#it would suggest that in those cases that her behaviour was more inspired by personal dislike | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thesherrinfordfacility · 8 months

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hope you're good!!!✨ i did get your first one but no matter! very good thanks! you? oh well. i've lost a few emails to the connection in the last few days so i figured just in case.

also thank you re: the amv, haha!!! i ended up doing another using The Darkness, but your suggestion of using Original Sin is inspired, ive put it on the list!!! as for being on the nose... well, i did one to lewis capaldi's heavenly kind of state of mind, so make of that what you will! you're welcome! it really is fantastic! (as are your others; i'm looking forward to the abba one.) lol true about heavenly kind of state of mind and original sin is just such a good song.

i completely agree with your remarks on the implications of god... feels incongruous with other aspects of god's characterisation or indeed the theme of the story - to my interpretation, anyway. yes to this entire paragraph. absolutely celebrate everyone writing whatever they want and god getting increasingly frustrated as increasingly ludicrous fanfic like matchmaking schemes keep failing is potentially hilarious but in my opinion it doesn't work with god or the story at large for her to be involved in things.

i also love the metaphorical imagery, the poetry, of crowley being the question, and aziraphale being the answer (this sparks narrative analytical joy). oooo yes that is great imagery. i agree that free will has to be the plan and aziraphale and crowley do represent that in a way but i think that might be - from god's perspective not the authorial one - fairly coincidental. like it didn't have to specifically be those two? i don't know. i tend to consider god pretty much entirely a non entity as speculation goes. she narrates and that's it.

whilst that certainly speaks to me as being his behaviour, im not personally convinced that is his motive. i think the motive question might end up going round and round in circles once you start digging into it. where do we exactly put the line between 'god wants' and 'i want' to establish a starting point? i don't think he's trying to undermine her authority. i do think he's trying to take/has already taken over heaven but maybe he thinks that's what god would want him to do. she's not talking so he's just going to have to defer to his own judgement of what god's will is and his own desires are certainly influencing that judgement extensively. to what degree he's aware of this? tricky question if you ask me. i prefer him to be fully aware and nonetheless certain that he's doing the divinely approved good/right thing but that really is just personal preference and you do make a good case for the reverse. might just call it a mix of both and give up on the details before i accidentally talk myself into a paradox.

for me, it's the specific, simplified concept that moral absolutism doesn't exist. noone is completely evil, just as noone is wholly good. good point! this is why i agree that the metatron should think he's doing the right/good thing (even if he fulfills the function of the major villain). i guess i just feel like a bit more self awareness might give him more agency?

it would make sense, to me, for this to extend to metatron this whole paragraph also makes a very good point. i said above that he thinks he's doing the right/good thing but might it be more accurate that he believes he's doing the necessary thing? that he needs to put himself in power and do all these reprehensible things because it's the only way to preserve heaven and with it god's will and the concept of 'goodness'? that could open up a bunch of things around the end justifying the means.

i think both absolutely could be correct, a mix of them - for me, the former being personal against metatron's motive, and the latter against his character. don't have anything to add here i'm afraid; just wanted to say i like this a lot!

his questions, i think again for me it makes for a more compelling character arc that crowley has existed throughout his fall and being a demon as not getting any answers you're probably right here narratively speaking. i got attached to the whole serpent thematic but the more i think about it that does also work with just questions. the serpent only opens up the path to knowledge without directly partaking of it themself after all. and the wrong questions are still dangerous. maybe even more so than the answers.

albeit, i have a feeling that the answer will essentially be that there are no answers, and it's 'up to each of you to find your own ones' oh yeah. definitely.

thoughts [about the demons]? hmmm. i'm inclined to say seeing more demons asking questions is just because we're seeing more demons now. not to mention hastur and ligur were fairly major antagonists (and i'm not yet convinced hastur isn't coming back!). it's the same as muriel to me. just because heaven and hell are absolutely terrible it doesn't mean all angels and demons are so we're now getting nicer characters on both sides to show this and balance out each side's antagonists. as for why the short-staffing: i like the idea that demons are just defecting but i think maybe something's wrong in hell? shax tells crowley beelzebub 'put some of the lesser demons on half rations'. this is a new aka post armageddon development so presumably pre armageddon hell had enough resources for everyone to be getting full rations. now there's less demons around than before but less resources per demon. of course i'm assuming that the half rations is because of lack of resources and not some other reason like punishment but I don't think that's an unreasonable assumption to make: when eric keep interrupting to draw attention to the lack of demons he also points out that they won't be able to take the large transporter which seems like a resources issue as well. it's almost like something's draining hell. i haven't the foggiest how or what or why but i'm pretty sure it'll matter next season.

i meant 'conclusive' haha!!! ah ok. that makes a lot more sense then and in that case i agree. the archangels aren't innocent but they're not as bad as the metatron either.

but the bottom line - as i see it - for them is to preserve heaven. we can view their actions as deplorable, and that is true, but in their unique circumstances, what other action would, could, or should they have taken? i refer back to my thoughts above on moral absolutism and its place - if it has any - in GO and its characters. yep! it's very likely the archangels think what they're doing - including the things they do to maintain their power (and they infight and try to exercise power over each other but they always present a united front to other angels) - are necessary. though as i said in ny last ask i'm not sure that doesn't make them more dangerous. righteousness is, shall we say, not good.

re: memory of their time as angels, this is where i largely fluctuate on how much i subscribe to the memory wipe theory - but i don't think it's a full wipe, but potentially partial? oof. yeah there's something happening with memory but the details?

but i think perhaps that the memory wipe is attributable more to the BOL than to the metatron himself - i do think there's potentially a link between falling/erasure of grace and divinity, and to memories of being an angel gabriel though. he was going to have his memory erased - depending on whether putting it in the fly was just backup or full removal, did - while staying an angel. i feel like tht might counter the fall/memory loss connection.

as for demons not being aware of a wider issue, that's a fair point - but do demons really talk to each other? wouldn't that indicate a weakness, vulnerability? if there is a large-scale memory problem going on, which is a very tentative thought anyway, im not sure that any of the demons would in fact talk to others about it. true and why i didn't discount the collateral damage option after the first season. though if it happened to everyone it might have been acknowledged in company policy? just another part of falling. like i said i really think it might be something that happened only to crowley because of whatever specific role he played and not a large scale operation. if we can trust his drunken ramble he still remembers the act of falling itself just not what led up to it and that i would tentatively hazard the other demons do based on what we see and hear from them. p.s. this doesn't really properly fit into my speculation but i still wanted to say it: 'we are the fallen. never forget that.' 'it's not the kind of thing you forget.' gains a certain kind of irony if there's as many holes in crowley's memory as i suspect.

i have my #halo theory wherein i wonder if aziraphale was the specific angel to actually declare the war in heaven ok that is a very interesting idea for parallels and mirroring. first he declares the war in heaven, then he introduces war to humanity and finally he declares war in hell defending the bookshop in episode six. rule of three. *pauses* oh shit. and hereby i just found a narrative argument for having the scapegoat theory apply to both pre fall and present day crowley. awcw get scapegoated for the fall, the serpent of eden gets scapegoated for the fall of man and crowley gets scapegoated for whatever happens with the second coming/the still unresolved declaration of war on hell. rule of three. that of course would set them up for not only mirroring/paralleling their own story arcs but also as counterpoints to each other. ok this possibility fascinates me. might need to think on it more and then get back to you about it later! and then of course there's the characterisation element of carrying the weight of that kind of guilt around, which is plenty interesting in its own right, not to mention could add another layer to him accepting the metatron's offer.

i absolutely love your interpretation of crowley's inner conflict, i think that's so well put, and i like it a lot!!! i certainly don't think crowley is willfully ignorant or in denial of his potential part in his own - or the wider - fall, but perhaps just doesn't want to examine or confront it, as you said... or perhaps doesn't remember altogether, and has just cobbled together why he thinks he fell. firstly, thanks! i tend to the latter option, but think the internal conflict/fear of finding himself to be evil would work with either especially if we lean into the scapegoat theory which does also work with either.

but similarly, i think it's also fair to assess crowley as having some measure of the same mentality as he did before he fell; that he can be quite blinkered, self-assured, and at times quite arrogant. yep! though - without trying to excuse it away - i do wonder how much of it's also a defence mechanism at this point.

and please, please do not think im hating on him - critique of a character does not mean i dislike him or find him reprehensible, i promise; it's quite the opposite honestly!!! no worries, i absolutely do no think that! if that's how my p.s. came across i'm very sorry. absolutely not my intention. i enjoy your analyses so it was just a passing thought i had that it'd probably be interesting to see you discuss an aspect of the story and/or characters you don't talk about as much; i find it usually is when people do. (you can blame the history teacher i had in my last few years of school for that lol. she was big on that sort of thing and i guess it just stuck with me.)

the narrative would still hold and be profound if it were the other way around. just personally i like the idea of him being a heavenly Nobody to becoming a hellish Somebody is rather compelling!!!✨ fair enough. i think there's definitely great things you could do with either so i'm more than happy to just sit back and see where it'll go. 🦭

hey 🦭 anon, lovely!!!✨💕 two gorgeously long and complex asks (second under the cut) - gosh, where to start!!!

okay let's get cracking with the first!!!

the abba one has been placed on hold for the time being (inspiration did not vibe with me for it BUT another is in the works and is actually shaping up to be a Slap so stay tuned!!!)

i agree with you re: metatron, i think his motive is going to be somewhat cyclical, and mutually inclusive - to be motivated in what he determines as 'good' and as decreed by god by lack of any other instruction, and to be in his own selfish or narcissistic interests - can and i think probably will exist simultaneously.

i don't think he necessarily would be unaware of what he's doing, per se, but more that he's convinced that as the voice of god, whatever he thinks and does is sanctified as being god's will (because god hasnt told him otherwise) and is done in the name of preserving heaven - and, by extension, the balance of good and evil. therefore, of course, it must be inherently good.

personally, i don't believe that that would remove any agency from metatron (same as aziraphale who, for all of his questionable decisions, to my mind hasn't lacked agency), even if we would evaluate metatron's actions as being bad or wrong - to him, they truly wouldn't be... but like you said re: necessity, i think metatron would potentially see his actions as necessary, and what is necessary is to uphold the 'good'... so does it therefore remain up to everyone else whether those actions are right or wrong? yes, imo - but it's the context that's key.

i guess the closest i can liken metatron to as a 'villain' type character (and please, mea culpa, im not very imaginative) would be javert from les misérables. the law is created, in his eyes, to uphold justice (good); when that law is broken, he is compelled to mete out that justice (also good). it's not a perfect analogy, and obviously there is compelling context on valjean's part (his parolee papers for time served on a justifiable crime make it impossible for him to start a new life as a free man), but ultimately he broke his parole and the law, and javert, whilst operating in a broken system, is doing what he believes to be the good, right thing.

LOVE your thoughts around hell and the short-staffing/dwindling resource issue. i did some writing around shax a couple of days ago, so in hand with that I'll think on your points a little more, they're excellent ones!!!

re: fall/memory loss - possibly, but i personally don't think so. i did a little bit of speculation around the BOL and saraqael, especially in relation to the trial scene, a while ago - it's probably in my #book of life and #saraqael meta tags, if you wanted a peruse!!! but the batshit thought essentially was: what saraqael has access to, in that scene, was the BOL, and she operates it on behalf of metatron... and did during the fall, too.

re: crowley critique, no no it didn't come across like that at all!!! ive just unfortunately had asks previously where people have questioned whether or not i like him, because ive been quite heavily critical of him, and wondered if i find anything redeemable about him... suffice to say, i feel the need now to ensure that any readers do not think that i dislike him if i point out his more... questionable traits; i just find them way more interesting and compelling in a character than the good ones!!!💕

onto your second ask, and just to clarify - it wasn't my mum, unfortunately!!! (the most insight my mum ever gave on GO was this beauty -

- she gets it).

but regardless!!! first of all, LOVE your speculation and what you've thought out!!! i will honestly need to think on it more before i can come to any kind of conclusion, but i am - and i hope you don't mind - essentially going to use this as a scribble pad for some speculation. some of it is in direct relation to your spec, some is general to the fall/war, and some is just Stuff feeding into it... hope that's okay!!!

could totally see it happening - that AWCW fought on heaven's side, and was made to fall essentially at the last minute/unexpectedly for a reason he doesn't even really know, and had to rationalise after the fact

however, i think that removes, as we've batted back and forth already and in the bit above, a little bit of agency on AWCW's part. i don't think AWCW chose to fall, of course, but i do think that he asked questions/made decisions, and followed through on them/stood by them, that resulted in his becoming a demon, regardless of whether he fell or was pushed

agree that hell can't make angels fall; it doesn't make sense, and i refer back to my thoughts/theory on BOL on this

also hard-agree that, without the memory-wipe theory in play, it doesn't make any sense for AWCW to have answers to dangerous (?) questions, because of the risk he'd pose once fallen. it would make far more sense, like they planned with gabriel, to just simply wipe his memory and demote him to a lesser choir*. so i think that's where, personally, i simply do think that he just didn't get any answers at all

now this all could arguably skew the scapegoat theory, but not necessarily, because the idea that he could have been scapegoated by his own 'friends' still stands, imo

my conclusion at the moment, but it will still require more thought for definite, is that i don't think it will have been the case - i think in a way it would feel a little overcomplicated, and whilst devastating i think would erase some of crowley's accountability for his decisions... not necessarily bad decisions! but decisions nonetheless.

*this has just precipitated the unfortunate thought (unfortunate in that it's gone 1:30am and i need to sleep) that - well, what if that was what was meant to happen to crowley??? same as muriel (we speculate), and same as gabriel, he was initially intended to fall but to a lower rank, with no memories, and instead he legged it? like gabriel did? immediately i can think of multiple reasons as to why i don't think this was the case, but... still interesting to think about.

anyway! this response snowballed a bit and for that please have another apology dance 💃 but let me begin with, pure hypothesis, a rough sequence of events re: the fall:

> AWCW and aziraphale meet, he starts asking questions

> meets lucifer and co, AWCW falls in with their little group that does not consider it bad to ask questions, and maybe he reiterates his 'if i were in charge' thought because he feels comfortable to do so amongst them

> lucifer starts getting bolder, as do his closest cohort, about challenging god, and crowley gets swept up in it, or fully agrees with lucifer and actually fully supports him - and aziraphale knows none of this is going on/nothing about AWCW's association with them

> all comes to a head, god nopes out of the whole thing (free will argument), and when things can't be reconciled, war* is declared (👀 at aziraphale and his halo frisbee)

> war, etc., possible temporary ceasefire or lucifer concedes; all the rebels are brought for their Final Judgement before the metatron and the archangels etc

> lucifer implicates AWCW for leading him astray, that he was the one asking questions, and now lucifer has been corrupted or something, idk, but metatron decides all of them need to go - and yet perhaps a particularly harsh punishment is in fact due for AWCW (so yeah, actually, perhaps it is only crowley that doesnt fully remember heaven? that was his own personal punishment, to not remember parts of his time in heaven/the fall?*)

> initiate::Book Of Life Protocol

*now that im writing it out though, i do wonder if that makes sense, that the war would precede the fall...? i think it would, because it seems like the fallen would, well, fall, as punishment for rebellion, and then go off to plot their revenge etc in hell furfur confirms in ep4 that the war/"dubious battle" indeed came "just before" the fall!!! wahoo!!!

*the thing is... in leviticus, there were two goats - sacrificial goat, and the scapegoat. so this is where, i - in equal conviction which is, to say, shaky at best - also personally hold the thought that AWCW might never have been the scapegoat, and instead aziraphale* potentially was - leaving AWCW to be the sacrificial.

this last thought is slightly tangential, but stick with me:

*we know aziraphale was a cherub during the pre-fall scene, and in eden. that doesn't mean that he stayed a cherub in between these points

i recently added some ramblings to this meta on his ring, which i think is the hallmark of the archangel rank - and the fact he wears his on his opposite hand to the others, and constantly covers it, feels very indicative of some unseen backstory

it also feels that him being on earth is an ostracism, a roundabout punishment by way of being cast out but not falling...

and the thing is that genesis 3:24 (KJV) reads the following:

"So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life."

so if aziraphale, as a singular cherub, was placed in eden, it was after the fall of humanity, after original sin. we only see aziraphale arrive to give adam the sword as they were leaving, not beforehand. and after eden, it's suggested, he was demoted to principality (the angelology is debated i know but im sticking with christian/GO-confirmed combination angelology for the moment)

so it can't, to my mind, be because of the apple business that aziraphale was demoted - it's not as if he let the serpent in (if we follow genesis, he arguably wasnt even there at that point). it could be because he gave away his sword, but a) god knows and let him get away with it, and b) neither gabriel nor the quartermaster knew that he gave it away in s1

so what other reason could it have been? well, the only plausible reason i can think of is that it's because he didn't smite crawley when given the opportunity on the wall

others have debated whether or not it was aziraphale telling AWCW about the stars that led to AWCW's fall, and perhaps in point of fact it was... but im not certain that anyone would have known about it, other than them. maybe aziraphale refused to fight (after knowing that AWCW was amongst the other side?), he refused to wield his archangel power in some way (like gabriel refused?), or he actually defended AWCW (personal favourite)?

idk, but either way, whatever he did, he was punished for it with the demotion to cherub, and then demoted again to principality for not smiting the serpent of eden

instead of AWCW being the scapegoat for the fall, was he sacrificed as an example, to atone for fallen, and aziraphale was scapegoated to atone for the fall of humanity? had the blame of not destroying the serpent of eden placed upon him, and was cast into the wilderness (earth)?

i realise how ridiculous it all sounds, believe me, but my sleepiness is now officially winning so i shall leave it there (honestly 🦭 anon, im so sorry for the unrelated ramble, but it's actually so helpful for me to type this out, it helps with understanding what my own theories even are when i write other stuff... so thank you!!!)✨

#good omens #ask #the fall/the great war spec #pre-fall aziraphale spec #AWCW spec #s3 narrative spec #scapegoat theory

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hoghtastic · 7 months

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Personally I can not agree why everyone on this blog is hating on his girlfriend. We can criticize her as a not nice person to put in mild terms and we can accuse her of abhorrent behaviour and personality. I argue that she has made her intentions clear. Johanne saw a good opportunity with Alex in front of her and took it! She appears an ambitious woman and she never able to achieve this level by her own means so she took the advantage of luck presented to her. This has made me start to think the "you snooze, you lose" post is her alluding to this luck, she has hit the jackpot with him! If Alex is actually blind enough at his age not to see through her obvious agenda and he just believes everything she says nd does everything for her like an obedient dog well I will say he is to blame for allowing himself get conned by her and I don't feel pity for him. I mean he is even distance himself from some good old friends around him in favour of jojo nd her posse and he also hang around Malte! Sorry not sorry.

Thank you for sharing your opinion on this, anon. 😊 But I'd like to respectfully disagree with you. If anyone is in the wrong here, it's Johanne. She's the one doing everything in her power to "secure her place" as Alex's girlfriend (hinting at them having a relationship, making it public as soon as possible, wearing his sticker on her phone, being the first to post couple pictures, etc...) and reaping all the benefits that come with it. Now, we've all seen how Alex has always helped his friends and their projects getting more exposure, of course it would be no different with Johanne and her friends (who he probably also considers his friends by now). So, if they're taking advantage of his kindness and helpfulness, it's on them. No one should be considered stupid for being kind and having good intentions. 😕 Plus, the way she's seemingly changed her style and interests since she broke up with her ex-boyfriend and started dating Alex (as seen on her IG), suggests some degree of manipulation, to make herself more similar/compatible with Alex, reinforcing the idea that they're a good match. The Pinterest board full of outfit inspirations to wear on their trip to Paris also suggests some calculations from her part. Manipulation and love bombing are very real ways one (especially narcissists) might use to control their partners. As well as isolating them from their friends/family, while also seeming perfect in their eyes, so much that when such couples eventually break up, they'll wonder what happened, because no one suspected what was happening behind closed doors. And please don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that this is the case with them, but it's a plausible theory that happens with so many couples. And even though it's a terrible situation to be in, many people take much longer than they should to realize the truth and gather the courage to leave their toxic/abusive partners. Either way, I don't think we should blame the victims, but rather those who manipulated/abused them.

