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edwardsmate4ever · 3 years

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The Phone Call

Note: This outtake is a companion piece to Chapter 4 of Visions Interrupted, but it can be read as a standalone too. What happened when Bella called Rosalie in Breaking Dawn?

Read it on AO3 or FFN, or just read it here!

The Phone Call

Emmett POV

“I might be...pregnant.”

I listened to Edward get on the line, his voice panicked as he questioned Carlisle whether such a thing was even possible.

Bella’s pregnant? Damn, son, what?

First thing that crossed my mind was whoa! Edward must have some super spunk or something. Was he some kind of undiscovered sex god? No fucking way. That kid was a hundred and he never even kissed a girl until Bella. He had absolutely nothing on me. If anyone was a sex god; it was definitely Emmett McCarty Cullen. This whole concept was kinda blowing my mind. Maybe Edward didn’t have to be a sex god, maybe any male vampire could do it. Maybe I had super spunk too, and if Rosalie were human… Could I have done that to her?

But Rosalie wasn’t human, and I couldn’t knock her up. A baby was the only thing she ever wanted in the world. And now, of all people, Edward was getting one. My girl was not going to be happy about this. Turning around to look where she stood behind my seat on the couch, I saw a motionless statue. Her face was a mask, but her stillness told me everything I needed to know. This wasn’t just angry Rosalie. I knew how to handle angry Rosalie. No, this was the face that scared me. This was jealousy and rage and hurt all rolled into one, and I never knew exactly what to do when she got like that. My girl was roiling[1] inside, and when she came back to herself, she was liable to bolt any second.

When he hung up the phone, Carlisle turned to look at the four of us. The look of panic on his face rocked me to the core. This man was unshakeable, and here he was, completely at a loss for what to do. The others felt it too, and my anxiety spiked with all of theirs before I felt Jasper try to calm us. He wasn’t that effective though since he was just as fucked up over this revelation. We all stared at each other for a few moments before Rosalie sprang to life. She crossed the room, heading for the door. “I’ve got to get Esme,” she murmured before taking off at a run. I was pretty sure that was an excuse. I knew she was hurting and she wanted to be alone. But I also knew that even though she always said she wanted to be alone, sometimes she actually wanted someone to hold her and tell her everything would be all right. I was pretty sure this was one of those times, so I followed her out the door.

I caught up to her quickly, and when I was a few yards away from her, she turned and fell into my arms. I clutched her to me, wrapping her up in one of my famous bear hugs. Pretty sure I’d hugged everyone in my family this way at least once when they felt really low, so I knew from experience it would help. And it did; her body went slack against mine, and she wept tearlessly on my shoulder. I buried my face in her hair, my own still heart in my throat.

Having her own family was what Rosalie was longing for when she died, and that desire held strong into her second life. How many times had I desperately wished I could give her everything she wanted? It was damned hard knowing I could never fill that hole in her life, that it would eternally hurt for her. The fact that Bella was going to experience what she so desperately wanted was devastating. She already didn’t like Bella for choosing to give up her humanity. On top of that, now she was going to get the only thing Rosalie ever wanted and could never have.

Pulling back from her, I swiped away her phantom tears with my thumbs and brushed her hair away from her face, bringing my hands back around to gently cup her face. “Rosie,” I whispered. “Let’s leave. We don’t have to stay here. We don’t have to watch.”

My girl inhaled deeply and slowly exhaled, steadying herself, and I could feel the last of the tension leave her body. “Yes,” she said. “That’s perfect. I think we should leave immediately. They’ll understand if we disappear.”

I nodded. They all knew what this would do to Rosie. They’d probably encourage us to go. Crooking an eyebrow at her, I offered, “Denali?”

“At first, yes,” she said, nodding thoughtfully. “But then let’s find a place we’ve never been and go there.”

“I love it,” I assured her. This was going to be awesome. Get away from all of this, just the two of us. As much as I enjoyed Bella’s presence in our family, the girl brought a lot of drama with her everywhere she went.

As she gave me a shaky smile, her phone began to ring. It was a jarring and unexpected sound at that moment, and it startled us both. She reached into the back pocket of her jeans and read the caller ID on the screen.

“Edward?” she exclaimed. “Why the hell is Edward calling me?” She sounded pissed off, and frankly, I kinda felt that way too. Unfortunately, it wasn't that weird to imagine Edward rubbing this in her face in some way. Sometimes that teenage assholery just came out of him, I think without him even realizing it. At least, not until it was too late. Edward was capable of some pretty cruel shit, but I didn’t think he would sink that low. This was probably really important if he was calling her now, when he knew goddamn well she would be upset.

“Aren’t you going to answer it?” I prodded.

She huffed. “I can’t imagine I want to hear anything he has to say.”

“Just answer it, Rose. If he’s calling you now, it has to be important.”

Knowing I was right and hating it, she flipped open the phone, pressing it to her ear, and begrudgingly answered, “Hello?”

“Rosalie?” The voice was definitely not Edward’s. “It's Bella. Please, I need you to help me.”

She wanted Rosalie’s help? Our gazes locked, and my girl’s eyes were just as wide and shocked as mine were. “What do you need, Bella?” she asked warily.

Bella’s voice was hurried and whisper-quiet. I had to really focus to hear her end of the call. “Please, Edward’s afraid. He thinks it's bad, that it’s going to hurt me. He wants to kill our baby. He'll do it too—Carlisle is on his side. I want to keep it, Rosalie. The baby is good—I feel it. I know I can count on you to understand.”

Rosalie’s eyes widened even larger which I really didn’t think was possible. But her eyes never left mine. I watched as fear turned to resolve, pushing aside all doubt and confusion. “Yes, Bella,” she said firmly. “I'll help you. You can count on me.”

