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sandbees · 3 years

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Child! Yuu: Heartslybul

So I was planning to write a full on plot idea for All the chapters, then I look at the chapters themselves and...yeah that’s going to drain a lot out of me. So instead I’m going to write what each dorm will think of Child Yuu and general headcannons about it.

Ace:

The older brother that Yuu looks up to.

When they first met, Ace was ragging on Grim. He didn’t say anything too mean to Yuu, though. That’s because of his inability to make kids cry.

Really, who makes a 10 year old cry? (Looks at the overblots)

I think Ace would act as the brother Yuu would look up to because he acts all cool around them.

He’d definitely teach Yuu some card tricks he learned from his family.

He treats them like a little sibling. (He’s always wanted a little sibling actually, to tease and joke with)

Yuu has smacked him 100% for being stupid (“Even I know not to make deals with shady fish men. Big brothers, why?”)

Look me in the eyes and tell me Ace doesn’t praise Yuu for causing trouble. Look me in the eyes and tell me.

I mean he’d probably lightly scold them but still.

If anyone makes Yuu cry? Guess they’re going to be thrown back in a gust of wind, with a lot of insulting words to boot. No one messes with Yuu.

When Yuu called Ace “big brother”, he smiled widely, and proceeded to act all smug about it (but he’s really happy that Yuu calls him a big brother)

Deuce:

Deuce is trying his best to be a good big brother.

He has no idea how to be a brother, he’s never had a younger sibling - or a sibling in general.

He’s going to try extra hard to be an honor student; he doesn’t want Yuu to grow up like him! He has to be Yuu’s role model!

Yuu wants Deuce to use magic to lift them up like he did with Ace. Deuce says no.

Low key scared that he’s going to scare Yuu if he goes into his “bad boy mode”

“Those poor chicks...” “...NOOOO THE CHICKS D:”

Ace explains to both of them that the eggs they have aren’t fertilized and never had chicks in them - it’s a chick shock x2

Yuu is softer to Deuce if he does something stupid, but will still scold him.

Both Deuce and Yuu are the excitement duo; they will be excited for anything and will be very hyped up about it.

Deuce is Yuu’s favorite brother (but they don’t say anything because it might make the others jealous)

Deuce summoned a cauldron by accident once, and Yuu climbed in and played peek-a-boo until it was...unsummoned? (I have no idea what happens to the cauldrons summoned by Deuce.)

When Yuu called Deuce “big brother”, Deuce was very flattered. “Big brother? You think of me as your brother? Well, I’ll be your best brother in the world!”

Cater:

So I imagine Cater taking a lot of cute pictures of Yuu.

He’s posted some photos of you on his Magicam and his fans love you.

He totally shows Yuu all of his cute animal photos he’s collected over the years if they asked.

Cater has two big sisters, so he knows the ins and outs of how to be a good sibling.

I can see Cater swapping foods with Yuu - he gives Yuu any sweet food in exchange for some salty food

Yuu doesn’t complain because they like the sweets Cater gives them

But sometimes it becomes a full on debate/trade deal that they take way to seriously.

“What about if I give you this, and you give me this?” “Never! That’s my favorite part, what about this?” “Hmm...I rather do like that...but what if I sweeten the deal and add this!” “....Clever, clever brother.”

Small photo shoots, Yuu is happy to hang out with him!

I think if Yuu ever wanted to wear a Heartslybul outfit Cater would be the one to help find one that suits Yuu (Trey would be the one to tailor it to make it fit better)

Yuu calls Cater “Cay-kun” whenever they want something from him, and he can never say no.

Yuu can always rely on Cater for any troubles they may have.

“Yuu~! Smile for the camera!” “Ok! :D” “I’m saving your smile forever.”

When Yuu first called Cater “big brother”, he laughed and went over to take a photo to celebrate a new sibling bond. (#gotayoungersibling #arenttheysocute? #newbigbrother)

Cater will live up to his big brother role, after all, as Yuu’s new big brother he has to take care of Yuu, no?

Trey:

Yuu thinks of Trey as a big brother and also the best parent.

Would buy Trey a #1 Dad mug if Yuu didn’t also see Crowley as their dad (sorry Trey...but your Yuu’s favorite 3rd year if that helps-)

When they first met, Yuu just got big brother vibes from Trey. Immediately went to hug him.

“You have big brother vibes and I vibe with that.” “What?” “It means Yuu likes you.”

Trey goes full big brother mode whenever Yuu is around. No one with ill intent (who has malicious thoughts about a child?) would think of approaching due to Trey being around.

He definitely spoils Yuu with any treats he bakes (though not too much - they’d get a stomach ache if they ate too many sweets!)

He’s totally the reason why Yuu went on a Sugar Rush around the school (luckily, nothing of value was broken)

I mean, he has a little sister and younger brothers so he knows how to deal with Yuu being hyperactive.

So the damage of the Sugar Rush incident was less destructive than it would have been.

If Yuu is sad, they can rely on Trey to be a shoulder to cry on. He’s very good at listening to their problems.

When Yuu calls him “big brother”, Trey carries the title with pride. Yuu also uses this as an advantage; call Trey big brother? He’s more willing to hear out whatever Yuu is asking more.

Riddle:

Riddle, Riddle, Riddle.

How do I put this? He made Yuu cry.

Yeah, not the best first impression.

During the Unbirthday party, when Riddle knocked the tart off it’s plate, Yuu is quick to defend Ace. Riddle retaliated with yelling at Yuu.

And Yuu (in my canon) does not take people angrily yelling at them well, which makes them panic and cry.

Cater and Trey didn’t have to force them out - Deuce and Ace left as soon as Yuu burst into tears and ran. (As good brothers, the duo went to go and comfort Yuu)

Riddle, for what is was worth, suddenly had a flashback of when he ran away in tears when he was young. He tried to convince his mother to have a tart, and she scolded him to tears.

He feels like an jerk now. A big, mean jerk.

After the overblot business, he didn’t expect a lot of forgiveness. Which is why he was surprised when Yuu walks over and hugs him when he was conscious.

Riddle: Wh...Why are you hugging me? Why do you think I deserve this?

Yuu: Because you look like you needed a hug. I forgive you for earlier, you had your reasons, as much as I disagree with them.

Yuu: You’re fine now! I hope I can help you make amends with Heartslybul big brother! :D

From that moment on, Riddle became Yuu’s big brother.

It was a really sweet moment, and no one dared intervene (well, Grim tried to but Crowley held him back)

As a big brother, Riddle is very overprotective. Be around Yuu in a way he deems “inappropriate” and “as a bad influence”, expect him to go “OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!”

Despite that, Riddle is particularly soft with Yuu.

If Yuu broke a rule, he’d softly scold them, but he did it in a way that was like a soft reminder and not like a lecture.

He’s never had a younger sibling before so he’s asking Trey for tips to be a good older brother.

I’d like to think Riddle teaches Yuu proper tea etiquette whenever they come over for Unbirthdays

Both share a love for sweets, so they tend to share/exchange sweets during lunch

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland imagines #twisted wonderland imagine #twisted wonderland mc #ace trappola #deuce spade #riddle rosehearts #cater diamond #trey clover #child!yuu #twisted wonderland headcannons #Heartslybul #ace and deuce almost punch riddle #Yuu is too pure for this world #and the world will burn if anything happens to Yuu #the more people Yuu drags into the family the more the world will suffer if they get hurt

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aceofspadegrass · 3 years

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Now It's an Entire Swap

Characters: Niragi Suguru, Chishiya Shuntaro, Kuina Hikari, Mira Kano (Briefly), Hatter, Morizono Aguni

Genre: Crack. Somehow even worse (better?) than the last one. They're really going for it now.

1.4k words

AKA Part 2 of Hair Day. It's just gotten way more weirder than ever, and it was just on my mind the entire time. Just.... ' How far would these two get?'

Well apparently it meant stealing each other's clothes and being them for a day. There were probably a whole lot more interactions I could have done for the day, but alas.

Niragi watches as Chishiya approaches him, carrying a bag in his left hand. Since two days ago, Niragi’s been keeping an eye on the man as Chishiya went around with his old hairstyle, his own still delightfully bleached blond and kept in the same style as Chishiya’s usual hair. People still did double takes upon seeing him, and maybe it held true for Chishiya as well, but Niragi didn’t care what anyone thought of the sudden change. All he cared about was making sure Chishiya didn’t go ahead and re-dye his hair so soon, keeping a careful eye on him.

Sure, it was a little stalkerish, but it was for a good reason.

Chishiya dumps the bag at Niragi’s feet, Niragi looking down to look at the small opening the bag allowed. “ What’s this?”

“ Well if you’re going to steal my hair, I might as well steal your life for a day.” Chishiya briefly explains, and he walks away without any further explanation, Niragi raising an eyebrow. He kneels down and opens the opaque bag some more, his lips curling at the white mass chilling inside.

“ Is this a joke…?” Niragi reaches in and pulls out the outfit, recognizing it as Chishiya’s favourite jacket, or at the very least copy of it, as well as swimming shorts that matched Chishiya’s. Niragi looks back towards where Chishiya had disappeared towards, and scoffs. “ So be it then.”

He puts the clothes back inside the bag and stands up, taking it and heading back up to his room. He starts stripping once he gets inside, unbuttoning his shirt and tossing it aside. Next came his shoes and pants, and he pulls out the two articles of clothing back out of the bag. There were sandals included inside, Niragi leaving those for last as he slips on the shorts. They were somehow a perfect fit on him, not at all as small as Niragi was expecting them to be. “ So the mayo man got me accurately fitting clothing, hm?” Niragi pulls on the jacket and quickly retracts his earlier statement, staring at his exposed wrist. Curse him for not bothering to get a proper jacket for him.

Still, Niragi wasn’t about to back down from the supposed life swap challenge, slipping on the other sleeve and zipping it up. It definitely was just some spare jacket, the bottom barely meeting with the shorts with his arms extending outwards. Niragi drops his arms and tugs the jacket down as far as he could before moving to the sandals and sliding them on. They were also about the correct size, if not just slightly smaller but still manageable. Humming, Niragi walks around to make sure, catching sight of his rifle.

“ Well…. as much as I’d like to….” Niragi sighs, and tucks the thing into his bed. “ If Chishiya wants whatever this weird role-play shit, then he’s gonna get it.”

Niragi spots Chishiya by the militants a few minutes later, a few loudly questioning and gesturing to Chishiya. Or, from the back, a much smaller him. Niragi couldn’t help but snort at the obvious sheer size of his shirt on Chishiya’s much smaller frame, or the fact that Chishiya was toting around a massive super soaker instead of the real deal, as if he was still semi-aware that he could be killed despite taking on Niragi’s aesthetics.

Niragi didn’t think this was much of a punishment for his hair thievery in the slightest, sauntering away. Just his face still kept people from coming too close, and the talk about him was near pleasurable for him. His reputation continues to precede him at least.

“ Hey! You, slow down, geez-“ A female voice catches Niragi’s attention, and he turns his head to see that lady Chishiya was occasionally by every so often, although Niragi didn’t bother with her too much, down to her name. She catches up to him, her eyes quickly scanning him before she lets out a sigh. “ I really can’t believe you agreed.”

“ Yeah? What’s it to you, huh?”

The lady folds her arms, letting out a sigh and chews on the stick hanging out of her mouth for a bit. Niragi was about to turn and leave her there when her hand reaches out and grabs him by the shoulder, Niragi whipping around and slapping the hand off. She recoils, but otherwise was unperturbed, looking at him with a hint of displeasure. “ Okay listen. Chishiya told me that since you stole his hair he was going to….. apparently take over a day of just being you, saying that…” She pauses. “ Well, that’s not important right now. What is important is to ’sell’ this, is that I have to follow you.”

Niragi blinks, raising his eyebrow and unconsciously flicking his tongue across his lips, leaning onto one leg. “ Why, does the toilet bowl not trust me?”

“ I wouldn’t trust you with a barrel of green tea left in your care, so you can figure out what Chishiya’s opinion is. Look, we can do this peacefully, no violence required, okay?” She extends a hand as if it were a peace offering, Niragi staring down at the hand.

“ Yeah, uh….. no. I do what I want, cinnamon stick.” He turns and walks away, said cinnamon stick’s footsteps coming up behind him.

“ Rude, but I really can’t expect anything else from you, wig snatcher.”

Niragi ignores her, although he didn’t bother to push her away today either. She was at least mindful of their positions, and kept her distance as she should.

It wasn’t long until she invited him to at least watch a movie with her, Niragi agreeing since he was technically absolved from doing his patrols for the day.

( Niragi wasn’t allowed to in any way touch her, and the one time he tried he got his toes crushed by her foot, so he had to behave the rest of the movie. Not worth it, in his opinion.)

Even at the meeting nobody really mentioned the sudden switch, although Niragi swore he thought he saw Mira’s smile become a little wider, and her eyes glitter in interest at the two. Hatter had to do a double take at the two, before sidetracking into what they were up to this time. Chishiya, surprisingly enough, just sticks his tongue out at Hatter like Niragi would’ve done, and Niragi had to suppress a laugh when he caught a glimpse of a stain on Chishiya’s tongue.

“ Oh my fucking goodness, did you seriously eat a fruit roll-up with those tongue tattoos before this?!” Niragi howls, bursting into uncontrolled laughter. Chishiya slips his tongue back in and just smirks. Aguni shakes his head slowly, pinching the bridge of his nose, Hatter just watching and waiting with amusement.

It takes a while before Niragi finally reins in his laugh, and that was only because one of Hatter’s pretty boy kimono men handed him water to calm the fuck down. Hatter grins, clapping his hands together.

“ Well, either way, this is an absolute rollercoaster that we’re all seeing today, aren’t we. One day I’m greeted with a hair swap, and the next you two are becoming each other! Aren’t you just… two peas in a pod?”

“ Tch, no. I’d rather burn.”

Chishiya glances at Niragi for a second, his lips curling ever so slightly in disgust. “ Not to be rude, but I decline that as well. I’d rather be shot instead. This is merely payback.”

“… How though.” Aguni questions. Chishiya turns his attention to the man, and leans back casually.

“ Because it leaves him practically defenceless in order to be me. Me, on the other hand….” Chishiya gestures to the super soaker lain on the table. “ Have temporary access. Even if this is merely a substitute.”

“ I will strangle you in your sleep anyways, you naked chicken nugget.”

Chishiya doesn’t react to the threat, Niragi glaring at him. Hatter looks between the two of them, then smacks his hand against the table a few times to get the meeting back to focus on him.

“ Like I said last time, grab a martini or something you two. Now, as much as I love a good drama and an enemies to lovers trope, we have to get back to real matters-“

Niragi huffs, leaning back slightly as Hatter starts his usual spiel. His glances couldn’t help but look towards Chishiya every so often, just glaring him down. Occasionally he’d lock eyes with him, Niragi smirking and miming random ways that Niragi could murder him with his bare hands.

If anyone else was watching their little act, they certainly didn’t bring it up. At the very least it kept Niragi occupied long enough.

The moment it was done, Hatter simply watches the two leave the meeting with a little more haste than he’s ever seen, and he leans towards Aguni. “ Think they’re gonna fuck it out with a nice martini?”

“…. Beats me.”

#aib #alice in borderland #aib fanfic #alice in borderland fanfic #niragi suguru #chishiya shuntaro #kuina hikari #hatter #takeru danma #mira kano #morizono aguni #sorry kuina you don't even get a name in this #that last interaction sentence is ness' fault you got me thinking about them doing the do #yes somehow hair swap evolved into a whole outfit swap it's just how it progressed #everyone just has to roll with whatever bullshit happens there every day this is tame really-#yes they specifically are wearing each others tops the other pieces are sized up correctly to a point but the shirt and jacket? Swapped.#yes chishiya ate one of those candies that stained his tongue just to mock niragi's tongue piercing #he also stuck rhinestones on his face I just don't mention them

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rexisnotyourwriter · 3 years

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by @rexalexander and @postcardsanddaydreaming

After the Atlanta child murders, the Behavioral Science Unit is as busy as ever. With a new team member by their side, they take on what feels like a growing number of active serial killers as well as continue their interviews of already incarcerated subjects. Bill tries to track down Nancy and Brian with the hopes of repairing his marriage, while Wendy tries to take on a more active role in their research with an eager budding protégé at her side.

Read on AO3

Catch up: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

*If you enjoy this, please like/reblog on tumblr and/or leave kudos/comments on AO3. Your feedback helps keep fic writers writing.*

Notes: As always, thanks to my beta fish @hardythehermitcrab

Chapter 3: Could You Be The One

The bell rang. Her peers bolted from their desks and flooded the hallway, grabbing at their coats and bags, before running down the hall, towards the door. Towards freedom.

She waited, at least until there were only a few remaining children gathering their belongings, before getting up from her desk. The teacher gave her a smile, but it felt off somehow in a way she couldn’t quite place. She smiled back anyways.

By the time she reached the hall, her coat had been knocked to the floor. A partial footprint was left on the arm. She picked it up and brushed the dust off. The tread marks were still visible. She slung her backpack over her shoulder and went to the washroom.

The stall doors were all open. Empty. She lifted the sleeve of her coat near the sink and ran the tap slightly warm. Then, with a wet paper towel, she gently dabbed at the dirt until it was no longer visible. The sleeve was damp, but she reasoned she should be able to conceal that from her mother until it dried. She pressed a dry paper towel into it as best she could. It would have to do.

She stepped outside into the courtyard, arms crossed to hide her sleeve. Her mother was waiting in the car, ushering for her to hurry. She walked quickly to the car and got in.

“Finally,” her mother muttered. “I was able to switch my hair appointment to,” she looked at the time, “well, now. So, you’re going to have to come along.”

She said nothing, having no choice in the matter. It wasn’t exactly fun, but there were worse things. The dentist, for one. Her arms remained crossed for the remainder of the car ride. Every few minutes, she checked her sleeve. Each time, the dark patch of wet fabric was lighter and lighter.