But then, we could be wrong and Alex is totally aware of her intentions, and also totally okay with them. Maybe he doesn't mind using his fame and recognition to benefit Johanne and her friends? Maybe he feels more important that way? However, in this case, we can't really say that she's a user, nor that he's "blind" or a "victim". 🤷‍♀️

It's just my opinion, of course, and we can only speculate at this point. So once again, thank you for sharing your thoughts as well! 😊

#anon asks

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gifted-burnout-archive · 4 years

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Family Dinner

Requested?: Yes! Anon requested an age-gap Spencer x Reader fluff where Y/N’s older sister starts flirting with Reid.

Word Count: 4.9K+

Author’s Note: I want to preface this and say I am getting back into writing, and the style of this is not my best work, but I liked writing it and I felt like I did the prompt justice, so I hope y’all enjoy.

Warning: Age Gap (24 and 35). Otheriwse, floof.

Being a Technical Analyst for the FBI had always been your dream job. You were a whiz with computers, and it didn’t hurt that your dark web connection Penelope Garcia was working there anyway. So, when, two years ago, you finished your Master’s and Penelope took you out for drinks to celebrate, you couldn’t refuse when she offered you the job. And just like that, you were an FBI Analyst. You were a part of a selected group of intellectuals tasked with aiding agents in whatever research they may require.

The job came with definite perks, you really couldn’t complain. Especially when, after your training and orientation, Garcia brought you on as her second in command for the Behavioural Analysis Unit. You would never forget your first day on the job, walking into the office and coming face to face with the man Garcia often referred to as Chocolate Thunder.

“So, you’re the new team member then?” Derek Morgan asked you with a wink, leaving you frozen on the spot with shock. Garcia had not downplayed his handsomeness at all.

“Leave her alone, Morgan. Poor thing looks like a rabbit in headlights.” A female scolded Morgan from behind you. A few clicks of her heels later, Emily Prentiss walked by your left shoulder into view, coffees in hand. She offered one to you with a smile, and you managed your first words of the day.

“It’s really nice to meet you both. I’m Y/N.” You offered a hand, and Prentiss shook it firmly. Why was everyone so attractive?

“So, darlin’, let me give you the rundown.” Morgan started, and you shook off the nerves. Everything would be fine, right? “This is the BAU. You are now a part of the Special Agents Unit of the BAU. Along with Garcia, you send us information while on the job to keep us informed, up-to-date and ready to catch serial killers, predators, rapists, you name it.” Morgan was friendly, confident in his words and walk as he led you around the office space. You had to walk double time to keep up.

“You’ve met me, and Prentiss, and obviously Garcia-“

“I met Agent Hotchner too. He interviewed me last week.” You added, nodding a hello to the Unit Chief as he exited his office. He sent one back, disappearing into a door to the left of his own.

“At the morning briefing you’ll meet the rest of the team. Rossi is in the office up there, our senior agent.” Morgan gestured to the door Hotch had just disappeared through. “Agent Jareau, we call her JJ, is our former correspondent turned agent. She has a son named Henry, that’s her desk there.” Morgan pointed it out, a clean and organised desk to your right sporting photos of a very happy family. “And Reid.” Morgan stopped at the most cluttered desk in the room, covered in stacks of books and files.

“Agent Reid?” You clarified, trying to commit all the names and general descriptions to memory. You glanced over his desk, one of the books catching your eye and causing you to smile. “He has good taste in philosophers.” You commented, picking up ‘Critique of Pure Reason’ by Immanuel Kant from the stack and flipping through a few pages of the title before setting it back down. Your eyes drifted back to Agent Morgan, who had a smirk on his face.

“Doctor Reid, our resident genius… I think you two will get along just fine.”

“What do you me-“ Before you could finish, the doors at the far end of the room opened to reveal a man maybe a decade older than yourself, though he didn’t look it, with messy hair and a bright smile to accompany his rather dishevelled appearance. A satchel hung from his right shoulder, a coffee cup in one hand and a case file in the other. Even from across the room, you could see the honey tones in his brown eyes, could see the creases around his mouth from smiling.

Why was everyone so attractive?

“Derek, I swear to God if you’ve messed with my filing system again.” The doctor marched his way over, seemingly not taking notice of you to be sure Agent Morgan hadn’t tampered with the chaos on his desk.

“Reid, be friendly. We have a new team member.” Morgan scolded, and Reid picked up the book you had looked at only moments before, setting it in the correct place before looking at Morgan. Then looking at you.

“Oh.” Was all he could manage, a flush coming onto his cheeks. “Sorry. I’m Dr Spencer Reid.” He introduced himself with a wave, and you waved right back with a small smile, taking a sip of your coffee.

“Y/N… You know, Kant was fairly inspired by the philosophy of David Hume when writing Critique of Pure Reason? Hume’s Treatise on Human Nature was insightful for Kant, compelling him to rethink his own views around religious and natural philosophy.” You offered the information with a nervous tap of your foot and a pull at the collar of your itchy dress shirt. You had bought it a few days ago with the hope of impressing, but it just made your nerves more apparent you thought.

“You like philosophy?” Spencer’s eyes lit up at that, and Morgan walked away with a smile and his arm folded. While you continued to discuss with the resident genius your opinions of the two western philosophers, Morgan had sat himself on Prentiss’ desk, holding up a twenty-dollar bill.

“Twenty bucks says those two are dating by the New Year.” Morgan offered the bet, gesturing to you and Reid as he spoke. Prentiss just grinned, pulling out her own cash to match Derek.

“I say Easter. Whoever’s closest?” She countered, the pair shaking hands just as Garcia called the team into the meeting room.

Two years later, you and Spencer had been together for a year and 3 months of that time. JJ ended up winning the bet, since after you established yourself as a long-term and useful member of the BAU the entire team got in on the betting action Derek and Emily had began on your first day.

You had all been out on the case this time round, flying out to Michigan for a serial killer case, and Hotch rewarded the team’s good work with a few days off. Cuddled into Spencer on the plane home, with your work family around you, it felt nice to know you’d get a few days with your favourite person to relax.

“So, what do you two lovebirds plan on doing?” Rossi asked with a raised eyebrow, forcing you to blush and lift your head from Spencer’s shoulder. The group had been going around, proposing ideas for their own time off: JJ was heading to a resort with the kids and Will, Prentiss was doing something called ‘Sin to Win’ in Atlanta, Morgan was planning to work out, Hotch was spending time at home with Jack, Garcia was looking forward to cuddling with Sergio on her couch. Now, the question rested on you and Spence. As you glanced out the window at the mid-day sun, the plane starting its descent into Virginia, your boyfriend spoke up with a glint in his eye and a smile on his face.

“Well, with Y/N’s birthday coming up, her mom and I talked, planned a birthday dinner so I could finally meet the family.” He admitted, and you looked up in surprise.

You and Spencer were very much meant-to-be, but when you first told your family you were seeing someone, they were a little worried, Spence being older and all. You were 24 and Spencer was 35, it made sense for them to be a little nervous.

Of course, you mom saw a photo of you together last Christmas and fell in love with him right away, all her doubts diminished. She had been demanding you bring him over for months now, and you had been hesitant. What if your family scared him off?

The fact that Spencer had taken it upon himself to reach out made your heart swell, and you squeezed his hand in your own.

“I probably should have run it by you first, right?” He said with a chuckle, and you smiled even wider.

“Not at all, it’s a wonderful idea.” You responded, followed by a chorus of coos from Garcia and JJ, and rolls of the eyes from Morgan and Prentiss.

Dinner with the family, what could go wrong?

“You look… Stunning.” The voice caused you to spin round and face your boyfriend, who was slack jawed by the dress you had decided to wear, consequently making you blush. You had chosen a navy satin slip dress; one you had bought a few months ago and never had the chance to wear because of work. It accentuated your features nicely, without hugging anything too tightly. You had let a few hairs fall loos from your bun in curls, chosen some simple jewellery that complimented your skin tone.

He had a reason to be slack jawed, and while you may not have admitted that two years ago, you could now.

“Guess we’re matching then.” You complimented back, slipping on some navy heels to finish your look before walking over to Spencer and pressing a kiss to his cheek. He had dressed up too, in a light blue button down and black dress pants, a blazer to match. Your destination for the birthday dinner was one of the nicest restaurants around, and Spencer had refused to let your parents pay for anything.

“Before we go, I have something for you.” Spence grinned, and grabbed your hand, leading you out to the living room of his cozy apartment. You had practically moved into his apartment in the last month, whenever he was home you were here. Spencer had paced ahead, pulling a present off the bookshelf and walking back over to you with a smile that could melt hearts.

“Spence, I’m not 25 for a couple of days.” You tried to counter the offer, feeling bad for taking a present early, but Spencer pressed it into your hands.

“Please?” He pleaded, and you smirked, reaching for your handbag and slipping it inside. He raised an eyebrow as you walked for the front door, waiting for an explanation.

“We’re already ten minutes behind. I’ll open it at the restaurant?” You suggested, and the doctor grinned after a moment, thinking over the idea.

“Deal.” He agreed, moving into the hallway outside the apartment and locking his door before offering you an arm, the pair of you walking down to his car.

On the car ride over, you really couldn’t contain your excitement. The last time you had done something so fancy was dinner with your family to celebrate your bachelor’s degree, and you were 20 then. It was almost 5 years since you had donned a dress so pretty to go somewhere so expensive, and it felt nice. Spencer just smiled to himself in the driver’s seat as you jabbered on, the sound of your voice making him feel warm inside and light-headed.

How had he managed to get someone like you to love him, he would never know, but he wasn’t about to remind you that he was nowhere near your league. He wouldn’t risk letting you go.

You pulled up to the restaurant about an hour later, the car slowing to a stop being what stopped your spiel about new coding languages you and Garcia had begun using to boost efficiency in the tech cave you shared with your mentor. Suddenly, there was a lump in your throat.

“You ready?” Spencer asked as he turned the ignition off, a hand quickly coming over to hold the ones you had clasped on your lap.

“I just really want this to go well.” You admitted. Your family was great, your boyfriend amazing, but something was nagging at the back of your mind. Why were you so worried?

“Hey, look at me.” Spence said gently, turning your chin to look up into his eyes. “Everything is going to be perfect, alright? Your mom already loves me, my mom loves you, we have passed the important checkpoints.” Spencer reminded, and you thought back to when you had met Spencer’s mom Diane for the first time. She was so kind, so clever, you saw where Spencer got it from. The trip had been great and had led to you meeting Diane without Spence when you had the free time. By the way Spence spoke about your mom, even though they had only talked over the phone, reassured you, and gave you the courage to open the car door.

Spence was round your side of the car in an instant, helping you out of the vintage model Volvo and pressing a kiss to the back of your hand as you straightened up your dress. The way he smiled, the heat from his lips on your cool skin, it amazed you. He was the fire to your ice, even if he didn’t know it. With a final kiss on the forehead for good luck, Spence led you into the dining establishment, a hotel and restaurant just outside of Baltimore named ‘Lotus’, and as you headed for the front door you noticed your parents’ car parked nearby, Pennsylvania license plates and all.

Spence’s hand didn’t let go of yours until you were at the reception desk, where he let go only to pull out a business card with the reservation information printed on it. The receptionist tapped away for a few moments, humming as he did, then smiled.

“Ah, Dr Reid and Miss Y/L/N, the rest of your party just arrived, they’ve ordered some cocktails on your behalf, we’ll be bringing them through now. If you would follow me.” The receptionist, who you quickly figured out was called Frank by the shiny nametag on his chest, ushered you both into a private dining area, equipped with a private bar and a fairly large table, your family sat around it.

“Sweetie!” Your mother squealed and pulled you into a hug before you had even taken the chance to say hello to everyone. “Aren’t you looking lovely? Have you lost more weight? You know you’ll be lighter than feathers if you don’t eat enough.” Your mom, in her fashion, complimented you with worry laced in her questioning before turning to Spence, who was grinning from ear to ear. He was finally seeing the person behind the voice and knew his mental image of your mom had been correct. She had a rounder face than you did, was around the same height, dressed like the typical middle-aged woman, with rosy cheeks and a flare for patterned shoes. “And you!” She moved from you to embrace Spencer, and you couldn’t help but chuckle. Spence was always a bit of a germaphobe, but he had no problem having the air squeezed from his lungs by a woman half his size.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you Mrs Y/L/N.” Spencer responded, the rest of your family making their way over.

Pleasantries were passed around, your father giving Spence the once over before extending a hand, your grandparents asking far too many questions with sincerity, your aunt and uncle thanking Spencer for arranging the whole dinner. Your worry was very quickly blown away by a) how lovely Spencer was being and b) by your family being so welcoming.

Only once the waiters had arrived did everyone sit down, a variety of cocktails on the table. You found yourself sat at the top of the table, Spencer to your right and your mom to your left. But, as everyone filled seats, you noticed an empty chair with a martini in front of it.

“Mom, are we missing someone?” You asked, wondering if your cousin Fiona or Aunt Cathy had flown in for the occasion from Canada. It would be the only logical explanation.

“I wanted to surprise you, but I guess working with the FBI clever clogs has given you a keen eye.” Your mom grinned, and you tried to stop your face from falling.

“V’s here?” You asked, taking a large sip from your drink, only to realise there was no alcohol in it.

“Who’s V?” Spencer asked, raising an eyebrow at your actions from over the menu. Your mother answered on your behalf.

“Veronica is Y/N’s big sister. Flew in from Paris just to see you.” She chimed, and you held back the groan.

“I didn’t know you had a sister, babe.” Spencer sounded rather surprised, but with his profession and aptitude, it didn’t take long for him to see through your smile and determine that Veronica was not someone you particularly liked.

“Yeah, we haven’t talked in years. She’s been in Europe since I was 14?” You suggested, gesturing for the waiter. “Sorry, could I get something stronger?” You asked quietly, trying not to listen to your mom and dad gush about V.

“Veronica is a ballerina, the current Prima Donna for the Paris Ballet. She’s held the title for, oh, almost 3 years now. She is a spectacular dancer…” Your relatives continued on, explaining the successful career of your sister who was probably a room over, listening through the wall.

“Ma’am,” The waiter got your attention again. “Do you have ID, the woman who ordered your drink said you weren’t allowed alcohol.” The waiter said with a weak smile, and you let out a curt laugh before reaching into your bag to find your wallet.

“Unbelievable…” You found yourself muttering and handed over your ID to the waiter. He checked it over, apologised, and went to fetch you a new drink.

“So, you still can’t take a joke then?” the voice you had almost forgotten after years of absence was like an alarm in your head, and you did your best not to scream from shock. Veronica walked towards the table from the far side of the room, dressed in white and looking just as cruel as the day she left home. Beautiful, yes, but cruel.

“Hello V.”

“Hey, baby sis.” The silence that followed was tense, and your relatives seemed confused by why. It was a sister reunion, where was the hugging, the tears?

“We haven’t met yet,” Your boyfriend interrupted the quiet by standing up and pulling out the chair beside his for your sister. “I’m Spencer.”

“Well hello Spencer, I’m Veronica.” She said in a cheery voice, and you couldn’t help but roll your eyes. She strutted her way along the table, squeezing grandpa’s shoulder as she went, and pressed a kiss to Spencer’s cheek in greeting, staining the tanned skin with red before sitting down and reaching a hand towards you. “I missed you sweetie, we have so much to catch up on.” A look to your left, your mom giving you a warning look, your dad’s face one of pleading, you plastered on a smile to match your outfit and reached over, squeezing V’s hand with a tilt of your head.

“I missed you too.” You lied through your teeth, sitting back in your chair as waiters came by to take orders.

There wasn’t much of a chance for you and Spencer to talk all evening, your mom and dad asking you constant questions about work and Spencer and Penelope, all the while your sister seemed to latch herself on Spencer like a leech. By the time mains were finished and dessert menus were being handed out, you had watched your older sister touch your boyfriend no less than 12 different times, and you heard her giggle at his conversation at least 23 times in the last hour.

“So, Spencer,” Your auntie asked, and you silently thanked her for shutting up Veronica. “How did you and Y/N meet? I mean, do you work in the same department at Quantico?” She sent a wink your way, and you took another sip of your cocktail, having moved from vodka to rum based drinks.

“Well…” Spencer flushed, and took your hand, resting them on top of the table. “Y/N and I work in the same department at the FBI. She’s our eyes and ears when the rest of the team are on the ground. The first day she walked into the office, I remember…” He smiled at you, and you couldn’t help but smile back, the rest of the table falling quiet to listen. “I remember she was getting the tour of the office and had moved one of the books on my desk. I was going to get mad, I’m not a fan of my desk being disturbed, but she smiled at me with these wide eyes and told me all about David Hume and Immanuel Kant and I just knew she was amazing. And we became friends as the job assists people to, but those first nine months she was in the office I was just waiting, just waiting for the right moment to ask her out for coffee.” You leaned over, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek, smudging the stain your sister had left. “The rest is sort of history, to be honest. I never thought I’d get so lucky.” The coos from your mom, aunty and grandparents, along with the nods of approval from your uncle and dad sort of sealed the deal for you that your family were as charmed by Spencer as you were.

“Are we ready to order desserts ladies and gentlemen?” The waiter asked, notepad at the ready. You flashed one last smile at Spencer before dropping his hand so you could both decide on your final course, not noticing the storm cloud that had formed over your older sister’s head.

Now, you would never admit you liked your family better tipsy, but after Spencer paid for dinner without a complaint and your grandparents, of all people, suggested more drinks, who could refuse? The table was cleared as your group sat at the bar, drinking into the late evening. Pair by pair, your grandparents gifted you a new watch before retiring to their room upstairs, then your aunt and uncle presented you with a new book on coding languages for work, until you were just left with your mom, dad, Spencer and V. You had all had quite a few drinks, your sister the most, but with everyone heading up to rooms, it would only be a matter of time before you and Spencer got a cab home as well.

“Y/N, Y/N.” Your dad came over, still sure in his step unlike your mother, who was dancing to the background music in the room’s centre. “25 is a big thing, and we wanted to get you something special. Of course, with your work and all, we weren’t sure what but…” You dad pulled out an envelope and handed it over to you. You placed your drink down on the bar, a smile on your face as you opened the gift, pulling out a slip of paper from inside.

“Dad… New York?” You said, tears brimming in your eyes.

“I know you don’t get a lot of time off and all, so it’s a voucher for a hotel in the city for a few nights, when you and Spence get the chance. I was looking for some stuff that’s happening soon, and I saw a new computer exhibition opened up at the museum, and the university is always hosting philosophy talks and I just…” He smiled, wiping a tear from your cheek. “I’m really proud of you sweetheart, your mom is too. You’ve grown up into such an accomplished and amazing woman, it’s all we could ever ask for.” You jumped from your chair and wrapped your arms around your dad tight.

“Thank you, I can’t wait to tell Spencer… Spen-” You looked around the room to find Spencer and V had disappeared.

“They went outside my love!” Your mom hollered, beckoning your father to dance with her. You nodded and made your way out, leaving your parents to dance as you left the comfort of the private room for the cool night air.

“… a little young for you…” You caught the tail-end of the conversation as you headed outside, spotting V and Spencer stood just along the road, the former holding a cigarette between manicured fingers. Their faces were lit by the lights inside, shadows cast on the pebble car lot. Most of the cars had left, leaving the few of guests that were staying over that evening.

“I think we need to get you some water Veronica.” Your boyfriend countered, offering her an arm back inside.

“Oh, don’t be stupid Doctor.” V responded with a giggle, and you watched her pull him close. “We both know who the better sister is.” Her words made your face and stomach drop at the same time, and left you frozen in place. Of course, once again, your sister tried to take what was yours. She didn’t just have to outshine you for years, to bully you and mock you, to scare away the boys you liked as a kid, no. No, now she had to return to the US after a decade away and try and steal your boyfriend.

The thing was, you wouldn’t even be mad at Spencer if she succeeded… You had been given countless reminders that V was better looking, more athletic, more charming, just better than you in every way she demanded counted. Your smarts were nothing compared to her beauty, and she let you know it your entire childhood. She was five years older than you and still acting like you were teenagers.