“Thank you,” Bella whispered with reverence, then she quickly said, “I've got to go," and the line went dead.

Slowly, Rosalie closed her phone and slid it carefully back in her pocket. Our eyes were still locked and I'm sure my doubts showed in them. I didn't like this. It wasn't going to be good for my girl's psyche. “Rosalie, we were leaving...”

“I know, Emmett. But weren’t you listening to Carlisle and Edward’s phone conversation a few minutes ago?”

I shrugged and shook my head. “No, I was distracted by Edward’s super spunk.”

She rolled her eyes like a champ, but a smile crept onto her face. She couldn't resist my dumb jokes; no one could. It was my superpower. She quickly sobered though. “Seriously, Emmett. They were talking about aborting it. They think it’s a demon or something. They want to kill that baby, and I won’t stand by and let it happen. Bella wants me to help her keep it. She knows I’m not afraid to stand up to them. I won’t let them strong-arm her.”

“But babe, you hate her.”

“We’re not friends, and I don’t like her. But this isn’t about Bella and me, or about me trying to get back at Carlisle and Edward, this is about standing up for someone who can’t stand up for themselves. Standing up for something I wholeheartedly agree with, and she knows that. She didn’t call me because we’re BFFs. If she wanted that, she would have called Alice. What Bella wants is to keep her baby, and she knows I will protect this baby at any cost.”

“But Rosie, what if this isn’t really a baby?” I tried reasoning with her. “I mean, I don’t know if a human and a vampire can have a real baby.”

Rosalie shrugged. “If Bella thinks it is, that’s good enough for me.”

I was really afraid this whole experience was going to break my girl, but she was committed. I knew better than to think she would be swayed. Still, I tried one last-ditch effort. “Edward will fight you. Carlisle will too.”

“No, they won't, because I have you to protect me.”

“Of course you do, babe,” I said and wrapped her up in a hug so she wouldn’t see my face ‘cause I wasn’t so sure I wanted to fight them on this. I thought they were probably onto something with this whole monster thing. No way did that petrified, rehydrated vampire spunk create a baby like Rosalie and Bella were thinking it would be. Edward’s spunk was from 1918 and vampified! That can’t be a good thing.

“Come on. Let's tell Esme,” Rosalie said, pulling away and grabbing my arm, unaware that I was having a crisis of morality over here. “She'll be on our side.”

Only I wasn't so sure I was on her side. As we ran to the cottage, I did my best to compartmentalize my emotions. I had to put the scared and nervous feelings in a box, and pull out the strong and stoic bodyguard persona. I wasn’t used to covering up my emotions. No point with an empath in the house.

Empath, telepath, fortuneteller—all the gifteds thought they owned the place. And the worst part was that the two of us and Carlisle and Esme encouraged their egos by being lazy and relying on their gifts too much. Me and Rosie felt like second-class citizens in our own family a lot of the time. That was one of the reasons why we honeymooned so often and for so long—it was just more relaxing not having to watch everything we said, or did, or felt, or thought even.

Now, instead of getting away and feeling every fucked-up emotion that Rose had every right to feel, she was going to have to gracefully face it all head on. Although, I supposed it was possible there really was a baby inside Bella, and if Rosalie was able to help Bella keep it, maybe Bella would let her help raise it. And that was it—the light bulb moment. I knew then that was the reason Rosalie agreed, as painful as her emotions were. Because in the end, there was a chance Rosalie would get her wish, the baby she always wanted. Even if Bella had to die for her to get it. And I was going to have to stand by and support them, no matter what happened, whether it sat well in my stomach or not. I loved Rosie and only wanted her happiness. After the circumstances of her human death, she needed to be able to trust me fully if our relationship was ever going to work, and I always told Rosalie I’d do anything for her. But this? This was tough to swallow and went against everything my head was telling me was right. My head knew this was wrong, but my heart was dedicated to my Rosie, and I would stand by my vow to give her the world, even if I didn’t like it.

The cottage was in sight and Esme stepped out to meet us, a smile on her face that quickly faded as she took in our dark expressions.

“What’s going on?” she asked, worry clouding her normally easy tone.

Rosalie just laid it out on the table. “Bella’s pregnant, Edward wants to kill it, but she wants to keep it.”

Esme’s mouth dropped open. “Pregnant? How?” Then she gasped, her hand flying up to cover her mouth. “Oh! You don’t think she and Jacob…”

“Wow, Esme. I’m surprised you took it there,” I praised her, holding my hand up for a high five, which she did not return, leaving me hanging.

“You’re worse than Emmett. Too many soap operas and reality shows,” Rosalie teased her. “But seriously, no, Edward’s the father. He and Carlisle want to take it out of her. But she called me, Esme. Bella stole Edward’s phone and called me when she had a few minutes alone. She asked me to help her protect it. She's afraid of what they'll do.”

Esme gasped again with shock and she looked like she might faint if that were possible. But when I saw that same resolve I saw in Rosalie’s eyes forming in Esme’s face, I knew Esme was on ‘our’ side. She was thinking baby, not monster, just like Rosalie. The possibility that it was anything other than a baby probably never even crossed her mind.

“Will you help her?” Esme asked Rosalie.

“I told Bella I would, and I will. It's her choice, not theirs, and I’ll fight for her right to carry this baby. Will you help me?”

Esme stood up straighter, her chin jutting forward. “Of course I will.”

“Do you think you can convince Carlisle not to abort?”

“I do.” No hesitation. Of course not. Carlisle would do anything for her, just like I was doing for Rosie.

“Perfect. We have to act like nothing is up when we get back to the house. Edward doesn’t know she asked for help—it was a covert move. We have to act like there’s nothing amiss.”

“No problem.”