Her mother turned into a different person as soon as they exited the car and went into the salon. Outside Mother. Outside Mother is attentive, always smiling (except when inappropriate), and does not raise her voice. Outside Mother also never smokes.

The salon was an onslaught of pastel from the pink cushioned chairs to the lime and cream colored walls. Outside Mother gave her name to the woman behind the front counter and apologized for her tardiness. She turned around.

“You can have a seat and do your homework while you wait, okay sweetheart?” Outside Mother told her in her sickly sweet voice.

The girl nodded and took a seat in one of the pink chairs. It wasn’t nearly as comfortable as it looked. She inspected the magazines spread out on the coffee table.

How to make two outfits out of one.

She passed on that knowledge.

There were only a few other people in the salon. Three employees including the woman behind the counter, who couldn’t have been more than twenty years old. She looked like Ingrid Bergman - warm, soft. She glanced over at the girl and smiled. The girl returned the smile, but looked away quickly, embarrassed, but unsure why. There was a sadness behind the woman’s eyes, despite the smile. It was the same way she saw anger behind her mother’s. Fear behind her father’s. She wondered what people saw behind hers, if there was anything to see.

Outside Mother was settled in her chair, the large cone-like contraption hovering above her head, next to another woman. They each casually flipped through a magazine while chatting.

“So, how are Harold and the boys doing? Your eldest must be, what, twelve now?” Outside Mother asked.

“Almost. Johnny will be twelve next month and Simon turned nine in August.”

“Just a year older than our little angel.”

Outside Mother nods towards “her angel”. She could feel their gaze and didn’t look up to meet it.

“Harry got some exciting news recently,” the other woman said.

“Oh really?”

“It’s not public yet, but it’s as good as done. I’m not really supposed to talk about it though.”

Outside Mother gave her an understanding look.

“But -” the other woman continued, “if you can keep a secret.”

“Of course.”

“Well…”

Her voice went softer than could be heard from across the salon. The girl gave up on eavesdropping and took out her notebook and a pencil. She flipped past the pages of her homework to the last clean page of her book and began to draw.

The bell above the door chimed, announcing the entrance of another patron. Her fitted dark blue dress popped out among the soft pastel setting. She didn’t fit the scene, but it was the salon and everyone else in it that suddenly felt out of place in her presence. The woman at the counter acknowledged her. She appeared to be a regular. She turned around and took a seat next to the girl revealing a bold, deep red lip.

The girl continued her drawing. It was an open field with a few flowers. At the center stood a penguin. In the sky, far above the penguin, an assortment of birds were flying. She finished the final details of the wings, added a couple more flowers to the field, then swapped her pencil for her container of colored pencils. The woman in blue watched her as she pulled out a light green pencil and began shading the grass.

“Hmm,” the woman pondered out loud.

The girl paused her coloring briefly, then resumed without looking up.

“I thought penguins lived in the North Pole,” she mused.

“No,” the girl replied. “They live in Antarctica.”

“I see.”

The woman took off her white gloves, plucking the tip of each finger like petals from a daisy.

“Isn’t there snow in Antarctica?” she asked.

“Yes.”

The woman smiled. She was amused.

“This penguin is from Antarctica, but she’s not in Antarctica,” the girl explained.

“Ahh, okay. Why?”

The girl thought for a moment, then shrugged.

“I think she was taken from there when she was very little and doesn’t remember it. She just knows she’s from there and supposed to be there.”

“Couldn’t she go back?”

“No. She can’t fly. Penguins are flightless birds.”

The woman took in the drawing once more, understanding it a little better.

“Is that why she’s all alone?”

The girl didn’t reply. Instead, she switched her green pencil for a yellow one. She colored the insides of the flowers.

“Why don’t some of the other birds come down?”

The girl let out a noise, somewhere between a laugh and a scoff.

“They wouldn’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because they can fly,” she replied matter-of-factly.

“Surely they don’t fly all the time. They must need to rest.”

“They do,” she confirmed. “But they never stay.”

“That must get lonely.”

The girl carefully filled in the penguin’s beak with her yellow pencil.

“It does.” She traded the yellow for a black. “She’s used to it.”

The young woman from the counter approached the woman in blue. They were ready for her. She gave one last look to the girl, who looked up this time.

Their eyes met.

They smiled at each other - a real smile, with nothing behind it.

The girl watched the woman in blue follow the hairdresser to her station.

She took out her regular pencil again and added to her picture.

——————————————————–

Wendy spent an inordinate amount of time over the past few weeks sorting through resumes and cover letters for the new secretary position in the BSU. There was more interest in the position than she (or Gunn, for that matter) had anticipated. She was able to get Gregg to help weed out some of the applicants, but he wasn’t as discerning in his decisions as she would’ve been, and found herself having to make further cuts to his “approvals”. The list was narrowed down to eight. Half of them were coming in later that afternoon for interviews, conducted by Wendy and Bill. The rest would be completed the following morning.

Bill sat hunched over a file, cigarette in hand, when Wendy knocked on his partially open door. He looked up at her with tired eyes.

“What are your thoughts?” she asked.

He stared at her, his brow furrowed.

“The applicants,” she clarified.

He let out a deep exhale.

“You haven’t looked at them yet, have you?” It was more of a statement than a question.

Bill shook his head in response to his own forgetfulness.

“I’m sorry. I’ll do that right now.”

“It’s alright. I have questions prepared. It’s more for your benefit.”

“Still.”

He shuffled the stacks of papers and files around his desk in search of the resumes Wendy had given him last week.

“I can make another copy of them,” she offered.

“No, no. I’ve got them here. Somewhere.”

She scanned his workspace, her eyes landing on a familiar looking folder in a tray.

Wendy cleared her throat. Bill looked up.

Her eyes flicked from Bill to the tray. He opened the folder, confirming its contents.

“I’m reading these right now.”

“Okay. Our first interview is at 1pm, so we should be in the meeting room by quarter to. Someone from HR will bring them down.” Wendy saw the look on Bill’s face and… “You forgot those were today.”

“Wendy - ”

“It’s okay, Bill. Really. Like I said, I’ve already reviewed the candidates and prepared questions for the interviews. You just have to show up.”

“I appreciate it, you know. All the work you do.”

She left him with an understanding nod and a polite smile.

Bill snuffed out his cigarette and immediately lit another one.

Holden walked quickly past Wendy, who politely acknowledged his presence, on his way to Bill’s office.

“Bill.”

He exhaled the long drag he just took of his cigarette.

“Yeah?”

“Gunn wants us to help out on those freeway killer cases in California. They found another body a few days ago in the San Bernardino Mountains. He wants us out there tomorrow morning.”

Bill groaned.

“What?” Holden asked.

“Wendy’s not going to be happy.”

“Why?”

“We have those interviews today and tomorrow for the new position.”

“The secretary? Do you really need to be there for those?”

“I’m head of this team, Holden, so yes, it would be good if I was involved in the hiring of a new member.”

“I’m sure she’ll understand. I can talk to her, if you want.”

Bill gave him a look that very clearly said no.

“Those freeway killings. The victims were drugged, raped, and beaten, right?” Bill asked.

“And bound.”

“Another BTK.”

“Not exactly, though. There are distinct differences between them.”

Bill looked at the folder under Holden’s arm.

“Is that -”

“Oh. Yes.”

Holden handed the folder to Bill. It was thick.

Wendy entered the meeting room at 12:45pm sharp with two glasses of water and the tape recorder under her arm. With Bill busy preparing for the last minute trip to California, they both figured it wouldn’t hurt to record the interviews.

Her notebook and list of questions were already on the table. She placed a glass of water at each side in front of the respective chairs, with the tape recorder on her side to the right. She popped open the recorder to double check that there was a blank tape inside. There was.

Wendy had done a fairly good job at screening the applicants. They were all (so far) more or less capable of doing the job, but each with their own weak points.

The first two candidates of the day were internal - both obscene stenographers, women about ten to fifteen years Wendy’s senior. Sandra was up first. She had passable answers to Wendy’s questions, but didn’t seem to fully understand what the BSU was or why it was important. Sharon, the second, was four minutes late and very rattled by it. It could’ve been coincidental, but someone who flusters easily was not the best fit.

The third was a young man named Peter. He was barely old enough to drink, but his resume was strong and he had work and volunteer experience. When asked about his comfort level with disturbing topics, his face went visibly white and clammy as Wendy listed off, in some detail, a few of the types of victims they deal with - those who have been dismembered, raped pre or post-mortem, mutilated, etc. She stopped before he got to the point of gagging and quickly wrapped up the interview.

The final candidate of the day was a much older man, at least sixty, if not older, named Thomas. He reminded Wendy of Gregg in twenty odd years. He was intelligent and experienced, but he had the same air of naivety as Gregg. That lingering aura of having been sheltered from the “evils” of the world as a child, or as they called it, a good Christian upbringing. Thomas was sweet and polite, but showed clear signs of not being able to keep up with the pace that the position would require.

At the end of the interview, Wendy thanked Thomas for his time and walked him to the elevator on her way to Bill’s office. His face was buried in his hand, his elbow resting on the desk.

She knocked softly. He revealed his face.

“I can come back if now’s not a good time.”

“No, now’s fine. I could use a break.”

“First round of interviews are done.”

“And?”

She waffled her head side to side.

“They weren’t bad. Not ideal in varying ways, but some are more...workable than others.”

“It’s a unique gig.”

“I think tomorrow will be better. There are two in particular that should be more promising. Frank Tyler, late 20s, some military experience, so he’s probably not squeamish. He has a degree in philosophy, so he’s educated -”

“And jobless.”

Wendy smirked.

“The other one is Ruth Cairns. She’s a bit young. But she has secretary experience and recently finished her degree in sociology.”

It was Bill’s turn to smirk. “The Boston girl.”

“So you did read the files I gave you.”

“No shame in rooting for one of your own,” he replied, still smiling.

“There’s no nepotism here,” she countered. It came out more defensively than she intended.

“She wasn’t one of your students?”

“No.”

He believed her. “Okay.”

“How’s the studying,” she asked.

Bill sighed.

“It’s a mess, honestly. They’ve gathered every case where a body was found near a highway thinking they must all be connected going back almost ten years. There’s dozens.”

“Better to have more to work from than less.”

He knew she was right. It didn’t make it any less work, though.

“Half of them don’t even remotely fit the MO. They’ve got women, gunshot victims. Some were disposed of in pieces in trash bags. Some appeared to have been thrown out of a moving car.”

Wendy processed the information.

“And the MO is based off of the most recent victims?”

“Starting in ‘79. An unidentified male, 20s, found his head, torso, and left leg in a couple of trash bags behind a gas station in Long Beach. He’d been sodomized with a sock. A couple weeks later, the body of Gregory Wallace Jolley, 20, was found at Lake Arrowhead, emasculated and with his head and legs severed.”

“Pre or post?”

“Post. A few months after that, the decapitated body of 19-year-old Mark Alan Marsh, a Marine, was found near Templin Highway. He was also missing his hands.”

“So, there is a definite pattern of young male victims, late puberty to early adulthood. All white?”

“Yup. Another 19-year-old Marine was found September of last year near the El Toro Marine air base, also in trash bags. Then four months ago, Michael Cluck, 17, was found on the side of Interstate 5 near Goshen, Oregon. Sodomized, beaten, kicked. Cause of death was thirty-one blows to the head with a blunt object. The back of his head was completely destroyed.”

He let out a long breath.

“I’m not even sure this latest one is part of it all.”

“What makes you say that?” she asked.

“Well, he wasn’t dismembered. We’ll know more of the details from the autopsy tomorrow, but they said they found tissue stuffed deep in his nose and rectum.”

“Could we maybe be dealing with a pair? Or perhaps even more than two killers, working together to some extent.”

“Maybe. If we are, they clearly have the same ‘type’.”

“Well, best of luck.”

“Thanks.”

Wendy lingered for a moment in the doorway. Bill could tell why, but all he offered her was a small smile. She nodded, understanding, and left. There was no word from Nancy.

Holden and Bill were relieved to find California not as unbearably hot as Georgia had been, but it still didn’t take long for their previously clean and crisp shirts to become nearly drenched in sweat.

They had studied the crime scene photos on the plane. Christopher Allen Williams, 17, had been missing his socks, shoes, and underwear. There was nothing that indicated any staging in the body placement, and lack of significant animal activity made it unlikely that it had been dragged from anywhere.

An officer was waiting for them when they got to the station. He was somewhere between Holden and Bill’s age with a moustache from the 70s.

“Agent Tench, Agent Ford.” He offered his hand to Bill first, then Holden. “Officer Eddie Zott. Thank you for coming out here.”

“Happy to help,” Bill replied.

“I’ve just got the autopsy report. Here, why don’t we -”

He led them down the air conditioned hall and into one of the empty interrogation rooms. It was not air-conditioned, but there was a single fan in the corner blowing warm air around the room.

Zott put the report on the desk and gave it a read, his lips mouthing along silently. Bill and Holden gave each other a side-eyed glance while they waited for the news.

Zott’s lips stopped moving, and his brow furrowed.

“Well?” Holden asked.

Zott looked up at their expectant faces and slid the report across the table.

“Cause of death was pneumonia induced by aspiration,” Zott explained.

“The tissue paper in his nose. He choked to death on his own mucus,” Holden added.

“And he had phenobarbital and benzodiazepine in his system,” Bill said.

Holden inspected the report for himself, looking particularly at the amount of benzodiazepine detected. It wasn’t an exceptionally high amount. More than what he had been prescribed, but not enough for an overdose. It was the combination of that with the phenobarbital that would cause more of the sedative effects.

“Do we know anything else about the victim?” Bill asked.

Zott smoothed out his moustache and cleared his throat.

“Yeah,” he started.

Bill and Holden waited.

“It, uh, “ Zott continued. “Well, when we were asking around about him, it came to light that he was, a...a working man, if you know what I mean.”

“You mean, he was a prostitute,” Holden confirmed.

Zott nodded.

“What about the other victims? Were any of them prostitutes?”

“Not that we know of. But we didn’t ask specifically about that. As I said, this just happened to come up.”

“See if you can find out,” Bill suggested. “It could be an important factor in finding a motive or pattern.”

Zott nodded, clearly not thrilled at the prospect of going down that rabbit hole.

“Yes, sir.”

Wendy once again prepared for the second day of interviews. The water, her questions, and the tape recorder were all set up with six minutes to spare.

Frank was up first, and he was brought down to the basement at exactly 10am. He wore a well-fitted ochre nailshead suit with a light pink tie that reminded her of something Bill would wear. His hair still had some semblance of a military cut, but grown out and groomed.

“Miss Carr,” he said.

“Dr. Carr,” she corrected.

“My apologies, Dr. Carr.”

She stood up to shake his hand and noticed a copy of Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche under his other arm.

“I always bring a book with me,” he explained. “I always give myself plenty of time to get places, which leads me with some free time, so.”

Wendy nods in acknowledgement.

“Have you read it?” he asked.

She smiled as they sat down.

“Yes, I have.”

Many times, in fact. But none for pleasure.

“It’s one of my favorites,” he beamed. “I’ve been taking German classes so I can read the original text.”

A real Nietzsche fanboy.

“Jenseits von Gut und Böse,” Wendy replied.

“Sorry?”

Clearly he needed more practice.

The rest of the interview went fairly well, the glaring issue being his devotion to philosophical concepts, and rather basic ones at that. It wasn’t exactly the worst thing, but she could already anticipate him interjecting into psychological conversations with philosophical “well, actually”s. He also made a point more than once to mention that he had no issues with the potentially graphic nature of the position, nor did he feel uncomfortable about the topic of twisted killings in general. In fact, he ended the interview by once again reasserting his comfort level.

Wendy looked at him with a small smile.

“‘He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster’,” she responded.

His eyes beamed at her like a love-struck puppy.

That’s when it hit her. He had reminded her of someone the whole time, but she couldn’t figure out who until he got that look in his eyes.

Holden. He reminded her of Holden.

She thanked him for his time and sent him on his way.

The interview had ended early - he was a fast talker - which gave her enough time to make a cup of coffee before the next candidate arrived.

Interviewing the candidates reminded her of when she was actually able to talk to the inmates for their study. She missed it. There was no way Gunn was going to let her do that again. At least not willingly. Maybe with more secretarial help at Quantico, Bill could convince him of her value in the field.

Her coffee break went by quicker than she thought, and she was soon interrupted by the arrival of the next candidate, Jenny Simms. Her application was unremarkable in the sense that nothing exceptional stood out, but she had all the basic requirements. She had secretary experience, was first aid certified, and volunteered at a homeless shelter since she was a teenager.

Jenny’s answers were all satisfactory. She had a calm demeanor, but was by no means fragile. She didn’t even bat an eye when Wendy described, in detail, some of the more graphic cases they had dealt with. Jenny took it one further and responded with an almost equally grotesque story of a man coming into the shelter with a gangrene leg that he tried to amputate himself with a pocket knife, heavily under the influence of multiple drugs. Plus she referred to her as Dr. Carr right off the bat. Wendy was pleasantly surprised, and marked her down as a front runner.

There was a larger break between interviews this time to account for lunch. She went upstairs to the cafeteria to grab her usual salad. A couple times, when she needed a break from the windowless basement, she stayed in the cafeteria to eat. On more than one occasion, she was approached in her solitude by a man, noticing the absence of a ring on her finger, asking if the seat across from her was taken. They would sit down before allowing her to answer. The daylight wasn’t worth the bother.

Back in her office, she kept a close eye on the clock as she ate her lunch. Today’s salad was half wilted spinach with almonds and blueberries and too much dressing. It was better than the bitter romaine they sometimes had that was drowned in what they called a caesar dressing, but tasted more like ranch with garlic powder. It hardly even qualified as a salad.

Wendy’s phone rang just as she was finishing her lunch. It was Bill.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d answer,” he said. “How’s round two going?”