“Actually, I don’t think we agree on that front. You see Veronica, I know people. I study them, that’s my job. And when someone decides to return home unexpectedly to celebrate the birthday of the younger sister they berated for an entire childhood, it says two things. First, that the attention you had in Paris has either disappeared or been removed completely from your life. And secondly, the only way you feel good is tearing other people down. It’s a shame that you can’t be proud of Y/N the way the rest of your family are, the way I am, because it just means you don’t love yourself… I know who the better sister is Veronica, and it’s not the one standing in front of me.” Spencer’s response shocked you from your stupor, and you found yourself walking towards the pair, your heels indicating your presence to the pair.

“Hey V, babe.” You addressed them both, Spencer taking the chance to pull you in for a kiss by the waist, leaving you giggling.

“Let’s head inside, I want your parents to see the gift I got you.” Spencer suggested, not looking at V for a moment once you had entered his vision. With a nod and your hand slipping around his waist the same way his arm held yours, you both headed inside, leaving V to contemplate the words Spencer had dealt her, the hard truth he had laid out.

“I forgot to say,” You grinned up at Spence, who return the expression as the pair of you entered the private room once more. “Mom and dad got us a voucher for a stay in New York. I was thinking we head next time we get a few days off?”

“That sounds amazing…” Spencer pressed a kiss to your forehead, pulling out a chair for you at the table then retrieving your handbag. “Close your eyes.”

“Ok, I’m ready for my present.” You followed the order, your eyes fluttering shut, and your hands held out in front of you. Your parents watched on as Spencer placed the gift he had given at his flat into your hands.

“Open.” He directed, and your eyes opened, a smile on your face. Your hands were quick to open the small, slim box, wondering if he had bought you a CD or something similar.

Instead, you found a locket necklace and a small velvet bag in the centre of the present.

“Spence…” You smiled, beckoning him over to help you clasp the necklace on. It had your and Spencer’s initials on it, a more materialistic gift than you would have thought Spencer would get you, but beautiful, nonetheless. “Are these matching earrings?” You questioned, opening the velvet bag in the centre.

“No.” Spencer said softly as you removed the item from within.

A key.

“I found us a place, in DC… With a study and everything, all the books and tech space we could want… Y/N, I know this might be too fast, but you are the person I want to spend my life with. And I know we aren’t at the wedding bells stage quite yet, but I thought this would be a good step to take in our relationship.” Spencer rambled on, and you leaned forward to shut him up with a kiss. It was soft and sweet, Spencer tasted like coffee and chocolate and booze and it made butterflies erupt in your stomach.

“Yes.” You answered his question before he even asked it to the applause of your rather drunk parents. “Yes, of course I’ll move in with you... I love you, Spencer Reid.”

“I love you too, Y/N Y/L/N… Should I order that taxi to the new apartment then?” Spence asked, and you nodded fast, gathering your things and kissing your parents goodbye.

And, despite whatever V had been up to that night, you left your birthday dinner to your new home, the home you shared with Spencer, the home you would keep with Spencer for many years to come.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x y/n #dr spencer reid #fanfiction #oneshot #fluff #bau #criminal minds

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gottawriteanegoortwo · 3 years

Text

Mermay - Dilliam - Getting To Know You

William and Damien want to get to know each other, but these things take time. There are more important matters that need to be addressed first.

Read the first part here!

Word Count: 2,159

Sure enough, early the next day William hobbled down the steps to the shore. He kept his balance with one hand, and gripped a flask with the other. Unlike the previous day, he wore more layers to keep warm. It made the chilly morning more bearable as the pair sat on the picnic bench. Even so, Damien's high energy and energetic gesturing as he told William the story of when he first met his extended merfamily was infectious. William kept the hot flask in both hands as he sat forward to take in everything and encourage Damien with more questions.

At one point, Damien seemed to snap out of the moment and throw William a concerned look.

"I'm sorry… this, this isn't too much, is it? I don't get to talk about my experiences too much -" He was cut off when he felt a warm hand on his.

"Keep talking. I want to hear everything." William's smile was so wide, it could be seen either side of his bushy moustache. He gave Damien's another reassuring squeeze before lifting his hand away; and Damien had to rapidly suppress the instinct to snatch the hand back. It was such a simple thing, yet Damien felt comfortable enough to keep going.

As it turned out, it was very easy to talk to William. He knew nothing about the world of the ocean, except a small selection of fish names… and even that wasn't right:

("Oh yeah! An orca! That's the one with a horn, right?"

"No. It's the large whale that is black with white markings."

"... Then what am I thinking of?"

"Either a unicornfish or a narwhal, I'd imagine.")

However, as William would later argue, it was because he was normally assigned to tasks on land and was better acquainted with recognising animals, something that Damien was not too confident on:

("But what about that big cat with the hair? You know, the one that has the hair all around its head like this!"

"... Damien, that's what I've been telling you about. Male lions have manes, see?"

"... I knew that.")

Back and forth the conversation went, and Damien could feel a pang of disappointment when Mark came down to accompany them when he returned from rehearsals. Then, to make matters worse, William got a call from Celine regarding something that needed to be reassembled ASAP, so he had to scramble back up.

"Hey… Damien?" Mark broke the silence that had descended on the rocky coast. "I know you were told William was staying for a day or two, but if he gets the all-clear to take off the boot at his appointment tomorrow he has offered to stay longer to help us with odd jobs around the house. Would you be okay with that?"

"Why are you asking me? I don't live here." Damien made quite a considerable effort to give a calm response, and he could only hope that Mark couldn't see through the flimsy act. "It doesn't really affect me what happens up there."

"Well… I wasn’t sure if you were going to continue on your travels soon. If you need to keep on track of your itinerary, don't let our possible change of plan mess with that." Mark's response had Damien cursing his sister. Did both Celine and her partner know about his plight? But Damien knew Mark. If that was the case, there would be obvious teasing. Maybe it was genuine concern on the actor's part.

"It's alright. I'm not under any time restriction, remember?" One key difference between humans and merfolk was how humans were obsessed with time and schedules, whereas merfolk were more flexible and carefree. "I don't mind staying a little longer. It's nice to be with family again. I'd be a fool to hurry off too fast and miss out on this." Mark's face lit up as he turned to pick up a bag Damien hadn't noticed originally. It was passed to him without any hesitation.

"Speaking of being with family - here. I had this commissioned for you. Consider it a 'new home' gift from both myself and Celine." The merman gingerly opened the present, surprised when he pulled out a small stacked stone ornament on a waterproof pedestal, complete with aqua blue natural sea glass for decoration. "I know you enjoy travelling the seas. Just know that we want this to be your home as much as it is ours when you are in the area. I might only be your brother-in-law to be, but you are still family, and this can be your home if you want it to be. There’s nothing too hard for us to do to make this your home. Just say the word - I have a credit card." Mark reached forward to ruffle Damien's hair, earning himself a dramatically offended hiss in response.

When Mark left, Damien took the decoration in his hands. It was beautiful, and he was enamoured by it… But it made something in his stomach twist. A home… such a concept was different between a merfolk and a human. If they wanted this to be his 'home', were they going to make some sort of enclosure and expect him to ‘settle down’? Celine wouldn't, he knew she never would. Even so, there was the worry if she felt sorry that he would never have a 'home' in the way a human can.

He put the gift into the chest to keep it safe and slipped into the water. He needed time to think about this.

"You sure you want to help out? I was kidding about working you to the bone." Celine accompanied William back to the car after his appointment the next day. The crutch and boot were gleefully returned as he was given the all-clear. Now all that was needed was to simply not break it again any time soon.

"Of course! You expect Mark to move things around for you? Or are you planning on killing your fiancé by letting him try his hand at wiring a new light in one of the empty rooms?" He threw Celine an accusatory glare when she laughed at the suggestion. Thankfully, the conversation returned to the matter at hand as they spent the drive to the hardware store deciding what needed to be done in the seafront cottage.

"Can I ask you a favour?" Celine had stopped in the middle of the 'outdoor' section during their shopping expedition. William screeched the shopping cart to a halt so he could reverse and see what caught her attention. "I want to make the rock pool a place Damien feels comfortable to call home. The positioning of the rocks means it's sheltered from the tides, but I don't know how safe it will be from winter storms. I don't suppose there's anything you can do about that?" William's eyes went from Celine to see what inspired her to request such a job. It was a rock waterfall, an ornament for a garden. The colour of the rocks matched the ones by the sea.

"I'm not sure, only because I've not seen much of it. It'd depend on if the 'pool' is shallow or not. I could try and add some extra support to those rocks that frame the water, maybe check what supports are normally put along beaches to protect coastal towns?" Celine nodded as William spoke, fetching several LED lamps and dropping them into the cart.

"We should ask Damien when we return. I didn't want to bring it up too soon after we moved in because I know he's not one for staying in one place for too long. I suppose it's the mer instincts at play." When she noticed William's confusion, Celine continued, "When we grow up, we normally want to settle down in a house of our own, right? Merfolk might have nesting grounds or communities of their own, but they tend to travel since they can cover large distances in a short amount of time. It's why Damien would often disappear for months at a time." She sighed as she shoved her hands into her pockets. "I wanted a house by the sea so Damien would have a place he could call home too and feel he can stay longer. I can't protect him if he's forever travelling."

"Protect him?"

"You've heard the stories, right? Where people have exotic 'pets' that are categorised as 'mythical'? Having a merman as beautiful as Damien is one thing, but one with fluency in English and an awareness of human behaviours would be a valuable asset to American collectors… Or worse." Even if her hands were hidden, William knew her fists were tightly clenched in anger at the thought of something bad happening. "I don't want anyone to hurt him. Even if he travels the seas and has plenty of connections, he's still my little brother."

"Hey," William braved putting a hand on Celine's shoulder, "It's okay. He'll be okay. We can go back and see how he feels about rubber duck decorations." He pulled back to lift the item in question. They were tiny LED lights on a string, but each light was encased in a small model that resembled a toy rubber duck. "If we got a few of these and draped them around the rocks, it'd really look like home. And look! They're half-price. It's meant to be, Celine." Though still worried for her brother, the distraction worked as Celine finally cracked a smile and lightly shoved William. "What? Oh! You're right. That's far too ambitious. Just the one will do." That was that as it was innocently dropped in, followed by an actual rubber duck toy.

"Trust me. I might not be an outside landscaper-person, but I know we'll be able to make the rock pool the most spiffing place this side of the seven seas!"

To William's credit, he had only gathered a handful of impulse purchases that he paid for himself, including a pair of small hanging mirror shaped like a crescent moon and a star as a belated housewarming present ("Mark is the star 'cause he an actor, and you're the moon 'cause of your magic stuff."). Everything else was relevant to the required home improvement jobs that William would be working on over the next few weeks. Once they had brought everything inside, it was then the turn of Mark to bring William out of the house and make the drive to William's family home. William could grab his tools and show his elderly parents that his leg had fully healed. His mother insisted they take a loaf of homemade bread and some cupcakes with them once she had smothered William in hugs and kisses and made him promise to come by while he was in the area.

Meanwhile, the twins sat on one of the large rocks, gazing out over the sea. Damien rested his head on Celine's shoulder as she told him about how her job was going and some of the ideas for the home renovation now that William was staying and ready to work. Damien held her phone, idly scrolling through the photos as she explained what was going on, until he realised the next few photos were of the area they were in.

"- some sort of way to make this place a little safer in the storms. Do you think you could have a think and see what can be done?"

"I'll think about it." Damien returned the phone to Celine as he sat up straight. "Whatever happens will happen, I suppose."

"But this is your home. Whatever happens here is your choice first and foremost."

"Yeah, sure."

"Damien. I'm serious." She reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, only for him to pull away. The fins on his collarbones flared briefly in agitation.

"This is your home, Celine. You don't need to pretend that I have a say in any of this, or that you'd even listen to what I'd want anyway. I don't need your pity because I can't go buy a house like you can."

"That's not what this about-"

"Isn't it? Don't think I never heard those conversations you had with Mom and Dad about wishing I could 'settle down'. I'd bet you even want to build me some sort of little enclosure to make up for that fact."

"Damien, stop that!" But it was too late. He had slipped into the water. Confused and frustrated, but wanting to avoid further argument, Celine stormed back up to the house.

Mark and William had decided to cut into the bread when the back door opened. Their argument on what would best accompany their snacks was abruptly cut off as Celine marched past them and down the corridor, before a door slammed shut. A silent nod was swapped between the men. Something happened between the twins. Food could wait. They needed to get to the bottom of this. ---

(I normally don’t stick these notes on the bottom, but I’m planning on spreading out this story over the month. It’s currently 20 pages on g.oogle docs total, so there definitely will be more. However, I will be putting the next part up tomorrow since 1. I’m not mean to leave it on a cliffhanger for several days and 2. It was waaay too long to put everything as one chapter)

#mermay #dilliam #writersofmark #mayor damien #william j barnum #(I never wanna tag Mark and Celine since they play a minor role)#Blue Soul (Damien)#Eccentric Goof (Colonel)#Shattered Heart (Mark Doom)#Red Soul (Celine)#(read-more is for tidiness! :D )

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uk-news-talking-politics · 3 years

Text

Why we should preserve anonymity on social media

By Aaron Drapkin

The argument for anonymity on social media is important because it is this that allows individuals to freely express themselves without fear of repercussion.

Yet this is also precisely the reason it has become a cloak from under which to send a barrage of hateful messages on social media, and why some have suggested putting a stop to it.

Calls to prohibit ‘anonymous’ social media accounts have intensified during the pandemic throughout which period online abuse has increased. From death threats to racism, our online spaces have turned into toxic cesspits of hate.

The sheer volume of abuse some people receive from anonymous accounts is enough to make even the most privacy-conscious question their commitment to anonymity on social media.

Yet it’s unclear whether ending anonymity on social media is the best action to take.

It’s hard to ignore, for instance, the importance of preserving anonymity on social media for users living under oppressive regimes.

Back in 2011 a Facebook group that played a significant role in inspiring protestors to march on Tahir Square was initially administered by a pseudonymous account, something which helped the creator avoid the considerable risks associated with acting under his real name.

Attempts by social networks to crack down on the use of pseudonyms, or implement new ‘real name’ policies, have previously silenced bloggers reporting from dangerous locations and have historically been met with resistance from rights groups, who have long argued that it protects people from harm across the globe.

Whistleblowers also rely on anonymity to voice their concerns while ensuring they won’t lose their jobs or, depending on the government, be subject to criminal punishment or even death. Such accounts exist in authoritarian regimes, but British accounts such as The Secret Barrister are a reminder that hiding one’s identity can enhance a person's ability to speak truth to power even in the West.

I remain unconvinced ending anonymity on social media will have the desired effects people think it will. Enforcing a ‘real names’ rule worldwide on a site like Twitter would potentially gag accounts in places where freedom of speech is a genuine and pressing concern and not just armchair politicking.

Domestic legislation won’t impact foreign accounts, meaning comments from all other countries - as well as those using location-spoofing technology like VPNs - won’t be affected. Labour MP Jess Phillips illustrated this point in an exchange on the subject three years ago when she revealed that her quest to take legal action against a troll led her to a server in Colombia.

Although anonymous accounts seem to encourage uncivil, abusive behaviour in and of themselves, ending their presence on social media would not end the culture of incivility now pervasive in most online settings. It’s not surprising that this status quo has arisen, since many crucial social cues, like eye contact, cannot be found in digital settings.

Social media users will continue to follow the rules of the game, anonymous or not, unless we make attempts to positively modify our online spaces by introducing frameworks that promote civil discussion.

The case for preserving anonymity rests partly in the promise this sort of solution offers. Twitter’s decision to road test a ‘read before you tweet’ pop-up last year to combat disinformation led to the proportion of people reading articles before sharing them increasing by 33 per cent. A similar warning regarding rude replies has recently been relaunched.

Any remedy to the problem of online abuse - including ending anonymity on social media - involves some fundamental alterations to how social networks currently operate. It’s just a question of what sacrifices we want to make.

Take platform moderation, for example. Pushing this concept to its logical extreme, we would see every single post and comment on a given social network going through a moderation procedure before posting. This would seemingly reduce abuse in a much more effective way, targeting not just anonymous accounts for being anonymous, but also abusive individuals for being abusive.

The sacrifice here would be the instantaneous nature of communication - but personally, I would rather see social networks reimagine their approach to moderation than lose anonymity.

The very fact that an end to anonymity on social media is being seriously entertained, considering its merits, is a sobering reflection of the scale of the abuse people now suffer online. However, ending it would be rife with practical difficulties and human rights concerns, and would not necessarily create sustained change.

If we really do want to get to the root of the problem, then social networks need to be held accountable; and content moderation, as well as technical modifications to promote civil discussion, need to be more seriously explored.

#social media #anonymity

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galaxy-parchment · 4 years

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Help! My daughter’s a Werewolf!

1 (you are here) : 2 : 3 (coming soon)

Taking a break from the Vampire AU because of a slight case of writer’s block. I’ve had this sitting around half-done for a while so I thought I’d finish it off and post it now that I’ve done a little development on it. The title is a reference to the knock-off knock-off movie “Help! My mummy’s a werewolf!” from Gravity Falls. This is very likely to be continued but I won’t put chapter notes until I add another chapter. Thanks to the TGS discord for reminding me to work on this AU!

Henry was minding his own business, wandering about the Society when suddenly he was faced with his two best friends, Rachel and Lanyon, arms and expressions looking quite crossed. Lanyon spoke up with a dramatic open-handed gesture towards Jekyll.

“Henry, this has been going on long enough, is Hyde your half-werewolf illegitimate son or not?” he asked pointedly, Jekyll just stared at the both of them, first being frightened at the confrontation but then simply being confused at the accusation.

“My… half-werewolf illegitimate son?” he repeated, unsure if he’d processed the statement correctly.

“Yes, there’s no point in hiding it any longer, Doctor, so just be out with it!” Rachel demanded.

“How would that even work? If I were his father I’d have had to conceive him in my teenage years, not to mention that if I knew I had a bastard child I would certainly tell you!” Jekyll protested.

A heavy knock pounded against the front door. The three halted their argument as Jekyll took the liberty of answering the door, not wishing to be left aside to continue a quieter argument with either of his friends. As he opened the door he decided that he was the best person to have answered, since Morcant was standing at the door beside a shorter figure with a deep hood covering their face, Morcant herself wearing a similar cloak that had seen far less care to maintain it than her companion. Upon seeing who it was, Lanyon made a sound that vaguely resembled a high-pitched harrumphh, whereas Rachel had opted for more of a quiet excited squeak.

“Ah, this is… strange” Jekyll said simply, “What brings you to London?” he asked, plastering a clearly fake, shuddery smile on his face.

“I’m here to tell you about your illegitimate child” she responded. Jekyll stared at her for a moment.

“You’re kidding…” he said, slumping against the door slightly, the arm pressed against it being the only thing keeping him from falling over.

“Not at all, Nora, say hello to your dad” she told the figure beside her, who pulled off their hood to reveal a half-werewolf hybrid girl with a fuzz of fur nowhere near as thick as Morcant’s that looked very much in the age range to be his daughter. Jekyll shoved a hand against his face and grimaced through it. He carefully looked back at Rachel and Lanyon and wasn’t pleased to find that Lanyon was staring daggers into his back and Rachel looked fit to burst with joy at her greatest dreams relating to Jekyll’s love life coming to fruition.

“You can’t expect me to believe this is my daughter?” Jekyll finally asked, developing an obvious annoyance at the circumstance.

“Believe it or not, she’s yours” she shrugged.

“So you don’t bother telling me for… I’m sorry, Nora was it? How old are you?”

“Fourteen”

“Fourteen years! Did you just forget that I might want to know I have a daughter for fourteen years?” he said, voice growing louder.

Some of the lodgers had heard the commotion and filtered out of their rooms and strangely enough, Frankenstein had also been intrigued by the racket.

“Look, she wanted to meet you and its her birthday so I figured it would be fine.” Morcant said, raising her hands defensively.

“Good lord, you could have at least sent a letter!”

