignore her, Noxians were strange in a way that made people hate and fear them, but Ahri wondered if that would be so bad, because at least that was a reaction, at least there was respect there, and Ahri longed to be respected. What kind of idiot human would ever turn down free food at a festival? She knew even Wukong would find that very weird, and Ahri didn't know how to explain that, but she had just desperately wanted to be normal and to do a normal human thing, and instead of being allowed to do that, her intent and desire was assumed, and she was given a gift she didn't want, without anyone asking her what she actually wanted, and she wished they had just looked afraid of her, because then she could impress them, and she could do her human thing and be done with it, and she was sure she would be just as lonely that way, but it would be better at least, she wouldn't be questioning who and what she was supposed to be, or whether this whole magic body thing was really just an awful cosmic joke.

...No, Ahri, you can't think like that, because this body is all you have now, and without it, there's... there's nothing.

She stopped and leaned up against a tree, breathing raggedly, her tails curling around her protectively, both hiding her and sheltering her from the cold. Calm down, Ahri...

At this point, it’s not really fair to say that the character I wrote in the Resurgence of Noxus is the same as the Riot Games character, Ahri (and not just because of her retconned background). But, regardless, I love this fox very dearly. Just because I’ve put a lot of distance between myself and League as both a player and writer doesn’t diminish any of my feelings for her.

To me, Ahri is (was) a very powerful symbol of my own struggle as a trans person. She is someone who was born as something she didn’t want to be, who spent her life watching and pining after the people who were what she wanted, and who was only granted half of her wish and then forced to be happy with that as a result. Ahri’s struggle to accept herself as she is and to find beauty and meaning in the ways she’s different from other humans is something I find myself coming back to in my own mind over and over.

In my early attempts at writing Ahri, I used long winding paragraphs and run-on sentences as a form of characterization, something about her that differentiates her from other people without her realizing why. I think it was a mostly successful experiment, but I’m sorry if it makes her a bit tough to read, hehe.

5. WA2000.

"How - isn't... it?" WA's voice cracked partway through [her sentence]. She sniffled, hiding her face. "Listen to me...! How... how isn't this a defect?" She sniffled again, curling up. She was crying now. "I'm a gun that starts sobbing uncontrollably if you make her even think about killing one particular human. Weapons can't get sentimental! Otherwise they can't do their job!"

I have spent comparatively little time with WA2000 as a writer. I have no published works involving Girls’ Frontline. I just have a few little projects - as I’m sure almost all writers do - that are personal and private and I keep on a back burner as something to come back to when I’m bored. You, Ellie, will probably recognize this quote.

As I’ve mentioned in other asks today, I love stories about AI trying to come to terms with the reason for their existence, while also gaining agency over their own emotions and forming their own desires and goals and relationships. WA2000 is just the perfect microcosm of all of those struggles. I think a lot of people see her as just That Really Pretty Tsun Android, but just like all genuinely great tsundere characters, there’s a very deep-seated reason for her acting that way, and watching her struggle with it and... slowly, ever so slowly overcome it... is one of the most beautiful things in the world to me.

Even if I don’t ever publish anything with WA in it, I’m really excited to do more with this character and with the themes she embodies.

#replies #wolfposting #fox writes #wa2000 #ahri #eirika #oc:rei #oc:phobos #wfo #cc #<3 i loved this ask thank you so much #long post #VERY long post lol

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moralanxietystudio · 5 years

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“An RPG / Visual Novel / text adventure hybrid” is a mouthful - Roadwarden Devlog

In her Rock, Paper, Shotgun article, Jay Castello has mentioned:

The game’s genre is purposefully fluid. On (...) Studio’s website, the top frequently asked question says “I can’t figure out what is this game’s genre,” to which they’ve cheerfully replied “Me neither.”

When I mention Roadwarden in my Facebook posts or on Twitter, I usually struggle describing it. I keep saying things like “RPG / Visual Novel / text adventure hybrid”, but it’s not very... marketable. I like to use “interactive fiction”, which is arguably correct and sounds fine, but it doesn’t explain well what the player does in the game.

The main goal of this post is to sink deeper into this topic: how could we label Roadwarden? And what it actually is?

By the way, during the next couple of days I want to update the game’s demo. It’s going to be awesome.

Why am I looking for a label?

Why is the label important? Is it just because it’s convenient for social media ads?

When we categorize a game, we also set up the player’s expectations. If we call a game an endless runner, we make a promise. We claim that it’ll be easy to learn and hard to master, with a very stable pacing, without pointless plot and accessible from your phone. Sure, some endless runners can diverse from this premise or even completely fail at executing it, but making this label is an act of communication. Here is what I have to offer. Are yo interested?

And while Roadwarden fits into various definitions of specific genres, it makes promises that are not as commonly associated with its labels. It has an experimental approach to role-playing. Violence, that’s always plot-related and significant, not grindy. Exploration of a grim, detailed and consistent setting, but not a very heroic one. Dialogues used as the core of the experience, not just a tool. Humble adventures of a regular person in a world that overwhelms it. And I try to avoid common tropes in my story.

And I never ask myself “is it OK to add this new feature? after all, it’s not popular in this genre!”. I add everything that helps me make a better game. I put the experience above the marketing convenience.

A term “video game RPG” is famous for being a very vague label, pretty much impossible to define. It’s one of the most diverse branches of gaming. Every person plays RPGs for different reasons, thou we could probably make a list like 1) a complex story with possible side quests, 2) some character progression (both story-wise and through XP-like mechanics), 3) combat and exploration. If you prefer western games, you’ll probably enjoy 4) having important decisions. And you probably like 5) fantasy, eventually science-fiction with fantasy elements.

Sure, there’s a lot of variety - we have action RPGs, text-based RPGs, tactical RPGs, dungeon crawlers, rouge-likes... It’s really weird that the same label somehow covers The Witcher 3, Undertale, Final Fantasy VI and Wizardry from 1981, yet not Far Cry Primal, but that’s because these games are classified by an objective definition of a genre. We just try to say: “if you like X, you may also like Y. they’re kind of similar”.

Roadwarden as an RPG

When I develop Roadwarden I’m interested in things that most RPGs consider unimportant. And I don’t mean something like “I care about story, and These Other Games are all about combat”! That would be a silly statement. But I put an emphasis on aspects of the story which are often marginalized.