“Better than yesterday.”

“Sounds hopeful.”

“There’s still two more to go, but I’ve already got a good idea of who I think would fit. I’ll let you listen to the interviews when you get back before I give you my thoughts.”

“Afraid you’ll influence my decision?”

“When have I ever been afraid of that? How’s California?”

“Hot. I’ll take it over Georgia, though.”

“And the case?”

“We thought we had an angle, but it didn’t pan out. The latest victim was a male prostitute, so we were thinking maybe that’s who he’s targeting. Local cops looked further into the other victims and it doesn’t appear that any of them were involved in that.”

“Hmmm. Were any of them suspected homosexuals? Even if they weren’t formally prostituting themselves, there could have been some form of covert sexual exchanges.”

“I can suggest that.”

Wendy heard the ding of the elevator from down the hall.

“I have to go,” she said. “You’re back tomorrow?”

“Yeah.”

“Have a safe flight.”

She hung up the phone and quickly dabbed her mouth with a napkin. She poked her head out into the hall. It was empty. False alarm.

As she walked across to the interview room, a woman who she recognized from the HR department, but not the usual one who had been bringing candidates down, turned the corner at the end of the hall with another woman whom she assumed was Ruth Cairns.

“Oh, I think it must be this way,” the HR woman said. “I get so turned around down here.”

Wendy quickly snuck into the interview room. Thankfully, she had made sure to have it set up before her lunch break.

A moment later, the woman came in with Ruth. She was wearing a red plaid suit with a pleated skirt and double breasted blazer, her auburn hair pulled back in a neat, but loose, bun.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Carr,” she said, holding out her hand.

Wendy shook her hand.

“Please, have a seat.”

Ruth looked at Wendy as though she was about to say something. She sat down and closed her mouth, but her eyes still had that look.

Wendy tilted her head and looked back at her.

“Is something the matter?” she asked.

Once again, Ruth opened her mouth, but nothing came out at first.

“It’s just,” she started.

Wendy signalled for her to go on. Ruth brought a finger up to her mouth.

“You’ve got a little something in your teeth,” she said.

Wendy felt her face grow warm and hoped it wasn’t showing.

Fucking spinach.

She ran her tongue across the front of her teeth.

Ruth opened her purse and pulled out an ornate silver compact.

“Here,” she offered.

“Thank you.”

Their fingers brushed as Wendy took the compact from her. The soft, innocent touch only made her blush more.

She hid her face behind the compact. It wasn’t as red as it felt, thankfully. She had successfully dislodged the spinach, and gave the rest of her mouth and face a thorough look over before handing the compact back to Ruth, holding it in a way that ensured their fingers would not touch accidentally.

“I know some people don’t like it when you say something, but if it were me, I would want to know. Rather get it dealt with right away then find out later you had a whole conversation with someone like that,” Ruth explained.

Wendy nodded in agreement, despite still being somewhat embarrassed.

She jumped right into the questions to get herself back on track. Some of her answers felt rehearsed. Not wrong, but definitely planned. Others, she seemed surprised by, but answered them acceptably.

“Why do you want this position?” Wendy asked.

“Well,” Ruth started. Wendy could already tell this was one of her prepared answers. “I am hoping to earn money so that I can continue my studies in psychology at grad school. Ideally in Boston, of course. This really seems like the perfect position for me.”

“And what makes you perfect for this position?” Wendy countered.

Ruth looked puzzled by the question.

“I should’ve thought that was obvious,” she replied.

Wendy raised her eyebrows.

“I mean,” Ruth continued. “I have the education. I have the job experience. I spent my summers on my grandfather’s farm helping him slaughter pigs and chickens, so I’ve got a strong stomach.”

Ruth went silent. Wendy looked at her. Both of them waiting for the other to speak.

“And,” Ruth continued. She took a deep breath. “I lied on my application form.”

Wendy sat upright.

“Just about my address. I said I lived here, but I don’t. I’m staying at a hostel. But I’m willing to move here because that’s how much I want this job. That’s how much I wanted a chance at an opportunity to work here. With you.”

Wendy’s eyes narrowed. Did she know this woman?

“I never formally took one of your classes. I didn’t get into any of them while you were still there. But I...I snuck in the back just so I could listen.”

She’s flattered, and a bit in shock. She wasn’t aware her lectures were that high in demand, especially based on some of the lackluster students she’d had over the years.

“‘Time and tide wait for no man’,” Ruth quoted. “Or woman, as the case may be.”

Wendy smiled.

“And wouldn’t you want someone who could not only do the job, and do it well, but also who could take the knowledge they’ve learned and apply it? Can you honestly say any of the other applicants would use this experience to further the work you’re doing even after they’ve left?”

They looked at each other - Wendy still smiling, Ruth worried that she’d blown it.

“You make a good case,” Wendy admitted.

She stood up. Ruth waited a moment before doing the same.

Wendy held out her hand.

“We’ll be in touch.”

Ruth shook her hand and gave her a sad smile, her eyes not meeting Wendy’s. Wendy gave her hand a gentle squeeze, and Ruth looked up to a reassuring smile.

#mindhunteredit #mindhunter fic #mindhunter #op*#a tide in a city #wendy carr #bill tench #holden ford

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duhragonball · 3 years

Note

Video for character ask.

I think you meant to say “Videl”, but if I’m wrong, let me know.

Give me a character and I will answer:

Why I like them: I like how Videl is slowly revealed over the course of several episodes. She seems like a bystander at first, then she turns out to be Gohan’s classmate, and then she’s revealed to be Mr. Satan’s kid, and then the hero of Satan City. From there, she learns all of Gohan’s secrets, his disguises, his powers, and eventually she finds out about his victory over Cell.

It’s a very romantic story, without really going out of its way to be romantic. They just find each other and get to know each other, and before long how could they not end up together? Also, she kicked Spopovitch’s head all the way around. So that’s pretty cool.

Why I don’t: Yeah, uh, no reason.

Favorite episode (scene if movie): Probably the one where she first learns to fly. I’m pretty sure that’s the same one where she cuts her hair because of an off-hand remark Gohan made, which still gets to me.

Favorite season/movie: Buu Saga, pretty much by default, right? Everything else she’s been in has been mostly a cameo role, right?

Favorite line: In the dub, when Angela reveals Gohan’s secret teddy bear underwear, Videl glares at him and warns him to “Keep your pants on, or else, got it?”

Favorite outfit:

After she fights Spopovitch, Videl gets this blue shirt over a yellow shirt that looks really awesome, but I think I have to give it to the palette swap version in Movie12. Both looks include the word “FIGHT!” on the outer shirt, which is awesome.

Additionally, Videl’s Movie 12 look includes this red panda apron, and that’s adorable.

OTP: Gohan. I mean, come on.

Brotp: I dunno.

Head Canon: She still trains, if only because I don’t know what else she would be doing all day. Raising Pan is probably a big job, but I think training would make that easier, not harder.

Unpopular opinion: Everyone acts like the character was ruined because she stopped fighting after she and Gohan got together. Like she was supposed to jump in and kick Berrus’ ass in Movie 14. Look, Chiaotzu still fights, and you hardly ever see that guy anymore. Bulma never fights, and she’s all over the DBS: Broly movie. I get wanting more women fighters in Dragon Ball, but Videl was never going to be one of the big guns. And I agree that there’s a lot more that could be done with the character, but the same holds true for several other underutilized characters. Sometimes supporting castmembers get put on a bus. That’s just how it works, and that shouldn’t be held against the character herself. Videl has goals and dreams and they don’t necessarily fit into what the fans would want for her.

I know that sounds kind of weird to say, like I’m treating Videl like a real person, but my point is that you can’t just make everyone a badass main character, simply because badass main characters are popular and get loads of screen time.

A wish: It’d be nice to see more cosplayers do the red devil dress look from Movie 14. It’s a sorely underrated look, which I think looks better on real people than it does on the character, really.

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: Don’t bring back GT Videl.

5 words to best describe them: Mister Satan’s daughter kicks ass.

My nickname for them: N/A

#ask duhragonball #dragon ball #videl #Anonymous

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miraculouscontent · 5 years

Note

Thoughts on Reflekdoll?

This episode is… strange.

Like, first things first: I know I don’t usually comment on the animation quality, but the animation in this episode is… different? I don’t want to say it’s bad, but it’s really noticeable. I think it feels as if the animators are trying to keep the characters constantly in motion, but some of the turns/twists are just a few frames off from where they should be. It’s a bit distracting compared to all the other episodes.

Honestly, it almost feels like some sort of edited back-door pilot to a spin-off series where they decided to switch miraculouses permanently, hence the animation being so different.

Anyway though, onto the real content of the episode.

…Actually, before I get into that, I just wanna say–

[LUKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA]

LUKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That is all.

[Scraptain Obvious]

I don’t really like the lead-in here. I understand that Ladybug and Chat Noir are going to switch miraculouses, so they’re trying to set up a “they talk about each other’s traits/qualifications for the miraculouses” thing, but it feels really forced. Most swap episodes in shows are very predictable/obvious in how they go about things, and this is no different. While I like the twist that Marinette finds the cat to be “easy”, meaning it’s actually only half the struggle one would expect, the road to getting there is too blatant, mostly because of the word choice.

Reflekta even worsens this by talking about people being in her shoes. Not only do Reflekta’s power have nothing to do with the swap itself (I know that the reason they get swapped is because of Reflekta, but that’s not what I mean), but it’s a ridiculous attempt at tying together the akuma to the conversation that Ladybug and Chat Noir were having. It’s simply not needed.

Like, I get it, episode. You’re doing a thing and you’re not even remotely subtle about it. Can we please move on?

Then there’s exactly how this plot happens, and I simply do not believe that Marinette would take off her earrings that easily. Not only did the outfits she and Adrien wore have pockets (because I understand Adrien taking the ring off since I presume he was supposed to match Marinette exactly), but when even Plagg is telling Adrien that taking the ring off is a dumb idea, it starts to feel like the episode is waving a flag in front of my face while screaming, “THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES TO THIS.”

I also don’t buy Plagg and Tikki hearing none of the fight going on until the car they’re in gets flung into the air. Like, they didn’t even phase out of the trunk to see how things were going? I’d expect at least Tikki to keep an eye out just in case, especially if they were both so worried about the miraculouses being removed.

There are other things too, like Mayura’s comment about how the swapped heroes are struggling (which is not only cliche for standard swap plots but makes no sense considering that Marinette wasn’t struggling very much at all), but they’re relatively brief at least, I guess.

Speaking of Mayura–

[Ruffled Feathers]

Mayura’s introduction to the episode is good… enough. The concept of her sentimonster is relayed to where I didn’t have too many questions about it (as opposed to having many during “Miraculer”). I’m glad that Marinette had to explain it to Adrien just because it confirms that Marinette has a lot more information than Adrien does.

I also like the SWISH of Mayura’s fancy peacock dress during her transformation, but that’s not relevant to the episode, so it will get no SWISH points from me.

I mean, granted, this makes “Miraculer” even weirder considering that this doesn’t show the transition between Nathalie feeling sick over the peacock miraculous and then just being able to move around without concern (is this gonna be established in a later episode somehow?), but that’s technically not this episode’s fault so whatever, I’ll chalk that up to a “Miraculer” complaint.

I think the other weird thing about it is that Nathalie is standing behind Hawk Moth when he goes to send his akuma. I don’t know if he just sensed that it was Juleka again and wanted to take advantage of that so he told Nathalie to follow him, but it’s just odd since I’m used to Nathalie doing business-y things.

Also, thanks to Nathalie’s skinnier body due to transforming (Watching her de-transform is so strange because it clearly doesn’t line up), it now looks like her head’s too large for her body, though that might just be me.

Duusu was a little more “hyper” than I expected, but I was technically correct with my “MC Duusu” I suppose, what with the “feels any emotion strongly” thing. Wasn’t really a prediction and just more of what I imagined but I’ll gladly take full credit–

I also suppose that the peacock is more obviously made not to be abused by someone evil if the sentimonster created just follows the orders of the person it touches. Makes it more convenient for someone who’s akumatized but is ultimately why Mayura can’t have a lot of solo appearances.

[Kwamfree]

So, the kwami swap and how it’s worked upon…

First, I gotta say that… like–

It’s baffling that we have to be reminded yet again that Chat almost caused Ladybug to mess up because, just in production order, we know that “Oblivio” will continue this trend. If this comes before “Oblivio” then it shows that Chat hasn’t learned anything from this. If it comes after “Oblivio” (hypothetically; I know what Thomas said about watching in production order), then the lead-in is completely pointless because we could’ve had this be a flashback episode rather than “Stormy Weather 2″ (and no, not an excessive one like “Stormy Weather 2″; I’m talkin’ brief flashbacks as in “here is actual legitimate evidence from previous episodes that show our claims).

Chat saying that Ladybug is a killjoy is rather uncalled for considering that they’re known in the fandom for their playful banter. Ladybug isn’t above puns either; she just takes her job more seriously than Chat does. I mean, the lack of balance (with the scales clearly tipped in Ladybug’s direction) does make for a more satisfying moment later when Ladybug can deal with Chat’s job just fine while he struggles with hers, but I think an extra minute or so would’ve gone a long way to creating a scenario in which the heroes would start discussing their roles in things.

It just feels odd after we’ve already seen “future” episodes like “Gamer 2.0″ where Chat carries along a very similar attitude of not understanding where Ladybug’s problems lie. It’s a good character flaw in theory but it doesn’t go anywhere.

Also, unrelated, but the whole intro could’ve been avoided entirely if “Reverser” had been the kwami swap episode (in which “Reverser” would literally switch their powers; something that Hawk Moth would put into Reverser’s powers to plan accordingly). That episode even mentioned Queen Wasp, which leads all the way back to “Syren” (since the “giving other people miraculouses” and “Chat gets let in on the Master Fu situation” plots are kind of tied together) in which Chat expressed distaste for how Ladybug was keeping him out of things.

We also get another instance of “don’t call me Bugaboo” here, which isn’t something related to Ladybug’s sense of humor at all, so I don’t know why Chat played it off as such.

It’s probably the scene where I’d say that Chat lays it on extra-thick with his ego and “you don’t have a sense of humor” (which I’d like to think is a callback to Adrien in “Frightningale” when he tells Marinette that Ladybug wouldn’t be as funny as her, but I’m not willing to stretch that far). It’s pretty typical Chat fare, but because it’s squeezed into such a short scene, it establishes things too quickly, hence things feeling “forced.”

Onto a positive note real quick though, I do like how it’s immediately noticeable how well the swapped heroes will fare upon transforming. Marinette adjusts her movements accordingly, making slashing/punching motions to show that she’s getting into the “destruction” mindset, whereas Adrien doesn’t change his style at all and does kicking motions despite the ladybug miraculous being a passive one. Makes sense too; Marinette is the versatile type whereas Adrien seems more like a one-trick kinda guy (which Marinette even points out upon calling him “simple;” it’s not really a bad thing, but just stating that Adrien isn’t as flexible as she is).

Now, despite how much I rag on Chat, I will admit that he’s really excessive in this episode, to the point where he doesn’t feel like himself. I already said that he lays on the ego, but even with the ladybug miraculous, he brags about his “mastery” of it after managing to get a mirror (i.e: what he wanted) using Lucky Charm. He also complains about how Marinette chose to make fun of him instead of helping him when helping him is exactly what she’s doing.

And like, I don’t have a high opinion of Adrien, but even I don’t think he’d doubt Ladybug when she tells him that Lucky Charm won’t give him what he wants. He’s talked about how Ladybug is so amazing and everything, but if that’s the case, it’s so strange when he completely ignores her advice and acts as if he’s better.

I mean, at the very least, I suppose it was nice when he finally admitted that he needed her help, acknowledged that using the ladybug miraculous wasn’t easy, and told her that he understood why she doesn’t have time to make jokes. I’m not even against the idea of them having their own roles, because sometimes a person just isn’t cut out for a certain miraculous.

And, in a vacuum, I don’t have a problem with the statement that “the heroes have their roles” because, I mean… as I’ve just stated, certain people fit certain miraculouses, but the issue is that it’s left too simple and doesn’t make sense within the context of the opening.

Giving Adrien the ladybug miraculous helps him feel the pressure that Marinette goes through, but that’s not helpful because it only shows him the mentality that has to go into a miraculous that he does not use. Ladybug was calling him out in the opening because his goofing off almost caused her lucky charm to fail, and what does he do?

He deflects and goes into a completely unrelated ramble about why he’s the humor of the team. Giving him the ladybug won’t fix that.

The episode tells him why Ladybug doesn’t have time for jokes since she’s thinking, but it doesn’t tell him why he shouldn’t be goofing off. Ladybug (as the cat) finds a balance between having fun (which does lead to her teasing him a lot and she’s sure to slip in advice occasionally to go with it) taking things seriously, but Adrien isn’t going to catch onto that.

Now, if the episode had somehow done some crazy fantasy magic and put Adrien in a situation where he had to deal with both being the ladybug and dealing with himself as his partner, then maybe that could’ve been different (also, Mister Bug and Chat Noir would be a horrifying combination, just sayin’).

Also, Chat needs to see that his actions have consequences. Ladybug’s always there to bail him out, and his screw-ups are either fixed by her or are things he doesn’t remember (*side-eyes “Oblivio”*).

If Ladybug is there, Chat won’t have a need to learn anything. Miraculous Ladybug fixes whatever in the end, so he has little worry about his actions. He’d need something bad–truly bad–to happen to shake him enough to get himself in gear.

Seeing the heroes swap was interesting. Seeing their civilian forms interacting with the opposite kwami was interesting. Seeing the difference in their de-transformed miraculouses was interesting.

But it just… doesn’t serve the story in a sense of character progression.

[Alya Out of Style]

Oh, Alya. I’ve talked about you so many times and now it’s time to do it again.