Murmuring began to grow from the balconies that lined the lobby. “Oi, Jekyll, you never said you bedded a werewolf!” a voice called out. Countless others joined in, asking all manner of questions and inspiring a deep scarlet to form on Jekyll’s face as his well-kept secret was suddenly the most well-known piece of gossip in the whole building. He felt a hand on his shoulder and was anything but relieved to find it was Lanyon.

“Perhaps we should… discuss this… in more private quarters?” he suggested, raising a stern eyebrow at him.

“Er… yes of course” he turned to his guests “come with me, we’ll talk in my office” he said as he gestured for them to follow him to the stairs and through the looming door at the top of them. As they entered and Jekyll shut the door behind himself, the protests of the lodgers were muffled and subsequently died down and he internally grimaced at the looks he was getting from Lanyon and Rachel, who were livid at being shut out of the room.

Jekyll turned to the pair and stared at Morcant, searching for some sign that she was kidding and that this was all her way of asking him for some favour and be on her way. He was unfortunate enough to not see anything of the sort.

“I’m not kidding, you know, she’s your daughter,” Morcant said with her arms crossed and an eyebrow raised at him.

“You’ve had plenty of time to tell me, why now? Why not contact me first? Do you have any idea how bad this could be for me if word gets out I have an illegitimate child? Let alone a werewolf?”

“And do you have any idea how little I care? You know I’ve never been one for all of those strict rules of society that you people insist on keeping to.”

The girl, Nora, stepped closer to Morcant and placed a hand on her shoulder, looking at Jekyll pleadingly, “I’m sorry, uh, dad? Can I call you dad?”

Jekyll contemplated it for a moment, “Fine, but it’s Dr Jekyll should you ever need to address me in public, which I hope won’t be happening”

Her face lit up slightly, “Well, uh, Dad, I just… wanted to meet you and it was my birthday recently and I thought that I could find out about my human half. I understand if you don’t want anything to do with me, but I just wanted for you to at least know I existed…” she trailed off and held her arm to her side, looking at him expectantly.

Something tugged at Jekyll as he looked at her. The more he looked the more he couldn’t deny it. The way her nose stuck out like his own, the kink in her hair as it reached her shoulders, even the crook in her eyebrows were unmistakably features that insisted on showing up in his family’s features.

“I… suppose we can spend some time together… but the full moon is tomorrow, and the exhibition is coming up, you’d have to take a wolfsbane potion if you intend to stay.”

Morcant cocked her head slightly, “You know I don’t touch that stuff, Henry, if you’re gonna make us take wolfsbane I’m leaving,” Nora glanced at her from behind with alarm.

“What? I don’t wanna go home!” she quickly looked at Jekyll, “I’ll take wolfsbane, I promise, I’ll be on my best behaviour, mum even taught me about how humans act!”

Jekyll smirked despite the situation, “Knowing her what you’ve been taught is bound to need some tweaking.”

“I’m standing right here.”

“So you are. Fine, she can stay, but you have to go home if you’re not going to take a potion and you,” he pointed to Nora, “will have to let me do my work every day before I’m able to spend time with you.”

Nora’s face was simply glowing with excitement, “Oh! Thank you! I can’t wait!”

The room was eerily silent as he led the two out of his office and marched solemnly towards Lanyon, who was at the foot of the stairs on his own. The room was clear but something about how quiet it was told him that everyone who had likely been shooed off were watching from hidden spots, but they were doing an awfully good job of it if they were. Lanyon just gave him a look of such annoyance that Jekyll was thankful for the silence.

“Robert! Our friend Nora is going to be staying with us for a bit. I’ll take care of everything, though!” he said, desperately trying to be as cheery as possible, but the lack of change in Lanyon’s face made it clear that he was seeing right through it, Jekyll dropped his facade and pleaded “Look, I know we need to discuss this but I promise I’ll take care of everything.” he waited expectantly for an answer.

“I’m going to be calm about this, but you’re right, we’re going to have a very long discussion.” He didn’t seem to want to continue the conversation, “Do what you need to, I’ll be in your office,” he walked up the way Jekyll had come without another word.

The walk across the lobby was brisk but it took an eternity. Despite Morcant’s utter lack of being being impressed by the vibrant displays strewn about the room, Nora was glancing about with such pure awe that Jekyll couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pride blossoming within him. It felt nice to know that to some degree, his love of science had been passed down to his daughter without any of his influence. The door seemed to creak more than usual and he pulled it open and let Morcant pass. She took the offer and turned back to Jekyll and Nora, paying more attention to the latter. She stepped forward pulled her into a big hug, making sure to use her abnormally strong muscles to squeeze her tight.

“I trust you’ll only do what I would do, behave yourself,” she pulled back and looked at her with a mischievous grin, “but not too well, when I come back I don’t want to find you’ve been turned into one of these posh fuddy-duddies.”

“Oh, mother, I wouldn’t dream of it!” Nora exaggerated, placing a dramatically ginger hand to her chest.

“I’ll be back in about a week, Henry. Any past connections we may have will be ignored if I come back and find something has happened to my girl,” she said sternly.

“Of course”

“Good! Until we meet again, Henry Jekyll,” she said with a grin that inspired a nostalgic blush on Jekyll’s face as she turned and walked away without a care in the world. The fond moment was lost the moment the door creaked shut again and Jekyll remembered the encounter he had waiting in his office and the very real problem of a 14 year-old half-werewolf bastard daughter staying with him for the next week to add to the 5 course meal of misery he was being served by the wonderful struggles of London life. The howling laughter of Hyde from the back of his thoughts was anything but reassuring.

What on earth had he just been talked into?

#galaxywrites #the glass scientists #tgs #fanfiction #henry jekyll #robert lanyon #rachel pidgely #morcant #nora jekyll

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tarotresearchresidency · 4 years

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tarot reading 12-11-20

Three of Cups (reversed), Two of Cups, The Hierophant (reversed)

Quick read: Isolation is real, for so many of us. So then: how to relate to the outside world? Relying on existing forms of wisdom seems counterproductive. Seek your own counsel. Enjoy how your FOMO is diminishing.

Long read: I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’re living through a global pandemic. The UK is in its second national lockdown. We can’t mix households indoors (and are only allowed to encounter one other person outside of your household outdoors), shops are closed etc. You know all this, you’re living it too. But the Three of Cups reversed speaks to a lack of connection with people, with friends. The era of a casual after-work drink with vague acquaintances is over, for now. Much has been made of how still to relate to other people? Knowing that no-one else has been going out has decreased one source of anxiety (that we’re not having enough fun). But how do we still maintain connection to others, one of our essential human traits? The Two of Cups is all about this question. Its lessons are ones of both reaching out and also offering up: you have to make yourself a little vulnerable when you’re building relationships. You have to build trust over time.

As Cara Page says in her conversation with adrienne maree brown in Pleasure Activism, ‘What I ... see is people ... in this heightened moment, and they want everything. They want all the energy, all the love, all the liberation. And I’m like, oh, this takes time. This is relationship building. And this is building trust. And consensually understanding how to be moved and inspired by each other without sometimes assuming that energy has to be sexual. That maybe that’s just an erotic exchange that’s actually about sharing knowledge, memory, power, and that to me is understanding levels of intimacy in relationship to liberation.’ You can’t just fast-forward to the place where it’s easy. You have to be in the tentative space for longer than you want to be. That’s what builds deep desire to interact.

The Hierophant reversed suggests maybe you don’t need to reach out too far, just yet. Culture would suggest to us that having best friends who you do everything with is the only way to be friends. That’s unrealistic for most people’s lives. Conventional wisdom might suggest you need to be firing off messages left, right and centre; or spending hours on social media to keep connections open. But does that work for anyone? I suspect not.

In Ann Helen Petersen’s Culture Study newsletter today, there’s an interview with sociologist Jessica Calarco, who researches family inequality, and has co-authored a paper on how COVID-19 is affecting mothers’ wellbeing. This paragraph stuck out to me:

There were some moms who were able to push back against or reject intensive parenting norms — but those moms tended to be less socially connected before the pandemic. With fewer social connections, they didn’t feel as beholden to other people’s expectations for what “good parenting” should look like. They didn’t stress as much if their kids were watching Moana on loop, because they didn’t have other mom friends to compare themselves to. And they didn’t stress as much if their kids weren’t doing much academically during the pandemic, because they weren’t comparing themselves to other families they knew at their kids’ schools (in some cases because they were already homeschooling pre-pandemic).

At the same time, having fewer social connections often meant these mothers had to do more on their own with less support (e.g., less support from extended family members or friends who might serve as a sounding board or step in to offer resources or assistance when needed, etc.).

We see here how social connections can create mental prisons for ourselves; the more people you are linked to, the more likely you are to be ‘beholden to other people’s expectations for what “good [insert behaviour here]” looks like’. It’s ok to take yourself off for a while, and seek your own counsel. You’re a capable person, and if you take the time for careful consideration, you’ll come up with a solution that works best for you. Make and keep connections on your own terms. The pressure to be in society is reduced right now. Enjoy the breather.

#tarot #tarot reading #tarot cards #three of cups #two of cups #the hierophant #adrienne maree brown #pleasure activism #ann helen petersen #sociology #covid-19 #motherhood #social connections #lockdown #cara page

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obeymematches · 4 years

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Hi, can I get a matchup? Thank you in advanced and I hope you're doing well despite the current state of the world ❤

(Edit: almost an hour later and I've finally finished writing this. Let's just say this did not turn out the way I expected AT ALL and I'm so sorry in advanced. But at least I got a new story idea)

Introduction (Innocence): At first, I'm extremely shy, timid, and quiet. I have a hard time opening my mouth and starting conversations. It doesn't always bother me since I like keeping to myself because it keeps me motivated and stay focused on my goals. However, if someone approaches me, I try to be as polite, passive, and friendly as possible. The only way to move out of this stage is to constantly interact with me until I feel comfortable.

Chapter 1 (Reality): Now that I'm comfortable, the snark and attitude starts to come through. At first, it will be a few light-hearted teasing that surprise people. Slowly, the jabs grow harsher and my voice grows louder. The dynamic of the conversation changes as I begin to dominate. My voice rises as my hands do all the talking. Sarcasm and eye rolls are regular parts of conversation. A thick cloud of chaos and self-deprecation arises, leading to a storm of endless rangs about my dramatic woes. In the midst of this confusion, you can't help but wonder: what happened to that soft-spoken girl?

Chapter 2 (Chaos): It has become my personal mission to make your life as miserable as possible. My sinister laughter rings through the air, bringing headaches to those around me. Despite all their attempts, no one stop me writing monologues that parody your towards your crush or stealing your phone until you give me your chips. My ego has devoured my self-deprecation; my word is law. My beauty, my hardwork, my intelligence-- me. You absolutely hate it, but you can't leave. The quick-wit, the variety of humor, and the soft crinkle around my eyes when I smile. The smart-assery is almost endearing. You can't help but wonder, what is she doing to do next? It's a game of cat and mouse, but I am always victorious.

Chapter 3 (Darkness): Beneath the madness, lies a small girl fighting against the shackles against her feet. She will not accept any help, she must escape on her own. Doubt constantly lingers in her mind, a consequence of previous endeavors that failed due to pride. She does not care for those who jeer at her as she struggles, holding her head high. There's only one thing in her mind: she will do anything to escape. It will be methodical, calculating, and nothing less than perfection. And when she does, she vows to do everything in her power to take her rightful spot on the throne.

Chapter 4 (Light): And so she escapes and sets on her path to become queen. Along her path, she befriends villagers who aid her quest. Although she becomes the voice of harsh reason, they heed her wisdom. Her companions know that despite her sharp tongue, she is simply looking out for them. Although she dislikes any form of affection, the cracks of her stone heart shine through her actions. It is here that she finds balance. Innocence, reality, chaos, darkness, and light meld into one.

Conclusion: Unfortunately, the journey is not over. However, the journey itself can teach one a lot about themselves. Thus far, the little girl has learned for her love of novels, often with her head in clouds to escape reality. She's also taken a liking to storytelling, finding solace in writing and storytelling to express the emotions she cannot communicate otherwise. She likes to bathe in her vanity by indugling in fashion and makeup, spending hours to create the perfect look. Despite this newfound sense of self, only time will tell whether she can succeed in her quest.

Adding a summary below because as a fellow matchup writer, I can see how this description would drive you insane. I'm so sorry for the story lol

Summary: At first I'm super shy, but I'm actually a sarcastic smartass that has a large ego and annoys everyone. My only redeemable quality is that I'm funny. Deep down, I'm ambitious, stubborn, and paranoid. With friends I'm the unaffectionate voice of reason that shows love through actions. My hobbies are makeup, reading, writing, and public speaking (aka storytelling).

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Hello! 💎

Thank you for sending in a request, I hope you like the result ! I’m doing fine, everybody at home is still healthy! 🙏

So I really enjoy how you elaborated on your layered and complex personality, because when I do matches I take people’s negative traits into consideration and they boy’s as well. Let’s face it, nobody’s perfect, and I like how the characters have their own flaws. I always look at how everybody could develop. (although it is not complete redemption cuz i’m not sure if that is possible for demons. like in paradise lost that is impossible but at this point it is not known how far obey me will go with that 🤷 but anyway regardless of canon i like to think that the MC has a positive effect on each character because i prefer healthy relationships)

So I think your shy first impression would actually draw all of them in. I mean like yeah, they all have their prefered types, but they are also very curious demons (not exactly genuine but curious nevertheless) and would compete to figure out your actual personality. (I mean..Belphie probably not that much but deep down he is interested too)

I think by the time you’d show your deeper layers and vica versa you’d have a strong bond with Mammon (he is supposed to be with you a lot so really; it is hard to avoid opening up to him first but it is up to your imagination how far that goes), Satan would appreciate your shared hobbies and intellect, but it is up to you how much you trust him. Asmo obviously because of makeup, you have a shared interest and he can show you some tricks regarding that. I think both Satan and Asmo could influence your writing also. (Satan knows some lit Devildom stories that the human world lacks, and Asmo probably knows so much gossip nobody is prepared for)

Now obviously, Asmo is not the ideal partner because he would definitely prefer someone affectionate.

I’m deciding between Lucifer and Satan..but I am unsure what kinf of improvement you and Lucifer would result in, despite the connection that might form between you two. (I mean I don’t think it is a good idea to pair a kind of arrogant character with a deep-down paranoid person.)

But I think you and Satan could work out.

I already mentioned the hobbies/shared interests and source of inspiration, but there is more than that to it!

He definitely needs some guidance in his life and no way he would ever let Lucifer play that role.

It’s not that he is not independent, but he should reconcile with his birth as much as he can - you being a dominant voice of reason under the surface is something he can respect.

Yeah he can be pretty dominant and that might result in arguments from time to time, but you are somebody he needs so he will do his best to apologize if he snaps for some reason.

You both are witty and sarcastic and I think you would kind of point out the other’s flaws like that. No offense taken on either side.

So his aggressive tendencies the others warned you about might cause paranoia in you but I don’t think he would actually be violent towards the MC so if you bring it up to him in a conversation he would reassure you that you really shouldn’t worry about that. (and then he beats up whoever made you think that, behind your back)

You see, on the surface he is also calm and collected but on a deeper layer he is also insecure and oh boy he has so much flaws that should be fixed.

Again, you being rational, wise, voice of reason proves to be much needed.

As I elaborated before, in his case I don’t think there is space for complete redemption but he would go a long way with your aid!

He also adores your ambitions and your goals in life.

He would read all the work you decide to share with him! He would disappear into the night reading your story and the next time you see him he has a copy of your story in his hand; little notes everywhere, underlined parts, several bookmarks, tons of insanely detailed questions, sharing his interpretations... you better be ready because it will be a long conversation.

This way he also learns so much about you and the way you express your feelings! He would fall sooo hard, especially when he supposes you like him because of some line on page 73′s third paragraph

He wouldn’t be sure though. (Again, he can be kind of insecure.)

Not until one of you actually makes a move. I think when that time comes, he would absolutely make a reference to one of your stories one way or another. Even if you don’t write romance. He’s smart, he will find a way.

I think he would also help you “stay on Earth” considering your fears and tendency of stubborn and prideful behaviour.

You would never have to ask him for help, as he will be the one suggesting it all the time. He is good at observing people, he will know if/when you need help. He refuses to be rejected by a human so really you have no chance here.

He also has his own sense of humour so time spent together would involve joking around sometimes. I mean despite his facade, he can be a little brat sometimes.

Like a cat he likes his independence so really he is not going to force any affection that you would not welcome. Maybe sometimes he enjoys it, but definitely not early in a relationship.

He would love to participate in your storytelling activities. Not one occassion he would miss.

#obey me!#obey me #obey me satan #obey me matchup #swd obey me #obey me swd #obey me shall we date #submission

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chibivesicle · 5 years

Text

Golden Kamuy chapters 218 & 219. Everything is wrong in regards to panning for gold.

Chapter 218 starts off with the man that Sugimoto saved from the bear. Which really as soon as he mentioned the scrape on his forehead was a recent injury (and no obvious signs of being chewed on by a freakkin’ bear) I’m going to go with the fact that there is no bear. Or that this man IS the bear. Why? Based on what he thinks about Sugimoto. That Sugimoto is so nice!

You know who thinks Sugimoto is nice? Criminals! Henmei and the con artist Suzukawa. Anyone who thinks Sugimoto is nice is almost always a dangerous person. His brother apparently catches up to him and we learn his name is Heita (who really has to be a dangerous person).

Shiraishi then asks if he’s a gold prospector due to his fancy boots and Sugimoto then smiles awkwardly as he admits his poor experience searching for gold himself. The older brother Taka is immediately suspicious as he looks at Sugimoto and Shiraishi, while Heita is just more interested in their plans.

I’m sorry Heita but your facial expression this panel really is making me nervous and Sugimoto is terrible at reading creepy and dangerous people in situations like these where he either saves or protects them.

Heita declares that there is still plenty of gold dust to be found while an younger brother? and his older brother are suspicious, since they do have 2 rifles, bayonets, the fact that Vasily also carries a pistol and Asirpa has arrows and knives. The putative father points out that robbers wouldn’t save them.

The next page reveals a very attractive woman who has come out to inquire about their unique looking group. She looks like she could be a seductive woman and she remarks on Vasily as a foreigner and Shiraishi winks at her to define them as comrades while Sugimoto annoyed decides to define them as a rabble in english.

I would take this to mean that Shiraishi’s using a more positive spin on their group while Sugimoto is distancing himself from Vasily. The longer they travel with Vasily, I can’t help but think Sugimoto will see him more and more like Ogata. Silent and observing them. Taka then angrily tells Noriko to head back to their tent and she seems annoyed by his order.

There are a few pages of gold prospecting 101 from Heita to Sugimoto and Shiraishi. They try to do things while Asirpa just stays behind on shore giving minimal support by heating water so they can try to work in the freezing cold water. Heita and his family are using a more effective way to look for gold and it seems that perhaps due to their friendship with Asirpa, Sugimoto and Shiraishi may not ever have a shot at finding gold since as an Ainu, she believes this is one of the mistakes people made polluting the river. I think it is a bit of a karmic reminder that they know enough information now, to realize they shouldn’t be doing this and if they do it - it won’t work out for them b/c they are friends with Asirpa and Shiraishi has even had the Kiro’s tour of Karafuto to explain the rights of the native peoples of the east/north.

And Shiraishi even knows this as he declares it just isn’t going to work for them.

Again, Shiraishi is the voice of reason. Just follow through on things Shiraishi, you are getting there!

Just as Sugimoto is about to give up as well, Heita tells them about gold that is mixed with platinum, and his family seems uncomfortable with him telling them so many points that they must have been keeping secret from others.

The next few pages are more description of the rising interest in platinum metals from miners and the value is increasing. It can be used in fountain pens which were become more popular in Japan and now they didn’t need to import it from elsewhere to make the pens. Therefore, Heita says there will be a second “gold” rush in Hokkaido.

Even though he’s factually correct, I would not trust to work with this man! He looks like a smaller version of Usami with those eyes.

Shiraishi and Sugimoto are awestruck and in shock as they look on with sparkle in their eyes as they then firmly hold each others hands and Asirpa looks on from behind them. They don’t even look at each other when they do this, they just instinctively hold hands.