For example, in most RPGs you simply kill things (in self-defense!) and grind XP to get stronger. You can kill 10 packs of wolves and 25 boars and it means absolutely nothing. You’re just overcoming a barrier while trying to get a new level or reach the other side of the forest. Killing these enemies won’t be considered animal cruelty. Won’t destroy the balance of the nearby forests. Won’t starve the villagers. These animals are not Really a part of the story.

In Roadwarden, bandits don’t randomly spawn and die without influencing the plot. They are not some random loot waiting to drop on the floor for the player’s convenience. They have families, friends, goals, story behind them. They don’t want to kill you - they want your stuff. And they’ll try to rob you only if they know you can’t beat them. Without an unfair advantage they wouldn’t put themselves at risk.

In my game, violence means something. Nobody here dreams about it, aside of the most terrible, wicked people. Every death leaves a void, and void should be haunting.

In most RPGs you find a tavern, buy a potion and leave. In Roadwarden you spend 15 minutes talking to the innkeeper, and he’s not there just to give you a quest. He wants to know more about you. He wants to know what news you’re bringing. And if you can be trusted.

Also, potions in this game are rare and have taste. And aroma.

Your character isn’t going to have one hundred thousand coins at the end of the game, nor murder two thousand creatures to save a village inhabited by 30 NPCs. They characters are not waiting for The Chosen One or a master of martial marts that can save them. You’re just someone who tries to change your own life by doing something risky, in a realm that’s filled with people who don’t even know if they want you here.

Your character is a part of the world they live in. And I think most RPGs don’t do a good work reflecting this idea. Immersion should be something more than the constant pursue of better graphics, cinematics and more “freedom”.

So while Roadwarden is still a game that includes combat, trade, exploration, unlocking new abilities and building your character, it’s all put in a new context. And there’s a good chance that a portion of RPG fans wouldn’t be satisfied with something this different. I try to encourage them to take a look... But I don’t want anyone to feel cheated.

Roadwarden as a Visual Novel

Roadwarden may also not be a perfect fit for many Visual Novel fans, even though it involves a lot of narration, descriptions and dialogues supported by limited visuals. Roadwarden has fewer gameplay elements than most RPGs, but way more than most VNs - it even introduces simple survival mechanics.

Also, the story is non-linear - it’s very complex (what doesn’t mean “long”) and modified by how the player moves around the map. Many VNs introduce story branching, but I’m pushing it unusually far. And, of course, Roadwarden has way more choices than most VNs, even though some of these choices are focused on role-playing alone and don’t impact the game’s mechanics.

Not only that, but the visual style and the lack of common tropes that are appealing for the core VN-fanbase can be a big problem. I was even asked a couple of times if my game will involve any romantic relationships. Sure, there are successful VNs that don’t involve porn (VA-11 Hall-A), romance (Ace Attorney), manga-style drawings (Cinders), nor Best Girls, so I’m not saying it’s impossible to make one and prosper. But it’s playing against the odds.

All these things push me into being very careful here, and I usually feel that I should say something like “it’s a Visual Novel, BUT...”

Roadwarden as an adventure game

So let’s make a step back. There’s an argument to be made that Visual Novels are a sub-genre of (or rather, an evolution of) a more interactive label. Here’s how Wikipedia defines the adventure games:

(...) a video game in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and puzzle-solving.

That works, doesn’t it? It’s also fair to say that such a definition is very vague and doesn’t even exclude RPGs or games like Half-Life. Quest for Glory series, for example, is usually considered to have “RPG elements” or gets classified as a hybrid of both an adventure game and an RPG.

This vagueness opens adventure games for many subgenres, and Roadwarden graciously falls into a couple of them at once. It has scenes with text parsers, typical for interactive fiction, but its advanced dialogue choices could even categorize it as digital gamebook (CYOA-like). Probably a better option for us is a “graphic adventure game”, since there are Some graphics and few ways to interact with the game - parsers, in-game “buttons”, dialogue choices.

I have a pleasure to be a part of few adventure game communities and there’s usually a small range of titles that are constantly mentioned as the “classic” adventure games. Point & clicks (Monkey Island, Grim Fandango), graphic games with parsers commands (King’s Quest), sometimes games like Myst...

Text adventure games, while accepted, are not really discussed often. And it’s difficult to make silly memes about them, so they are a bit obsolete. However, a group focused specifically on text adventure games really doesn’t care about graphics.

It feels to me like there Should be a spectrum of graphics vs. text, and of visible interface vs. text parsers. But it’s not the case. Text adventures and graphic adventures are almost in different worlds - not because of what they are, but rather because of what communities surround them. And, once again, Roadwarden is in between. It’s not just a hybrid of an RPG and an adventure game, it’s also a hybrid of a text adventure game and a graphic adventure game.

Roadwarden is a hybrid, and that’s not sexy

In conclusion, here are some of the genres that I think are strongly present in Roadwarden:

· RPG;

· Visual Novel;

· text adventure game;

· graphic adventure game;

· digital gamebook.

Also, I heard opinions that “it feels a lot like a tabletop RPG”. What makes me happy, since it’s intentional.

Some of my game’s features are not exclusive to any specific genre. All of the labels I’ve listed tend to be story-heavy and support their plot with dialogues (or even narration), often include inventory management, allow you to role-play a protagonist and tend to use fantasy settings. Others, however, are genre specific: parsers, open world exploration, mechanically progressing protagonist, simplified visuals, resource management...

Roadwarden is a hybrid, what means it’s going to have a problem appealing to fans of a specific genre. Yet, at the same time, it’s a game that’s not restricted by its labels - and I don’t think genres should limit our designs. My game can include all the things it needs. It can be unusual, experiment and creatively look for new ways to explore.

I just hope I can earn your trust.

#indiedev #indie game #devlog #rpg #visual novel #pixelart #text adventure #adventure game #video games

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knightofbalance-13 · 6 years

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http://alexlayer.tumblr.com/post/176968058052/how-not-to-ever-ever-defend-jaune-part-3\

Considering this is targeted at one of my friends, consider this PERSONAL.

Today we exterminate @rainbowloliofjustice‘s reply as well as her apparent ingrained misogyny, taking everything into account, following @outcasts-redeemer’s argument’s deconstruction

So no matter what, if someone defends Jaune it’s sexism. Wow, I’ve seen some stupid forms of logic in my time but this is literally the strawman every right winger uses to describe someone like you. So uh, good job on that end just don’t stand near any open flames.