So, okay, it was bad enough in “The Puppeteer 2″ when Alya both forced Marientte to talk to Adrien and caused the villain of the day to happen, but now we have both of those things on top of Alya being even more insistent on the matter. This is also yet another time when Alya brings up Adrien and races off despite Marinette’s protests.

Alya tries to play it off as some sort of perfect opportunity when it isn’t, and I am so tired of Alya acting that way when there are clearly more important things to deal with.

In “The Puppeteer 2,” it was “I know Marinette is babysitting but Adrienette is more important!”

And here, it’s, “I know Marinette needs all her focus but Adrienette can happen, I’m sure it’ll be fiiiine!”

Also, Alya plays it off like Gabriel will never know about Adrien helping them, but Gorilla would know (since Gorilla has to pick him up), and let’s not forget “Origins” where Adrien begged Gorilla and Nathalie not to tell his father and Nathalie blabbed to Gabriel anyway. There’s no guarantee that Gorilla wouldn’t find a way to tell Gabriel, so Alya is ignoring both Adrien’s record with Gabriel and Marinette’s anxiety to make this work. This isn’t just about Marinette (even though it mostly is); it’s about Adrien too (just like “The Puppeteer 2″).

If this was just Marinette hanging out with her friends, that’d be one thing, but this is a situation that needs Marinette’s focus and Alya prioritizes getting “her ship” together instead. I literally cannot fathom how Alya sees Marinette trying to get all this together and go, “You know what would make this better? Let’s toss Adrien into the mix!”

Marinette even warns Alya that this isn’t going to work and Alya doesn’t listen. She has no concept of what the right time to do something is.

Also, not to be that guy, but Alya wants someone for the technical aspect of things and Adrien is just a model. It doesn’t make sense that Adrien would know what looks good because he’s not the one behind the camera. Nino at least was the one filming in “Horrificator” so maybe he’d have an idea of what a good shot would be, but he literally appears and then promptly disappears from the episode.

Also also, Marinette is trying to focus on the modeling stuff (you know, the stuff that’s IMPORTANT for her FUTURE WEBSITE) which Alya is ignoring entirely to make it about Marinette asking Adrien to the movies.

Like, “Animan” was a perfectly acceptable situation for Alya to help in; that was something where Marinette was just casually at the zoo and didn’t have to worry about messing anything up with.

Actually, furthering a point on “Animan” as well, it’s laughable at how wrong Alya was when she claimed that she “doesn’t go making decisions for other people” when that’s a vast majority of what she does to Marinette.

And obviously, Alya doesn’t know that Juleka wanted to be a model, but she stepped in when Marinette was trying to calm Juleka down. Anyone could see that Juleka was distressed and bordering on hyperventilation, but Alya fixated on Adrienette happening instead, even to the point of just snatching the hat off of Juleka’s head. It’d be one thing if Alya and Juleka weren’t close (like, if the girl squad still existed but it was more of Marinette having female friends and Alya having female friends and it’s a “friend of a friend” situation) but Juleka is in the girl squad.

Alya also continues to make everything worse by stressing the time that Adrien has to leave, so she’s making Marinette’s little event all about getting Marinette together with Adrien. Even if it had worked, that doesn’t make it okay for Alya to highjack all the operations.

And, I mean, this wouldn’t even be a problem if Alya just felt bad about it or even took responsibility, but she doesn’t feel a thing after Juleka is akumatized. When Marinette is the one to apologize, Alya doesn’t step in to be like, “I’m sorry too,” or, “it’s my fault for trying to make everything go how I wanted it to.”

Alya basically goes into the foreground only to force the entire situation and then drops into the background once she’s served her purpose. At that point, she’s less of a character and more of a plot device, which is never a good thing.

…That said, Alya isn’t the only poorly-handled one here.

[Reflekdull]

Juleka, not you too!

…Okay, I mean, being fair, it was nice to see that Juleka does have a goal in life with wanting to be a model despite her obvious anxiety on the matter. It was both surprising but also made sense for her character (and simultaneously makes “Reflekta” more tragic because of her photo curse).

I also think it’s great how perceptive Marinette was on it since–y’know–it’s Marinette, it’s natural that she’d be perceptive to anxiety.

…Unfortunately though, that brings things to the fact of Juleka being mad at Marinette.

Because why, what, and how.

Like, I am so sick of characters/episodes turning against Marinette for things she either didn’t mean to do or literally did not do.

Marinette was helping Juleka. She was asking Juleka what she wanted to do and only started suggesting that she should handle things when Juleka was not giving her an answer.

Marinette checked on Juleka multiple times yet, when Juleka finally gets akumatized, it’s Marinette that Juleka goes after, and then they have Marinette claim that Juleka said that she didn’t want to model just to make Marinette look to be in the wrong.

Reflekta argues, “You didn’t let me explain!” but no, that was Alya who cut in. Alya was the one who started going on and on about Marinette and Adrien being the models. Marinette was taking responsibility and checking on Juleka (again, twice) to see if she was okay.

I’m not even mad that Marinette apologized, because it is in-character for her to do so. No, I’m mad at the episode for failing in everything else completely. Everything about the lead-up, the process, and the aftermath of the akuma is wrong.

And it’s not just Marinette either. Rose is also very attentive towards Juleka, but Juleka insists that she’s fine to both Marinette and Rose, only to then target them directly once she’s akumatized.

This is exactly like the original “Reflekta,” where Reflekta shot Rose without any focus or thought on the matter. I hate to complain about it here because it’s not a fault exclusive to this episode but, like–

I get that being akumatized means taking away a lot of the original traits of the person being akumatized, but they should still have something. Akuma like Rogercop still had attachments even when said attachment had nothing to do with their akumatization, so I don’t understand the logic that someone who’s akumatized just becomes a completely different person. It’s boring and makes the akumatized person less like “a person we feel for and are attached to” and more like “a generic villain-of-the-day.” Reflekta is flashy and confident, unlike Juleka, which is totally fine, but if she has no hints of who Juleka was, I find it too hard to get invested when she’s rampaging around Paris.

I dunno. It’s just weird knowing that Reflekta is the worst example of this while her brother is one of the best.

And on Reflekta herself as the villain-of-the-day here, I’m not sure how I feel about her coming back as a repeat akuma. I mean, Stormy Weather and Gamer 2.0 made sense given their build-up, but Reflekta feels like too much of a stretch here. I don’t even have a problem with repeat akuma in concept, but the situation that Juleka goes through doesn’t correlate to Reflekta’s idea of “I want to be seen by everyone.” Like, yes, Juleka wants to be a model, but the lead-in to the akumatization is the main problem; Hawk Moth’s lines fixate on Juleka wanting to be seen when the problem was that she didn’t have the confidence to model Marinette’s outfits.

Also, if Juleka wants to model, making everyone look like her is literally the opposite of what she should want to do. Luka’s whole line about her being pretty and Juleka’s want to model clothing only hold up if she’s actually modeling clothing as herself.

I know it wouldn’t be a kwami swap episode if I did this, but if Reflekta’s goal is to make people understand how she feels, then her powers should center around giving people crippling anxiety, like what she had when she was trying to model for Marinette. I already suggested the same for my version of Reverser, and I still add that it’d be hilarious for her powers to not affect Marinette/Ladybug because she’s already an anxious mess normally so she’s used to it (plus, then Reflekta would’ve seen that Marinette is just like her and, if the episode still went with Reflekta being mad at her, that would’ve made her realize that she was wrong, even if Juleka herself would have to be corrected later). This also would’ve had the same effect that the original episode has on Chat where he realizes how Ladybug feels on a daily basis.

Heck, this episode even fails to point out that this is on Juleka as well. I’m not criticizing Juleka for having anxiety to the point of not speaking, but getting mad at Marinette was completely out of nowhere.

Right before Juleka is akumatized, Juleka blames herself for the situation, which isn’t entirely wrong. I’m glad that she made an attempt to put herself out there, but throwing blame onto Marinette was uncalled for. I would’ve happily excused Reflekta being mad at Marinette and Rose if Reflekta was just deflecting (heh) the self-loathing onto others to compensate, but she also would have had to:

a - be mad at Adrien too because Adrien is ALSO “stealing” her spot as a model (and, suddenly, I’m reminded of “Gamer”) and also get angry at Alya for the hat snatching

b - not be huffy at Marinette after being de-akumatized; if she is, it’s only deflection and she immediately feels bad once Marinette apologizes and then Juleka assures Marinette that’s it’s not her fault

This is the problem when there are four writers writing one episode. Regardless of how much it “helps continuity,” too many ideas are being thrown in and it turns the episode into a mess that feels like it was written by writers who all wrote different scenes but then didn’t consult each other enough on what happened in those scenes, so one writer will go in with a vague idea of, “oh, Marinette took Juleka’s spot in modeling so this must be Marinette’s fault; I’ll have Juleka be mad at her for that and then have Marinette apologize!”

Just… ugh. Some of the interactions are wonderful and the swapped heroes are interesting, but I don’t know if it’s worth it for the rest of the plot.

#category: critique #episode: Reflekdoll #category: long post #word count: over 3000 #other: ask and answer

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darkhymns-fic · 4 years

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All Wrapped Up

Sometimes the comfort of each other's clothing can be more than enough.

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters/Pairing: Lloyd Irving/Colette Brunel Rating: G Mirror Link: AO3 Notes: For Colloyd Week Day 2: Outfit Swap / Role Reversal, but mainly more about the outfits here! (Also I apparently very much like colloyd and sleeping put together).

In his jacket, Colette looked so small. It was one thing Lloyd noticed above all else.

On their annual visit to Iselia, they always went to Dirk’s. The dwarf was usually out on commission work, leaving the house to themselves. Lloyd was used to it, having learned to take care of Noishe, some of the gardening and other household chores that his father expected of him while he was gone. And with Colette, it was double the help!

But this time, they were too weary to do much except go to bed and give Noishe a few pats on the head as the animal snored in his stable. Lloyd had struggled just getting his jacket off, but once he finally did, laying it across the chair next to his small desk, Colette had picked it up immediately.

“Hm? Why’re you taking that?”

She wrapped it around her shoulders, clasping a few buttons near the collar. “It’s my new blanket!” she announced. Then went to curl up on his bed, careful to not knock over any of the potted plants that lined the front wooden headboard. “It’s so warm and comfy.”

“We have actual blankets though! I even brought up several from the closet…” But Colette only poked out her tongue at him, then snuggled more into the red outfit, hands already engulfed by the long sleeves.

In his jacket and in his bed, she looked so tiny that he could have carried her easily in his arms (though maybe not as easily as she could carry him).

His bed was already quite small on its own, having only been meant for himself. But it barely even fit him that well now, his father saying that assessing the height of humans was always a gamble. Standing an even two feet over the dwarf, Lloyd figured that made sense. He didn’t really understand just how tall dwarves grew either!

Lloyd soon climbed into bed as well, dragging along one of the blankets he had retrieved, although it was musty from having been locked away. He coughed away the dust clouds that came as he tried to air it out, eyes occasionally straying to Colette, who seemed to already be fast asleep. The jacket bundled up around her, its white ribbons running down her side to fall over the side of the bed. Her soft breathing was all he heard once he stopped hacking his lungs out.

And still she looked so small.

Lloyd always tried to sleep at a reasonable time when he could, or he wouldn’t be at his best for the next day! These were drilled into him by Dirk, who always expected him to be up as soon as the sun peeked over the horizon. Yet with all that knowledge, Lloyd couldn’t get to sleep, even with the still-dusty blanket on him.

Colette was sleeping throughout his tossing and turning, until finally Lloyd just decided to throw the blanket to the floor in frustration. Sleeping was dumb anyway.

His eyes had long adjusted to the dark in the room; but he had seen the same ivy clinging to his walls a thousand times, even if he hadn’t been home for a year. It was amazing how everything managed to stay the same, the familiar scuff marks on the floorboards when Lloyd first tried practicing with his swords, or his lockbox of picks, knives and tools still staying in that one place on his desk since he last left. He wondered if any old projects he had started on and then abandoned would be in there too.

But these were all things he was bored already of seeing. So he turned on his side, watching Colette sleep. It wasn’t weird. Colette had admitted she did the same thing too!

Her hands were held just beneath her chin, her face pressed into the pillow. The bed was still small, and he tried his best not to crowd her, one of his legs dangling over the side. But maybe he moved in just a bit closer, to get more comfortable, to not wake her up.

Colette, you’re still up.

Hehe…I couldn’t sleep.

The two moons hung in the sky just outside his balcony window. It was strange seeing them there, seeing them light up the night even more so. But they illuminated the room now, falling over Colette, and the gentle way her chest rose as she breathed. It painted his red jacket to a shade of white that could only be seen in the dark. So deeply she slept, eyelashes fluttering slightly, sinking inside dreams that he couldn’t see.

Colette deserved to sleep, after everything, but somehow, he could barely stop himself as he reached out to poke her cheek in curiosity.

“Ah…” Colette uttered in her sleep, her forehead scrunched.

“Uh oh.” Lloyd instantly took back his hand, but it was too late. Colette was already blinking awake, the jacket slipping a bit from her shoulders.

“Lloyd…?” she asked, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand.

“Um… good dreams?” he asked with a grin. But that didn’t take away the fact that he had messed up. “Sorry…just couldn’t sleep.”

“Oh…how come?” Colette was still laying on her side, both facing one another within his small bed. “Did you not eat enough earlier?”

“I am kinda hungry…” he said, thinking back to the delicious beef and pork stew they had earlier… “I think it’s just this bed… I feel too big for it now.”

Colette smiled then, though she yawned right after. “Hehe. It’s because you’re growing up.”

“Well, so are you!” Lloyd stated. “Isn’t this bed too cramped for you also?”

“Hm, not really. It feels so comfy.” She hugged the jacket more to herself, eyes half-lidded. “It’s like you’re all around me.”

Lloyd had thought he had gotten over blushing like an idiot, but that was what he did, and the two moons wouldn’t exactly do a good job of hiding it either. “Well, I am actually right here too…”

Colette laughed softly, looking up at him with those tired eyes. Her hands clasped tightly around his jacket to keep her inside. “Maybe you just need something like that though. I’m already getting sleepy again…”

“So I just make you fall asleep!” Lloyd said in a fake-offended tone. “Didn’t know I was that boring.”

“It’s okay. It’s really useful actually! I always have a full night’s sleep when you’re around.”

“Hey…” Lloyd whined. “I was just joking before…”

Another giggle, and that made him laugh too. Something about the night always brought out something in them both, to make them want to keep talking, long after the sun had set. Well, if one didn’t count Colette already falling asleep earlier.

“Well, though?” Colette asked him. “Did you wanna be able to sleep? I bet I have something that can help!”

“Sure, I guess,” Lloyd said, not super concerned with that if it meant he could just hang out with Colette for most of the night. “Or is this just your way of trying to get rid of me?”

“Aw, hehe, you’re silly!” Colette would only say before she turned away from him. He couldn’t tell what she was doing, but it seemed like she was going to reach for something?

“Colette, you totally avoided the question!” he complained. Then suddenly his face was covered, some sort of fabric thrown over him. “Ah!”

“Oh…I guess it’s too small on you?” He heard Colette’s question, before whatever thing was on him was being pulled down over his head. “If we just… Or maybe your head is too big!”

“My head is normal-sized!” he argued back, until he finally could see again, popping through an opening in the fabric. “Gah… Uh, what am I…?” He looked down, the moonlight highlighting the white, glaring off the golden buttons sewn near the shoulders.

Colette was sitting up now, his jacket slipping off her slightly. She looked at him with such pride. “It looks cute on you!”

Just as his red jacket looked so large on her, so did her overcoat, despite its much too small head opening. Its front flaps laid out over the bed, blue streaks cutting through the middle. He felt the other outfittings of the outfit hang off his back, and it also… “Is it always this heavy?”

Colette tilted her head, considering. “Hm, it might be? I guess I never noticed.”

“There’s no way!” he said, but maybe it just took some adjusting. Once he felt more fitted to the overcoat, Lloyd also sat up straight, hands on his waist. “Hm, needs more red,” he stated.

“Oh yeah! Then we can match,” she giggled. “You can keep that one.”

“Really? Well, if you say so.” While it didn’t exactly fit him perfectly, the ends of the overcoat just barely reaching his waist, he could already see a few of its benefits. “It’s super easy to move in!”

“Mm! And it’s also good to keep warm in too!”

“Eh, really? But it’s like all open here!” Lloyd rushed his arms out from underneath the overcoat, unhindered by the flaps. “See?”

“Oh, well with my dress, it keeps me warm. Did you want to have that too?”

“I-I don’t think so,” Lloyd said, another flush to his cheeks. “Also that definitely won’t fit me!”

He wanted to keep talking about silly things with Colette, the night outside rustling from the oak trees that surrounded the house, crickets chirping just underneath his windowsill, but he caught a familiar scent too from what he wore. It’s her, he thought, his chest feeling hot. Like she’s around me…

Colette laid back on the bed again, wrapped in his jacket. She looked up at him with a sleepy, kind of goofy smile on her face. “It’s so warm…”

“Dork,” he whispered, eyes feeling just slightly heavy. “You know…I haven’t really washed that in a while…”

“Mmhmm…”

And just like that, Colette was asleep again, clutching at the pillow she laid on, cheeks pressed so firmly against it. She was cute, and he was tempted to kiss her, but he didn’t want to force her awake again.

Besides, maybe he was finally getting a bit sleepy.

“This would work better…if I was in your room…” he mumbled, laying back down on his side, watching her face. Lips slightly parted, the soft rush of breath that left her in an even rhythm, and the moonlight sliding down her hair and onto the jacket she held.

It was like she was around him, but it wasn’t enough, even with her overcoat on him. So he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her in close, as slowly as he could so that she wouldn’t wake. Maybe she was dreaming her own good dreams, too. She only slightly shifted but was soon leaning against his chest, her smile peeking through his own jacket collar.