After this Heita notices the bear again. The rest of his family can’t see it and no one else can see it either. Just looking at his facial expression and the creepy font for his statement about the bear getting closer (a likely hallucination) he’s creepy and suspicious as all hell. Furthermore, he says that the bear is the wen kamuy. And Asirpa upon hearing that notices the carved bear case on his belt.

Thanks Noda, I now know who the wen kamuy is - it is Heita.

Sugimoto and Asirpa go to check out where it was spotted. Yet they don’t find any signs of a bear. Asirpa clearly states that there is no sign of a bear yet Sugimoto does not believe it. He fully believes Heita, just like he believed Henmei and Suzukawa (as an Ainu elder).

Then Sugimoto tries to kind of apologize to her by disagreeing with her read on the NO bear status by referring to the white bear a sign that the Mountain gods are angry. Really Sugimoto? This is a half-assed attempt to connect with Asirpa’s own belief system. Yet she just pauses before she states that she wonders . . . The chapter ends with the older father being chewed on by the “bear”.

219 then starts off with Vasily sketching a wren. For a character who I think is a snow leopard, he does seem to have a cat like tendency to patiently stare at a bird. Asirpa seems to becoming more comfortable with him. I feel like this is Ogata 2.0, she has a reason to talk to him about a bird. This also shows that Asirpa is still a non-judgemental person and she really does seem to try to approach others in a neutral fashion despite the fact that Vasily shot Shiraishi in the leg. This is really Ogata 2.0 since she approached Ogata even though he had fought with Sugimoto with a clear intent to cause harm.

To add to the fact to my now official “I am the Wen Kamuy” Heita hypothesis, she remarks that the wren, Cakcak Kamuy should call indicating there the the bear is. The lack of its call means there is no bear near by. The last panel shows a super creepy looking Heita and he’s gotta be the Wen Kamuy. He explains more prospecting tools and terms to Sugimoto and Shiraishi and then he appears to be almost magical as he tells them where they should look for platinum. Sugimoto and Shiraishi are obsessed with him and ready to do whatever he says. He gets them when he agrees to split the money between them equally and they would rather do this than kill the Wen Kamuy. Asirpa then strongly interjects that gold panning polluted the rivers and everyone lost their focus on hunting.

She tries really hard to convince them otherwise, and they completely ignore her (and her uncle’s words that Sugimoto was already told once before) and they beg Heita to help them, Master Heita even as they bow. Asirpa then inquires about his Ainu tobacco case with the bear on it. Heita says he worked with some Ainu and they got along well so they gave it to him as a gift. She replies that it explains why he knew the term Wen Kamuy (and this must also imply that most Japanese in Hokkaido are not familiar with the term).

Sugimoto then tells Heita that they know about the Wen Kamuy and that it has attacked people along the river and then Shiraishi tries to re-assure him that it will be okay b/c Asirpa is their bear hunting specialist to help him relax and help them find the gold.

Asirpa tries to get information from him about the bear’s behaviour and he with the creepiest expression ever - white eyes, Usami shaped says that it has been going on for years and years - implying that this cannot be a single bear that has become a Wen Kamuy.

I assume that he also mumbled this a little since Asirpa turns around in shock as she says “What?” while Shiraishi is encouraging Sugimoto to do his best with him together. As Asirpa looks back at Heita, his head is awkwardly turned to the side, his eyes a shut as he smiles in a scary fashion and his mouth is completely black. A few pages before when Heita was speaking you could see his teeth and his mouth was a light grey. But now, it is totally black which CANNOT be a good sign. He’s no longer human with that facial expression.

The action then shifts to Vasily drawing by himself. Noriko asks him to come with her to draw her in their hut. To give context to her as a character, here are a few tweets form Sei Kobiyama describing the context of her type of character.

The story arc is a combination of Showa pulp fiction and horror stories explaining the creepy factor. Noriko is also a draw like a typical dangerous and seductive woman looking to do something bad, I’m guessing likely towards a male target.

That immediately comes out as she strips down to pose in the nude for Vasily. Based on his furious sketching he seems to have found it very inspiring. However, she catches something out of the corner of her eye and she freaks out!

Some sort of object that she was trying to get rid of is back and at that moment Taka comes to interrupt them and does some major shaming of her behavior. She seems tired of waiting for Taka and he tries to explain to her to wait a little while longer, it is clear that she’s lonely as they try to find the gold. The next page then reveals Heita up in a tree watching them kiss as he licks his own lips and then climbs down the tree face first and leaps off like a flying squirrel. Noda really wants to make it clear that Heita is not okay. I get it. Thanks. Sugimoto and Shiraishi are trying to pan for gold when they realize that Heita is missing and they panic that something bad may happen to him. They tell Asirpa to keep an eye on him as the bear expert. She replies to them if there really even is a bear around.

But either way, she does take their suggestion to go look around. Meanwhile, Taka tells Vasily that Noriko is playing a trick on him by taking his binoculars and placing them over on a mushroom growing off of a tree.

Vasily being the sniper that he is, immediately goes to retrieve his precious binoculars. It is clear that Taka is leading him into a trap, an amappo specifically set up by some local Ainu.

Thankfully, Asirpa manages to save him and points out the signs for others to observe the presence of a trap.

After she speaks Taka appears in the background watching them as it is clear that he sent Vasily there on purpose. Vasily nods, so hopefully this is showing that he can understand a tiny amount of Japanese. She then has a full monologue to Vasily about how she’s been trying to find evidence for the bear that Heita has seen. She went as far as looking beyond the described range, found all of the local bears that are all in hibernation so she knows that he’s outright lying. Since Shiraishi and Sugimoto won’t listen to her - she tells Vasily who can’t even talk back towards her currently.

The big question is now, why is he lying? Besides the obvious fact that he is a killer based on the Sugimoto is nice rule.

Sugimoto and Shiraishi notice a bear off in the distance and go to find Asirpa. They caught a glimpse of its butt. Bear bum spotted. The final page then shows a bear claw around the Father and youngest son, buried in the snow and a final scene of Heita screaming in total shock/fury/I don’t even know what else.

I would guess the bear claw is actually Heita’s foot via “Heita vision”. The editor’s tag line of “I came, I saw, I devoured” instead of conquered makes me think Heita is the bear and a cannibal. So where does all of this action in 218 and 219 leave us? First off this is a creepy horror story arc. People driven by greed to pan for gold in the rivers, out for themselves, not trusting others and wanting to keep others from robbing/killing/stealing from them. Heita is clearly a killer - a Wen Kamuy human. Shiraishi almost gets the idea that panning for gold is a bad idea, but he gives into Heita’s sales pitch. Sugimoto and Shiraishi keep ignoring Asirpa and her observations. I’m obviously biased, but Asirpa is getting a bit of the Ogata treatment/repeat of how Sugimoto ignored her during the Silent Kotan arc. He should know by now that her observational skills are vastly superior to his. I’m hoping Vasily will be a stand in for Ogata and he will help out in their battle against Heita and even Taka and his binoculars may be important to that. Sugimoto and Shiraishi are going to freak out when the horror reveal happens. It would be interesting if Asirpa is forced to fight against Heita. What if she has to kill him out of necessity? That would be a cool plot point where Asirpa takes down the human Wen Kamuy. This would be a philosophically interesting point.

The other major theme is how Japanese people are exploiting the Ainu land and this is a bad idea. I’m sure Heita did not get that Ainu tobacco case through friendly means. Or, the Ainu gave it to him to warn other Ainu that this man is the Wen Kamuy. That would be a totally awesome plot point as well! Just based on the fact that Sugimoto is still not quite getting Asirpa’s background shows that this will likely reveal something deeper between them in regards to Wen Kamuy, different cultures and how to really respect each other. Overall, these types of arcs in Golden Kamuy aren’t my favorite, but they are frequently tied to colonialism and the abuse of the natives as this has overlap with; the bear monster arc with the American, boss and princess; the Silent Kotan arc; how Japanese fisherman were over fishing and Henmei was hiding among them and the central theme of wanting the gold.

#golden kamuy #golden kamuy meta #sugimoto saichi #Shiraishi Yoshitake #asirpa #vasily #gold panning #wen kamuy #bears

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wolfpawn · 5 years

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Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 19

Story Summary - Based on an idea I had that I submitted to Imagine Loki. Imagine Loki was raised on Jotunheim as Laufey’s son after the war, but an agreement was then made that he would wed Odin’s daughter so Odin could secure the alliance of Jotunheim through the marriage. Loki, in turn, was raised to be king of Jotunheim, but how he views Asgard is far different from how Odin’s daughter is raised leading to a clash of cultures as well as uncertainty between the pair of betrothed youths.

Chapter Summary - Loki decides to ask Ella something leading to more questions.

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Tags - @peppermint-j @damalseer @perpetual-fangirl @tinchentitri @inspired-snowflace @raphaelaisabella @alexakeyloveloki @caffiend-queen @devilbat @nonsensicalobsessions @skulliebythesea @majoringinlife @salempoe @lotus-eyedindiangoddess

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Loki trained with his brothers, not thinking of anything except how to get past their defences. His lesser height had its disadvantages, but with it, were also some abilities they could not wish to possess. The long-range weapons of their ice swords posed an issue for him getting close to them, but once he got past that, then he was impossible for them to stop. He was working up a sweat, something only he was able to do by Jotnar standards due to his mixed heritage when he realised that his brothers were no longer looking at him, but across the arena.

“That is different,” Helbindi commented.

Loki looked to see Heriff, his father’s oldest general walking by. He was loathed by most everyone. A stoic, gruff and cantankerous being that growled or barked orders at his men. There he walked with his mate, the only one that ever seemed able to bear him, beside him and in the middle, far shorter than her companions, was Ella, speaking animatedly with them. When they heard peels of laughter, the three brothers looked at one another in shock. They never even thought Heriff or his mate to be capable of such a sound. He watched as Ella’s hands moved as she spoke, her face filled with animation as she described something to the older Jotnar, both of whom seemed to listen with keen interest.

“Maybe she is not insufferable,” Byleistr commented. “Perhaps she is interesting?” “Loke’s?” Helbindi looked to his brother for confirmation.

“Just get back to duelling, or else you will slip further back and be forced to return to beginners training,” He growled in response, noting that others seemed to be looking at Ella in intrigue also around the arena.

His brothers scoffed but did as he suggested, ignoring their now sister-in-law as she continued to speak with the general.

Ella registered who was training in the arena, but said nothing of it as she continued to regale Heriff and his mate of the Elvish customs of the autumn festival, and of how she, as a youth, accidentally caused a terribly funny accident to occur at one such festival which led to laughter any time she told the story, this time wielding the same results. She was elated that most Jotnar seemed to immediately accept her apology for her distant demeanour before and those who were more sceptical seemed to realise after mere moments of talking to her that she was not as stuck-up as her past behaviour had led them to believe and that she was more amiable than they thought, that it was simply a misunderstanding.

* That evening, with a single use of her seidr, Ella had her rooms tidied, not wanting to bother those working in the palace. She looked around the room for a moment before looking sadly at her flowers, noting that they were beginning to melt, their manner of dying. She tidied up a little more and thought over everything she learnt that day from speaking to others, smiling at being able to speak with others and spend time feeling less alone. She learnt a lot from listening to them speak, from hearing their thoughts. It taught her a lot with regards to her surrounds and allowed her to learn more. She was thinking through this when she heard a knock on her door. Curious, she went over to it and opened it. “Prince Loki.” She bowed slightly on seeing him standing there. “Is everything alright?”

“Yes, I just…I was wondering if I could ask you to join me for dinner?”

Ella eyed him carefully, not knowing what to say, highly suspicious of why he would make such a request.

Seeing her uncertainty, Loki felt a little insulted but forced himself to refrain from making comments with regards her reluctance. “I think, if we are to try and work at this, that perhaps we should attempt to have some meals together, it will allow us to get to know one another.”

The awkwardness with which he spoke caused Ella to suspect that there was no ulterior motive to his suggestion and it was as he stated. “Actually, I think that a good idea.”

Loki did not know if she was being sarcastic for a moment. “ Yes?” She nodded. “Good, well, I…” He paused and recalled his earlier thoughts. “Is there a time that is more preferable to you? I know Aesir prefer to eat into the late evening.”

“No, many simply prefer to pretend to eat late so to give an excuse for drinking like fish at an earlier time than is deemed acceptable. Six is a good eating time, ten is a good drinking one, meeting at eight and doing both is seem as something of a compromise. I personally prefer to eat sometime within the next hour or so. If this is not agreeable with you, then, of course, we should compromise on a time between our preferred times.”

“No, that would suit me also. I would ask that we do so in my rooms, they are somewhat larger.”

“That sounds like a good idea. I had best ready myself for such if we are to do so.”

Taking the hint, Loki nodded slightly. “Yes, of course.” His eyes scanned around the room for a moment before he noted a petal dissolve from one of the flowers he had given her which still stood in the case that seemed to be pride of place on the table, his arms that she had designed in her boredom still very much on the vase, though altered to that of the one he had made suggestions of alteration to. Thinking to himself for a moment, he got another idea. With a smile that showed far greater confidence than he showed mere moments before, he gave a slight bow. “I will go and allow you the time to do as you require.”

Noting his sudden change in demeanour, Ella eyed him warily. “Yes, thank you. And thank you for your suggestion, My Prince."

Loki stared silently at her for a moment at such a reference. He cleared his throat and nodded before rushing out of the room.

Ella, who did not realise the reason for his erratic behaviour wondered if there was, in fact, something more occurring that evening or if indeed, he did simply just want to dine with her to try and thaw their less than ideal situation. She could only way and see. Going for a bath, she prepared for the evening ahead.

"What in the realms are you doing?"

Loki, though rarely startled, jumped slightly when he heard his father behind him. "Getting some flowers.”

“I established that much by myself, but why?”

“The last ones I collected are dying, it’s time for fresh ones.” He answered, using a small ice blade to slice off some more.

“For what purpose?”

“I just stated, the last ones I gave Ella have died, she will require more.”

Laufey expected one of a few answers to his question, but that answer startled him. “Ella?”

“Yes. You stated these were something of a hit with her, so I thought them a good idea to give to her as a small gift. She accepted them and when I was in her rooms earlier, I noted that the last ones are dying so I thought perhaps to give her some fresh ones.”

Again, Laufey was shocked by his son’s admission. “I see, and I assume there was some reason you were in her rooms? I don’t mean to pry but conceiving a child at the end of an illness is rarely recommended.”

Loki shook his head. “No, it’s nothing like that. She…she fought to fix things, things she did not break.” “She supports you, as a mate is supposed to do. Even when you do not wish for her to, she does so willingly, for so long, you pushed her away, yet she still stands with you. She stood against her father in front of us and fought to remain. Odin may have become more benevolent with age, but to stand up to him, in front of those he has little to no care for the opinion of but wishes for them to see him as strong, that is noteworthy.” Loki nodded slightly at his father’s words. “I am only glad you see this now, even if you were blind before. Perhaps there is still hope.”

Loki looked at the flowers again, wondering if they were enough.

#loki fic #chapter 19 #Pride and Prejudice

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restlessmaknae · 5 years

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flavour to my fantasy

Kim Seokjin is an aspiring food vlogger, loved by thousands on all social media platforms. While he marvels around Seoul one day, he enters a burger place where he meets Jang Nara and a whole new culinary experience begins.

♦ Pairing: food vlogger!Jin x vegan restaurant owner!OC (Jang Nara)

♦ Genre: fluff, comedy, romance

♦ Words: 5k

Kim Seokjin was wandering around the downtown area of Seoul, searching for a hidden place that hadn’t yet caught his eyes. He was constantly looking for new places with new foods and new drinks to try. Considering that his job required him to always evolve, to always come up with new ideas and new recipes, he liked getting inspiration from random visits at Seoul’s food places, let them be popular ones or hidden gems.

This was also a district he wasn’t familiar with, and he decided to go with his gut feeling, and chose a random, cosy-looking place called ‘Burger & Land’ and stepped inside. He was immediately welcomed by the scent of mediterranean herbs and freshly cut veggies, lovely little plants all over the place from the ones on the tables to the ones on the counter and by the windows, the variety ranging from cactuses to tulips in all colours of the rainbow.

The place was rather small, only a few tables with wooden chairs, but considering that it wasn’t a franchise, it couldn’t have been any larger. There was tranquil music being played in the background, not too quiet to go unnoticed, not too loud to disturb any customer. The atmosphere was friendly and homey, not like the nosy burger place he had expected but he was genuinely surprised in a good way, he had to admit.

As he sat down at an unoccupied table, he was immediately welcomed by a pretty waitress with the widest smile he had ever seen who handed her a menu. The options were both in Korean and English, and the range of burgers, side dishes, sauces and other meals such as seasonal soups and cream soups and desserts made his mouth water. He hadn’t expected such a variety, especially after seeing that everything was fresh and made on the spot. He had indeed come to the right place, there was only one thing he didn’t catch sight of.

“Good afternoon! What can I get for you?” The pretty waitress came back with that trademark smile of hers after leaving a few minutes for him to decide on his order, making Seokjin smile in return. He didn’t want to sound rude or inappropriate, so he flashed his best charming smile as he leaned forward, almost as if he had wanted to know a secret.

“Perhaps, do you have something with meat? As I can see, you only have tofu, seitan, mushroom and veggie-based burgers,” he inquired curiously, putting his elbows down on the table.

Something akin to amusement flashed across the woman’s face, but she didn’t show any signs of confusion, she answered patiently.

“It’s because we are a vegan place. You can also see on the menu that our burgers are 100% plant-based.” She pointed at the little line on the bottom of the menu.

“Oh really?” Seokjin chuckled a bit nervously, ashamed that he had made such an amateur mistake. Though when the meaning of her words actually kicked in, he shrieked as if he had seen a ghost. “OH REALLY?” he repeated, totally bewildered, and his sudden loud exclaim made the girl jump a bit.

“Well, yes.”

There was a moment of silence before Seokjin could pull himself back together, and start anew. He couldn’t believe that vegan food had never crossed his mind even though he was very well aware that it was a rising trend on the food market, and it had become common that vloggers like him were eating plant-based meals. How could he not think about it before?

He cleared his throat, averting his eyes from the menu to the girl, starting his explanation with a wide smile.

“You may not know me but I’m Kim Seokjin, I’m a food vlogger and I’ve been looking for inspiration for new recipes but I couldn’t find anything that piqued my curiosity,” he shared with her his latest mishap. Being a food vlogger, it was usually fun and challenging, he had a lot of ideas, he was brave enough to try all kinds of foods, plus he was so enthusiastic that he didn’t seem to run out of meals he had wanted to make. However, after almost two years of uploading videos twice a week, countless recipe tastings and restaurant visits, he felt like he got a bit stuck lately.

“But why have I never thought about vegan food before? I think I found my call!” He continued joyfully, almost ready to bolt up from the table to celebrate his victory, but he decided to stay still in the end. He didn’t want to make a fool out of himself, there were some people at the nearby tables, so he didn’t want to embarrass neither himself, nor the pretty waitress.

“That’s great! I’m really happy to hear that,” she cheered him on equally beamingly, and there was just something about her zealous behaviour that made his smile grow even wider. With her little buns atop of her head (those were the so-called space buns, right?), that broccoli-patterned apron on her and her petite figure, she looked like a fairy, a fairy who was sent by mother nature. She was indeed cute.

“Do you think you could show me how you make your burgers? Or suggest some vegan recipes?” Jin asked immediately, his enthusiastic reaction making her giggle.

“I’d love to, actually, but maybe you should taste our burgers first. You know, there’s always a slim chance that you wouldn’t like it,” she remarked almost playfully, yet he wasn’t one to get mad hearing her words.

In fact, it was such a nice start to a whole new culinary experience, and the waitress was right, it could also happen that he didn’t like vegan food. Not that he usually didn’t new foods, but he was rather interested this time.

“Yeah, sure, you’re right.” He agreed with a slightly aggraveted laughter and looked down at the menu yet again. He was such a fool really, but he tried his best not to show what kind of emotions were going through him, because that would have made the situation even more awkward. “I’ll take the Broccoli Dream burger then with sweet potato fries and guacamole on the side and as for drinks… one medium strawberry lemonade,” he decided a minute later, and so the pretty waitress disappeared with his order jotted down in her notebook and a smile that lasted until she came back again.