Apparently, I wasn’t going to be consulted. It was clear that my opinion didn’t matter. They never once even looked at me as they plotted. I was a man, so I had no say in this. I was only needed as a shield, and that’s what I’d be. Anything to make Rosie happy, to get her the only thing she ever wanted. What kind of mate would I be if I didn’t? Still, my conscience was eating at me, not sure what this thing was going to end up doing to Bella. She was pretty fragile. What if she ended up dying? What would that do to my brother? Would he hate me forever for standing by my mate? This shit was fucked up, and the only thing clear to me was how long we’d been gone.

“Ladies,” I interrupted. “We should probably get back. We’ve been gone a while now. We were only supposed to be telling you what happened and bringing you back. The phone call took some time.” I didn’t mention Rosalie’s breakdown, and she shot me a grateful look.

“Well, if anyone asks, we’ll say I got upset, and you two had to talk me down. That sounds like a plausible explanation for why we’ve been gone for a while, doesn’t it?” Rosalie and I both nodded. “Good, let’s go then.” With that, the three of us raced off to the main house to face whatever came next, bound to protect what some of our family was bent on destroying.

Extra special thanks to @palmofafreezinghand for being an awesome beta for this and VI

#Emmett Cullen #Emmett POV #emmett x rosalie #breaking dawn #missing moment #outtake #twilight #twilight fanfiction #look at this gorgeous man

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ernmark · 5 years

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Do you have any theories about how Nureyev is going to interact with Juno in the beginning of the next season, and what their dynamic will be like? Peter’s so hard for me to read, I can’t tell what’s going on in his head, but his line at the end didn’t seem to have any malice in it.

Continued: Obviously peter knew juno was part of the crew but like is the job just Worth it (if juno isn’t in his good books)?

I ADORE that I have gotten multiple asks about this in the first couple of days since the episode aired– and that you’re asking me to make coherent guesses based on all of seven words of dialogue.

That just makes me really freakin’ happy.

So let’s break it down a little:

The theory goes that anytime someone experiences a loss, they’re going to go through the five stages of depression. Anger, denial, depression, bargaining, and acceptance, in whatever order, and I think Juno walking out on him was a big enough blow to count as a loss. The thing is, I have no idea where Peter is currently. So let’s look at them all.

(Thank god for READ MOREs, because this is gonna be long.)

Bargaining

For being A Man Without A Past, Peter Nureyev sure as hell makes a whole lot of callbacks to his and Juno’s shared past right when Juno’s trying to move on with his life.

Let’s look at the last time Peter uttered almost those exact words, in Midnight Fox:

JUNO (NARRATOR): It’s more trouble than it’s worth. History, I mean– relationships with other people. You regret things you knew you had to do; you do things you know you shouldn’t. And why? Another warm body in your bed doesn’t help anything – it doesn’t stop killers or end hunger or make the world any better than it is. Just makes your bed a little warmer. That’s all. That’s all.

[…]

That’s why I don’t bother with all that. This is the new Juno Steel, now; the PI who doesn’t let a pretty face stop him from doing what matters. The PI whowon’t let history weigh him down. Without a past to hold him down, a guy could take on the world. And in the morning… once I get a little sleep… that’s what I’ll do.

JUNO: (MUTTERING TO HIMSELF) Can’t remember the last time I was this tired… Where’s that damn light switch?NUREYEV: Hello, Juno. It’s been a while.JUNO: Nureyev?!NUREYEV: The very same. Don’t get too comfortable, Detective. We’re leaving immediately.JUNO: If you think I’m going anywhere with you—NUREYEV: I don’t think, Juno. I know. You called me, after all – by way of one Valles Vicky.JUNO: You’re Vicky’s… This can’t be happening.NUREYEV: It is, I’m afraid, and I’ve neither the time nor inclination to prove what’s plainly in front of you. Now, put on your coat and give me your keys. We’ve a long night ahead of us.

The reason I copied the entire scene is that I’m using it as context.

In Midnight Fox, Juno resolves to distance himself from the past. He tells himself that he’s moving on with his life and trying to take it into a new direction… tomorrow. Seconds later, Peter shows up, posing in Juno’s apartment with the lights off.

Similarly, in Soul of the People, Juno is taking physical action to move on from the past by boarding a ship with a bunch of near-strangers (and Rita), and Peter shows up, dramatically posing on a car.

Notably, in Midnight Fox, Peter is decisively cold towards Juno. There is no flirtation, there is no banter. It’s crisp and clean and straightforward. He interrupts Juno. He gives him instructions that leave no room for argument.

It is quite possible that this is the kind of attitude that we’re going to see from Peter, at least initially, especially considering the way Juno left. He’s got a job to do, and he intends to see it done.

The thing is, his cold tone doesn’t last long. Over the course of the hours that they spend driving to the Oasis, Peter goes back to flirting, to playing, to showing off. I suspect that he’s too mercurial to hold a grudge for very long against someone he likes.

But let’s look again at his entrance in Soul of the People:

He repeats, verbatim, the line that he said at their last reunion: Hello, Juno. It’s been a while. He’s deliberately calling back to their last grand adventure in the Oasis Casino, the train robbery, their weeks underground in the Martian Tomb, their fight against Miasma.

He’s sitting on the Ruby 7– the car they stole together, the car they drove back to Hyperion City after it all ended. And he’s sitting on the hood (as Sophie, Kevin and Joshua said non-canonically, “knee up, booty popped”) posing dramatically. Vain as he is, he’s not putting on that show for Rita.

All of these little callbacks communicate very clearly that he wants Juno to remember what they had, and that at least on some level, he wants Juno back.

He could easily be thinking, “I got you into bed once and I can do it again,” and just be constantly throwing himself at his favorite grumpy lady, which would be a delight.