She looked so small, like she’d disappear if he wasn’t too careful. But he had to sleep soon, or he wouldn’t be at his best tomorrow. He had to…and she promised to stay with him. He didn’t have to worry now.

Still watching her as the hour passed, he couldn’t resist another poke on her cheek, half-guided by sleep.

“…Nn…” she muttered, shaking her head. “Lloyd…”

“Sorry,” he whispered, going back to holding her. But he eventually fell asleep too, wrapped in each other’s jackets, wrapped in each other’s arms, the night feeling so warm.

#colloyd #tales of symphonia #colloydweek2020 #lloyd irving #colette brunel

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anomiezine-blog · 5 years

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The Cult of the Proletariat

“Because the horror of Communism, Stalinism, is not that bad people do bad things — they always do. It’s that good people do horrible things thinking they are doing something great.”

-Slavoj Zizek

‘But as in all cults, what’s central to the Communist Party is the belief system and the elimination of nuance. From there you’re very slowly led down the road to fanaticism and mass murder.’

– Alexei Sayle

I have found a way to tell apart Leninists (otherwise known as Communists or Bolsheviks in the common parlance) from what you might call the reasonable left. It is not the outfits, stained by take-away and Tippex, or their odour, because deodorant is a bourgeois affectation. Instead it is their answer to one rather simple question: ‘Do you trust people to make their own decisions?” I have never met a Leninist that didn’t say No. An addendum to that might be the question: “If you could have your revolution but it would make people poorer and less free, at least in the short term, would you still want it?” Once again I have never met one that didn’t answer in the affirmative. It is the same toxic combination of misanthrope and fanaticism that you can now see in Brexiteers in Britain, and amongst Fascists the world over. It is the belief that you and your tribe alone have received the revealed truth from on-high, and however you see fit to make that a reality is acceptable. It is the language of a cult.

It’s a word that is thrown around a lot and there are even multiple competing definitions, but it is essential to understand what a cult is if we are to understand the toxicity at the heart of Leninist parties of the past and present. What are the obvious signs of a cult? In my opinion, there are 10 unequivocal signs:

1. A small group of people united by a Utopian ideology (or religion) who stand outside normal society.

2. A dominant leader/s that hold complete power over the lives of its members.

3. An all-or-nothing worldview. “Either the Revolution comes or the world will end.”

4. A cadre or administrative class that directs the majority of members.

5. Gaslighting. The changing of facts and reality to suit the party.

6. Mental, physical or sexual abuses (see the SWP in the UK)

7. The policing of language, opinions and the effective creation of secular blasphemy.

8. The welding of the social and the political. The party becomes your only community, sometimes to the detriment to your family and older friends.

9. Those that leave the party become apostates and are to be shunned and demonised.

10. A uniform. In this case conformity of clothing is encouraged through bullying and mocking rather than an order from above.

It is hard to explain to those that have not experienced life in a cult why anyone would willingly join such a toxic entity. Left wing cults, like all cults, don’t look toxic from the outside. In fact, when you first join you are often showered with not only attention, but with a sense of purpose. You feel that finally you are with people that see the problems of the world as you do and are motivated by high ideals of humanism and solidarity. This is described by some psychologists as the lovebombing stage. It is a very powerful indoctrinating tool and often keeps individuals attached to the party long after the toxic nature of the party has become apparent.

In this I can at least speak from personal experience. I was a member of a Trotskyist party, that shall go unnamed, in my youth and I got a firsthand experience of cult tendencies within the left. All the cliches were there; the lovebombing; the close social circle; shadowy General Secretary; the strict hierarchy; the self-censorship of speech; the pandering to party leaders; the Gaslighting; the blasphemy; and the apostates. I have done a large amount of study of what are known as cluster B personality disorders (anti-social, narcissistic and Borderline) since, to try and understand what had happened to me, and I can attest to the presence of these toxic behaviours within all levels of the party structure. I am not the first to notice the cult tendencies within Leninist parties, in fact a cursory google search will present you with ample evidence of how commented upon this is. It really is one of the worst kept secrets on the left. Yet, these parties still persist and in the case of Ireland are the only real alternative to the parties of the Landlord class. As an Anarchist with a sense of history and responsibility this is exceedingly worrying.

This is not to suggest that Anarchist groups can’t become cult like. I spent time in a certain British anarchist group, that again shall not be named. In many ways it functioned along similar lines to the Leninist party I had formerly been part of . While there was a rotating leadership role, the same small group of people swapped the officer positions, and there was the same narrow mindedness to new ideas. Thankfully there is a great deal more individualism amongst Anarchists and this small toxic group were eventually expelled from the organisation. To some extent cult behaviour is a human failing. The legitimate and noble desire to make the world a better place can easily be perverted by disordered people for their own pleasures. You can see this in countless churches, sects, and organisations of every hue. In the case of political groupings, at least, anarchism has an answer and it is in our very DNA. A distrust of authority. Leninists parties can never be reformed from within given their very inspiration was taken from the mind of an authoritarian cult leader, Vladimir Lenin.

If you have the time or inclination to read about the father of 20th century Communism, you will learn many things, none particularly endearing, whether it be his: accepting German Imperial help in 1917; crushing the Soviets, snuffing out workers’ democracy; the invasion of Poland in 1920; the founding of the vile gulags; the rejection of a democratic vote in 1917 that the Bolsheviks lost; the creation of the brutal Checka, etc. The figures vary, but Lenin’s Red Terror is believed to have killed anywhere between 100,000 and 1.3 million people. The fanatic view of the Lenin towards any challenge to the new regime was published within the organs of the party: ‘anyone who dares to spread the slightest rumor against the Soviet regime will be arrested immediately and sent to concentration camp”. By 1921 70,000 were imprisoned in the brutal gulag system. The authoritarian and genocidal views of the Leninists were apparent quite early with Grigory Zinoviev declaring in 1917: ‘To overcome our enemies we must have our own socialist militarism. We must carry along with us 90 million out of the 100 million of Soviet Russia’s population. As for the rest, we have nothing to say to them. They must be annihilated”. The fact that so many within the left still celebrate this man is stunning to behold, but then again he had the good fortune to die before the experiment of Leninism reached its apex under his protege Stalin. He would order the deaths of tens of millions of his own people, whether through the repression of the secret police or through man made famines, and after World War II enslave the population of Eastern Europe for half a century. And yet, the failure of the Left to ever really exorcise the ghost of the USSR and Leninism is one of our greatest failings. The supposed unique evil of Josef Stalin is a lazy way to avoid the truth, that the Bolsheviks were totalitarians in their very DNA, due to the teachings of Lenin. The USSR was in its origins a cult of Leninism extended to the entire Russian Empire. The Left need to except that the USSR is ours to own much like the right must accept Fascism as the logical extension of their own ideology. There is little to salvage in this experiment and the left should have long ago acknowledged Leninism as the twin evil of Fascism in the 20th Century. Unfortunately, it has not and we are left in a situation where anarchism remains at the fringes and the Leninist parties remain the only likely alternative to what must soon follow another violent collapse of Capitalism.

Any reasonable look at the enormous debt bubble forming around the world can not help, but lead you to the conclusion that a major global depression is looming. The conservative estimate is that there is 420 trillion dollars of debt worldwide. In Ireland we are one of the most indebted countries in the western world. Our debt to GDP ratio is 170% of GDP with some estimates as high as 210% of GDP. Each Irish citizen owes 42,000 Euro of debt. We will never be able to pay that off. This global debt can be combined with the huge wealth now centred in the hands of a very small cabal of oligarchs. Less than 100 persons now own over half the wealth of the entire globe. A vampiric ruling class long ago tore up the post-war social democratic settlement and could give a shit about the long term cost of their greed. As a result, the middle class’s spending power has shrunk to a fraction of what it once was. (Economics 101: the middle class buy the products of the ruling elite. If they have no money, and cannot borrow anymore, a crisis of capitalism ensues. It is that simple!) This makes a major depression almost inevitable, with some recent estimates saying it will arrive by as early as 2021. A collapse of capitalism will in rather short order unleash not only the demons of Fascism, but also the demons of Leninism. If, as I fear is likely, we are in the midst of another era of capitalist crisis similar to the 1920s and 30s, the corrupt parties of the centre across Europe will fall, and the masses will look for answers and alternatives to croney capitalism. At the moment the working class is bearing the brunt of neoliberalism and are looking to Trump, Brexit and the European Fascist right, the Orban’s and Le Pen’s. In the future there is no reason to suppose that some of remaining middle class will not make the same choice. In such a situation, it will seem wise to align ourselves with the Leninists in hopes of preventing another epoch of Fascist authoritarianism, but I would ask all anarchists to consider the old Bakunin quote: ‘When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called the People’s Stick’. We have been here before and we know what the Leninists will do if they get a whiff of power, therefore ‘What is to be done?’

Well, surprise, surprise, I recommend anarchism, but not in its current form. These days anarchists are a scattered and clicky sect within the left, rightly mocked for both the black block and its disinterested hipster membership alike. We must accept some of the blame for failing to take advantage of the post-Leninist era of the 90s-today. There were even some signs of anarchist ideas permeating the general left in the Seattle demonstrations of 1999, the occupy movement of 2011, the Arab Spring, and the yellow jackets, but these were to come to nothing. Clearly we have not learned from our own mistakes of the 20th century. Here I will perhaps lose some of my audience when I say that our principles held us back in the past. We were firm believers that ‘the Great is not enemy of the Good’. That ‘pragmatism was defeatism’. We, too, believed in an ‘all or nothing revolution’. Either it was complete eradication of the state and class system or it was not worth fighting for. This did us no favours in the past and it will do us little favours in the future. The world is not as we hope it to be, but rather as it is. Who will our allies be in the times to come? Unless we want to repeat our ancestors mistakes in Russia and Spain, it can’t be the Leninists. Rather I suggest the reasonable left I mentioned at the start of this article: Socialists, Left-Communists, Social Democrats, Republicans and even Liberals have all proved in the past to be determined enemies of the cults of Bolshevism and Fascism and capable of pluralism, though not always willing. It is possible to imagine a society of differing political structures coexisting, and of this being a truer reflection of the will of most people than any monolithic authoritarian Leftism can provide. These are our logical allies, some more than others, but to ensure history does not repeat itself we will have to find a way to both defend ourselves and inspire hope for a better future. For such a pluralist society of state socialists, anarchists, and even liberals, must not sap the hope and idealism of a genuinely Libertarian Socialist Revolution. We will have to walk a tightrope between reactionaries, both left wing and liberal. For without going down another rabbit hole, it was not just the Leninists that betrayed the Anarchists of Spain, it was also their republican and liberal allies. It will not be easy and much like our ancestors we will probably fail, but the difference between fighting for a society that allows differing political ideals the chance to bloom and the totalitarian cult of Leninism, seems a worthy trade off.

#anomie #anomiezine #anarchism #anarchy #article #proletariat

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amemixfan · 6 years

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“I can’t imagine this world without you.” - Iraia and l&l mc

Once more, I have said the wrong thing.

I wince to myself as the Elven noble family I am greeting eye each other wearily. I have slipped up again and broken protocol. It seems I am still ill equipped to be among them here.

An apology leaves my lips in Elvish, it is the only phrase I have mastered after many months in this domain, and I drop myself into a low curtsy. My head is bowed and I am grateful for the curtain my hair provides as I bend low. My face is burning and I try to suppress my humiliation.

Even after the training, even after the incessant drilling, I still make errors. No matter how hard I practice, I still can’t manage to greet someone correctly. I really am a failure.

When I rise back up from my curtsy, the Elven noble family is still staring quizzically at me. The woman is smiling but I can see the dimness in her eyes. Her posture is a little rigid and she almost seems to look past me as if she has grown tired of my presence. Her partner, another young woman, is openly scowling. There is a flushness to her face in irritation and she all but breezes right past me in her effort to be away from me.

I quell my anxiety and bite painfully on my cheek.

How many people have I offended yet since the celebration began? It’s hardly been an hour and about half the guests have made faces at me.

I press my fingers to my lips in growing nervousness.

After arriving months ago into the Elven country, I had been put to work. Being chosen as the consort to the future leader of the Elven domain required extensive lessons and classes. Every waking moment had been spent learning to navigate the life of Elvish royalty and learning all I could about the culture. Still, I have advanced less than an inch.

I squeeze my eyes shut as anxiety settles into a pit in my stomach.

Almost a year ago, I had fallen for Iraia. The future leader of the Elven domain had come to Reiner’s domain to secure more troops in the effort to stop the growing war with the Witch Queen. We had met and had a whirlwind romance. At the end of her stay, she had asked me to return with her to her own domain to serve as her partner. I had agreed without thought.

Now, I was realizing my mistake.

I did not regret coming with Iraia, I could never regret that, but I did regret agreeing blindly to becoming her future consort. I had never imagined how difficult it would be to enter a new world. After falling from Chicago into this one, I thought I had mastered being thrusted into new dimensions. Now it seems I was very wrong.

The Elven domain was rigid in everything. Propriety was big with the locals, the royal family has millions of tiny rules they have to obey, and centuries of isolation has engraved a distaste for outsiders in the minds of many.

In this domain with its foreign tongue, foreign culture, and foreign practices, I am not welcome. Not only am I not an elf, but I am also simply not Elvish enough. And, somehow in this country, not practicing their culture is worse than not being a member of their race.

“How are you doing?” A voice greets me from the side. I am startled out of my self loathing by Iraia.

Iraia wears her armor over her usual green outfit. The metal gleams freshly polished and she has taken care to adorn it with fresh flowers from the garden. Her entire outfit has been carefully selected for this very formal event-

An event in which I have already humiliated myself many times over.

“Hey,” I greet wearily. I carefully dodge her question and make an effort to smile. The corners of my lips hurt from all of the false greetings I have given all day.

Iraia stands at my side and folds her arms before her professionally. Her posture straightens and she easily slips into her “royal” mode. The act falls easily over her and I envy the way she can just be a royal without trying. After months, I still can’t fit that role despite my best attempts.

“Everything alright?” Iraia asks. She glances at me from the corner of her eye. As always, there is concern in her gaze. These past few months, I’ve seen her worry evident on her face. She is frightened for me in this land so different from all I know. I worry her.

Somehow, that makes me feel worse.

My throat tightens suddenly and it takes me a few moments to remember how to use it. Desperately, I want to break down. A day full of humiliation and embarrassment has left me exhausted, but I don’t want to show her the worst parts of myself. If I let her in on how much I am struggling, will she recant her offer? Will she realize she’s made a mistake in asking me to be her consort?

The thought chills me and I suppress a shudder.

“Everything is fine. Have you finished your rounds?”

The lie slips easily past my lips. I only feel just slightly guilty about not telling the truth. I shouldn’t hide things from her, but I don’t want to worry her any more than I have to.

Iraia looks like she doesn’t quite believe me, the familiar concern still on her face, but she is forced to abandon the matter. Another noble family arrives and awaits to be greeted. I let her handle things.

Rapid Elvish is exchanged between the crown princess and the noble family head. They bow to her, give me a polite smile, and very quickly forget my presence. The greeting is over in seconds and the family moves past us and into the palace where soft music can be heard.

Once they are gone, Iraia turns to me fully. She reaches her hands and takes mine in hers. Her palms are callused from fighting and work. I feel some of the tension on my shoulders easing due to her close proximity. Being with her is better than any medicine.

“I snuck away from my rounds to be here,” Iraia admits, “My little brother can handle them on his own. I would rather be here with my consort.”

Consort. The title still feels heavy on me. I suppress my wince. I certainly don’t deserve it.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I confess.

I really am. Any moment I can steal with Iraia, busy as a bee in her country and always away, is a precious gift I don’t take lightly. Her presence is a rare gem I treasure. Already, I can feel myself starting to feel less suffocated.

The corners of her mouth turn up in a genuine smile. It’s not the practiced grin she puts on for guests, rather, it’s the real deal. I see the way her eyes soften and affection shines through.

My own fake smile is swapped by a real one. “How is the party inside?”

The party, one of the thousands the Elvish family throws, has been raging for hours. Guests have been steadily arriving all day and I’ve been stuck outside the walls greeting. Every one wants a glimpse at the future consort. I am like a show piece at a museum. It’s more than a little upsetting.

“Not as fun as you’d imagine,” Iraia soothes. She is clearly lying to spare my feelings at being trapped outside but I let her. Her fingers intertwine with mine. “I’d much rather be here with you. You’re much more fun than some random nobles anyway.”

Despite myself, a laugh leaves my lips. I press my hand to my mouth to stifle it. Color rises on my face at the compliment.

“Don’t let the nobility hear you. I don’t think they’ll appreciate you preferring a human to their company,” I say. I mean for it to come out light hearted, but some pain slides through.

It is still painful to remember my place. I am human and not Elven. This little detail has never been forgotten by anyone around. The amount of times I’ve heard the Elvish word for human whispered under a noble’s breath is impossible to determine. I honestly believe I’ve been addressed as ‘the human’ more times than I’ve been addressed by name. It is just another reminder that I don’t belong.

Iraia gives me another concerned glance. Ever observant, she has picked up on that tilt in tone. She gives my hand another squeeze, reassuring and caring, and leans into my side.

Lightning fast, before anyone can tell what happened, she presses a kiss to the corner of my mouth. It is quick, chaste, and over before I have a chance to savor the feeling of her lips on my skin. Nevertheless, the feeling paints a dark blush on my face and helps me feel more at ease.

I hiss her name in a playful chide and press a finger to where I can still feel the phantom feeling of her breath on my mouth.

“Iraia! What will the people say?” I can’t help the little giddy laugh that leaves my mouth again.

Iraia winks at me and the edge of her own mouth turns up in a pleased smirk. As the crown princess, she is not meant to show “improper” behavior before the nobility. Kissing her consort before a gathering crowd is probably against thousands of cultural regulations, yet she seems to not mind. If anything, she looks quite pleased with herself. Like the cat that ate the canary.