The burger arrived a bit more than half an hour later but it was understandable since the meals were made on the spot with fresh ingredients, thus they couldn’t just put it in front of him like they did at burger franchise places.

However, based on the smell of the freshly made burgers, the fries and even the guacamole, he knew that he was up for a good feast and the nice exterior probably hid a delicious interior.

“I can film here, right?” he asked just in case before he could have dug into his food and record the whole thing.

“Yes, sure,” the waitress responded with a pretty smile and walked back to her usual place behind the counter.

Seokjin turned back to his burger, brought out his camera from his bag, adjusted the angles and the lightning, made a few pictures to test out the waters and then he could finally start the recording.

“Hello, everyone!” He greeted the imaginary viewers on the other side of the camera with a wave of his hands and a wide smile. “I’m Jin, you’re watching Eat Jin, and today I stumbled upon this lovely place called Burger & Land. This is a vegan place, and it’s also my first time trying vegan food, let alone a vegan burger, but I’m curious. Let’s dig into it, shall we?” he introduced the video’s theme enthusiastically, and spoke a bit about the ingredients of the burger he had chosen before showing his order to the camera. He made sure to zoom on the colourful veggies and sauces well, so that the viewers could have the best point of view.

Then, he put down his camera again and took the first bite into the burger, humming satisfyingly when the flavours kicked in.

“Oh my gosh, this is so good! The flavours are so intense, and this sauce resembles mayonnaise so much that it’s almost scary!” He commented zealously between two huge bites of the burger, then reached for the fries as well and digged them into the guacamole sauce. He enjoyed having all sorts of foods at the same time, thus it was no surprise that he decided to eat the burger, the fries and the sauce all at once. “The veggies are really fresh and crispy, they complement each other so well. I especially love the bean sprouts because we don’t use them often but they always give an extra flavour to a meal,” he mused out loud after digging in more, and the more he ate, the more content he was.

He continued his mukbang, talking about the different flavours and how they mingled in so well; that he had never thought a broccoli-based patty could be this good and also the fact that he was genuinely surprised that he didn’t miss the taste of meat. For once, that was for sure, because he couldn’t have assumed the rest. Yet, one thing was for sure, he really enjoyed his feast and didn’t even leave a single fry behind, he ate everything.

Tummy full and content, camera turned off, he wasn’t ready to leave, not yet. After telling the pretty waitress just how much he had enjoyed the meal and asking if he could come by next time and learn a few recipes, it turned out the waitress was actually the owner of the place, the one who had came up with the recipe herself, and she also liked to help out in the kitchen when she wasn’t helping customers.

“I would be really glad if you could show me some basic vegan meals I could make, they don’t have to be burgers. Of course, we can also talk about sponsorship as well,” Jin cut to the chaste after he had been enlightened about the person behind the whole concept of Burger & Land.

She smiled that wide smile of hers that seemed so endearing, almost like the sunshine peeking out from behind the clouds on a rainy day. He couldn’t help but smile back at her, the reaction seeming so natural and easy. No matter how pumped up, confused or overly excited he was, she could handle it well for the time being. He hoped that it would stay the same.

“Yes, sure. Let’s decide on the time then,” she suggested beamingly, and a few minutes later, Jin left the place with a full stomach, a sweet aftertaste in his mouth and a (strictly business-related) encounter for Friday after working hours.

No matter how many places Jin had already visited and no matter how many chefs he had already met, he was always looking forward to another encounter. This time was no different, he was definitely looking forward to meeting Jang Nara again, the petite, fairy-like waitress and the owner of Burger & Land with the widest smile he had ever seen. There was something enchanting about her, her whole persona was radiating warmth and kindness, so how could he not be excited for Friday?

When he arrived at the place at 9pm, it was closed as expected, but she had told him beforehand that he should come by from the backdoor, and so he did, gently knocking on the door before he would have come off as a sudden intruder.

When he opened the door and stepped inside, the girl was already in the middle of rushing to the door but stopped halfway when she caught sight of him and bowed politely.

“Hey!” Nara waved a bit, her smile stretching from one ear to the other. “I still need to do a bit of cleaning, but it won’t take longer than five minutes, so make yourself comfortable in the kitchen,” she suggested zealously and disappeared (probably) into the restaurant part of the place, leaving the boy alone.

He did as he was told, getting rid of his coat, pulling his fluffy, beige sweater’s sleeves up to his elbows and fishing out his little recipe notebook that he always had on himself in case he needed to jot down some recipes or ideas while he was commuting. Then, he looked around a bit in the cozy kitchen with neat, organized cutleries and kitchen essentials on multiple shelves. Cute little cactus pots occupied some empty places, painting the otherwise white and black scenery with a little bit of green. The aroma of some kind of scented candle (maybe vanilla and cinnamon?) lingered in the air, soothing the boy’s nerves with its sweet and warm fragrance.

He didn’t even have a lot of time to look around before Nara came back and put a cactus-patterned apron around her waist. She was so quick that Jin didn’t even have the time to suggest helping her, she was already finished by the time he could have opened his mouth.

“I’ve thought that we could make pad thai with crispy tofu and my favourite peanut butter-based sauce,” she suggested with a wide smile as she started putting the ingredients onto the counter. She was so organized and focused, he was already baffled by her professionalism even before she could actually show him anything.

“Sounds really good,” Jin exclaimed with an impressed whistle. “Can I help you with something?”

“I’m going to bring together all of the ingredients, so I don’t think you can help with it, but maybe you can put on an apron,” she explained and pointed at some aprons on a hanger by the door between the kitchen and the restaurant part of the place. “Though I’m not sure they will be to your liking because they are all for girls,” she added cheekily, and it was so fun to see this side of her.

Though Jin wasn’t one to be intimidated by pink aprons with hearts painted all over the material. In fact, he was actually pretty glad to wear something like that.

“Don’t worry for a second. Pink is my second name,” he joked around and flashed a confident grin. She immediately burst into laughter.

“Alright, Pink Jin. I’ll keep that in mind.” She winked at him before turning to a random cupboard and reaching for a chopping board.

Jin walked to the hanger with a smile plastered into his face, not quite believing what he had just witnessed. He wasn’t sure that she would be so free around him, especially not after his slightly awkward first question that should have probably not been asked at a vegan restaurant. Plus, somehow he always imagined owners of such places to be serious and no fun, he had actually met quite a few of them, but Jung Nara wasn’t one of them. Maybe it was because she seemed fairly young and she had such an authentic, homey place with not too much hype around it that she could let herself loose while still taking everything seriously. Or maybe she was always like this, he couldn’t tell for the time being.

“Are you ready?” Nara clapped her hands when Jin walked back to her and the ingredients were all placed on the counter.

“Yes, I’m ready.” He nodded and clapped his hands just like she did, earning a little giggle from her.

“Okay, so we are going to start by making the tofu because we are going to put them in the oven and bake them for around 30 minutes or until golden-brown,” she introduced zealously, bringing the chopping board, the tofu on a plate and a knife closer to them.

“I’ve never thought about baking tofu in the oven,” he admitted with a little laugh. He already liked this girl, it seemed that she liked extraordinary methods.

“Spicing them and then baking them will make the texture crispier,” Nara explained patiently, exchanging a glance with Jin before letting him chop up the tofu into bite-sized pieces while she was working on the tofu’s coating.

They worked together so well, and Jin really enjoyed that he also had something to do, she didn’t want to make everything on her own. It was much more fun this way. She was also a patient and enthusiastic chef with clear instructions and such hacks that he had never even encountered before. He was in awe more than he would have liked to admit, not just because of the cooking process and the recipe itself but also because of Nara’s personality that was like a ray of sunshine through the cloudy sky.

She was like a delicate flower growing in a blossoming field but she had her own thorns as well, the responsibility of someone who owned such a place after her grandmother had died. Her mother was never interested in cooking, thus she would have abandoned the tteokbokki place, yet cooking was Nara’s everything and it was because of her grandmother that she had learned how to make her own dishes, so she couldn’t let it just go to waste. Even though no one in her family had their own business apart from her grandmother, she tried her best to make things work, and she learned from her own mistakes during the years.

It wasn’t always easy, her vegan place was not even the most popular one in Seoul, but she was glad to have motivated and joyful employees and even the regular customers from nearby work places who had lunch at hers almost every day. She even told Jin that the name of the place was one of her friends’ idea: burger standing for the fact that she sold burgers and land for the other plant-based dishes she offered.

After finishing with the meal, they enjoyed a warm and delicious dinner by the scented candle’s light, sharing with each other the hardships of constantly evolving businesses and coming up with new recipes. Nara told him that it was difficult to have a daily lunch offer because she didn’t want to be too repetitive but at the same time it was sometimes bothersome to get every ingredient she wanted for certain dishes, so she had to be very clever with her choices. Plus, local and seasonal ingredients were a must, and she changed most of the burger options seasonally as well which was also challenging.

He shared with her how many times he usually made something before he would call it a recipe and how he had to give his leftovers to his friends and relatives because wasting food was a big no-no, yet there were days when he made dishes all day and ended up with 16 servings of food all to himself. Plus, sponsors and financing were a tricky thing when he was his own boss and his content wasn’t something that people could directly pay for, so he had to find ways to earn money for his work, but he seemed to be balancing it out well.

Through their hardships and angst stories, they could actually get to know each other a lot better, and by the time they finished with their dinner, they had already agreed on cooking together next Tuesday as well. They even walked to the nearby metro station together after Nara had closed the shop, but they went different ways from there.

“See you on Tuesday then,” Nara bid her goodbye with one of her trademark smiles, waving in the man’s direction.

“If anything comes up, you know my number.” Jin winked playfully and waved back, watching as she hopped on the metro, looked out of its window with an equally wide smile he looked back at her.

There was just something about her than made him feel like he was enchanted, but oh how much he enjoyed it!

The more time they spent together, the more Jin liked spending time with Nara, and no matter what they cooked, what they talked about or how long of a silence fell upon the two of them, everything seemed so right.

Those nights spent cooking together were always fun despite him sometimes being too weary and cranky after shooting videos for long hours or not being able to come up with the perfect recipe. If she could, she liked to help him out, thus the idea of shooting an actual cooking video with her came to his mind.

At first, she objected fervently, saying that being on camera was really not her cup of tea, but after some little nudges and the ultimatum that if she didn’t like the final outcome, Jin wouldn’t upload the video, she gave in.

That’s how they found themselves in the Burger & Land kitchen, fully equipped and ready to kick off the shooting.

However, Jin noticed that the petite female played with the hem of her apron as if she had been a bit overwhelmed, so he asked playfully:

“Are you nervous?” he inquired with one of his trademark smiles, hoping that his attitude could melt the girl’s anxiety away.

“Yes.” She nodded almost immediately and let out a bit of a laughter. He had never really seen her in such a state and it surprised him. Though he really tended to forget that some people were not as used to cameras as he was, and that he didn’t feel intimidated anymore while shooting, but a lot of people had never really been filmed like this.

“But why?” he inquired further while busying himself looking around, making sure that they really had everything they needed on hand.

Nara giggled a bit hearing his question. She looked particularly fairy-like that day with her messy bun atop of her head and her long, colourful, heart-shaped earrings framing her beautiful face. Even if she would have been frustrated, she would have looked adorable, and one couldn’t change Jin’s mind about that.

“Because you are filming, obviously.” She huffed almost comically but he had the perfect response.

“Not because I’m too handsome?” He wiggled his eyebrows seductively, earning a whole-hearted, genuine laughter from the girl.

“Might as well be because of that,” she joked, her little giggle reminding him of the heartwarming twingles of Christmas bells. Gosh, when did he become so weak for her? He couldn’t quite pinpoint the exact moment, maybe it was already during their first encounter, maybe not. No matter what, one thing was for sure and that was the fact that her whole persona was charming and he couldn’t get enough of it.

“Are you ready?” Jin threw the same question at her as she had done when they first met, and he saw the realization flashing across her face. She flashed a little smile as she recalled the memory of their very first encounter.

“I’m ready.” She nodded confidently, letting out a long sigh before looking up at him again. He couldn’t help but smile seeing her nervousness, it was rather cute, but at the same time he felt a bit guilty for putting her in such a situation.

That’s why he didn’t even think when he put his hands on her shoulders and patted them.

“You’re going to be amazing! I know it!” He said as he gave her a thumbs-up. She smiled that sweet smile of hers, tucking a loose strand behind her ear.

He didn’t know if she believed her but she had done great nevertheless, talking casually and naturally finding a way to look between the camera and Jin’s face. They had made the same pad thai recipe she had showed him during their first encounter but as the food vlogger he was, he needed to add some extra ingredients like lemon zest into the sauce and sesame seeds and kale as additional toppings.

They worked together just as well as they always did, and even when they said something that was slightly embarrassing or unprofessional, they merely laughed it off and moved on. He had a feeling that Nara even forgot about the camera by the end because she stayed the same even when they had finished and he turned off the camera.

“How did you enjoy the recording?” Jin grinned at her, hoping for the best possible answer.

“It was actually pretty fun. At least more fun than I would have expected,” she admitted beamingly, getting rid of her apron and folding it in two, then putting it back onto the rack by the door.

Then, just as she walked back to the counter and stopped beside Seokjin, the food vlogger turned to face her and seriously spoke up.

“You did really well,” he whispered gently and smoothly leaned closer to her, pressing a chaste, soft kiss on her left cheek that turned into scarlet red the moment he backed away. The roses that were painted on her pale skin by his simple action were even more beautiful, almost mesmerizing. He didn’t regret his little kiss in the least, not when a blushful smile stretched across her lips, not when she looked away so coyly.

She didn’t reject him and she didn’t oppose, that’s what mattered the most.

Weeks passed by and after Jin had uploaded the edited video and it had received a massive amount of positive feedback, he decided to make the cooking session with Nara into a series - of course with her own consent.

They had tried to make a lot of different dishes, not just main meals but desserts and snacks as well with easily accessible, seasonal ingredients, they had even made a video about student dorm-friendly, budget-friendly lunches. With time and practice, Nara got less and less nervous in front of the camera, and Jin’s chest swelled with pride whenever he looked at her while shooting a video together. Her features were much more relaxed and her smile was much more genuine and radiant on-camera than before, and he wanted to believe that he had also contributed to that outcome.

Of course Jin knew very well that he couldn’t make only vegan videos forever because his focus wasn’t just plant-based foods and also because Nara was busier than ever with Christmas getting closer and closer. So they decided to put an end to their collaboration for the time being, but it didn’t mean that he didn’t come back anymore.

In fact, he had tried to come up with some plant-based recipes on his own and he loved when he could surprise her with his creations after an exhausting work day. Sometimes she finished by the time he arrived, but sometimes he decided to help her with the cleaning or washing the dishes because she could definitely use a helping hand, and he didn’t mind assisting her a bit.

It was after another time when he was helping her out and after Nara calling it a day with a clap of her hands, Jin let out a long sigh and turned to the girl.

“So I was thinking, would you like to go on a date with me?” he inquired out of the blue, the previous topic of favourite scented candles’ fragrances long forgotten.

Nara was apparently taken aback by his question, her eyebrows were delicately elevated after hearing his words. She blinked a few more times, her lips slowly yet surely being lifted up into a smile. The silence was seriously dancing on his nerves, but at the same time he was already weak for her, and he could have just looked at her for hours without getting mad or bored.

“Yes, I would love that,” she admitted with a wide, childish smile and took off her apron to put it on the reck. “Are we going to a restaurant?” she asked as she turned back to him, curiosity filling her beautiful, star-filled eyes.

“No.” He shook his head confidently and took a step closer to her. “I’m cooking for you. In my territory. All vegan, don’t worry,” he concluded his plan with a wide smile that grew even wider when she let out an airy giggle.

“I’d love that.” She nodded zealously, taking a step closer to the young man.

Then, she looked up at him, the smile never leaving her lips, not even when he planted a kiss onto her rubin-coloured ones, their first kiss as sweet as the aftertaste of the vegan bounty cake they had previously shared.

#bangtanbuds #kwritersworldnet #kpopwritingnet #kreativewritersnet #bts scenarios #bts imagines #bts fluff #jin scenarios #jin imagines #jin fluff #bts comedy #jin comedy #bts #jin #my story #restlessmaknae #restless_maknae

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egdocument · 5 years

Text

About the EvaGeeks wiki and why you shouldn't trust it, concerning mainly one user.

On the subject of EvaGeeks: Let’s talk about the manipulation of information on the wiki, and perpetuated “nastiness” on the forums that has persisted for several years now. THIS IS A MIRROR OF THIS GOOGLE DOCS FILE. (My twitter post.) You can share this post or the original document freely, use parts of it, etc. I want this document to simply serve as a warning to new Eva fans and those less familiar with EvaGeeks and their history - as well as an update for people who haven’t seen the current state of it.

NOTE: If you can’t read any of these images, these are Imgur albums containing all of the notable ones: https://imgur.com/a/z2mGvvX https://imgur.com/a/oAgufc3

The intent of this document is not to “take down” the wiki or forum, obviously. The intent is simply to inform people of the dangers of trusting this site with their Eva info. It might be the best we have but that doesn’t mean we can’t improve it. I would actually love to see a more community cultivated version of the site with less biased information, but I fear that will never happen. The anxieties of any one (or many) individual(s), which have prevented consistent change until now are well justified, and it is not within reason to blame the outsiders for never bothering to correct the myriad of issues with the wiki. Please extend kindness to other Eva fans and approach sites like EvaGeeks with the appropriate scrutiny, if you aren’t already. We’re divided enough as it is.

Before I begin, I must state: All of the information presented is publicly available, either through main pages, chat logs or history. And yes, the link to join the Discord server and verify the information given in this is publicly available too. I will not link it myself, as I want to avoid any possible harassment of the users I speak about here. Harassment is NEVER the answer in any kind of conflict. This behaviour I don’t believe can go unchecked, but that doesn’t mean the consequences of it should be any kind of conflict towards any user. I will be naming them here so you are aware, but I really do have to advise you, as a reminder, DO NOT HARASS OR ENGAGE WITH THEM. The rule of thumb is that these issues are more systematic than you might think, and blaming or taking it out on a singular person or even a whole group is never justified. Targeted harassment, even with reason, especially never helps to remedy an issue, because it forces the person to double down on their behaviour and beliefs. Causing unnecessary pain to a person is never okay, and the ‘offences’ committed here aren’t deserving of it in the first place. Please also consider the feelings of the people who use the server and EvaGeeks site; not everyone is your "enemy" or your "target" (and frankly, no-one should be) and despite the feelings echoed in this document, EG is not a monolith of a singular opinion or belief.

The purpose of this document is to inform people of the ways EvaGeeks fails objectivity and has existed to push narratives and exclude outsiders for far too long. With new people coming into the Eva fandom (and there of course being others who have been around for quite a while but just aren't aware) I feel like now is the best time I could write this.

As for what prompted this, an anonymous member of the Discord server contacted me regarding the behaviour of one particular user they were concerned about. Said user had expressed considerable bias in the past and was admitting to making large edits to pages on the wiki very recently, and the person who contacted me felt unequipped to bring the issue to light themselves.

A decent amount of this document will be dedicated to presenting said user's contributions - while I feel someone always had to address the EvaGeeks Problem at large, it doesn't help that this user has essentially incriminated himself here to expose the problem in its entirety.