Depression

On the other, there is a not-insignificant chance that he’ll be far more closed off and less flirty than he was before. The first–and last– time they were intimate, Juno was only halfway reciprocating. He was traumatized and numb and still halfway considering suicide, and honestly? Sex probably was not the best thing for him right then. There’s a strong chance that Peter decided that he was wrong to push it the way he did, and then overcompensate by trying to remain entirely platonic out of guilt, despite his own wishes.

You could actually get some really good drama with that– with both of them thinking that the other one wouldn’t want to pick up the relationship again, and both of them miserably pining for the other while everyone else in the ship collectively facepalms. (Honestly, I’m kinda hoping a little bit for that one.)

Disorientation

(It’s not an official stage of grief, but bear with me)

Even before Juno left, Peter had trouble keeping up with Juno’s changing moods– largely because they tended to be steered by Juno’s depression than by any external logic (and it wasn’t like Peter could research a formal diagnosis, because Juno’s gone out of his way to avoid anyone who could give him one).

Juno started to warm up to him– particularly when they were in danger– and then suddenly would go cold and mean when things seemed to be going well. They won a card game, and then Juno accused him of trying to kill him. They beat Engstrom and successfully stole the Egg, and Juno demanded that he give up the Ruby 7. They defeated Miasma, and Juno started talking way too enthusiastically about mass suicide. They slept together, and in the morning he was gone.

Knowing what we know about the inside of Juno’s head, that makes sense– he’s scared to trust, scared to have loved ones who could leave him, scared to have anything good in his life that he could potentially ruin, and so he’d lash out and isolate himself.

Without that context, though, it paints a confusing picture– so confusing that it’s really hard to guess exactly how Peter interpreted Juno’s leaving in the first place.

And that’s going to get even more confusing now that Juno’s trying so hard to be better.

Peter knew a very specific incarnation of Juno, and the Juno we have now is a very different person. He’s going to have to get reacquainted with this new Juno Steel, who acknowledges his mistakes and apologizes when he hurts people and lets go of the past, who isn’t nearly as grumpy or surly as he used to be and is maybe still figuring himself out after all this time. A lot of the things that Peter used to do to get under his skin will just glance off him now– and maybe the little flirtations that Peter expected to just bounce off might actually be openly reciprocated.

And that’s gonna be weird.

What I’m saying is that Peter’s going to have to internally recalibrate, and that’s gonna be weird, and I don’t know how much of it we’re going to see on the surface.

Maybe he’ll see it as a game, but he may just as easily get frustrated and upset at Juno for being so difficult to figure out.

Denial

Let’s not forget: Peter Nureyev compartmentalizes like a champ.

He could be 100% in the same mode that he was in when he and Juno were working together against Engstrom for quite some time, and only later admit to Juno (or even himself) that he was hurt by the way Juno left.

Alternatively, he could deny to himself, at least) that he ever actually loved Juno in the first place. He’d still play and flirt with Juno, but only in the way he does with everybody, without the sincerity and vulnerability he expressed before.

Anger

I’ve mentioned it several times as part of the other stages, but there’s a lot of room for anger.

The fact that Peter is lounging on the Ruby 7 takes on a slightly different meaning when you remember that Juno made Peter promise to turn it into the police, and now he’s flagrantly showing off that he still has it. In the same vein, Peter promised that if Juno didn’t want him, he’d leave Mars and never return– now here he is in all his glory. There is something defiant and vindictive about that kind of display.

If he struggles to keep up with Juno’s latest change of heart, there’s room for him to get frustrated and angry– for a lot of reasons, really. I could never see him getting violent with Juno, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we see Peter responding to a relatively minor slight with a cold and cutting remark, as an expression of the anger from everything that happened before.

#the penumbra podcast #penumbra meta #mostly wild guesses #atleastthisusernamewasnttaken #pockketpluto #100

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thenexusofsouls · 2 years

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For Ghost!Tony: I know you like to think that Beck is weird which he totally is not gonna lie, but it's Obadiah you should worry about. Man is literally terrible and most likely going to pressure your daughter into becoming the next Iron Man. What are the best and worst things about the mantle? What would you tell her about the mantle if you could?

@starcchild

“Yeah, um, I think I’m worried about both, to be perfectly honest. I mean, why compartmentalize my worry when it’s clear that I have more than enough of it to spread wherever it needs to be? But be that as it may, your questions are... tough ones.

“The best thing is being in a front seat position to see something going down and be able to do something about it. You’re sitting at home watchin’ TV and you see the shit hit the fan, right? Most people think gee, I wish I could help. As Iron Man, you suit up and you go help. You have the ability, the tech, the freedom, the authority... sometimes... to get shit done. That feels great, both for actually fixing problems and helping people but also it’s a great anxiety reducer to know you’re part of the solution. You don’t have to sit back, you can make good things happen, save lives, stop catastrophes, lessen the severity of things, and make people feel safer. It’s a big responsibility but it feels good. Really good.

“The worst thing... or things... is first of all not being able to be everywhere at once and not having all the answers, and second... when things don’t go according to plan. Tackling that first one, you may be in one country helping one horrible disaster and another goes down halfway across the world. And people are like... where were you? What happened, champ? Didn’t you care? Weren’t you paying attention? So you open your mouth and the most insufficient answers come out. I was busy. I was halfway around the goddamn world. Nope. That’s not good enough. It’s still your fault and people still blame you for it. Or, let’s say, you save a hundred people. Only one dies. Guess what? The family of that one guy or gal or kid is gonna hate you forever. Also, that person will haunt your dreams for months, years, whatever, because the guilt just eats away at you. No one cares that you saved a hundred people. You know what, you won’t even care. Because that one death, that one failure just overshadows any and all good you did in your mind and heart. And it’ll be all over the news. That one you didn’t save. Because that’s what gets ratings, that’s what people wanna hear, the scandal, the tragedy. It’s sick and it’s unfair, but its gonna happen, and you’ve got no choice but to deal with it.