Her body leans into mine again, pressing up against my side, and I inhale her scent. It’s something floral and impossibly sweet. I savor it, archive it to memory, and draw strength from her presence next to me.

“Let them gawk, dear one, gossip never hurt anyone,” Iraia chirps.

I look away to hide my own smile. Gossip is a sharpened blade that can cut through reputation, but I let it go. If she wants to break custom and kiss me, I won’t oppose.

I open my mouth to come up with some witty retort, something that’ll make her blush because I’m tired of being the only turning red, but I don’t have much of a chance. Another carriage is pulling up before us and another noble couple is exiting.

This one is very important by the looks of their clothing. The woman curtsies low to Iraia and almost ignores me. The man looks right past me to the princess and greets her in Elvish.

I feel like an outsider to the exchange and quickly realize I am meant to. This family, like most elders, refuses to acknowledge my presence. I am not Elvish enough for them, so they are eager to be away from me.

Iraia must realize this too because her smile turns a little pointed. She hooks her arm around mine and makes it clear that I am her partner. When her eyes meet mine, I see her message clear as day.

Help me greet them. Prove to them that you belong.

I bite my tongue and turn back to the couple. They’re expectant, still waiting for Iraia to give them the indication to go into the party, and I don’t have much time to lose.

The anxiety in my stomach twists and my throat tightens. Greet them? I can try.

I try to remember my training from earlier and draw as much courage from Iraia at my side as I can.

My form lowers to a curtsy, more polished than the ones that I’ve given all day, and I bow my head appropriately. The greeting I’ve rehearsed thousands of times slips past my lips in Elvish. I offer a smile, something delicate and worthy of a consort, and wait to be greeted in turn. Perhaps this time I’ve managed to get it right. Surely I’ve done everything correctly. After all, Iraia is at my side and I can’t fail with her watching me.

I wait to be greeted back-

But hollow silence rings out. The Elvish couple quirks an eyebrow and glances at Iraia. The crown princess gives a little movement of her lips in pain before her smile returns full force. She squeezes my hand reassuringly and swoops in.

Once more, Elvish phrases fall from her mouth fluidly. I can’t tell what she is saying but I hear my least favorite phrase mixed in. An apology.

My heartbeat is a dull roar in my ears. Iraia has apologized on my behalf. Once more, accidentally, I have slighted a noble.

My eyes begin to burn and it is all that I am not to melt into a humiliated heap then and there. I force myself to reel in my emotions and continue to smile.

The nobles accept whatever apology Iraia has given them and move past us and inside. They coldly disregard my presence. They were already weary of a human taking the title of consort and I have just proven their worries true.

My hands begin to shake and I clear my throat. Once they’re out of earshot, I blink up at Iraia.

“What did I say?”

My voice sounds devoid of emotion, as resigned as I feel internally. I am exhausted from making mistakes all day.

Iraia nervously coughs. “You…You mixed up a phrase. Instead of welcoming them, you told them they were not needed.”

My eyes fall close in shame. A tightness to my chest leaves me speechless.

All day I’ve ruined things…

As if she could read my thoughts, Iraia hurriedly continues. “It’s alright! The phrases are almost identical, I don’t blame you. Just put the accent on the last vowel next time, yeah?”

She raises my hand to her mouth and kisses my knuckle. An action that would have usually made me smile now only leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Do I even deserve her touch? Does a failure at a simple greeting even deserve the title of consort?

I withdraw my hand from her grasp and look past her. Another carriage is pulling in and I suddenly feel like I’m drowning. I don’t have the energy to make another mistake.

“I need some fresh air,” I gasp out.

Although I know I am not supposed to abandon my spot, I turn around and stalk away. Iraia calls out my name and signals for her sibling, Imohn, to take her place. They do so without question and Iraia hurries after me.

Somehow, I make it into the royal courtyard. The palace gardens are empty today because everyone is inside the palace for the festivities. The only sound is that of a toad on a lily pad and a few crickets underfoot.

The silence is not as comforting as I thought. I sit on a bench and press my hands against my eyelids. Don’t cry, don’t cry…

Iraia reaches me and slips into the seat next to me. Her arm comes around my shoulders and she brushes her fingertips over my eyes. A tear is collected on her hand and she wipes it away. Concern and love burn in her gaze.

“It’s really not that bad. I make that mistake all the time too. If you want, I can go over the phrases with you again.”

She lifts my hand to her mouth. Another warm kiss is pressed against my fingers.

I block her soothing words out. My self loathing plays itself as a mantra in my head.

I shouldn’t have accepted coming to this domain when she asked. I love her, but love isn’t enough to turn a millennial from Chicago into a royal consort. Iraia deserves so much better than someone who will always slip up and humiliate her at every event.

My heart gives a painful beat and I blink away tears. Don’t cry, don’t cry…

A weak breath leaves my lips. I squeeze my hand into a fist at my side until my knuckle turns white.

What was I thinking? I am not made to be a consort. I do not deserve the title any more than I deserve to be at Iraia’s side. A consort is the second highest title in the land, the thought that it could ever belong to me is laughable.

Iraia is still soothing me, murmuring quiet comforts under her breath, and I suddenly can’t stand it. I cut through her next words in a breathless rush. My heartbeat is still roaring in my ears and I can’t get it under control.

“I think we should break up.”

The words leave my lips before I can stop them. They fall out of my mouth and hang suspended in the air between us. Iraia stops, stares, and some of the color leaves her face.

A terrible, uncomfortable silence spreads. I can see the shock and heartache evident in her gaze. My own chest is tight with an impossible amount of pain. It is all that I am not to break down and recant my words.

Finally, Iraia breaks the silence. Her voice sounds quiet, timid almost, and she looks past me almost as if meeting my gaze is too painful.

“Is that what you want?”

It’s a quiet whisper under her breath. I can hear the loaded heartache there.

No, I could never want that.

“I do want that,” I breathe out, “I think it is the best thing for us.”

More silence. The air between us feels oppressive, it almost hurts to breathe. I stare down at my fists, still white at the knuckles, to avoid staring into her eyes. I will lose all of my resolve if I see her face.

Iraia takes a deep breath. It shakes as it enters her lungs and quiets as it exits. She stands up suddenly, armor clanking, and turns away from me.

I can’t see her face, but I can imagine a wall coming up between us. It is made of cement and blocks her emotions from view. “Very well.”

She agrees to the break up almost as if in a dream. Her head is raised up and I can see that wall growing thicker. Without sparing me a second glance, she takes steps away from me.

I press my fists against my eyelids. My heart is painfully shattering and I am almost worried she will hear it. Surely the entire world can hear the way my heartache splits me into fragments.

Iraia vanishes past the garden walls and the breath leaves my lungs. I break suddenly and quiet my sobs. Tears stream down my face and my hand slams on top of my mouth to hush the ugly sounds wanting to leave my lips.

The silence that she left behind is deafening. I feel so alone in the too big garden with the too quiet atmosphere.

My heart thuds loudly in my chest and pain exists everywhere. I cannot remember a time where my body wasn’t burning with heartache. Of all the pains a human can experience, nothing is as bad as heartache. Get a headache and take medicine, twist an ankle and ice it, but break your heart and be forced to do nothing but tough it out.

My hands shake at my sides and I have to remember how to breathe to keep myself from coming undone-

And suddenly Iraia is back.

She appears before me in a clank of metal and her gaze is burning with the same amount of pain that I feel. There’s a scowl to her mouth, a challenge in her eyes, and her hands are tight at her sides.

“No,” she says. She takes a deep breath and steels herself again. “We are not ending like this. Not unless you tell me why.”

She takes her seat next to me again and gazes at me defiantly. It is a challenge. She is almost declaring war with me. Our relationship is worth the fight to her.

My throat constricts. I force myself to remember how to talk. Force the words to spill from my lips.

“I can’t be your consort. I don’t belong here. You know I don’t belong,” I gasp out. My hands come to rest on her shoulders and I force her to look at me. I almost want to shake her, to make her see what I see. “I am an outsider and I will never fit in.”

More sentences leave my lips. They jumble on my tongue and spill out of me. A seal has been broken and all of my doubts wash out of me like a tsunami. It is imperative that I make her understand just how little I belong.

Iraia can have whoever she wants as her consort. She must choose someone who is better suited for the position. I am ill qualified.

I lose track of the things I’m saying, it’s just a jumbled mess, but I am forced to stop. In an effort to shut up my rambling, Iraia moves forward.

She kisses me forcefully and grabs me by the cloak. I think about resisting, to kiss her after ending things with her is agony, but I very quickly melt into her. I meet her kiss head on and knot my fingers into her hair. I am probably ruining her hairstyle and scuffing her armor but that is the last thing I care about. The most important thing right now is her and how well we fit together.

After that searing kiss, she gives me thousands more. I meet her embrace head on, abandoning my earlier protests, and am content with just being here with her in this moment. She tastes sweet and I’ve never known a better heaven than being at her side. I am so much better with her than without her.

Finally, the need for air breaks us apart. My mouth feels swollen and my skin is flushed. Want and need burn inside me, light a fire that scorches me, and I take lungfuls of air just to remind myself that I am alive.

Iraia regains her own breath. Her eyes are burning with that same challenge again and her scowl is cutting.

“Is that why you wish to end things with me? Because you believe you do not deserve to be my consort?” She intertwines our fingers.

I close my eyes. Now that she has said it out loud, it almost sounds crazy.

“Yes,” I whisper.

My mouth is still burning with her kiss and I can still taste her on my tongue. I suddenly cannot remember my earlier doubts. My mind is entirely occupied with how well it feels to be at her side and to kiss her. She is like the air in my lungs. I can’t exist without her.

Iraia tightens her hold on me. She presses our foreheads together and whispers my name under her breath in a scolding tone. “You are impossible.”

I wince. She sees this and her eyes soften. Her hand cups my cheek and she presses her mouth against mine again. It is a brief kiss and I have to resist the urge to chase her when she is gone.

“Do you want to end things because you are worried about being a consort or because you no longer wish to be mine?” She whispers.

I blink. Can I ever stop being hers? The thought seems impossible.

“I think you could have a better consort-“

Iraia shakes her head, irritated. She meets my gaze head on and I can see millions of emotions burning there. There’s frustration at the fact that I won’t listen, pain at my inability to understand her feelings, and love. There is so, so much love in her eyes. It burns bright like a supernova and my breath hitches. She loves me completely and wholly. Why did I ever doubt that?

“Look at me, dear one, and listen well,” she orders.

The tone of her voice is strong, powerful, and I am forced to comply. Her orders give no room for disobedience.

“You belong at my side. You are the love of my life. My consort. I want you at my side forever. I love you more than you could ever imagine,” she raises my chin with her finger, “I will not let you go. If you tell me that you want to break up with me because you do not want me, then I will release you and wish for nothing but happiness for you. But if you tell me that you want to end things because you believe that you are not worthy of being my consort, then I refuse.”

She stops and stares at me. I lean into her touch despite myself. My heart is hammering in my chest.

“Your parents don’t like me,” I whisper.

Iraia narrows her eyes. “My parents love you. My father keeps pressing me to marry you and my mother goes out of her way to remind me that I should give her a grandchild. In their minds, you are already a part of our family.”

I bite my lip.

“I don’t know your language-“

“You can learn it with practice.”

“I don’t know your customs-“

“Iseul, Imohn, and I will teach you.”

“The elders don’t like me-“

“The elders are a couple of old men past their expiration date. Their opinions are not worth my time.”

“I am not an elf. You hear their whispers in the halls. They call me a human.” I repeat the Elvish word under my breath.

Iraia winces at the racial slur most elves have taken to use for me, but she is undaunted. “Tough luck. You are their consort and they will accept it. Pretty soon, they shall bow at your feet whether they like it or not.”

Quiet descends again. I am at a loss for what to say. My doubts suddenly seem unimportant. I feel lightheaded and very stupid.

Was I really prepared to throw Iraia away over a few hushed whispers and glares?

My strength leaves me and I sag against Iraia. My head falls over her shoulder and she wraps her arms around me. Her lips brush the top of my head. I feel exhausted and want nothing more than to just rest with her.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper.

I’m sorry for doubting you. Doubting us.

Iraia shakes her head. “I love you.”

The phrase is whispered like a prayer. I seek it out as if it were divine deliverance. And it might as well be considering how much I yearn for her. Every atom in my body is irrevocably in love with her. Life is meaningless without her.

“I love you too,” I whisper.

This time, I am the one to kiss her. I pour all of my love for her into the kiss and she kisses me back in turn. I can taste some of my tears on my tongue but, mostly, I taste her. I all but melt into her embrace.

Finally, it’s over. She draws back and stands up. Her hand is offered to me again and I don’t hesitate. I take it and intertwine our fingers together.

Iraia grins, a flush to her cheeks from our kissing, and beckons with her head to the entrance. More carriages are waiting to be greeted. Imohn is still there but they are quickly growing tired of standing as a guard.

“Are you ready to greet more nobles?” Iraia wonders.

I make a face.

“They won’t like me,” I remind her. Still, I squeeze her hands. I am ready to greet them even if I will more than likely make thousands of mistakes. After my conversation with Iraia, I can face it.

Iraia smirks and presses a final kiss to my lips. When she draws back, her eyes are bright with mischief, pride, and love.

“Too bad, they’ll be forced to. You’re my consort, so they have no choice. I can’t imagine this world without you, and I won’t let you go for as long as you love me.”

She gives me another tug towards the carriages. This time I let her.

The Elven domain is still an impossible mystery to me, the title of consort still feels too heavy on my shoulders, but none of that matters anymore. As long as I have Iraia and she loves me, I can take it. I will learn to navigate this foreign world and be her consort for as long as she wants me.

#Iraia Idreis #request #love and legends #lovestruck voltage #voltage amemix

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astro-b-o-y-d · 6 years

Text

Camp Xray and Vav/Hero Hero AU: Roles Part 1

Since it might be a bit before I can draw EVERYONE out, I kinda want to make a proper list of everyone’s roles in both AUs. Not all of them will be directly swapped, like David’s and Mogar’s, but I’ll definitely still try and fit them into roles that already exist in the canon setting. Of course, I might also change up just how big or little a certain role is, but that’s mainly because....my AU, my rules.

For this post, I’ll do the roles for Camp Xray and Vav, and then the Hero Hero roles will be a separate post that I’ll write up later. Readmore because this gets long.

Mogar: A mostly-silent and slightly-intimidating camp counselor of the camp (who’s name I haven’t quite decided on for reasons I’ll explain further down). Plays guitar, but not really when other people are around, and usually just keeps his guitar on his back for the most part. Tends to have very little patience when it comes to the campers (specifically two of them) but he never gets so angry that he yells at them or anything. They are just children after all. But it does get kind of frustrating when Xray spends half the day clinging to his leg in an attempt to take him down.

Hilda: The second camp counselor and a disgraced scientist who couldn’t get a job anywhere else as a result. Is favored by the camp’s sweet mascot; a sweet, unusually blue platypus she named ORF (guess it can’t really stand for much when she’s not orbicular, but...maybe she’s just real round). Overall hates the camp, but the isolated location does make for a good place to think and she does spend a lot of her time planning out new inventions. Of course with her limited budget/supplies, she can only built so much and a lot of the inventions she’s actually able to build ends up in the trash, where they can easily be snatched up by the tiny, gloved hands of two wannabe heroes.

ORF: Like I said, camp mascot and an unusually blue platypus. Much nicer than Mwack, though she often doesn’t know how dangerous she can be and bites people in an attempt to play with them. Tends to stick to Hilda.

Xray: Ten-year-old-camper; at the camp for Superhero Camp (which is...kinda not really a camp and his ‘superhero’ outfit is a towel camp and symbol taped to his little red camper shirt). Wants to be the best and coolest hero in the world, like in that one anime! But he’s ten and also has a bit of an attitude/ego going on, which makes hero-ing tough. He’ll get there one day, though. In the meantime, he’s perfectly content with being a hero around the camp and ‘borrowing’ any

Vav: Also a ten year-old-camper, and also at the camp for Superhero Camp (so he says). Pretty much the same as Xray, though without the temper/ego. The two of them met the first day of camp and have been best friends ever since. Tends to be the more levelheaded of the two, though he’s not afraid to get involved in fun adventures with his best friend. Also this has nothing to do with anything, but he has a stuffed, pink plush toy with yellow spots that he tends to carry around with him (”Superheros need a sidekick!” so he says). Though...it is a bit.....terrifying....

Ash: The newest ten year-old-camper, attending the camp for Writing/Journalism Camp. She’s bubbly and excited and eager to tag along with the boys on their adventures, which makes Vav happy because little baby summer crushes. Xray, not so much. But he still lets her come anyway, because she can write down all their adventures and tell everyone how cool they are. Also she’s ‘actually kind of smart and fun and stuff’ (Xray’s words). Why didn’t I make the third camper Hilda? Simple, I like me a AshVavXray dynamic.

Rusty: The Quartermaster of the AU (that’ll...make putting him in the other AU tricky, but we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it). Pretty much the same character as he was before; just a bum who needed a job. Take care of a camp for a summer in exchange for money, food and a bed? Hell yeah, Rusty’s your man.

Dragonface: An eight-year-old camper, who was originally attending Fantasy/Magic Camp. However, he became so enamored with Xray and Vav’s hero-ing that he keeps trying to sneak over to Superhero Camp so he can hang out with him. Something that makes Xray complain loudly to Mogar about, which causes him to come and fetch the eager child and take him back to his own camp area. But he always finds a way back, and sometimes sneaks off to follow the trio when they go on some wild adventure.