There is quite a bit of pretense I must discuss before I get into the subject of the wiki pages themselves. I suggest you read all of it; the start of the wiki section will be in heading text if you’d like to skip to it. I’m sure information on the biased editing of wiki pages is privy to anyone who has used the server or the site itself, but at the server’s current status of 60 entire members, I know not everyone has, or is aware of what the problem actually is. Please note that the person who contacted me has requested anonymity and I will be complying. I will not include screenshots of their conversation with me, and anything I quote from them will be paraphrased so nobody can go full Sherlock and analyse their typing patterns. It sounds silly and it’s probably just paranoia, but they shared my concern here. Any conflict we can prevent is for the best. EvaGeeks, of course, has a culture very much promoting the idea that it’s the “number 1 source for all things Eva”, and for English speaking fans it definitely is - you’d be surprised the amount of people who still, after all these years, think this site is consistently reputable. For the sake of context, I’m going to assume that you are not all that familiar with the site’s history or nature, so I’m going to provide a little bit of information about it for those without any first-hand experience. The forums in particular cultivate a very join-us-or-get-out type community, where those who dare to go against the grain get incentivised to leave the site; they’ll claim this isn’t the case if asked and obviously the site is NOT a hivemind but that doesn’t mean it’s not insular. I can vouch for myself and many others who refuse to go in more than a few threads for fear of discussion turning particularly nasty. Even the server member who came to me about this has stated they feel it “might not be a hivemind but it sure feels that way.” Silencing dissent, even when officially-backed, is part of their culture. You don’t have to personally harass everyone who has an opposing thought to you for it to not feel acceptable, you just need to have a history of mocking those who do. If you want some previous, notable cases of “discussion turning nasty”, here’s some off the top of my head: 1. The AWL Incident - In which ADV VA of Rei and director of EoE dub, Amanda Winn-Lee, joined the forums for discussion and was promptly harassed by a user. Most of these messages have been deleted but you can view what remains of her post history here. 2. Recently brought to my attention: upon beginning translation of the Episode 24 drafts, EG forum user LiLi was subjected to incentive to leave, mostly in the form of homophobic disgust in replies to her thread or others they were mentioned in. Any information that goes against the cultivated narrative, even when it is literally officially licensed content, is only ever considered with a degree of reluctance. The fact these drafts co-exist with other pages concerned with this episode is almost a miracle. You can find plenty of repeat instances of the above if you want to (more to do with homophobia and misogyny than outward hostility, but honestly it’s the same thing.) A look at basically any EvaGeeks thread concerning pairings or the female characters will unearth a variety of awful comments from many other users, not that that would be surprising to anyone who has spent more than two minutes in the fandom. Now, of course, that’s very relevant to the topic at hand even if it doesn’t seem to be. The EG wiki and forum have quite a bit of overlap and circular influence on each other as you’ll see later if you aren’t already aware of it. For a short summary before we jump into things and analyse our subject of the day, this essentially means that anyone with an opinion or information the majority doesn’t like will never get in a position good enough to edit the wiki and keep the edits there. This has resulted in many articles filled with conjecture and fan speculation that serve to shut down other viewpoints, whether it’s intentional or not.

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ON THE TOPIC OF THE EVAGEEKS WIKI

The issue surrounding homophobia and downplaying of references to LGB content in Eva, through proxy of fan-dictated content control and translation is not a new one by any stretch of the imagination. I'm sure you're all very well aware. It’s far from the only issue present in the fandom but it will be our subject of conversation today. Any ‘one instance’ of this persistent behaviour from Eva fans is never going to be enough to summarise how insurmountable it really is, though, so today I instead draw your attention to one user of the wiki who goes by the name of FelipeFritschF and his recent, frequent updates to pages concerning Nagisa Kaworu.

[TOPIC: FELIPEFRITSCHF]

I must reiterate here: although this document is mostly concerned with this user and will contain a number of receipts from various places, it is NOT supposed to function as a hit piece or inspire any kind of mob. Leave this guy the hell alone, just be aware that he’s the one making most of these changes and isn’t a particularly impartial party, to put things lightly.

Now, before we really get into things, it should be stated that the EvaGeeks wiki requires approval to get your edits there, as stated at the bottom of the homepage, here:

This means that anyone making consistent edits to the wiki has in fact been approved, and this isn’t the result of lack of maintenance.

What you’ll find is that it is consistently Felipe making edits to the pages in question. Kaworu’s bio page, for example, is almost entirely edited by Felipe, which we can see from the “History” tab of the article.

This is barely half of his edits made in the last few days. Take a scroll through it yourself if you’re so inclined. This hilarious bit of waffle was added by Felipe a few days ago and since revised since by him, as shown here.

(As an added bit of comedy, the man who decided to add in the Japanese in the first place apparently didn’t know the difference between 好意 (kindness, what Kaworu actually says) and 行為 (action). It’s been fixed since but I still think it’s quite funny.) Now, as anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of Japanese knows, 好き is not actually a very ambiguous word at all. I think it goes without saying, though, and I’m not here to have an argument about translations with you all (for the record, Kanemitsu’s now scarily infamous translation of this scene is perfectly fine with me in a vacuum, it’s just literally everything else surrounding it that’s the problem. Also, regretfully, I will have to speak about this nonsense later when it becomes relevant.) I’m using this as an example instead, to show how utterly ridiculous this guy’s additions to these pages are. He’s not even making a point here. It keeps going past this excerpt, and I suggest you read the whole thing (Kaworu’s page is linked above.) The point of bringing this up - and when I eventually discuss the Netflix translation when it’s necessary - is not to complain about semantics, although I’d argue that’s what’s happening in these articles, honestly. It’s just helpful when proving the actual point of the editor being incredibly unreliable and biased in how he phrases and omits things.

On the page dedicated solely to Shinji and Kaworu’s relationship (which is basically identical to their section on Kaworu’s page as far as I can tell), we can see that Felipe has also edited this several times, and even credits himself with expanding the version on the Evangelion Fandom Wiki now copy and pasted back to EvaGeeks.

The kind of “discussion” (very much not discussion when added to a wiki page supposedly presented as factual information, is it, frankly?) would be fine if it was happening in the EvaGeeks forum itself (and happen does it ever, but that doesn’t change the inappropriateness of this particular behaviour.) What I find disturbing is that in the past few days, this user has gone out of his way to make some already worrying articles even worse, presumably in an attempt to silence discourse, or add more fuel to the flames, surrounding the new Netflix translation. He has a whole page on that one, too, one which is very up-to-date in some regards and not at all in others, despite only being added a few days before me compiling this information. Frankly, going through this whole page on its own is a huge waste of my time considering how BLATANT it is in its biases, but I’ll do it anyway. It IS only a Theory and Analysis page (which is essentially an EvaGeeks free-for-all), but I think it’s quite bothering that the site even allows Theory and Analysis pages that consider only one viewpoint and are written by one person. The forum, presumably, is connected to the site for a reason.

I’m just going to link it here, for the sake of brevity. https://wiki.evageeks.org/Theory_and_Analysis:Kaworu%27s_lines_in_Episode_24 I suggest you read this before continuing. For a slight departure, the original theatrical Funimation dub of 3.0 is partially available for viewing online, although the audio is in cam quality so you may want headphones if you have plans to watch what’s there. The home media dub’s major changes are to issues with lore and localisation of jargon. While not directly mentioned in this article, it is implied from the subject that this is what it’s about; it’s been speculated that the very literal translation of Episode 24 in particular has come about due to Khara’s embarrassment with how Funimation’s theatrical dub of 3.0 handled Kaworu and Shinji’s relationship rather loosely. Despite these claims, every instance of the two sharing (honestly pretty awkward and unnecessary) flirtatious back-and-forths are still present in the home media version, barring an instance in the stargazing scene where Kaworu’s dialogue was translated even worse than it is in the final dub. If you don’t believe me, do the comparisons yourself. It may not be conclusive, but I think it puts mostly to death the rumour that “a Khara employee was there and saw how people laughed at the Kaworu and Shinji scenes and demanded it needed to be changed for the final release and now that’s being reflected on the new translation”, which is what it tends to boil down to.

It also goes without saying that NO ONE PERSON is “the most qualified” (holy shit, is this entry not even bothering to hide how biased it is) to translate an entire TV show, let alone something like Evangelion. Let us not forget that Kanemitsu’s claims that he respects “ambiguity” are not even true to begin with. EvaGeeks itself is a shining example of Eva fans, of which Kanemitsu is one and this is even discussed in the article, not being impartial enough to be tasked with discussing Evangelion! (There is obviously issue with citing the ADV translation as a source of all truth; if you read further into the thread on my tweet [the kitchen scene in EoE], I provide extra context for those interested, which I am aware has been spread around Discord and other places without that context included. Of course, I’m not an unbiased source either as you can probably tell from my tweets nor am I claiming to be, so please feel free to discuss these things in other places if you want. I’ve just got the tweets I have on hand here. Sorry about that.) Next, the repeat claim that this is “Khara’s licensed translation and thus the most accurate version” is pretty obviously nonsense; I’m sure I don’t need to point out to the audience that Japanese companies meddling in localisation has ended poorly in the past, or that Khara uses questionable translations from the dubs of the Rebuild films on licensed merch from time-to-time, or that the translation was fairly obviously not overseen or even QA’d by anyone following Kanemitsu’s translation work judging from the myriad of grammatical errors, missing subtitles and overly literal, poor sounding phrasing present in the final work. (Do I need to source this? Just watch the damn thing.) It’s not even like the ways it was translated have been consistent through different versions on Netflix; some were translated from Kanemitsu’s English to other languages judging from the obvious mistakes being present in multiple tracks, and some were barely even translated at all - the Italian version, the dub of which is mysteriously now missing, was so bad people were commenting that it sounded like Shakespeare or that it was translated word for word from Japanese. I dunno about you, the reader, but something about “Khara only bothered to check very rigorously the English version for their specific requests with the translation” doesn’t sound like what really happened to me. It’s more like they’ve just sent a translator they have worked with before to work on a project of theirs. Apologies for engaging in speculation, but that’s all this whole article is anyway. It’s just something I noticed from skimming through the page, but I find it quite interesting that Felipe makes a blanket statement about the excerpts from Schizo and Prano “being wrongly attributed to Anno” and then the source he provides for that is just someone on the EvaGeeks forums saying the same thing with little proper sourcing, when that was never really the intent of their post anyway. An interview summary exists where Anno has stated he wrote both books himself, and if you haven’t seen it, here it is. It’s obviously flimsy at best, but Tokyo Otaku Mode is an officially licensed Evangelion distributor. If Felipe is going to parade around his love for the Very Official Khara Subtitles Of NGE he can at least extend the same gratitude to other forms of official information; I mean, frankly, this article is about as reputable as anything in the Netflix subtitles are. Lastly, another thing I found quite interesting is his strange love for the ADV VHS subtitles. I really, really think this is obvious, but subtitles changed in later versions of the ADV release were changed because they were deemed incorrect. I don’t have sources for this so take it with an absolute grain of salt but I believe there’s even a commentary track on the Platinum release where the translator talks in depth about why she translated episode 24 as she did. It’s not exactly a better word than Kanemitsu’s, but if we’re considering translator’s word as law for whatever reason like Felipe is here, we might as well consider hers, too, right? Oh, and actually, have a look at the sources used on that article. Most of the sweeping statements he makes have absolutely no backing beyond what he’s piecing together from old and irrelevant interviews (when discussing the Netflix translation) as well as...linking Kanemitsu’s job history...I mean, sure, the guy is qualified, but do I really need to go over this again?

INTERMISSION: Speaking of sources, you might have noticed from perusing these articles yourself that EvaGeeks has a very low standard for sourcing to begin with, which is likely partially to blame for how things like these articles can even exist in their current forms in the first place. A site that doesn’t have such a lenient policy on sourcing, though, is Wikipedia. Felipe, of course, cannot stay within the confines of the fandom and has decided to have a go at providing some information to Kaworu’s actual Wikipedia page as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kaworu_Nagisa&action=history Felipe is far less to blame for the state of Kaworu’s Wikipedia article, which is honestly pretty bad to begin with. There have been plenty of other people editing this one and the rather homophobic “Relationship with Shinji” part of the article has been present for a while before he started editing it. (The fact this article literally uses someone being explicitly homophobic as a source is not surprising for Eva fandom, but holy shit, am I disgusted every time I reopen this page. I'm not even going to bother figuring out who added that one.) I do wonder if his reasons for not desecrating this page the same way he has on EvaGeeks is because he knows it wouldn’t stay up for particularly long. Reminder that he is also the main editor of the same pages on the Evangelion Fandom Wiki, which is essentially a copy and paste of EvaGeeks. Of note is this little tidbit I found:

This is what Felipe then deleted, as this is apparently not relevant, despite literally being about Kaworu’s relationship with Shinji. I mean, I’m sure this could have been put in somewhere else and perhaps phrased a bit better, but why the hell would you outright delete that kind of information? It’s supposed to be a wiki, not your own personal opinion chamber. BTW, this is the thread post he links as a rebuttal to that person adding it, and it’s probably for the best it’s presented here with context: https://forum.evageeks.org/post/886380/NGE-Ep24-Script-First-and-Second-Drafts/#886380

He clearly thinks he has a point here, but I’m not sure what exactly he’s going for. Basically everything he’s saying is conjecture, and while I can kinda see where he’s coming from it sure does completely fail to address the intent as explained in this interview. “Read the whole interview” is very dismissive, especially when the interview in full doesn’t exactly contradict the initial point. It does say quite a bit, how he will disregard official information when his wiki articles themselves are full of nothing but rambling.

Here’s another relevant and quite funny Discord screenshot:

Felipe is making a pretty hypocritical statement here. I’m sure he does have a point - there’s probably been quite a bit of vandalism happening to these pages which isn’t exactly surprising (again, Eva fans are not often rational people, please be honest with ourselves). That being said, I think there’s a particular irony to the man who has written many very, very long paragraphs on the wiki pages he has control over trying to stop people from thinking there might be anything but “ambiguity” between a pair he doesn’t like.

In the case anyone reading has forgotten: the purpose of a wiki should be to provide unbiased information on the material it discusses. Obviously the repeating of “innocuous” statements about how “ambiguous” it all is, in the vain of EG’s now made fun of ‘we don’t know what he really meant by that’ and ‘why Kaworu is so intent for Shinji alone to have happiness remains a mystery’ are pretty obviously intended to downplay the very, very obvious “subtext” and leagues of official information provided.

It kinda goes without saying that WE CAN INFER THESE THINGS FROM THE ACTUAL INFORMATION ON THE WIKI, you don’t need to add a disclaimer to everything going “well we just don’t know what it means!” (even in instances when we do know what it means, but that’s almost besides the point). You don’t need to add in these statements, unless you’re trying to sway people into ignoring what's presented by the show. If you want people to draw their own conclusions, you are in fact capable of presenting information without commentary - in fact, that's kind of the whole point of a wiki. Yes, Eva is ambiguous at times, but talking down to people like they need this reminded to them constantly is an absolute waste of time and energy. It’s almost as if the editor has been trying to cultivate a narrative and has been getting away with it because you can’t really prove these statements are biased unless you do the research. (I mean, you can from context, but it certainly hasn’t done much to get them removed, has it?)

You can view the editing history of any given EvaGeeks article on their own pages if you want to see just how many times these things have been added in by Felipe. And obviously, no, it isn’t just his fault - there are other users, several, in fact, credited with the editing of these pages, many of the edits serving the same point as Felipe’s paragraphs on “ambiguity”. He’s just the most concrete example of a biased editor. Also, yes, I do recognise this has all happened within the few days post the release of Eva on Netflix and that it was likely prompted by that. But we know at least one of the mods is aware of it given how Felipe talks about it in the EvaGeeks Discord server. It’s also quite funny I’ve seen people linking these pages like they're some kind of "gotcha" in response to tweets discussing the new translation, as if they haven’t been invented out of thin air in the past few days.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now, frankly I’m sick of staring at EvaGeeks, and if you want any more information on these articles and others with instances of the same thing happening, you can have a look at it yourself.

Originally, this document contained far more screenshots from Felipe. My desire for this to not turn into a hit piece has lead me to remove a great deal of these messages. I do suggest, if you want to, you join the server and make your own conclusions. Even beyond what the member told me about I found myself agreeing with him fairly frequently when he was being reasonable - this doesn't change my concerns regarding the presentation of information on the wiki, though. The anonymous member was mostly concerned about this user having basically all the control over Kaworu's wiki articles, seeing as he has far too high of a stake in everything. Not all of these messages are inflammatory or even necessarily bad or wrong, but I find that to anyone privy to the “revelations” about the EvaGeeks Wiki here, they paint an interesting story, to say the least.

It’s starting to sound like he perhaps has just had some bad experiences. The following few messages are part of the same conversation.

I find it interesting how he flipflops from not understanding anything about the whole Eva Parallelism Theory Thing to suddenly being all for it when it concerns things not about the gay stuff.

Comments on how ‘manipulative’ Kaworu is

Because Kaworu is very pro instrumentality, and this definitely isn’t just a theory, I mean, it’s even talked about on the wiki, guys! (And I’m not even touching on the yes-men in this server.) Oh.

Oh no.

For the record, this page is clearly still under construction, and to point out any one thing about how bad it is would be essentially just poking a stick at a beehive. At least this one is so absolutely poorly phrased it’s doubtful anyone could mistake it for any kind of proper information. I also find it incredibly funny whenever pages on the wiki use the forum as a source. Relevant: Qmisato’s post on his defending of Shinji sexually assaulting Asuka: https://qmisato.tumblr.com/post/183082754484/yesterday-i-was-invited-to-evageeks-official

In response much later. I really can’t see it as being framed as “fun teenage romance”, also why is the word romance suddenly being used to talk about Asuka and Shinji after the whole debacle with Kaworu? He’s said before he doesn’t see Asuka and Shinji’s relationship as romantic, either (and GOOD! It’s not!)

(Also - it’s not sexual assault when Shinji tries to kiss Asuka in her sleep, but it IS when Kaworu does the exact same thing to Shinji? Make up your mind, dude.) Turning this sort of thing into Shipping Discourse is frankly not the right way to go about it, but it is perhaps notable that despite what Felipe says, he is in fact an Asushin shipper. (I don’t feel the need to post all these images in the document as its cluttered enough as it is.) At this point it’s rather adhom and I feel irrelevant but I do think it’s relevant that through all of Eva fandom, those who have the most issue “understanding” (more like accepting, I suppose) LGB subtext, are those who also are really attached to a fairly morally grey het pairing themselves. Again, seriously, there’s nothing inherently wrong with any of this and assuming the worst of someone because of the pairings they like isn’t my intent here, it’s more that I find this pattern has always been prevalent and it’s bothering me I’m seeing it STILL in 2019. ESPECIALLY from a wiki editor who inserts so much of that into his work on the site.

You’re probably sick of reading all of this (and I’m getting sick of writing it), so I’ll wrap up the part on Felipe quickly: Yes, I just dedicated several pages to screenshots of mostly innocuous (when considered out of context) stuff one guy had to say. I feel more obsessive than I’d like to admit, and frankly I have no business with this person. We’ve spoken twice on EvaGeeks threads if you can even call it speaking. This task was given to me by a member of the community who was concerned about his behaviour but didn’t want to publicise it themself and I feel a little out of my depth here. I at least hope we can come to the conclusion I wanted to here, that I fear may have been lost in this whole great mess of language - no one person should have THIS much sway over the state of a wiki that’s supposed to be impartial, especially when they have not been quiet with their biases in the first place, and it is the failure of everyone involved in the maintaining of the wiki itself that this sort of behaviour has been allowed in the first place.

The guy can have whatever opinions and theories he wants, obviously. I don't give a shit; he's not even that bad compared to the grand majority of Eva fans to begin with. Don't think this document exists to "cancel" him or thoughtpolice, I truly, genuinely, do not care what is said inside this server anymore. It doesn't concern me. I mean, it's a fucking cartoon, for god's sake. This only becomes an issue when opinions are expressed on a wiki, for reasons I have reiterated many times now. EvaGeeks lacks the objectivity required to function as a wiki and I'm trying to make that clear.

[ON THE TOPIC OF THE EVAGEEKS WIKI AND COMMUNITY IN GENERAL] As for who can edit the wiki and what they’re allowed to say: As you can see from the nature of people’s posts in this thread, you’re given access to do very specific things, and although I haven’t bothered going through the process myself (as I find it would be quite redundant, trying to fix such an inherently broken system), I’m guessing it’s very easy to get your edits reversed if you post anything they don’t like. Take that as conjecture of my own.