Hello! NB person here.

So you’re not a woman and therefore have no place talking about female issues? Good know! We can just go ahead with the assumption that, even if every single argument I make after this is wrong, you still don’t get to say anything.

It was more than twice, and it’s not the constant asking out that’s the problem, it’s the disregard and disrespect for the girl’s agency that makes him a douche.

Really? Because uh, this is the first I’m hearing of this from you. Before,Jaune asking Weiss out multiple times was the issue.

So the issue you actually have has no corporeal form nor does it have any definition other than ‘negative against Jaune’. Great, how about you take it up with that wall over there?

Jaune actually called out Neptune on not caring about Weiss’ feelings, which is practically giving him a lecture and incredibly hypocritical of him considering his behavior towards him

So apparently a parent can’t lecture their kids on making mistakes they made, ignoring how people who made these mistakes would know the consequences of these mistakes and how to avoid them? Good to know you don’t understand a fundamental aspect of life.

I’m not here to deny that Weiss wasn’t the best of the best during Volume 1, but she’s actually shown development and evidence of moving past this. Yeah, she approached Pyrrha with her own interest in mind, but that was just once and it has never been repeated since. Not to mention Pyrrha was nowhere near as visible uncomfortable about any of this as Weiss was with Jaune shoving himself in between them, and at least Weiss was smart enough to pick up the hint and drop it.

Actually-

Pyrrha was being vsibly uncomfortable by her tone of voice and how she constantly tried getting away from Weiss. And since Weiss, just like Jaune, didn’t outright admit she was being wrong: shouldn’t she be considered just as bad as Jaune?

Or does this actually boil down to “Weiss have vagina so good and Jaune have penis so bad”?

P.S. Pyrrha was more comfortable talking to Jaune than Weiss. Or are women not allowed to choose who they talk to now?

Yes, Miss Chick, I’ve watched the show, and I stand by this statement. Pyrrha was made, from beginning to end, to complement Jaune’s arc, not to be a character of her own. And if you don’t see it, then… girlfriend, sister, gal pal, wake the fuck up! Not that I’m saying that you can’t like Pyrrha on her own right, but what can you even tell me about Pyrrha other than she’s kind, badass, smart, and dependable, mh? What are her hobbies? What are her dreams? What’s her background like? Do we even know anything about her family that might tell us anything about her? About how she grew up? Can you even tell me what’s her relationship like with her teammates and fellow classmates other than Jaune? ‘cause I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed, but outside of Ozpin’s circle during her would-be “arc” in Volume 3, Pyrrha is practically never allowed to interact one-on-one with characters that aren’t Jaune. Her conversation with Weiss in Volume 1? Interrupted by Jaune. Ren and Nora trying to cheer her up before her big fight in Volume 3? Interrupted by Jaune. Her apologizing to Ruby in V3 after killing Penny? Goes about two lines before Jaune steps in again to claim all of Pyrrha’s attention once more.

A. Sexist.

B. Also sexist implying she can’t see it due to her gender.

And C. You know, you mentioned Penny here....

So what is Penny’s hobbies?

What is Penny’s dreams?

What is Penny’s background like?

What is penny’s family like, outside of what she told Ruby?

How did Penny grow up?

Can you even tell me about a relationship Penny has outside of Ruby?

Trick questions:

You CAN’T answer them.

Because Penny is in the same fucking boat as PYRRHA. In fact, Penny has LESS of a character than Pyrrha because, guess what, She HAS no arc! She is entirely connected to Ruby!

So if you have such an issue with characters like this then surely, you would say something about Penny right? Unless, of course, you only have an issue with Jaune because Jaune has a penis and you have outright misandric tendencies.

Even her death has served nothing but Jaune’s development. We’ve never seen any characters mourn Pyrrha other than him. Not Ren and Nora, who were her teammates, not even Ruby, who saw her die first hand. Nobody outside of Jaune seems to even remember her most of the time (and yes, I know Ruby mentions her in one scene in Volume 5, but that’s about it), and even her remnants were melted down to improve Jaune’s equipment rather than being brought to Pyrrha’s family to be placed on her grave or something.

A. Ruby outright shows development because of Pyrrha at leats three times in the series.

But B.

Even her death has served nothing but Ruby’s development. We’ve never seen any characters mourn Penny other than him. Not Ironwood and Dr. Pollendina, who were her father figures, not even Pyrrha, who saw her die first hand. Nobody outside of Ruby seems to even remember her most of the time, and even her remnants were forgotten about because they couldn’t be used for Ruby instead of seeing her buried or something.

Notice how my paragraph is almost exactly like yours? That’s because no matter what argument you make for Pyrrha, I can make the EXACT same argument for Penny (or even better.) So unless you show an issue with Penny’s death 9which you don’t): Why should I take this as anything other than the ravening of an insane, biased asshole?

Again, I’m not saying you can’t like Pyrrha for what we’ve seen of her. I myself liked her as well, but in the sense that I really wish she had been her own character, that we could have actually gotten to know her and see what she was really like, rather than have her near entire screen-time revolve around Jaune. Stop for just a moment to think of what Pyrrha’s character would be like if Jaune wasn’t in the show, and you either come to the realization that she’d have no purpose, or realize about the endless possibilities there is to her character that the show never bothered to explore because the writers never saw her as anything but a complement to Jaune’s character. From day one, she was meant to die. She was made by design to be little but the Disposable Woman, and it shows.

Do I need to do the paragraph thing again?

Because here it[’s even more effective considering A. Pyrrha would be the exact same character whereas we’d never even SEE Penny wthout Ruby and B. Pyrrha died for her own reasons whereas Penny died basically to give RUby development.

So uh, once more:

Either stick your standards or showcase how your standards is just sexism.

Honestly, no, not really. I mean, I didn’t really meant to blame Jaune for those things. You’re right. Cinder is the one to blame here, for everyone that got hurt. I do believe, however, that Jaune’s behavior during that fight did more harm than good during the earlier half of the fight, and made so many mistakes that it makes you wonder if he’s really learned anything throughout the series, though really, the whole part here is not so much about issues with characters as it is with the writing. I mean, why would Cinder even target Weiss instead of Ruby, whom she holds a personal grudge against and was even more vulnerable than Weiss? This is what worries me, that it feels like the writers chose Weiss because, since Jaune used to crush on her, that would hurt him the most. It’s a writing decision placed solemnly with Jaune’s character in mind and no one else’s, which is a serious problem because it shows the writers keep prioritizing Jaune above most other characters, even the titular characters.