“Now tackling that second one... things not going according to plan. Right. You’ve got plans. Contingencies. Protocols. Backups. Backups for your backups. You’ve tested, troubleshooted, practiced, drilled, and accounted for everything. And something still goes wrong. Or... that one thing you never thought of? Guess what? It just happened. And now lives are being lost. Buildings are falling over. Property damage, environmental contamination, massive loss of life, traumatization of the public... and it’s your fault. Because you didn’t plan for this. Or you fucked up. Because your attention was split in a hundred different directions and ninety-nine of them went off without a hitch but the one that didn’t... cost you bigtime. Now you’ve gotta face the families, the press, the politicians, law enforcement, and tell them why. And nothing you say will make it better, or redeem you to them or yourself, or help anyone or anything because it’s over. Done with. Gone. Next, they wanna know what are you gonna do about it so it never happens again? But that doesn’t matter either because there will always be something you didn’t think of. Life is unpredictable. You have to think on your toes and react in the moment and just hope for the best. Then brace for the worst. That’s... that’s all you can do.”

Tony paused for a little while because the majority of what he just said, even though it was honest, couldn’t be said to Carter. She was too much like him for any of that to be healthy for her to hear. So he thought for a bit before he responded. “What I would tell Carter is... that the rough spots are gonna outweigh the joy and the pride. Always. But that’s not a reason not to do it. Also you have to take what joy and pride you do find and don’t just discount it, even if you want to. Don’t listen to that voice that says you don’t deserve to be proud of the good things. Because that’s what’s gonna save you every time. That’s what gonna get you through the hard times. Keep sight of why you took up the mantle in the first place, keep that in your mind, and stay true to yourself.

“I know that sounds cliched, but you have to. If you wear the suit, you have to stay focused on your intentions and why you know you did or didn’t do something. Because civilians, the press, and even your own teammates very often won’t get it. Or they’ll see something different. They’re gonna paint their own picture of you. They’ll attribute motivations you never had, or diligence you didn’t. They’ll wanna tell you... why you did or didn’t do something, or why something worked or didn’t work in the field. Only you know why you do something. What gets you out of bed in the morning? What gets you out in the field? Remember that. That’s you. That’s your core purpose. That’s the truth that’s gonna get you through being villainized on TV or pressed by your team when something goes wrong, because things will go wrong. All you can do is your best.

“As long as you know you’re doin' it for the right reasons, and your intentions are true, then whether something goes right or wrong, you can still say... I meant only good. It may not be enough for everyone, it may not exonerate or redeem you, but it keeps you focused on what’s true instead of on the noise that everyone else brings in on you. Because the press and people out there... they don’t know you. They think they do. They’ll see a twenty-second clip on the Tube and think they know all there is to know about you. And if you listen to what they say, you’ll start to believe that their version of you is the real one. You have to find a way to shut it out. And it’s hard, believe me I know, but... the person behind the mantle needs to have their shit together and the only way that’s gonna happen is if you find a way to filter the noise and stay focused on your own mission statement that runs in your head all the time. Why you do what you do and why it’s important to you? That’s what you have to make sure gets through the noise every time. Do that, and you’ll be okay. There’ll be ups and downs, but you'll be okay.

“But also don’t become Iron Man, geezus, be safe. Please. Just. Yeah, don’t. Unless you... want to, I mean- No, just don’t. I... Be safe.”

#muse: tony stark #ghost!tony

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fancykraken · 7 years

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Thor’s got the power

Spoilers for Thor: Ragnarok below!

Of course one of the things that just make me so gd ecstatic about Ragnarok is that we finally got to see Thor and the level of power he really possesses. I still don’t think we’ve seen what he can fully unleash yet, but Ragnarok was a breath of fresh air because I feel as if they severely depowered him in the past movies.

This panel pretty much sums up my feelings about his situation for the past movies:

You want some ice for that, Tony?

Thor 1 made sense with his powers not being as formative looking because he spent over half the movie without them. In Avengers we saw his strength and his power, but it wasn’t anything that we were presented with as being overly different or magnificent. We see him light shit up and fight like a badass, but I still think that the MCU didn’t really tap into what made Thor Thor. Whether this was intended because he was holding back or not isn’t too clear, but still, I was left wanting.

Dark World and Ultron showed us some more of his powers to affect the elements and use them to his advantage. Also, we how much he could endure in a fight without him getting too beat up. But still, it felt like they didn’t give him his due.

Mjolnir has always been such a prominent weapon, fixture, and symbol for Thor that you literally cannot picture him without it. The immediate knee-jerk reaction is that Thor without Mjolnir isn’t as powerful or deadly. Even Thor thinks that because it’s what he was presented with as a youth. Almost as if it were a crutch. Mjolnir was a very powerful weapon, but in the end, Mjolnir was only as powerful as Thor. Odin even said that it was there to help focus the power he already had and that Mjolnir wasn’t source of how powerful Thor could be. He’s not the god of hammers, he’s the god of thunder.

I love Mjolnir. I feel like they were a character on its own and they will be missed. Korg put it so nicely:

"Sounds like you had a pretty special and intimate relationship with this hammer and you losing it was almost comparable to losing a loved one."

"That's a nice way of putting it."

That is perfect because to Thor Mjolnir was a part of him and seeing that part of him destroyed is no minor thing. He’s lost his father, found out that his sister is a maniac that just wants to rule and kill everything, and had Mjolnir bite the dust all within a literal 10 minute period. Seriously if that were me I’d be a mess, but hey, this is Thor and he can compartmentalize like a champ.