I have it in decent faith that the approval process involves whoever of the mod team is there at the time coming to an agreement based on people’s applications. Obviously this is a decent idea for a system, and I’m sure there are legitimate reasons as to why EG has to be locked down as much as it is; judging from the state of other fanon wikis I’ve seen there’s likely to be a decent amount of vandalism, especially in a fandom as passionate as Eva’s is. However, I think it’s fair to say that the complete restriction of updating these pages to those approved by a mod team who, while I’m sure are very reasonable people overall, certain individuals of which have displayed concerning behaviour and biases of their own in the server during my brief look around. I won’t be naming anyone in particular from the mod team as I don’t feel like I need to add any more targets of shame to this already horrifically negative document, but I have gotten the general impression (in case it needed confirmation, following the remaining of these specific changes on the wiki) that some mods, not all, aren’t the most nonpartisan individuals themselves. I do happen to be decent acquaintances with at least one of them so, again, please don’t consider this a personal attack.

My concern here plainly is that I don’t think a group of mods who have routinely failed to prevent events like the ones mentioned earlier, nor seem to have much of an issue with the myriad of examples of people being openly homophobic and misogynistic on their own forum are really in the position to be choosing who of the Privelleged Few get to control the Eva meta-narrative here. As I was writing this, I was alerted to the state of the primary Japanese Evangelion wiki as a source of cross referencing for what these things can look like if done right. If you take a moment to browse it, even if you don’t speak any Japanese and have to use an automatic translator it should be very obvious how something like this differs greatly from EvaGeeks. Kaworu’s page, for a relevant example, doesn’t have present any of the nonsense statements about ambiguity or overwritten descriptions of everything. The wiki respects the reader’s intelligence enough to know that it is, in fact, a wiki, and thus tries its best to be factual. His page is fairly decent in size and states things we know are fact rather than theory. There’s no attempt made to influence or confuse.

Oh, and just in case you think the mods aren’t actually active or present enough to know what Felipe is doing, his particularly awful page on Kaworu in episode 24 got a shoutout from the official Twitter account two days ago.

If you are going to join the Discord server to verify things yourself* or do further digging, again, please be cautious of other users inside and do your best not to start anything. I am an occasional contributor to the forums and I’d prefer not to get my account flagged or to experience harassment myself, if any EvaGeeks members are still reading this document and disagree with my conclusions. I may not have posted much since I joined earlier this year, but despite everything I find the forums to be valuable for connecting with other fans and have enjoyed the positive feedback to my SIRP translation! Those who have spoken to me there have been very kind (including Felipe himself), and I must reiterate that this is not targeted at the whole site, or even at just Felipe. I simply believe there is more than enough evidence to suggest there have been consistent, systematic failures to recognise and correct the utter lack of objectivity present. I seriously don’t have any personal issues or beef with this guy, either. I wouldn’t have done this if it wasn’t someone else who came to me about it.

*It should be noted that the person who spoke to me has pointed out certain members have been concerned about outsiders joining and screenshotting the chat. They may remove the public link to join if this document were to cause a huge issue. I will leave the server following the publication of this document and I have no plans to join again. I can’t speak for those who may join of their own accord but I do hope people have heeded the disclaimer I made initially.

Thankyou to all the people who have extended their own kindness and support during the creation of this document, to the anonymous person who tipped me off and the lovely Eva analysts I know for offering their own experiences with EvaGeeks and further supplementary information. If this whole document reads like the product of a bad mental health day, I guess it is. Also yes I know how hilarious it is that I’ve spent all this time creating what essentially amounts to an EVAGEEKS CALLOUT POST but I mean. Someone had to say it. Why not make an utter buffoon of myself in the process?

#Mirroring this for the sake of people concerned with their privacy when accessing google docs #reading this back theres a lot of bad wording but whatever. itll do

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fishcakedoodles · 5 years

Text

Love Viruses

Words: 1.645

Rating: K+ (I think? If I get it wrong let me know!)

Pairing: NaruHina, mention of SasuSaku and SaiIno

College AU

I got inspired by this post, precisely the 4th point, and I felt the need to put my idea down.

This is my first ever writing in English I publish online. I've never been really good at English writing, always made a lot of mistakes (as for a foreign language: this is not my native tongue). I hope this will be appreciated by someone anyway.

I try, during almost 2 months, to fix any grammar error and make the story more flowing, but I reached the point of can't recognise any mistake nor possible fixing anymore. I'm sorry if it's a little cracky.

If anybody has grammar corrections, suggestions and explanation about why I get wrong some part (about English), I would be really happy to know them :)

______________________________________

It happened again.

She hoped her little sister would have learnt the lesson last time. It was the seventh time Hanabi downloaded those daft games from the internet, causing her computer to crash, and this is the fourth times in a week she need to go to the IT department in order to fix her problem.

Not that is something completely unwelcomed.

Indeed, there is a silver lining in this situation that she would never have expected.

There is a student into his second year, who helped her the first time she came searching for some kind-hearted soul, and she got stricken by him. His big, warm and charming smile disoriented her so much that she couldn't thank him properly, she just managed to shyly nod after he fixed her laptop and almost stumbled into the many cables on the floor in the process to run away. She felt so embarrassed she would rather run naked in the campus courtyard than see him again. But fate had never been on her side.

The following times, at least, she got by with a murmured "thank you", looking down at her feet, and paired with the reddest face she ever reached. However, the blond boy have always been really gentle and sympathetic, and her response seemed to be enough for him all the time, because he displayed others of his majestic smiles, turning her mute again every time. She would never think someone could make you fall this hard just with a grin, nevertheless here she is.

Thus, this time, the fourth she got to visit him in just one week, she must manage to say something more to him, not just "laptop", "virus", "sister" nor a simple "thank you".

She must be resolved.

When she get to the IT room, where he usually would be, she start to doubt herself. N-no! I can handle it, I promise myself to not run away anymore! Brace yourself Hinata, you can do it. She lecture herself, an habit developed during many years of shyness and self doubt, and after a few more seconds she knock on the door.

Just when her last knock ended, the personification of the sun open with a smile ear to ear"Hey Hinata!". She already feel the heat rise up to her face "H-hello Naruto-kun" she said, looking down to her feet.

"Another virus?"

"Uhm" she nod with a light blush onto her cheeks. Stop blushing! Stay focused! "I'm sorry to disturb you one more time Naruto-kun"

"Don't worry! It happens a lot, especially if you share your computer with other people." He said with is kind voice.

"Yeah, I think that is true."

"Let's check it, can I?" he offers his hand to her, obviously asking for her laptop, but she only stares at it, dreaming to hold it right away.

Perhaps she stared for too long, because sapphire eyes are looking at her, puzzled, and maybe a little worried?She come to her senses, ashamed for her rude behaviour "O-oh! Y-yes, s-s-sorry, I didn't mean to. I-I was spacing out." Stop stutter!

"Yeah don't worry! It happens to me a lot too!" and he beams even more fiercely than before, making him look like a happy fox.

She totally have the hots for him.

She gave him her case, hoping her hold habit to tremble when nervous don’t show up.

When the computer has turned on, he race his fingers on the keyboard, rapidly looking all folders and applications through. She watch him make his magic to fix her device, and she is enchanted by his skills, bewitched by his efficiency and precision. It is—

It is a strangled moan that take her out from her thoughts.

High, choked, sexual noise which reminds too much that english rock band her sister used to listen when she attended middle school.

If only her seat could swallow her all, she would be happier than being here in this awkward moment.

Even if his fingers fly over the keyboard, all the process seem to flow in slow motion to her, buttons too heavy to come up quickly. Few seconds, more similar to hours, passed, and finally the boy closed all banners and cancelled all viruses in her laptop.

She would never, EVER lend it to her sister again.

Once done with the cleaning, Naruto appear unquestionably troubled by the actual situation, and she can empathise with that. She can feel the uncertainty, the fear, the worry for any possible motion.

And so she decided to move.

In one fluid gesture, she stand up, take the PC without put it in its case, and try to make a run for it, only to be caught off guard by a big hand on her harm. She turn, wide eye seek the reason for this action, and she attempt to find an excuse, an apology, to leave soon as possible in order to avoid any more mortification.

But he speak first, and what he vocalise is not closely what she anticipated

"I wanted to ask you out today. I planned to do it after I fixed your laptop, because I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable if you wanted to reject me… I wanted to ask it last time, and the time before too.. but I couldn’t find the right words and– Maybe you’re thinking I’m a pervert by asking you out right after what happened, but really! I-I’m not that kind of guy, believe it! You’ll find out it if we hang out! If it make you feel more at ease you can make a friend come with us.”

When his babbler stopped, she couldn’t do anything but gawks at him, speechless. He take it as a bad sign evidently, because his immediate reaction is to draw back his hand from her wrist and look away.

This is like a dream, something she hoped to, but never dared to expect. This is the perfect occasion, the perfect turn of events to accomplish what she desired to do since he came into her life.

And she's letting it slip through her fingers.

When she finds the courage to utter her thoughts, a male voice speak with her

"Maybe this was–"

"I'd like to."

"...Really?"

"..Yes." she says softly with a small smile and rosy cheeks. When her answer completely settle in his mind, a light pinky dust color his face.

------------------------------------------------------------

“Konohamaru.”

“Mh?” the dark haired boy respond lazily, while dusky eyes looked up from their position to meet sapphirine ones.

Really enraged sapphirine ones.

“What’s the problem, Naruto nii-san?”

“Can you explain me how those porn viruses we created for Ero-sennin lesson end up in Hyuga’s personal computer?” he try to sound commanding, but ended with an acute voice on the ‘Hyuga’ that almost make Konohamaru laugh, but he manage to control himself.

“Which”

Naruto look at him, a little bit of the anger slipping from his eyes, and he ask completely perplexed “Which what?”

"Which Hyuga. Because, you know, there's three of them we met, so I can't know which one you're talking about"

At this Naruto look taken aback, and a faint blush appears on his face. "Well.. the female one."

Purposefully horrified, Konohamaru sputter "Nii-san, I didn't think you would be such a perv…"

"... What?"

"I know Hanabi is really cute and all, but you are quite old–"

"I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT HANABI" and he's not 'old'!

"... Oooh." A sly grin comes into the dark haired boy's face "do you mean… That Hyuga?" He says, with his pinky finger up. "The elder one? The one you're speaking about lately? The one with that undoubtedly nice big boo–"

"DON'T YOU DARE" Naruto shout out with a deafening voice, smacking forcefully the young man on his head. "Ouch!! That's hurt!" He whined, scratching his nape, "I didn't thought you'd be so caught by her in just 3 times.."

"To…To be accurate, this was the seventh time I've seen her."

"Oh, seventh?" the hitted boy say "I didn't track how many time I did that."

There is an heavy silence, tension hanging in the air. His observation was more a self speaking, but maybe he did it too loud, because after other few more seconds the blonde senior utter "So you DO are involved into this."

With no more escape from this situation, Konohamaru look sheepishly anywhere but Naruto, and only say "...Ups?"

"YOU put those stupid viruses on Hinata's laptop, didn't you?" The senior boy demand with an abrupt tone, not wanting to buy a shit from the younger man.

"Why the fuck did you do that?!" he finally shout out, is anger not in check anymore.

"BECAUSE YOU TWO WERE HOPELESS. You were dancing around each other for weeks, and we get sick of ear you two complain about it."

With a suspicious glare and an hesitant voice, the Uzumaki ask "...'We'? Who else is involved into this?"

And the other start blather "Well... Hanabi.."

"Of course she's involved–"

"And Sasuke and Sakura.."

"....."

"And Sai and Ino. Precisely, this was their idea."

"WHAT?!"

"They attended that class of Jiraiya with our 'exhibition'.. they thought it would've been a fruitful way to push you two together. Personally, I've always thought those two guys are fearfully twisted."

"... I can't believe they all are implicated. This was a terrible idea of yours"

"Well, it seems this terrible idea of ours worked, didn't it?"

"...."

"Didn't it?"

"I'm too mad at you to talk you about that." Naruto pouted, and is in time like this that Konohamaru feels like he's the adult one, not the other way round.

But he's too curious to let his pride mess things up.

"So, when do you two hang out?"

"...on Friday. We'll go to get a ramen and then–"

"Shit! I owe Sasuke 50 bucks."

"... You bet if I would get a date with her?!"

"That, and where you'd go on your first dinner together."

".... I hate you. All of you."

Fin.

#naruhina #naruto au #naruto uzumaki #hinata hyuga #naruhina fanfiction

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starsmuserainbow · 4 years

Note

(I've never done this before but...) All symbols for that Munday meme? XD

Monday Malarkey

[[Thanks for sending! And wow guess that means this post will be quite a size xD!]]

☯ : Do you prefer to wing it or to plot things out first when it comes to longer threads?

I think that always depends - but in general, I assume it tends to be good to at the very least have a starting point, so I guess that means plotting (to a degree, and not completely counting when stuff comes from memes because usually that takes care of a rough starting-point)? But when we do have a general ‘what we want to happen’, I think it’s nice to just let things happen as they do?

So, I guess a mix of both!

✎ : What is your favorite genre to write for in roleplay?

I don’t know, actually! I’m absolutely incapable of putting stuff into genres, so I don’t know! I like when, somewhere in threads, people actually open up to one another, like, talk about past happenings or the likes. And I think a lot of my threads would go into the ‘casual’ or ‘fluff’ category so maybe that? But I have a lot of other threads I like or liked a lot too, so I don’t think I really have a favourite genre.

✉ : What’s your favorite genre to read in roleplay?

I don’t really read that much specifically because of it being in a genre - if at all, I read RPs because they appear on my dash by being done by one of my mutuals with someone else!

✘ : Are there any genres you refuse to write for?

Smut would be the first thing I can name here, since I simply don’t write that stuff. Outside of that, uh, I can’t think of anything immediately!

✪ : Do you use roleplay as a method to better your writing in some way? If so, what are you trying to improve on?

I don’t actively think that I’m using it to better my writing, but I think upon repeating something again and again - which basically any RPer existing longer than a week does - it’s pretty much automatic that it also helps one to get better at it, so I sure hope that RPing does better my writing!

I can’t name anything in particular that I’m currently working on improving - I can say that I’m definitely interested in dash talk and all that stuff (you know, these fast-paced things that usually go back and forth quickly and die after a few hours or so) though I can’t quite see me actually trying to participate in it.

🎭 : Is roleplaying/writing a way to cope when things get rough irl?

I like to live in the world of my RPs, of my characters, so yes in a way - but I don’t really think I’m coping with stuff. It’s just that I like to think myself into a different world, and yeah. I guess I’m just mostly ignoring RL as much as I can anyway, so there isn’t really much to cope?

⌘ : How much importance do you place real experience into the things you write/rp?

Pfft, right, I could barely write about anything at all, then!

So, to actually answer this: Very little importance. I think as long as one can write it well, or imagine it, it isn’t important if they actually have experience in the area or not.

⚡ : What typically leads to inspiration for you when it comes to writing?

Nothing in particular! Like, there was at least once recently a dream that inspired my for a wishlist thing on Moonshot (which I still wanna write some day, and I’m considering to make my next open on him be about the situation even if that doesn’t really mean it’s any more likely for me to be able to explore the situation but still), and movies or stories or pictures do inspire me for things too, but mostly I think it’s just my imagination and what ‘letting my characters run freely’ there brings up. Hard to explain!

✿ : What’s your stance on self-inserts?

It feels a bit like a weird thing to me, and I don’t know if I quite entirely know all the specifics to the term. I’m not a fan of RPing with ‘real’ people anyway - be it from actual history, or politics or maybe stars or bands or whatever else exists as people RPing them - so I don’t think having someone put a FC around it changes that much?

If it’s a character they can simply connect to a lot, and maybe have some headcanons here and there that would also fit to themselves, that’s a totally different thing I think?

⌚ : When in the day do you feel you do your best writing?

There isn’t really any specific time of day! I usually do most writing during the afternoon and evening, but that’s because it’s how my day is scheduled and not because I can write there best or anything.

♟ : Do you do any research when you roleplay?

Number one - a lot of looking up of english words. There’s a reason why I basically always have a tab of a dictionary open.

And of course, if I’m to write like a poisoning or a certain area being wounded or a specific type of sickness, and if I haven’t researched anything to it or something similar before, I will try to look up a few things. It helps to get a better image of it, I think.

♞ : Which do you prefer, shorter or longer roleplay posts?

I can’t really work with one-liners much, they often feel like no effort had been made, so, longer than that would be good. Outside of that, as long as there’s something I can work with, I think I don’t have much preference towards how long or short is it. Well, I mean, maybe a full-on novel or something would be a bit much as reply xD, but I assume that’s rather unlikely to happen anyway with how RP works.

Or if this is about the length of posts, I can only try to appeal to people again, to please cut their posts, and remove and ask from a continued thread. But I don’t think that that’s what the question is about, so I won’t say more on that here.

♥ : What kinds of characters are the most fun for you to write for?

If you look at my muses, I guess the only answer I can give is: Aliens!

I don’t know, maybe that has to do with confidence. I have other characters too, but when considering to write them I tend to feel uncertain of if I can do certain things or if they work or would be interesting for others, so, I think that’s why my roster so far only exists of tamaraneans.

In general though, I think I tend to enjoy writing characters in a certain ‘good against evil’, or call it maybe action if you want, setting more than casual, everyday life ones, if that makes sense.

💔 : What kinds of characters do you have the most trouble writing for?

First thing that comes to mind here, is ‘sexy’. Like, take Blackfire for example, if I wasn’t as much myself as I am, I bet I’d have her do or say a lot more ‘dirty’ or suggestive stuff. I just can’t write that, and that’s one of the reasons why every now and then I feel like I don’t do Blackfire justice at all.

➳ : When creating OCs, what do you typically start with first? (i.e. appearance, name, a theme, etc.)

I think usually the rough ‘who’ comes first, as in what they do or are for? Like, that was the case with both Moonshot and Starlight, and, though I don’t think anyone actually knows of her since I only made like one post about her ever or so, Kahmlur. Also with most other (= non-tamaranean) OCs I’ve ever made I think. Usually first comes the rough idea, like said, and then I’ll work on details some more, like how I imagine their personality or behaviour. And usually by then already a image starts to form in my mind for their looks, which will then be the next thing to do. An actual detailed backstory usually only comes when I actually want to, like, write them on something public like here I think. Or when I happen to just be bored enough to write one.

Though of course, sometimes it can also happen that I play around in some character creator, and the result inspires me to do an OC out of that look.

♚ : What’s something you just can’t stand and will unfollow someone over?

If it happens too much and too often, a dozen, especially when non-RP, posts almost at all the same time. I get it, they’re online at that moment and want to share stuff or something, but it’s just too much and frustrating to see other stuff through. So yes, if that happens too often, I might end up unfollowing.

🌟 : How do you usually like to start an interaction with someone new, or do you prefer to have them approach you?

When I followed someone first, and they follow me back, I usually take an effort to make myself go to their IMs soon-ish (or asks or whatever if like their rules say they don’t want IMs, or the likes) and just greet them in some way. I try to lead that talk then towards something more, maybe plotting or a random starter or whatever, or at least to asking for how they prefer to start things.

As with those following me first, well, usually I kinda subconsciously wait for them to come to me first. Which… not always happens, and I think I should change that thinking anyway since I should just approach even if they were the first to follow if I want to interact with them too, but uh, that’s just what I do there without actually thinking much about it.

(And as for those I never become mutuals with - I usually don’t reach out there. I’m not confident enough to do that, so if I’m not ending up mutuals with someone, I’ll in 90% of the cases unfollow again once I realize it won’t happen, and the other 10% I’ll keep on my dash because I really like their content, even if it makes me sad that I won’t ever interact with them. And those that I never follow back, I hope I’m having it stated where I can clear enough that I’m still open to them approaching, though of course I have a right to say no in occasions.)

💕 : When it comes to shipping do you prefer to draw things out and let them develop slowly, or do you prefer to jump right into them and skip the developmental stage?

I love the interactions, the deepening of a connection, the admitting of secrets or talking about heavy topics of the past! Not that I have ever had those to write much, but I still love the idea, and so I think I can with rather good certainty say that I prefer the slow developing.

#✫ Tamaran to Earth ✫ | Answered #✫ Out of Clurblopf ✫ | OOC #long post #(and yes I know maybe I should have done it with a cut here bc length but I didn't want to)#nvertoolate

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