Or you know:

She’s also Ruby’s partner and her and Yang have been getting very close this season and thus choosing her would affect the most people?

And because hurting Ruby wouldn’t give her the same satisfaction as hurting Weiss.

And finally: bullshit. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang, Oscar, Qrow, Raven, Hazel, Lionheart, Illa and Cinder all had more focus this entire Volume than Jaune. He Is literally one of the least focused on characters this entire Volume.

That’s fair, but even then, there’s been zero interaction between Jaune and Weiss since the reunion in Volume 5 (they practically didn’t acknowledge each other). In other words, there hasn’t yet been a development to their relationship, which I wouldn’t be exactly against. What I’m against is the writers using the whole “Jaune saving Weiss” as a shortcut to show a development in their relationship and thus completely avoiding having Jaune own up to what he did wrong in the past, as if suggesting Weiss was in the wrong (and no, she wasn’t. It’s completely within her right to reject someone she’s not interested in) and Jaune never did anything bad, which just isn’t true, despite what they want the viewer to believe. They themselves (the writers) need to own up to their shortcomings just like Jaune needs to.

A. WHAT DEVELOPMENT? Their relationship is EXACTLY THE SAME as before. Weiss doesn’t even ACKNOWLEDGE that Jaune saved her life. Your bitching about nothing!

B. Jaune kind of SAVED HER LIFE. N doubt she’s gonna act differently! that tends to change one’s view of a person!/

C. Jaune WAS suppose to be in the wrong! You just don’t want to see it because that would tear away one of your beating sticks.

And D. Why SHOULD the writers acknowledge jackshit when you adamantly REFUSE to? You bitch at my friend for being seixsdt then display almost as much sexism as Dudeblade and act like hypocrisy is so bad when you have done nothing BUT spout hypocrisy!

Like I said before, this much is right. Mind you, though, I only brought up Jaune failing to stop Cinder as Ozpin told him not because I really want to blame him there, but because @outcasts-redeemer actually dared blame Pyrrha’s death on Weiss for failing to save Pyrrha after Jaune asked her and Ruby to do just as much, which… I don’t need to tell you just how ridiculous that is, now do I?

... bullshit, you did want to blame him. Hell, your excuse here has no evidence to back it up so I’,m just gonna assume you willfully misinterpreted something.

If you wanna ignore the obvious fact that there’s clear issues with the way Jaune’s written, and the way near everyone gets written to accommodate things for his sake (the battle of Haven being by far the worst offender), then you do you, but I’m not. We were promised a show about four badass action girls, not about a boring, generic and stereotypical dude who’s just the most unoriginal archetype ever but has the world bend to his whim because the writing says so, and so long as they keep making these blunders, criticism will continue to show up.

Thing is:

Not only do only ONE issue here actually apply, but that issue applies to THE MAIN CHARACTER and you never say a word then.

Not just that, you act like Jaune took up the entire battle of haven when at most, he took up half an episode. In a Volume where he made NO other significant appearances while the rets of the Volume focused on the main girls while you STILL bitch about Jaune having too much focus then say, the other TEN characters that had more focus than him.

And then to top it all off, you call this shit ‘criticism.’ Bull fucking shit. You blatantly IGNORED facts here and showed a clear double standard in regards to what is good and what is bad. You don’t want the show to get better, you want the show to cater to you ALONE. This is even EXCLUDING your hypocrisy as you call misgyony while being misogynist AND misandrist or how you bitch about the show so called bending to Jaune’s will while you demand everyone around bend to YOUR will.

Guess what? So long as this shit still happens with you, your criticism will never go away either. So long as RWDE spews bullshit, people will shovle that bullshit right back in.

#alexlayer

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badlygolden-blog · 6 years

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TASK001: getting to know you

entertainment tonight’s amanda lau was able to get this exclusive interview with jaron nicotero ! we got to learn a whole new side of them while talking about their latest project scarlett, the second film in the lunar chronicles series.

al: so you were actually born in los angeles, yes ?

jn: my parents were big in hollywood before i was even a twinkle in their eyes, their words, not mine. so yeah, i was born and raised here.

al: and what was it like growing up there ?

jn: my birth was plastered across magazines everywhere. every life milestone i had was publicized, and i honestly was more than okay with it. i liked being in los angeles. it made me the man i am today, through all my ups and downs.

al: wow so you’ve always been as captivating as you are now. so did you always want to be an actor then ? or what gave you that idea ?

jn: have you met my parents? i didn’t really have a choice in the matter. but that’s not like i’m complaining. if i really didn’t want to do it, my parents would have supported that. but the first time i was on a set? i fell in love with the whole environment. i loved being in front of the cameras, and even though i was playing a character... i felt like i was more myself than i’d ever been.

al: so tell me about this latest project then ! your fans seem to be very excited about it. our twitter was flooded with notifications when we mentioned bringing you on the show.

jn: so i’m sure you saw all the buzz around cinder. post apocalyptic world, cyborgs, crazy plague, aliens... well, scarlett continues the story started there and even expands the universe. i’m joining as carswell thorne, a pilot and a criminal who becomes a huge part of cinder’s story. i can’t give you much more than that, or else you’ll have no interest in seeing the movie.

al: well we all can’t wait to see more from you, jaron. now we just have a few questions from our twitter to ask you.

jn: do i get a minute to prepare? we all know how twitter can be. [laughs] i’m kidding, i love my fans. let’s go.

al: @/daddyjaron asked: who is your biggest inspiration ?

jn: my dad. donovan nicotero has been directing since he was twenty two years old, and he’s got so many hits under his belt. if i can be half as good as him one day, i’ll be ecstatic.

al: @/nicoslade asked: who is your celebrity crush ?

jn: obviously carter slade.

al: @/aaronwithaj asked: what’s the weirdest thing a fan has ever done for you ?

jn: so back when i was on spellbound, there was an arc where my character was being possessed by a demon. it was a really long arc, and for a while my character was possessed. but one day i was out and about with carter and someone ran up to me, threw a glass of what they claimed was holy water at me and yelled that i needed to live for grant. i guess they had trouble... separating fact and fiction. i don’t know, but it was almost sweet.

al: @/nasty4nicotero asked: if you weren’t an actor what would you be doing right now?

jn: honestly, i’ve never thought about it. i’ve been acting for so long that the idea of doing something else never crossed my mind. but i’d definitely want to do something that helps people. i like to think i’d be an activist, fighting for the little guy.

al: well i think that’s about all the time we have ! it was great meeting you, jaron nicotero and to everyone watching, be sure to check out jaron nicotero’s latest project scarlett, where he plays carswell thorne, in theaters now !