While I’ll miss Mjolnir very much, the destruction of them was very necessary for Thor to grow as a character and fighter. It gave the audience who may not be as familiar with Thor as we diehards are a good look as to how powerful he really is. He is the weapon. He is the one that would ultimately cause the destruction of his enemies, not Mjolnir.

I’m happy that Ragnarok showed us what Thor could be without Mjolnir same as in Iron Man 3 we saw what Tony could do without his suits. These guys are far, far more than their tech and their weapons. It showed us they can be equally badass without.

Then there’s his fight with Hulk. There’s always debate about who is stronger and who would win, but Thor was created to be stronger than Hulk.

Of course, it varies with writers through the comics, but he was originally created to be stronger, so he’s stronger than Hulk and no one can tell me differently.

We saw in Avengers how well matched he was with Hulk, but there was no clear winner because things were all over the place in regards to what was going on.

This is why I love the gladiator arena fight so much because you see both Thor and Hulk just absolutely throw down and not hold back. You see Thor throw Hulk and just send him flying around half the damn arena. Thor gets absolutely pummeled in the face repeatedly and he barely has a scratch on him. This is how powerful and indestructible he really is. He is in no way a lightweight in the MCU and can go toe to toe with the best.

I fully believe that had the fight been seen through that Thor would have won. I think Grandmaster realized this, especially as Thor was connecting to his powers deeper down. Hulk would lose so Grandmaster did what he had to and took Thor out of the game. While I would have liked to have seen Thor win, I thought that this was kind of a clever way to have it as so there was no clear winner. Everyone kinda leaves happy.

Then, of course, there’s The Scene™. The Scene to end all scenes and my life. We see a fully powered up Thor that absolutely deals out destruction and doesn’t take names. This is Thor THE God of Thunder. This is the Thor that hasn’t been given to us before. This is the Thor that finally understands the depth and reach of his powers and that it’s him and nothing else doing this. This is him unleashing the thunder and lightening to end all thunder and lightening.

This

is the

Thor

I have

been dreaming of

I literally cannot thank Taika Waititi and Ragnarok enough for this. I hope that he just grows more powerful and we see more epic shit like this in Infinity War.

#Thor #Hulk #Mjolnir #Thor: Ragnarok #Thor 3 #Ragnarok #Thor 3 spoilers #Ragnarok spoilers #meta #long post

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hawthornewhisperer · 7 years

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I'd like to hear your thoughts about both Bellamy and Clarke's relationships during those 3 months she was gone, especially Bellamy's, bc it seemed to have a more emotional component to it. did Bellamy love Clarke at that point, and was just pushing it away? do you think he was truly moving on? also, why do you think Raven said B doesn't deserve Gina?

I am always and forever here to talk about Gina so yes, let’s do this.

When it comes to Clarke’s relationships during her three month walkabout, I think we’re supposed to assume she was in some kind of emotional stasis. Aside from her friendship with Niylah, I don’t think she really developed any relationships so much as brooded on what she had been forced to do at Mount Weather. So I’ll just set Clarke aside here and we can talk about the meat of your ask, which is Bellamy and his feelings for Gina.

First of all, I think at 2x16, Bellamy was on the edge of admitting to himself he was in love with Clarke and when she left he put those feelings in a box on a back shelf. Like, “Nevermind, let’s not examine that any more because it is clearly Not An Option.” Bellamy seems to pride himself on being practical with his emotions despite being a giant ball of feelings most of the time, and he’s definitely a champ at attempting to compartmentalize his feelings, so I can see him telling himself that his feelings for Clarke are irrelevant at that point in time.

Since none of this is canon, I’m going to headcanon that Bellamy didn’t really *meet* Gina until after he’d pushed those feelings away, and I’m pretty confident he wouldn’t have pursued anything if he thought he hadn’t truly moved on. There’s a big difference between “is actually ready to move on” and “thinks he is ready to move on” of course, and I suspect it was the latter rather than the former, but Bellamy is also a character who is incredibly emotionally honest. That was basically what he asked of Raven before he had sex with her, after all, and he really doesn’t strike me as the type to start a relationship unless he’s convinced himself he’s ready for one.

All of that being said: clearly, his feelings for Clarke weren’t quite as cut and dried as he thought, but that also doesn’t mean his feelings for Gina weren’t genuine. You can definitely care for more than one person at a time, and I think Bellamy truly cared for Gina. This is also not canon, but I think that part of why Bellamy disliked Finn so much was his dishonesty, and part of his downward spiral in 3A was because he hated himself for how he treated Gina. He realized when he found Clarke in 302 that he loved her, and that meant he didn’t love Gina. But she dies before he really has a chance to fix that, and so in his mind she becomes a sign of how hard he fucked up-- he didn’t treat her right and then she died because he rushed off to save Clarke. He spent three months being a good man, loving a good woman, and then in less than a week he realized he still had feelings for someone else and then Gina died because of those feelings. To quote a show I haven’t ever seen: that’s rough, buddy.

(Now, a week passed between Clarke being kidnapped by Roan and Echo arriving to tell them the summit was a trap, and you could argue “if Bellamy realized he loved Clarke instead, why not break up with Gina?” The real answer, of course, is “because this is a TV show and then he wouldn’t have had a reason to feel so guilty about Mount Weather,” but the headcanon answer is “figuring out you love someone you’ve just spent three months telling yourself you didn’t is a lot to handle, so it makes sense that he didn’t just dump Gina the second he arrived back at Arkadia.”)

As for Raven’s “she’s too good for you” crack in 301, to me that read as a joke-not-joke on about six different levels. It showed that she and Bellamy are friends, because that’s not something you say to someone you don’t already care about-- it’s friendly ribbing, which tracks with both Bellamy and Raven’s characters. They’re both snarky and sarcastic, so it makes sense that they would show their affection for one another with teasing. It also showed that Raven is friends with Gina, something that gets picked up in 303. So “she’s too good for you” establishes that Raven is friends with both of them, and on a surface level it’s a pretty standard joke when you’re friends with both halves of a couple.