Corpirate: Okay, so remember when I said I was having trouble coming up with a name for the camp in this AU? That’s because I planned on the Corpirate being in Campbell’s spot as owner of the camp and Camp Corp is already an actual thing in CC’s canon. Not that it really matters either way; the Corpirate is always away on either business or vacation so it’s not like it matters if the camp is even named after him. In fact, he’s on vacation so often that he’s referred to as the Yarrrgarita by Hilda (g....get it? GET IT?). But maybe I WILL stick with the camp being called Camp Corp, until I can think of a better name. In any case, yeah, Corpirate’s the boss. He’s obviously not as evil as he is in canon, though he’s....kinda along the same veins as Campbell. Still kind of an asshole obsessed with money, and doesn’t really care that much about the camp itself. But honestly, he’s not much of a threat to the counselors/campers/camp in general. Now, his hired assistant on the other hand...

Mad King: He’s exactly the same, but he kills, manipulates and traps animals in holes with the claim that it’s his religion. No seriously, the only difference between him and Daniel is the reasons WHY they murder and manipulate. And also the Mad King is actually handsome. Hey-o. But he has a much bigger role in the AU than Daniel ever did in the CC canon, and actually comes to visit the camp on multiple occasions in place of his boss. Definitely gives everyone an uneasy vibe, and the kids aren’t fucking idiots and know what a cultist is, but he never does any of that stuff on the campgrounds so they can’t really confirm their suspicions about him. But MAN, is he a fucking weirdo. Also Mogar definitely seems uncomfortable and angrier when he’s around, but the kids don’t know why.

#Hayley Speaks #Camp Camp #Xray and Vav #Camp Xray and Vav and Hero Hero AU #Camp Xray and Vav AU #Separate tags for both AUs because that one tag is so long #Also these are the ones I've thought up for now #If any characters were left out I either didn't know where to put them or haven't gotten there yet #I want Flynt to be in here somehow I know that much

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lilrooroo · 6 years

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Headcanons for a sides role swap were they switch what they were made for

An au world in which locking Roman up resulted in their traits being swapped around

Logan felt something he never did before after being the one encouraging Roman’s lock up. Guilt. That sent him into a spiral of learning about emotions and understanding how actions resulted in different emotions. Logan become obsessed with feelings and understand them. Partly out of guilt for what locking up Roman had done to Patton.

The new Feelings / Heart Side

Curious little thing

Likes feeling extreme things (even bad things)

Gets in dangerous situations just to feel the trill of fear

Mixture of Toddler and Adult. He’s a big boy!

If he’s out of little space he feels numb and claims to have a headache (resulting in him being snappy)

Littlespace age range 2-5 (leans towards the 5 side)

Causes Thomas to have mood swings (oops)

Still has his power to read minds if he’s touching them. But, uses it to read thoughts to study how they are feeling. A sad person is crying, touch hand to read the thoughts that are making them sad.

Patton ended up becoming Anxiety unable to cope with the guilt of what they had done to Roman. He was so afraid they had ruined Thomas that he couldn’t cope. He slowly struggled with seeing anything but the bad things that could happen. He just wanted the remaining sides and Thomas to be safe. So he started worrying about every little thing that could hurt them. Babied by the others.

The new Anxiety Side

Sad Cinnamon Bun

Needs lots of hugs

Acts like a scared toddler more than an adult

Littlespace age range 2-3

Rarely out of little space, when Patton is big he’s a worry wart more than normal and depress.

Sweetest lil, but very needy, with lots of love to give

Loves helping caretakers, always afraid caretakers will get mad, has terrible social anxiety, very clingy.

Always has red rings around his eyes

Causes Thomas to worry and be nervous a lot

Uses his power to tell what other people feel by touching them. This tends to help calm him down when he’s scared someone hates him or is angry

Virgil realize he was the one who was going to have to step up and help get Thomas functioning (Since he had fallen into a depression) So he started acting like the missing Self esteem / Ego side. Encouraging them to do things, he helped Patton go from less of a worry scared to a caution protector.

The new Ego / Self Esteem Side

The leader, really stepped up to help everyone.

Great caretaker

Regresses when he just can’t handle it anymore. his age range is 3-5

Still has bad thoughts but has learned that he can’t let negative feelings hold him back.

Sometimes forgets to take care of himself

Hates Roman with a passion (He did so much work to help everyone and Roman keeps trying to ruin it!)

Uses his powers to tell what a person fears to help comfort them and overcome or protect them from their fears

Deceit on the other hand threw himself in learning anything he could. He and VIrgil actually put their differences aside for the best of Thomas. He took on the Logic side trait. With this he was able to reason Pattons fears down to something more reasonable as well as help Thomas listen to Virgil.

The new Logic side

The coleader never had a falling out with the other sides

Great caretaker like Virgil

Is able to reason Patton out of a panic attack.

Willingly regress alone, doesn’t have to. Just enjoys it, he regress back to 6 and has a stuffed dog named “Rowan” Totally not because it reminds him of his old best friend

The one who is the nicest to Roman tries to help Roman get adjusted.

Roman and Deceit’s relationship is like Virgil’s and Patton’s before everyone accepted Virgil. Roman is viewed as the bad guy by everyone, but Deceit who refers to him as his “fallen angel” (Like how Patton in canon calls Virgil his dark strange son)

It hurts Deceit when Roman calls him a liar

He uses his enhanced shapeshifting to make Patton laugh, Logan to study the animal or thing in a safer way, and to help Thomas to practice taking to strangers and such.

Poor little Roman broke in lock up. At first he had given up and let the demons and nightmares win each battle accepting the pain to feel something. But, then there was a sparkle of hope. (Unknown to him this was a result of Virgil and Deceit’s work) and he realize things could be different he could save himself. That’s how he became self preservation. When he broke free from his chains he came back as a proud Disney villain. Who wants revenge.

The new Self Preservation Side

Anger ball of fire

Classic Disney Villain

That voice in your head that says you suck and no one can love you

So much anger in such a small short boy

Wears a Queen like outfit because everyone knows queens are evil

Stuck at the age of 6, little age is very unstable though one second he’s acting like a 6 year old the next he’s a cranky 2 year old

His little age range is 1-6,

Spends most his time on par to a 6 year old or 1 year old.

Rips the heads off of stuffed animal, throws toys, breaks things in fits. Then gets really sad when he finds out one of his favorite toys are broken

Being locked up hasn’t had much affect on his powers besides giving him less control. His imagination abilities are slightly out of his control now so sometimes it comes to bite him in the butt.

Of course he’s using his powers to make him seem like a cooler villain (appearing in green smoke and so on) Also makes things that he claims will help Thomas be better.

Despite coming off as evil and pointing out Thomas’ many flaws. He does want the best for Thomas and just wants to make him into a better person. It wasn’t his fault that he got locked up. It was other people. He doesn’t want Thomas to ever change for another person again.

Hates it when Thomas is trying to think of others, because being selfish is better

Will go gentle on Deceit because he can’t hurt Dee even if they all hurt him

Other Stuff to Mention

For the first 2 years during Roman’s lock up everything was chaotic and Thomas suffered terrible depression. His grades didn’t get better when Roman was locked up but rather worse. He also lost all his friends

Then there was a spark of hope and he started on working on himself, as well as going to therapy.

Virgil and Deceit are very close, acting as the leaders of the group. They are also the two main caretakers.

Roman hates the other sides with a burning passion and even has a distaste for Thomas. But, he despise other humans from the bottom of his heart

One day when Thomas moved out of his parents his new therapist suggested he made a video diary and thats when the sides start appearing to him

Roman will have a habit of telling Thomas how he’s a terrible person but if he listened to him Roman could make it all better.

However the other sides are always able to get Thomas to feel good about himself

This will be called Out of the Toy Box and I love this way more than I thought I would

#sanders sides #logan sanders #toddler!logan #lil!logan #patton sanders #lil!patton #toddler!patton #virgil sanders #cg!virgil #daddy!virgil #deceit sanders #daddy!deceit #cg!deceit #roman sanders #lil!roman #baby!roman #Out of The Toy box AU

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ironinkpen · 7 years

Text

The Secret of the White Lion

Alternatively Titled: Local Girl Ignores Responsibilities in Favor of Overanalyzing Children’s TV Show

Alright so ever since we were shown this mural, which depicts Voltron fully assembled and a lion off to the side, some people have started discussing the possibility of there being a sixth lion. And since I have nothing better to do with my time (besides my midterms next week whaaaat), I thought I’d try to answer the question: if there is a White Lion, who would pilot it?

Now I don’t want to get too into the whole idea of “how likely is it that this is going to happen” because like? That’s hard to tell. But, I’d say that it at least makes narrative sense for there to be a sixth lion.

What Alfor faces throughout Zarkon’s fall is the very real possibility that the leader of their magic robot lion fighting team could easily end up crossing some sort of line and going too far. Alfor begins to doubt Zarkon’s leadership, and has several arguments with him about his judgment and his and Honerva’s hunger for power. It’s not that big a stretch for Alfor to go from “this dude could try to use Voltron for evil / go rogue / etc.” to “I need to have a back up in case he pulls some shit.”

And a hypothetical sixth lion could logically be that back up. If Alfor built one, the idea was probably for the lion to either be an alternative head for Voltron or just an alternative lion in general, in case any of the other lions were unavailable, so that they could still create Voltron even if someone went missing / ran off / turned evil.

And there’s a pre-existing precedent for a physical white lion, too:

In one of the Voltron spinoffs / AUs / whatever (I’ll be real, I only know as much as the wiki page tells me lmao), there’s a White Lion, whose location is only known by Alfor. Alfor leads some guy named Rick Hunter to the lion and he becomes its pilot.

And of course, in OG Voltron, there’s an episode titled “Secret of the White Lion” where Haggar makes a mirage of an actual white lion (ie not a robotic lion like the voltron lions), and sends it to Allura, who thinks it’s a reincarnation of her dad, to try and kill her or whatever.

So the idea of a White Lion in our Voltron wouldn’t be completely out of the blue, and would solve the problem that Lance expresses in season 3: there’s six pilots and five lions, so who should be on the bench?

With a White Lion, the answer would be “no one.” But then the question becomes: who would be its pilot? And as far as I can tell, the answer is either Shiro, Allura, or Lance.

Alright, so I maintain that the Shiro that’s with the team right now is actually a clone, but, let’s say that he’s real. Or, rather, let’s say that when real Shiro comes back, Black still chooses Keith or someone else as the Black Paladin. Shiro could, in that case, fit the role of the White Lion’s paladin.

In OG Voltron (or, at least, the English dub, which combined Shiro with his twin brother), Shiro left Team Voltron and worked with the resistance, coming back in a final whammy against Lotor. While I do think that Resistance!Shiro is a completely interesting concept on its own, having Shiro be in the White Lion would allow him to not only be a fighting force for the resistance, but also be able to go back and forth between it and the team more easily, so we wouldn’t have to lose Shiro from the team dynamic.

Having Shiro be in a lion separate from the main team would also allow more room to explore his lost memories and what happened to him during his year in captivity– he would have more mobility, and still be able to hold his own in battle, making it actually possible for him to run off on solo “let’s discover my past” adventures. And, given the original Voltron’s precedent for having Shiro outside of the main cinco, this would make sense.

Allura is another possibility for the White Lion’s paladin. One of the most compelling pieces of support in her favor is that the white lion story in OG Voltron was all about her. Her discovering the White Lion, her father’s final legacy, would be an interesting plot line. And I dunno, there's this sense that Allura has this unique place in the group that's almost separate or above Voltron itself-- giving her the White Lion would allow her to act independently but also continue to be a paladin (which is a role I love her in ahhh). She could lead without being in Black in that case, and I honestly think the mobility of being able to operate outside the main group suits her? One of my favorite scenes in season 2 was when the castle shorted out and she and the Blade ran off to fight Haggar.

On another note, having her in White and Alfor being its creator is in tune with something the cast said about why they “killed off” of the Alfor AI: he basically knew too much. What did he know? Well, maybe the existence and location of a White Lion, which his daughter would be the perfect fit for?

There’s also another neat theory that the castle could be the white lion. And think about it: only Allura can pilot it to its full potential, it’s linked to her quintessence, and is shown to have a mind of its own to an extent (seen when it actively tries to kill Lance and Keith during the Crystal Venom episode, showing an ability to reason to some extent). And, speaking of the Crystal Venom episode, it seems to mirror the events of the original “Secret of the White Lion” episode, where Allura is tricked by something she thinks is her father (in this case an AI) and almost gets killed.

Also, when Allura moves to Blue, she complains about how Blue’s controls are different from the castle’s in a similar way to how Lance complains about Red’s being different from Blue’s. The castle seems to operate pretty similarly to the lions. Coran mentioned that his grandpa built the castle but I don’t recall ever getting the exact timeline of when he finished. I don’t know, maybe Alfor could have jumped in and asked to add some aspects of the comet to it? It’s probably not all that likely lmao, but wouldn’t it be super fucking cool if the castle suddenly transformed into a magic fighting robot?

Anywhom, last possible pilot:

Lance has expressed on multiple occasions a sense of being a “seventh wheel,” or kind of separate from the team. In this scene, when talking to Keith about the whole five lions, six paladins situation, he puts up six fingers and, when he’s done, singles himself out as the one separate from the five others. And, interestingly:

The hypothetical White Lion is pictured as separate from the others as well.

Lance seems to view Allura as Blue’s true paladin and Keith as Red’s, so he sees himself as not having a real place with the current lions. But, maybe that’s because he hasn’t found his real lion yet?

(On that note (and this is sort of a tangent but still neat): look at the team’s color coding! Everyone else is color coded to their lions (Pidge wears a green shirt, Hunk wears a yellow shirt, Keith wears a red jacket and a black shirt, Allura’s outfit is Blue, and Shiro’s is Black) but Lance is color coded white)

Plus, if I’m right about the White Lion being an alternate head of Voltron / alternate lion in general, placing Lance in that position makes sense. The crew of the show has said before that Lance’s thing is filling spots that need filling. And, since he and Keith (if Keith is still Black Paladin after Shiro’s return) are something of a dynamic duo, having them being able to swap places would be a really interesting dynamic (and fucking hilarious).

Also, Rick Hunter, the pilot of the White Lion in the comic I mentioned earlier, seems to be a pretty similar character to Lance? Wiki says: “As a young man, Rick was good-natured, although he could be disrespectful at times… Throughout the course of the First Robotech War he went from being a relative pacifist into a full-fledged soldier, becoming a deadly ace who even the Zentraedi feared.” Good-natured, sometimes disrespectful, deadly ace… It’s food for thought.

I’d also say there’s something of a chance that Keith could be the White Paladin? I don’t have too much support for the theory yet, but his whole view of himself as the “loner” and the hanging plot line of his mother and his mysterious past would make him well-suited for the White Lion’s mobility.

Anyway, as with all of my metas this is Getting Too Long and doesn’t make sense lmao (sorry I just wanted to scribble this down before s4), so I’ll cut it off here. My point is that while I have no idea how likely it is that a White Lion exists (though again, I think it’s narratively possible and maybe even narratively probable), you could squeeze an interesting arc out of any of these possible pilots. Plus, having the White Lion (if it is an alternate lion) around would allow for a lot of mobility and give everyone possibilities for cool solo adventures that I think would be fun.

#voltron #voltron meta #whoop #anyway this would be neat

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simplyoriginalcharacters · 7 years

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((Thank you for taking the time to read this re-do. I really did lower my word-count and I tried to make his story more straight to the point, but I am not sure. I tried to follow the feedback that was given and hopefully this presents a better picture of who Nazzaereno is. My cousin drew him for me.

My cousin and I were re-doing our universes and we decided to go really in depth with the Netherworld characters. We did a character swap and they let me take Nazzaereno back so that I could try to focus better on his story.

World: The universe that my cousin and I created, but from the Netherworld Series of characters ))

Hi! This is Mod D with your profile re-review. Your full profile and critique are under the cut.

Name: Nazzaereno Abategiovanni

Real Name: “Sette” or “Seven”

Aliases: Nazz, Vulture.

Gender: Agender, but he uses he/him pronouns.

Sexual Orientation: He’s never explained it to anyone.

Age: He just learned that he is actually 3000 years old.

Species: Archdemon turned Avvoltoi.

Birthplace: Poveglia, Venice, Italy

Occupation: He now works as a free assassin.

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Affiliations: The Avvoltoi, and he is loyal to whoever owns him at the time.

Family:

Uno Bianchi: Uno is his blood brother and they have had it out for each-other for years. Nazz has always had to protect himself from his greedy brother, who has abused him, killed him multiple times, and taken all of the friends that he loves. They hate each-other so much that Nazz changed his appearance so that he wouldn’t look like him any more.

Cinque: Cinque was the closest thing to a sister that he had. She cared for him when he was younger and she taught him the ways of being an Avvoltoi. She was killed by Uno and Nazz has been trying to get revenge ever since.

Best Friends:

Akhenaton Ralïs- Their relationship is very strange. He thinks of Ahken as a friend and he will listen to him but he also tells people that Ahken owns him. He learned his teleporting skills from him and he’s always willing to do a job for him.

Janus Dragyn: Janus, or as he calls her “Sorella”, is one of the few people that he gets along real well with in the netherworld. She was raised in an assassin cult like him and they talk to eachother about killing, death, and morbid things. When he is not working for Akhen, he asks to be placed with her.

Relationship Status: Single

Significant Other: NA

Other Relationships:

Nero: He has a weird fascination with Nero, but it’s not an unhealthy one. He learned that Nero is actually an Alien who is living in the netherworld, and he wants to know what his blood tastes like. Nero is actually too nice to tell him that he’s creepy, but Nazz is starting to get the point.

Height: 6'4

Weight: 220 lbs

Build: Athletic, muscular and lean.

Skin Tone: Deep tan, with gold undertones. A weird thing is that towards the tips of his toes and fingers they look black like a birds.

Hair: Jet black and ear length. It falls in his face and he likes the effect that it has.

Eyes: His eyes are gold, and his pupils are vertical like a cats. He also has two vertical scars underneath them, the left being longer.

Identifying Marks: He has very sharp, white teeth, almost to the point where they are hyper white and his eyes do glow, like they are on fire or something.