#success:task #ii. ᴊᴀʀᴏɴ ɴɪᴄᴏᴛᴇʀᴏ ― ( development )

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dunmerofskyrim · 7 years

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I wake late. What is there to wake me? No light to reach me here where I shelter and sleep. I’m walled in, half-buried, and that too feels like home. Like my hammock in my parents’ warren, off the creak and chime of the Grey Quarter Rigs. But here there’s no city-sounds to wake me either. It’s hunger that does it, thirst, a full bladder…

My eyes come open. Here again. Darkness, three-days-familiar. The scent of old colours, seed-oils, solving-spirits. I shake off the tangle of my bedding and the air outside them is cold. Rub my hands together to warm them but into my joints a brittle chill has found its way. I call a magelight to move by.

Dust beginning to dance as it rises from the mess of bags and sacks, curtains, coat, and rags where I’ve heaped myself to sleep. Here again. The faded colours of what was once a ceiling painted such a lurid blue that the sky creeps into my dreams these days, and I fall then fly then fall, then wake. Here. It was a shop once, I think. The frontroom of some low trader off an alleyway: a dealer in paints and pigments, dyes and mediums.

I make my bed behind the counter, facing the doorway. Shutters on the outside, slatted in chip-lacquered wood. On the inside, my side, a grate of painted metal on a swinging frame. It doesn’t lock – someone has made away with the mechanism – but I swing it to as I sleep even so: its hinges scream with rust as it moves. On the counter itself are mortars, crucibles, scales and pyramidal brass weights. Old stains of magenta, cyan, turmeric yellow stain the grout between the marless grey tiles on its worktop.

The ruins round here are all this way. Vats stained crimson, yellow, black in rooms hung heavy with the scent of crushed minerals. Warehouses, workshops, retailers; hoarders, makers, and sellers of colour. Dyer’s End, says the one legible sign I’ve seen. Spelt out in chips of blue ceramic on a ground of tan tile-shards; a mosaic pressed into each face of a squat skinny obelisk still standing at an intersection between alleys. Characters down its face. Dyer’s End.

Back to the wall, I rise. Hang with my hands to the countertop and heave onto my feet. I slept full-clothed. No sense even in offing my boots. The whole world now is filthy.

My belly cramps with hunger. Blurred shapes like the scales of fish swim silver in front of my eyes. I blink til they leave off but the sharp acid feeling in my stomach remains. The sense that my body is eating itself with every passing day. The least I can give it’s water and the fluid illusion of fullness that it brings. I know where to find that. Ought to count myself lucky but can’t.

I sling my bags. Carry all I own with me, always, and sleep with my luggage around me. This huer’s shop isn’t home, only shelter. What if I find somewhere better? Richer pickings; warmer, safer walls? So I go, a shambling shape of strapping and cloth, a dead mer’s singed and carpetlike coat.

The grate screams as I open it. The shutters spread out onto dim Winter sunlight and the narrow street beyond is hoary with last night’s frost. Weeds dried up from the cold crowd between the cobbles. Every year I suppose they grow and die here, grow and die.

Above the shopfront of my shelter is an awning of stretched leather. It sags down with a liquid weight: dew and melted rime. I ready my waterskin and reach up right-handed to tug at one corner til it becomes a kind of spout. The wound in my side is stiff and tight as I raise my other hand as far as I dare, mouth of the waterskin to the trickle of falling water.

“We don’t talk a lot now.”

Even statements, even-toned, Tammunei could turn into questions. Lines of questioning, not perhaps promising they’d ever say more about it, but starting you off yourself: asks chasing answers round the dark of your head. Simra knew that well enough from when they used to talk.

“Hmmh.” His close-mouthed murmur left his nostrils as mist.

A damp chill morning, and he squat by the ashes of last night’s fire. New place, fire built the same way, and ending in the same cold cinders. Trees dripped dew from bare branches, growing up sparse on the edges of the camp.

Neither forest nor copse, this. Only a wide-ranging statuary of lone trees, fighting what Simra could only reckon was piss-poor soil, fighting each other for rain and sun and whatever else a tree’s roots asked from the ground beneath it. Standing and stillness aboveground, but below those roots searched desperate, pale and hungry. Maybe they didn’t know each other; didn’t see the war they were all fighting over the same thing, but they fought it all the same. Everything gained, taken from someone. Everything won is lost. Simra thought of Old Ebonheart. Had thought of little else these past days.

“Sometimes silence can be something shared,” Tammunei said, asking Simra’s eyes and attention back to them. A shape sitting in the failing grass of these shallow hills. Clothed in the colours of the sea, patterned in the shifting shapes and colours of water. That was the coat Simra had cut from a dead Vereansu for them, the tassels of its hem gone daggy already with dry grass, damp, sitting straight down on any old ground. “Sometimes it’s something worked on by people. Like a blanket whose warmth you both wear. It becomes part of your comfort.”

“And what you’re saying’s this isn’t that? Make you uncomfortable, do I?”

Simra’s eyes flicked up quick as flinching to check Tammunei’s face. See the damage. He’d spoken sharper than he’d meant to. It was hard of late to have much patience with people and less still was left for himself. He caught a shifting something cross Tammunei’s face. Confusion in the way their brow, the corners of their eyes, of a sudden showed their age. Whatever that age was. Another time Simra might have asked. It’d do for a change of topic.

“No?” Tammunei said, slow. “I mean, I don’t mind you. But you’re so filled with words usually. Questions. Why is it? Is something wrong?”

“You know what it is.”

“No.” Tammunei shook their head. A shudder of wet red hair. “If something’s wrong I’d like to help. Can I?”