But I also think it was there to imply that some people suspected Bellamy’s feelings for Clarke weren’t quite as gone as he was pretending. Raven was one of the people who gasped and looked at Bellamy when Clarke announced he was going into Mount Weather, and I read that moment as “Raven knows Bellamy cares about Clarke.” So now, that joke is also not quite as lighthearted as it appears on the surface, as it’s Raven subtly saying “Gina is my friend and I suspect you’re lying to yourself about some feelings there, buddy.” When Raven is possessed by ALIE this knowledge becomes a weapon, since “too bad you were never that devoted to Gina” is roughly the same sentiment-- your unresolved Clarke feelings are not fair to Gina-- twisted into something much darker.

All that being said, do I really think Raven doesn’t think Bellamy “deserves” Gina? No. I think she cares about both of them and she knows that Bellamy’s feelings are very complicated, and she’s worried about the fall out.

The tl;dr of this is: yes, Bellamy was basically in love with Clarke as of 216, but he didn’t admit that to himself and thus was not being deliberately dishonest in having a relationship with Gina. His feelings for Gina were also genuine, and Raven was trying to gently call him out on that before everything blew up in their faces.

#lost-girl-found-neverland #the 100 meta #I know I've written about this before #but I don't necessarily have a specific tag for it other than the 100 meta

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speakingintothedarkness · 5 years

Text

Old Memes and Memories

Hnn.... It’s been a while.

Still with Liz. Briefly dated a trans girl long distance over teh interwebs but it went downhill.

Still... grappling with gender, even though I’m way more comfortable with being not-cis than I was last time we talked about this, dear internet.

I read a thing today. Its keeping me awake, and I have this weird feeling that if I tried to talk to anyone about it, it’d come off as... either inscrutible, offensive, or both.

Ugh it’s embarassing really. Fucking Homestuck. I know, what is this 2015? But seriously I had read that entire trashfire of a webcomic when it was being released and I only just learned about the epilogues so I figured I’d read that.

It’s a bit weird. Go figure, right? Hussie is a weird dude who leans into his weirdness even harder than Dan Shive does. The entire thing is framed around a dichotemy, a choice that one character makes and all the action that follows comes from that choice. You get to make that choice for that character, but the story only really makes sense if you do it both ways. And, perhaps typically, even though this is the epilogue to a vast spanning story, somehow it’s not even really about tying up the loose ends. In fact, it leaves you with more than you started. The antagonist of the epilogue isn’t even the villain that was built up throughout the run of the comic and then never directly addressed.

But that’s not what’s bothering me. What’s bothering me is, of course, the trans question.

In one of the two branching timelines, a character comes out as trans. In that timeline, he is given time to examine his gender with an understanding partner and winds up deciding on a full transition to being male.

...but in the other timeline, the same character winds up being married to a straight dude and remains a woman, has kids and basically... goes as straight cis as she can. And its really hard to say which version of them is happier in the end. A bunch of shit goes terribly for both versions (either/both ways, this was not a happily ever after for pretty much anyone involved), but both versions wind up soliloquizing about how they struggled with their gender and are happy with where they wound up.

This... is a thing that as a tran myself I know I’m supposed to be foaming at the mouth over. Implying that trans is a thing you can choose to be, implying that, if things had gone differently you might wish to not be what you are, even if specifically asked about it... these are cardinal sins.

And certainly for some people, they’ve known on some level who they were their entire life. But... I am not one of them. I can point to the exact moments in time that pushed me towards this self-realization, three sentences that various people have said to me, and two life-decisions that culminated in me being forced to examine what all this meant. So I guess since I can’t sleep and this is a self-indulgent exercise to begin with, it’s mOtHerFuKiNg StOrY tImE hOnK!

The first moment that led me down this road, the point that planted the first proto-seed of thought about my gender in my mind was, perhaps predictably, about a game. In this case a long-standing DnD game I’d played with my OC friends in the early days of my relationship with C before she decided she hated them and didn’t want me to spend time with them and that’s own fucking rabbit hole.

In our game, our characters had become so intrinsically involved in the politics of the nation our game was set in, that we realized that going on adventures was irresponsible and might cause irreparable harm to the world. So rather than end the game, we statted up our characters’ children. To make things interesting, we randomized who got who. To my (at the time) mild dismay, I drew a girl, When I showed the others my slip of paper with the name “Tamora” written on it, one of my friends snorted “God, it’ll be hard to imagine you playing a princess.” And it.... stung. It hurt in a way I’d never before experienced. My first brush with a now all-too-familiar sense of dysphoria. As if there were a part of me I’d never before examined that had its ego crushed. I don’t remember how I responded.

Thing is, I played Tamora like a fucking champ. And no one ever made another comment about me playing a girl. I think I’d proven that I could convincingly play any role I wanted to.

Which brings us to the second sentence. I’ve talked about this here before, a friend on an online game admitting to me that the gender of her character did not align with the one she was assigned at birth. It was both shocking and enticing. In a way its laughable now (we’ll probably get around to why) but at the time, I just sorta assumed that... I’d be able to tell? And S was... she was as female and feminine as anyone I’d ever met. I’d never wondered for an instant.

And those two things... those two moments. The pang of hurt, the desire to be perceived as a girl; and the sudden realization that there was a venue where that might be possible. That lead me to make the first of those life choices: creating a female character, deliberately this time, and dive into her so thoroughly that there were times where I was’t sure where she ended and I began.