“You know what it is. Starts with ‘En’ and ends in ‘Or’.”

Tammunei’s frown opened into something so patient as to be frustrating. Their old and listening quiet. Noor was away, tending to whatever deeds and duties carried her away from camp whenever they stopped. Put enough ritual round all that you do, Simra thought, and no-one’ll suspect, when you slip away, that it’s only to piss. Deeds and duties and prayers to the dead; she’s made that what she’s made of.

“I feel…chaperoned.” Simra rose to his full height. His knees griped a moment and then did as told. Turning half away from Tammunei, he began to work the fingers of his right hand, putting feeling back into them, and flex. “Dunno why. Fuck… Maybe cos she’s kin to you. Just…can’t make myself say what I mean. Like everything needs to be something I’m fine having overheard.”

In a way it was the truth. Or a truth at any rate. Only thing that belied what Simra said was that it buried the obvious answer. That it was hard to say on what morning, or else in the depths of what night, but the Grey had found him again. A sickness in all its symptoms, like the winter fever or throat-caul Noor had warned him of, but in how it came – and always came back – it still felt so much more like a curse. Years went by, friends and family came and went, and lovers even, and it was amazing the sheer number of things he found easier to say than this: that sometimes he got sad, and stay sad for a time. Stupid to even think of it now. Everyone does, don’t they? It’s only your weakness, Simra. If that’s your curse, you bear it.

“I understand,” Tammunei said after a pause. An impish curl at the corners of their mouth. “Me too. But d’you know, I don’t know why? When I was small—”

“In the Morayat?”

“—Yes, when I was small in the Morayat, and before too. Back then, she was always the least…something. Rigid. I could say more around her than any of my mothers. She was my sister. She let me ask things, stupid things, because she knew that’s how you really get wise.”

“But?”

“I was afraid of my mothers’ disapproval, disappointment. But with Noor I was scared of…Noor, I think. I don’t know. She gave me less cause. She never raised a hand to me. But in everything but how she was to me, I knew she… I mean, she hated things. The life we lived. The state we’d come into. Blacklight and the Redoran. Skyrim and the Nords. Everything that wasn’t us…”

“Amazed she tolerates me at all.”

Tammunei shrugged. “She owes you.”

“Reckon she hates that too. It does that. Debt.”

“I don’t know.”

“Hm…” Simra glanced to his bags. To the track they’d beat the night before, from the road to where they’d camped. “Tammunei?”

“Yes?”

“This was talking, right?”

“For me. More than I’m used to. But you said almost nothing. If you’re still full of words but not saying any of them, is that why you’re writing so much? To get them out?”

“You make it sound like…something. Lancing an ulcer. Draining a boil.” A clipped rustle of laughter, sounding short then gone.

“Is it not like that? You never seem to enjoy it.”

“Hm. Maybe. But doing it’s better than not.”

Writing so much, they’d said. Strange to have it put that way when it felt so far from true. He was writing, but badly, til it felt like no writing at all. No relief in it. Only stumbling and stumbling, and hoping you were stumbling forward, not just wasting ink and paper.

A poet is a paradox, some poet once said. What poet, Simra couldn’t recall. But a poet is a paradox. Wise in the ways of language, of words, the poet knows enough to know that words are never enough. The only thing the poet knows more about than words is the failure of words. The aphorism, when Simra read it, had made it sound like a good thing…

I was a good climber once. Blight it, a week ago I was a good climber. But here and now I’m hindered. The pain’s gone down to a murmur. Good. Only goes back to hurting as bad as it did sometimes. Only when the nights turn vicious-cold, or when I move my left arm just so. But I keep thinking of my side tearing open, starting up again. The reach and pull of climbing — if anything’d stretch the scab to breaking, it’s that.

Old Ebonheart’s a city made for climbers now. There are streets you can’t leave except upwards, crawling skywards. There are places you can’t go except by chancing yourself down. And that’s familiar to me. Before I ever knew open country, roads or fields, hills or plains, I knew this. The landscape of my childhood, and most of my life thereafter.

In the Grey Quarter things are simple and narrow if you’re grounded. Two choices then. Back and up’s your first. The muddy hillclimb into Northslope, in the shade of holding-cells and crowcages, guard-barracks for the Uptown Watch. A journey into the city’s uptown to the sound of baying dogs; to the creep of white-edged human eyes on your skin as you pass, if they let you pass at all. Or else you press forward, down, through the constant slough and swampen floor of the Grey Quarter’s lowest point. Gulleybottom, skyless, sun-starving. Where no rain falls but flows all the same, to the throwing-and-forgetting pit all Windhelm holds in common. Where beggars sleep on planks and boards, like rafts above the muck, in the shade of the city’s weight as it towers above them; not just Dunmer now but Nords as well, veterans, maimed too thorough to be heroes, and so ignored. Where savage markets spring up and disappear like mushrooms, here one day and gone the next, selling anything you could want if only you have the coin and know on what day to search for it. Sludge and drowning mud in Winter, and biting flies that live out the cold months by hiding in the folds of your clothes. Churning choking dust in Summer. Gulleybottom, then through and into the Morayat…

But if you’ve cunning hands and clever feet. If you’re brave or young or stupid enough – or wise enough to know those three are all the same thing when you boil them down – to risk a fall. If this, if that, if you’re able and willing to climb and crawl, then your options open wide. The Grey Quarter becomes a maze of possibilities. The Rigs and the hot roofs of Crucible. The crawlspaces and crevices of the Combs as they thread through the gully sides. The Warrens dug beneath the Quarter’s lowest reaches.

And Old Ebonheart’s the same. I’m beginning to learn that through how much it pricks at me to be grounded in a place like this. Mapless, and changed so much from whatever maps might once have been, the streets here make no sense. A labyrinth. When I walk, I walk slow and write every turn in my journal so as not to lose my way. Tall buildings, tall ruins, toppled towers; I’ve got no sense of the wood for I’m too blinded by the trees.

Until I start climbing.

Blight my side and how it hurts and blight my starving belly. I need vantage, perspective, to see what’s to be seen.

I rope my bags together and tie the rope’s end to my belt. I stand at street-level, among the weeds and grasses that overgrow this city, and look up. Who’s to say what the building was before. Now I only see that vines, thick-stemmed and woody, cover one face of its first three storeys and then come balconies, staggered on their way up to its high overhang of roof. And up there is the city as the city sees itself. Up there is the morning light and the sky and the breeze off the sea. A chance of not starving.

I begin to climb. Focus on my hands, the placing of my feet, and not the warning stretch of my side. To better forget the wound, I focus on memories I’d rather ignore. Climbing when I was still Katharas, days after we left Omayni. It came after the triumph of my ascent; defeat in going down. I remember how my hand slipped just so and my foot scrabbled to make up the difference. A rock that gave way or my foot that gave way, not gripping quite right, and I fell. A slow fall, hurting myself to hold on, scrabble, slow my descent. Like a crowd jeers a prisoner to the pillory, to the crowcage, the rocks and crags clawed at me as I passed. And then I was on the ground. And then I was in Tammunei’s arms. And then I was cleaned, skin showed to them and seen at its red and white worst. But I felt their voice all round me, like a warmth laid over my shame as they sang me whole again.

The overhang is the hardest part. A leap of faith. I pry my spearhead dagger, picklike and pointdown, into the tiles til it finds a place it will stick. Don’t think of how I’m blunting it at the time. Then I haul, crab over, lie panting on the blue-black shaley surface of the roof. Untied from my belt now, I take the rope in my hands, lean on my back, and pull my baggage up after.

What I see from the roof is the ocean again, but lit in antique gold. Wincing, clutching my side as it decides whether to start bleeding again, what I see is rooftops on rooftops on caved in rooftops, and a city-that-is overlaying the city-that-was. At street-level, death and dust, but up here is almost the Rigs of my childhood. Structures and spars and scaffolds span between some of the rooftops. Shacks lean against the shattered sides of towers. New brickwork mortared together from old brickwork grows as lichen does on the trunks of long-dead trees.

And writ all across the distance, in Dyer’s End and beyond, I see rising smoke against the grey-sunned sky. Cookfires, forgefires, kilns. Fire for warmth in Winter, when fire alone fosters life.

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atlaswriting · 5 years

Text

STEPS TO GRIEVING:

Denial.

The calm before the storm settles in like the beginning of winter, an aching chill bites at my bones—his side of the bed is empty and unslept. I sit up. Wait for any rustling in the kitchen, peak over into Theodore’s nursery; pause for the dismemberment of his room—silence.

Unsteady feet drag me across my bedroom door, tear open our closet—my closet now; I should have guessed that boys with matchsticks for hands would burn down everything they touch.

Knowing hands curl and uncurl into fists, white knuckling as I hurdle my body down the hallway—girl into comet. Nausea rises up my throat, bile in the form of everything left unsaid. I run back toward our room—my room—and tear open the drawers of his bureau. Unapologetic wood stares back at me and I slam it close.

I don’t cry.

Anger.

I break every plate we have—all of our glasses and bowls. When there’s nothing left to break in the kitchen and my feet are bloodied, I’m left with the gentle reminder of all the pieces he’s left behind.

Ellie begs me to stop—says these smoke signals won’t bring him home. Tells me that bleeding myself dry isn’t a sacrifice I have to make.

I want to laugh—tell her that destroying everything else means I can’t destroy myself. Instead I find a t-shirt of his and cut it up. Instead I walk into Theo’s room and rip at the blue and green walls until the paint is covered in scratches and his crib is nothing more than firewood.

Still, the tears refuse to come.

Depression.

Three months and the ache hasn’t become any less dull. The door in my chest that kept all my hauntings inside begins to rattle and I wonder—would it be such a bad thing for the ghosts to sneak out? For my body to not be their only playground?

I forget to eat. Forget to purge. Forget to shower and go to class—I forget to talk, speak to Ellie in grunts and nods, eventually she gives up, gives me my space. She stays in her room and I stay in mine.

I’ve changed the bed sheets three times—but they all smell like him. I think of setting fire to the bed, burn him out of me once and for all.

Lately, I drink more wine than water—and drink tequila every time the tears well: will myself not to let them fall—he doesn’t get to win this.

Bargaining.

Please come back.

I’ll be better. Do better.

We can try again. They won’t be him – but we can try.

I love you, Abram.

Please please please.

Abram, it’s Elise. I’m using Ellie’s phone. For the love of God please text me. Call me.

You’re it for me.

I lost him and I lost you, how is that fair?

It was supposed to be always.

I’m done trying – I can’t do this anymore, this begging, this awful need. It’s been a year. I don’t even think you’re at this number anymore. But I’m done trying. This is it. I’m closing my heart to you. You get what you wanted.

You win.

Acceptance.

“You’ve been sitting in these groups for months, do you want to share anything? This is a safe space.” Georgette smiles at me, tucking a piece of brown hair behind her ears.

“I… don’t know what to say? Um—Hi—my name is Elise and I—I killed my son.”

“Hi Elise.”

I look around at all the faces; some were aged with wrinkles while others looked fresh out of high school.

“You don’t have to say anything you aren’t comfortable with,” Georgie urges softly, “No one here is going to judge you.”

The brutally honest in’s and out’s of these people’s lives lay bare in their hands clutched between fingertips and held out—hoping someone else is just as fucked as they are.

“I guess I was sick—am sick—always gonna be sick,” I press my lips together; “I never liked who I was?” I keep my eyes focused on the wringing of my hands, “I wanted to tear myself to pieces because it was the one thing I could control. But I killed him—I let the sickness take control. I fell to my knees in front of the toilet, focused more on the immediate relief than on keeping him strong—,” I stop and a woman next to me hands me a tissue—I don’t realize I’m crying until warm tears fall into my palms. “I allowed this… thing inside of me to infect him.”

“Who, Elise?” Georgie urges.

Brows crease, I look up at her—all eyes on me I realize that the letters of his name feel foreign to me. I haven’t spoken his name in so long it felt fake.

“Theodore,” I admit, “He would have been one a month ago and I often wonder what would he be doing? Would he look more like me or his father? What would have been his first words?”

“And the father—has he been supportive through this?”

I laugh, drawing puzzled looks from a crying woman across from me. By the way her shoulders shake with a sob I could tell this was her first meeting.

“He…left.” I say, “I don’t blame him, I guess.” Lie. “He had to do what’s best for him. I’m over it.”

“Elise…” Georgie begins.