Things got a bit weird in all this. I mean, people asked me questions about myself ooc and I would answer as if I were a girl. Hell I even gave myself a name in all that. Karen, if you can believe it. Its not the name I’m currently using. Who the fuck would name themselves Karen in 2018-19 right?

But ultimately none of that really mattered, I’d so thoroughly compartmentalized my brain throughout all this that barely anything of my character in the Game leaked into my real life or vice versa. For all intents and purposes, “Karen” who played the game and the me who did everything else were two entirely separate people.

And yet some of it must have seeped through because C noticed. Or at least, I’m pretty sure she did. She knew I was playing the Game, but I never talked about my character or her gender. She knew that that rp involved romantic and sexual subplots, but I never discussed them with her, nor she her own sex-rp’s with me. It was a sorta tacit polyamory with very specific confines that we’d agreed to in a purely theoretical sense some years back and then adhered to rigidly in practice while determiniedly never talking about it.

But for all the fucked up shit, she knew me well, maybe better than anyone other than Liz has. I mean, we were a couple of woke 20-somethings in the Obama era, so lgbt issues were pretty forefront at the time. Guess they still are, we were just a lot more... hopeful about it. But she kept sending me articles about trans people. Like, human interest articles.

There was one in specific that she got really... enthusiastic about, about this one trans-woman’s journey to self-discovery through WoW. C read part of the article to me out loud, culminating when the person in the article was confronted by her wife: “You can be a girl if you want to be”. She kinda repeated that a couple times, looking at me hard. And in retrospect, yeah, it wasn’t fucking subtle. But at the time... it was not a thing I was willing to examine. Like fuck, honestly I think there was a part of me that knew. I mean there had to be at that point, right? But I didn’t want to pursue it irl. I think I made up my mind that it would be something I’d approach the same time that I approached the poly question that was inevitably hanging over C and I at that same time: after we were married. So I just nodded and went “Huh, interesting” with a straight face as my at-the-time girlfriend all but told me that if I wanted to come out to her, she’d be okay with it.

Never got a chance to see if she really would have been.

After we broke up, all this shit got put so far back on the back burner that... well hell, go back and read my first few posts if you have the fortitude to stand a lot of bitching. Like way more than I’m doing now.

And I mean the funny thing was I was still playing the Game I just sorta figured that once... I got another girlfriend, that’d have to stop? That who and what I was in the game would stop mattering. Because I was monogamous right? Just like I was male and straight, and the fact that my character was none of those things meant that I’d have to put her out to pasture. So it didn’t matter that I’d been playing a lesbian ethical slut for the past five, six years, because once I was in another sanctioned cishet relationship, I’d have to put all this foolishness behind me and never speak of it to anyone ever again.

Goddess alone knows if I even could have but I would have tried. I suspect it would have gone badly.

Instead... by almost comicallly random happenstance, I wound up with a poly girl. And after some initial winging about whether or not I wanted that, a part of my brain I’d been ignoring went, “Hey dumbfuck! You never cared when A--- slept around or when E--- was in another relationship, why should it matter to you that CR has a boyfriend?”

And the rest of my brain took a second to process that and was like “E--- and A--- weren’t involved with me irl, only my character in the game.”

And the first part was like “Oh yeah, smart girl, if that wasn’t a thing you wanted on some level than how come you fucking jumped into it with both feet in the game?”

And the rest of me rejoined rejoined, “I suppose you have a p--wait! smart girl?”

“Oh yeah, that’s a thing too. You probably better process that because this whole fucking thing is tied together like a goddamn giftbasket of deviancy. Good luck having anything resembling a normal life once you’re done untangling it”

And at that point there was no turning back. I’ve dragged my feet certainly, not... as much out of a sense of general reluctance as a bunch of worries about how my family (who I’m still reliant upon) will take it. But once that realization had occured there was no putting that bunny back in the box.

Which I guess brings me to my point, if one can even say I have one.

In a lot of ways this whole misadventure seems less like something that was always there and more like... a memetic virus that somehow burrowed into my brain, incubated for a few years and then burst forth from my skull like some horrifying amalgam of Athena and a chestburster. Like, if I had pulled a dude’s name from that hat... would literally any of this happened? If my friend hadn’t admitted that she was experimenting with gender herself would it have occurred to me to try? If I hadn’t created that first female online character, would I still think I was a man? Would I still be a man? I mean that’s the crux of all this. In the fucking Homestuck epilogue, is candyverse Roxy still a man like they are in the meatverse? Sorry, spoilers I guess. To them, the only real difference is an opportunity to prioritize their own self expression and gender identity. But Candyverse Roxy still has put thought into those things, just because of how and when they had the time to do so, she arrived at a different conclusion than he did in the other timeline.

And yes, I know that the Meatverse is considered more cannon than the candyverse, and yes, Roxy is the only character in the meatverse who isn’t being manipulated by Dirk’s mind meddling and therefore we can safely say that his epiphanies regarding his gender are genuine, more truthful and relevant to the character than the weirdness going on in the Candyverse.

But... where does that leave me. Obviously we’re playing the “what if” game on a weird scale here but, what if that series of events hadn’t occured? Would I still wind up roughly where I am, genderwise, by a different rout? Or would I have continued to labor under the false assumption that I was a dude... and would that assumption in this case even be false by any empirical standard? That’s the question that’s kept me up tonight.

I think I can safely say that by the time I had constructed this Karen figment that it was a foregone conclusion. But.... if either of those two inciting incidents had gone differently... Ugh... I don’t know. I feel like some people would want to take my trans card away from me for even suggesting that there’s a universe out there where I’m happily continuing to think I’m a dude. Maybe there is... but ultimately it’s not relevent or true for me, because its not a thing that I can go back to now. In short: it’s simply not cannon.

#transgender #homestuck

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