“I’m writing again, though.” I change the subject, “I’m almost done with my first manuscript.”

That night I don’t stop crying—let the tears fall until Ellie’s small body wraps around mine, feel her arms tighten, they push back the pieces of myself I’ve dislodged.

/ / / / / / /

I find love again in between empty take away containers and highlighters.

“We need a break!” Delaney declares as she pushes herself up from her stomach, “It’s perfect—you know it’s perfect. I know it’s perfect. So let’s take a break.”

Using chopsticks I shovel another mouthful of lo-mein between my lips and stare at her. After I swallow I say, “It’s nowhere near perfect, Laney. It can be better—do you think the end is a little…aggressive?”

“She died of a broken heart, Elise. If that isn’t the opposite of aggressive—,”

“I just don’t want it to trigger people.”

“It won’t.”

“Or try to tell them that this is what you strive for. That suicide is the right end when somebody breaks your heart… I don’t want girls to read this and—”

“They won’t.” She sighs and stands, holding her hand out to me, “Dance with me.”

I roll my eyes, flip through my pages and shake my head, “There’s no music.”

Laney wiggles her fingers, “It wasn’t a question.”

I stare back at her—sunflower yellow curls and a bright smile that just about disarmed me. Reluctantly I take her hand and stand. Wrap my hands around her waist, Laney’s curls around my neck. “Are you distracted yet?”

“A little.”

Our bodies sway to nothing—the raucous from London’s nightlife died down to a whisper and her brown eyes swallowed me. Not the blue I wanted, but I knew she was safe.

Leaning forward, she presses her lips to mine, “And now?” Soft and slow, Laney kisses me now like how she’ll kiss me in fifty years. She tastes like cheap wine and even cheaper take away—but I love it.

“Completely.”

/ / / / / / /

I’ve torn myself apart. Dug my fingers into the space between ribs and pulled, cracked apart the pomegranate and choked on the seeds.

I razed myself to cinder—breathed in the ash and re-birthed in ruin.

Refused to pray. Got up off my scarred knees, unclasped my hands and burned the bible. Spent so much time thinking I could stick my fingers down my throat and regurgitate holy water—spent so much time thinking that was the only way to be divine.

Less girl, more phoenix—holding ghosts under skin, dead parts of myself I’ve killed to get to where I am.

“Tell us about your book—a debut, correct?”

I look over at Robin Roberts who holds a copy of my book, “Yes. My first—hopefully not my last, but,” I shrug, “Nothing is ever guaranteed.” My fake laugh matches hers. “It’s… about a girl who lost everything—herself, her love—herself. There is no happy ending in Heartbreak Hattrick—which is sad for me, I’m a Lifetime kind of gal, but I don’t think we’re all awarded happy endings.”

“It’s sold as fiction—but is it something more? Something a little realer?”

I shrug, “Some parts. I suppose Annie, the main character’s end is how I saw myself years ago. After my son’s miscarriage, I sort of just—shut down. Luckily for both Annie and I, I made it out alive so I could tell her story.”

Robin nods, “There was some buzz in the Twittersphere that you had gone through something traumatic. Do you feel comfortable talking about it?”

I expected the question—braced myself for it and somehow the words still manage to hit like bullets. I try to maintain a smile, look toward Laney who stands next to a camera man, she smiles back at me, gives me a thumbs up and I look over at Robin, “Not completely. It’s been five years and there isn’t a day that passes where I don’t miss him.” I pull back the sleeve of my blazer and show her—and the camera the delicate script of his name on the outside of my wrist. “What I do want to say about it is: to any person who gives birth, if you ever go through a miscarriage it is not your fault. Despite what your partner may think or say or do—it is not your fault.”

“Your partner at the time he—,”

“Oh, Robin, you’re going to have to get me drunk for me to answer that.”

We laugh and she nods, “Fair enough—but I do have to ask one more question before we finish. Is it true that there’s movie talks in the works.”

I feign my best surprise face, “You won’t tell anyone will you?” She shakes her head and my eyes fall onto the camera as the words come out of my mouth, fully rehearsed with my manager before walking on set, “We may already be filming.”

/ / / / / / /

“Do you still love him?” Delaney asks that night before we fall asleep, “This is a 250 page love letter, isn’t it?”

I turn toward her, cup her cheeks in my hand and weigh my options: ‘yes’ feels wrong lingering on the tongue but ‘no’ feels like a lie. Finally I sigh and kiss her forehead, “I don’t think so. It’s more of an apology I guess.”

/ / / / / / /

Laney groans as I pull her into a coffee shop, adjust my glasses and order our coffees.

“I don’t know why you wanted to move back to LA,” she whines, “It’s so hot and sunny. Don’t you miss London and New York?”

“Sure, but LA feels like home to me. Not Paris home but good enough.”

“We can move to Paris,” Laney muses, “We haven’t gone there yet. Maybe we should go this year? Besides,” Laney pouts, “I don’t think your friend Ellie likes me much. Ever since we’ve moved next door to her she’s been rather…standoffish”

I nod, lean in and kiss her, “Ellie isn’t—oh—shoot, I forgot our straws hold on.” Laney waits by the door as I hold our coffees and rush toward the end table of extras: milk, cream, sugar and straws. Paying attention to the coffee and little else, I don’t notice when I turn around and the six dollar, overpriced ( but totally worth it ) iced latte winds up down the sweat pants of some guy standing too close for comfort. Immediately I drop the saved coffee onto the counter as he fumbles around apologies and let me buy you another—I reach for a handful of napkins and begin rubbing at his pants—ignoring Laney’s call to my name, looking up only when I hear his voice say it.

“Elise?”

I stop wiping and look up—“Holy fuck.” I drop the napkins into the trash and step away, reaching out my arm for the cup on the counter and holding it tight against my chest. “Sorry I didn’t—,”

“You mean you don’t always accost strangers’ crotches with ice and napkins in public?”

I glare up at him—staring over the thin rim of my glasses—the first sentence he’s spoken to me in five years and it’s a joke.

“If I knew the stranger was you it probably would’ve been fire or acid or—,”

“Elise, love—are you okay?” Laney closes in on us, arm sneaking between mine.

Nodding I look up at Abram then at her, “Delaney this is Abram. An old…friend.”

Abram snorts into his own coffee.

#thread: ablise #thread: all

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