Appearance: Nazz has been described as being rather beautiful. He recently went through a change of his own doing because he was told that he looked too much like his brother, and that offended him. He has dark tan skin, and Jet black hair that is currently ear length and parted. He has full lips, big eyes, and shaped eyebrows that always give him an amused look. His eyes are actually glowing yellow with slit pupils, and his sharp teeth are obnoxiously white, almost fluorescent.

Along his body, he has black binding tattoos and metal locked cuffs that are on his neck, arms, and ankles. Due to boredom, he sometimes turns himself into a raven, a black dog with no tail, a child, or a feminine version of himself.

Various tests have been conducted, and apparently his clothes are made of the same material as his skin, so he can change his outfits rather quickly if he needs to. When he’s not disguised, his outfit consists of a black, backless form fitting material that ends in boots and black gauntlets. He has black raven feathers on the shoulders and back, and he has a tasset. It goes down to his knees and flows like a small train.

Personality: Nazzereno has a rather strange personality. It is almost as if he has bits and pieces of different personalities that converge to make his own personality. He is almost always friendly, but friendly to the point where he comes off as being a bit creepy. If one can stand being near him for the time being, he’s actually a nice person. He kind of acts like an older teenager, so he’s always willing to have fun, or he’s always ready to cause trouble. He’s also known for being very capricious.

This changes whenever he knows that Uno is around. He becomes quiet, sensitive, paranoid, and generally distressed if he knows that his brother is in town somewhere.

Motivations: He just wants to live, that’s about it.

Current Goal: He’s actually trying to help the Netherworld with stopping a demon vampire.

Life Goal: He wants to learn more about the rest of the Archdemons and who his real family was.

Motto: “Io sono tuo, maestro ”.

Best Quality: He is very thorough when it comes to completing contracts.

Worst Quality: He gets bored easily, so it’s best to keep him entertained. When he’s bored, he gets really destructive.

Likes: His swords, blood, and video games. He is also attached to anything on his person that is yellow. He found these items and he likes integrating them into his outfit.

Dislikes: Demytri Dzurhov. He has met him once before and he knows that there is somethings seriously wrong with that guy.

The Nazzerela family because They are demon hunters and they make it their goal to destroy the Avvoltoi.

He also hates meeting people that he can’t figure out, which is why he is so interested in Nero.

Fears: Being bound to his brother. He would rather hurt himself instead of working for that evil man.

Hobbies: Sightseeing, He also enjoys painting and creating new outfits.

Talents: Nazzaereno is extremely good at sword fighting. He is a natural with any weapon that he can find, but he an expert with any bladed weapon because it is nearly impossible to get a hit on him when he is fighting.

Skills: Like most Avvoltoi, He is fluent in multiple languages and He’s also a very good story teller.

Abilities: Nazzaereno is an Archdemon who was turned into an Avvoltoi, so his abilities are varied. He learned that he can teleport, he can become incorporeal, and he can even possess people for a limited time.

He is immortal and he can’t really feel pain unless its from another Avvoltoi, but he can fake an injury very well.

Weapons:

He has two blades named Tè and Caffè. They are twin curved long swords and they are actually very rare. He bound them to himself, so he can summon them at random.

Weaknesses: Unknown, but he’s really afraid of the necromancer, Tera Na'Vole.

Secret: He and Janus are friends with benefits. They’ve been together for a bit and since nobody asked, they haven’t told.

Influential Memory: It is a negative memory, but he remembers how his brother was willing to kill him so that he could keep his material possessions.

Role Model: Cinque was that bit of good morality that he needed in his life. She was always a good person to him and anyone that she met.

Crush: He might have a crush on Akhen. It’s probably not even a crush, but he just likes being near him.

Source of Embarrassment: He’s embarrassed by the fact that he can do all of these things and that he’s basically a super demon, but once he sees his brother, he can’t do any of that. He freezes up.

Source of Pride:His swords. He actually killed his brothers fiancée for them. She was a tough fight, but he managed to get through it easy enough.

-History-

Nazz has a spotty memory of his own life. He knows that his oldest brother, Uno, hated him for some reason and that he was the youngest child of a poor family. He heard that his brother had eventually summoned a type of demon that was known as an Avvoltoi. These demons were wish granting ones and he heard that Uno became one of the richest men in Venice because of her.

Every month a sibling would go, and Nazz assumed that they were working for him. Something happened and he sent in some guards to kill everyone but Nazz, who was taken as a prisoner and given to Nove so that she could have her own personal play thing.

For 5 years, She did horrible things to him. When he was alone one day, he heard from some guards that Uno was growing paranoid and that he feared someone would come to take his money. Nazz knew that she killed all of his guards and he was stabbed by someone.

After waking up, Nazzaereno met a friendly woman named Cinque who helped him out. She said that she was his teacher in the Shadow World and he had to do what she said. As he trained, he noticed that there was always a man who would watch him. The guy looked familiar, and Nazz learned that his name was Uno, but that was that.

For his first proving mission, Nazz was summoned by a ghoul named Akhenaton. Akhen was an elite soldier and he wanted Nazz as one of his cadets. He made a bond with him and for 5 years they worked together. Akhen admitted that he had feelings for him and Nazz did like him as well, but this was forbidden by the current Queen. He unbound himself from Nazz, but not before he taught him teleportation.

To avoid Uno, he started to take on long term contracts like joining armies or being married. He was caught caught and punished by his brother who gave him most of his human memories back while also binding him to Nove, who was as cruel as ever. He wanted to get out, so he teleported to the netherworld where he asked for Akhen’s help. In a drastic measure, he asked the current Reaper, Troa Dødsson, to bind himself to Nazz, which caused him to become unbound from Nove.

Nazz made a trap for her which involved him getting caught by the Reapers. When she arrived to get him back, Akhen grabbed her and teleported with her. Knowing that teleportation was disorientating to first timers, Nazz appeared and he cut off her head. He then left the head in Uno’s home, sending him a message.

Nazz was free to do what he wanted. As he traveled Italy, he was attacked by Uno. He explained that an eye was for an eye and that if he went with him then he wouldn’t kill Cinque. Nazz was worried, so he willing went with him.

Cinque was already dead and he finally caught his brother. Uno physically tortured him for weeks and out of spite, he gave him all of his memories back. He became physically sick from trying to understand what he was seeing. Akhen appeared soon after and he defeated Uno.

He awoke to see that he was in the netherworld. He saw Akhen and he tried asking him some questions, but he acted strange with him. He told him that he was bound to Troa and that he should speak to him instead, which was odd because he had never brushed him away before. He went to speak to Troa, and he learned that for defying his Queen, Akhen’s memories were erased and he was exiled. Troa also told him that he was actually an Archdemon who was turned into an Avvoltoi, and that he should spend his time reading about his people. He accepted and he’s been in the netherworld ever since.

First off, I’d like to acknowledge how trimmed down Nazz’s profile is with this revision. It’s very much apparent that things have been streamlined, especially in-regards to the History section. Also the included Relationships sections expand the profile for the better as well. These are great improvements that present things that much more clearly and with a lot of extra focus. Thanks for taking those aspects of the prior review to heart – it definitely shows.

Back on the topic of Nazz’s revised History though, I can also see that you’ve reworked his Backstory to make the progression more straightforward. Specifically the biggest shifts being that Uno is now the antagonist (as well as the older brother), Nazz is now a more self-interested, opportunistic character rather than being outright evil, and the story itself starts out in Italy with Nazz as human and moves to the Netherworld from there. Combined with his maintained prior aspects and the trimming of his more cartoonishly villainous ones, I think this is a solid improvement for Nazz himself as well as his overall arc. It makes his traits mesh that much better and gives him a stronger sense of progression.

However, I will suggest that his History section be made more specific at points. This isn’t to say that the information included is bad/inconsistent (the angle of Nazz having memory issues does provide some cover for vagueness), but it does seem a bit too undefined in places. To provide an example, at the end of the third paragraph it’s said that Nazz “was stabbed by someone.” Emphasizing that this was someone Nazz didn’t see (and thus couldn’t identify) or didn’t recognize would allow the moment to be more concrete while retaining the mystery of the attacker. Alternatively, for added antagonism, have the person who finally stabs Nazz be Uno. There are other places like that in this section that could benefit from added precision as well, like Nazz’s training in paragraph four, but I don’t think it needed to be re-written – just made a bit more specific.

Beyond that, the other details of Nazz’s profile all seem pretty straightforward and solid enough. His Personality section is fairly fleshed out, his Appearance section covers all the required bases and goes into nice detail, and his Abilities and various Relationships are all defined. Something I’ll point out that I especially liked about Nazz’s revision is the addition to the main Personality entry about how he seems to be a completely different person around Uno. It highlights the impact Uno’s hostility and torture has had on Nazz pretty well and reflects back on Nazz’s new History section. Especially so given the fact that Nazz has never actually fought or beaten Uno himself. The angle of a demon having to deal with the trauma of years of abuse is an interesting one to say the least.

All in all, this revision is a definite improvement to Nazz’s profile. I think his character comes across more strongly given the streamlined History that keeps the focus on his experiences, actions, and reactions while more accurate reflecting his Personality. The fact that it leaves him with a clear path of future progression makes it even better. It could benefit from being more clear and definite in places, but what you’ve got now is solid.

Thanks again, and I hope this helps!

-D

#SOC Critique #OC Critique #Development Help #General Help #submission #yokaigemini

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sophiacresta1-blog · 4 years

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Living and Working in the Fashion World

Samantha Feher believes her end goal career doesn’t even exist yet, as new technology is found everyday. However, she knows it will revolve around her passion: digital media. At a young age, she found a love for TV production, knowing that writing and creating content was what she was made to do. Since Feher first discovered her enthusiasm for writing, she had dreamed of one day becoming the editor-in-chief for Cosmopolitan. She reached her dream of working at Cosmopolitan, as well as incorporating fashion into her career by the time she graduated college. Feher, age 22, grew up in Chatham, New Jersey and never wasted any time, as she was actively involved in various activities. Her strong work drive and risk taking characteristic got her to where she is now, an Editorial Assistant at Cosmopolitan and owner of her online clothing boutique, The Brunch Club. The boutique is a two women show, as it is run by Feher herself, and her mom.

Feher gives insight on how she finds her inspiration, as well as how her boutique has become so successful. With 47.9K followers, Feher has built a platform for herself, due to her unique and trendy style. Feher uses social media, specifically Instagram, to create a personal relationship with her customers and followers, as she has made it a policy of hers since she created her account as a teenager. Since The Brunch Club is only online, Feher discusses why it has been so beneficial to not having a physical store and how she uses social media to connect virtually with customers, which has ultimately become a business strategy.

What is your background?

I grew up in Chatham, New Jersey, which is a small suburb of New York City and we are about 30 minutes outside of New York. Growing up I played tennis and I was a dancer and by the time I was like 13 or 14 I was so into dance that I didn’t have time to play tennis anymore so I dropped tennis and focused on dance. I danced as much as I went to school, if not more, so I was going to a regular public school for however much it is like 35 hours per week and then I was dancing about 40 so that was crazy but it was kind of always in my blood to be an overachiever and to like keep myself probably busier than it was healthy. My mom is the same way-- she knew what she wanted to be when she was a little kid and she achieved all of her life goals by the time she was like 35 and then she was like well now I need to shift my trajectory a little bit and then come up with new ideas and so it was just always something that ran in my family and to overcommit ourselves and just be into as many things as we could and go really hard at them and that’s just in our personalities like it’s not like we ever felt forced to do it but we all just love to stay busy and just get our hands dirty and it’s just kind of our thing.

So I did all of that, and like I said I went to a public high school in Chatham and I loved that and it was there that I kind of discovered this love for TV production. I took a class where we made little webisodes of a weekly news series and that kind of stuff and we had all kinds of funny little video projects, we had to make like documentaries and comedies and all kinds of little fun things and I had already known that I was better at writing and that kind of stuff than I was at math and science and I always just liked it better and I found that I was just good at it. Pretty much my whole life I was always interested in entertainment and since I was a little kid I have wanted to work at a magazine company and it’s always been a dream of mine and I was never scared of the hard work, never scared of putting myself out there to seize the opportunities, so we all knew it was kind of a long time coming.

Were you interested in fashion growing up or was that kind of something that you kind of just picked up on as you were growing up?

Totally interested in fashion like forever. My mom always makes fun of me because if you ever saw old family photos of mine I'm always wearing a dress and tights and Mary Janes in all of them and I was like did you not have any other clothes for me, and she was like what are you talking about? My mom was a total tomboy so she would put me in like overalls and sneakers and like baseball caps and I would throw fits. Apparently the only thing I would wear were like tights and dresses and it would be like the dead of summer in Arizona and I would insist on wearing tights and dresses. So I think it was a very early age thing. In high school I started caring more about what I wore and I was very experimental. I grew up in a town where the norm was kind of preppy and sweatshirts and bean boots and I kind of did that for a little bit just cause when you're first starting high school you want to blend in and do the high school thing and then there was just this moment for me where I started wearing whatever I wanted. At first, I remember my friends being like I can’t believe you're wearing that like it would be such random things, it would be like tie dye, like things that are like cute now, I would wear like bright colored tie dye and big weird sneakers and it's so funny that all of those things are in now because in high school my friends would all be wearing the same riding boots and leggings outfit and I’d be in something totally weird. But then when I was in college I started doing this whole content creation thing on Instagram and a lot of what people followed me for my outfits and so it kind of just became a thing where I would work with clothing brands and it just ended up being kind of a big part of my account so from there I got however many followers and was doing business on Instagram. I had graduated college early so I was applying for this job at Cosmopolitan.

How did you start your online clothing boutique business?

Actually, it was my mom’s idea and she was like maybe you should start a clothing boutique because people on Instagram always tell you they love your style and I feel like if you curated a collection of clothes that you handpicked, people would buy it and I was like I don’t know, that sounds like a lot of work and I was like maybe, I guess it would keep me busy and she knows as well as anybody that I’m not the kind of person that likes to just sit around so she was like I think we should give it a shot like let me know if you decide to do it. A couple days later I decided to go for it and so we started brainstorming names and like all that kind of stuff and the whole point of it was like if I didn't get the Cosmo job I would need something to do. So we started thinking of names and we were brainstorming all this stuff and then like a couple days later I got the call from Cosmo being like you're hired and I was like well now I have this whole other thing I have to do on top of a full time job so it was a very fast turnaround. At that point it felt like we were too excited about it and in too deep to kind of just throw it all out so I ended up with that and the Cosmo job.

What was it like starting out, and what role did your mom play?

At first I was like I’m never going to sleep again cause I was also, at the time like for the first couple months, commuting from New Jersey and so it was like 2 hours of commuting everyday and then a full eight or nine hour day at work and then you come home and like see all the orders from the boutique and we have to pack them up and ship them out. It felt like a lot in the beginning and my mom seriously has been so helpful. She likes doing it as much as I do and if there was ever a time when I was in a pinch and like needed to ship out an order I would text her and she would do it at the end of the work day for me. The truth is, I don't recommend to anyone to do it completely by yourself, it's a lot of pressure and a lot of work and you feel so guilty like if you mess something up. One time I had two orders and I swapped the two and sent two people each other's items and they were so chill about it, but I was like oh my god I’m so sorry like I haven’t slept in a week and they were like, omg relax. So it has been really nice to share that weight with her and some of my friends who have been really cool about helping promote it on their own Instagrams. So for me it has been a saving base that I am surrounded by wonderful, talented people who just want to help.

Do you have any employees or people that help you in the financial aspect or with social media or did you kind of just figure it out all on your own?

So part of why we started this was because we knew we had a captive audience because at the time I had like 50,000 followers on Instagram and they were the people who were like we love your style. So we were like basically we have 50,000 people on deck who already like the way I dress and if I pick clothes that I would wear everyday then we assumed that I could promote it on my own Instagram and people would be into it, so it was based on the fact that I had already been working on Instagram. We don’t have any employees, it’s really just me and my mom helps out, like I said, a lot when I am in a pinch and I keep all the inventory at my house in New Jersey because I don’t live here anymore and I’m in New York City so there are definitely times when I need to lean on my mom and be like, can you help I’m an hour away and this needs to be done right now, so that’s really great. We're not really in a place, like I feel like it would be helpful to have an employee to share the work, but for me the social media stuff is fun and I’ve been doing it for a long time so we don’t really need to hire someone there and in terms of like shipping and stuff again, since it's kind of a small operation in terms of like how much product we have, like it all pretty much fits in my bedroom. So we don’t have any employees yet, but I do foresee if it continues the way it is, eventually hiring at least like interns who are interested in like fashion merchandising because I didn’t even know that was a job until I was in college and found out there’s a whole industry around buying and the big scale ones are like Bloomingdales and Nordstroms and you are the person that picks the clothes to buy from vendors to sell at your store and that is something that we do. So for me, it's really important to select all the clothes myself but I can foresee a future where we have an employee who like is a buying intern or like a buying assistant and they go and pull what they like from a collection and then they send it to me and I tell them like, I think we should buy this and not buy this, so I could totally see that coming in the future. A social media intern would be really helpful because there are days when I forget that I also have to post on this account as opposed to just my personal one or the Cosmo one so just to have a security blanket and to have someone handle it I think would be really helpful and we are getting into a place finally where we have the means to do that which is awesome. It's been about a year and it's been really successful and we're just really happy with how it’s going so I can totally imagine adding to the team in the coming months or year.

How did you become educated in fashion?

I actually have no fashion education at all. It’s always just been an interest and like self imposed learning so like every year at Fashion Week, ike literally since high school, I would go online and see what all the like famous designers were doing and it's always been something I care about enough to go in advance and try to figure out what the trends are going to be instead of just identifying what they are currently, so just having that like drive to be involved and caring enough to pay attention to it has always been it for me. What I do at Cosmo is not fashion, contrary to what literally everyone thinks. We’re not a fashion magazine, we're a young womens media media brand and we have seven or eight sections and fashion is one of them, but people are like how did you start working in fashion? And I’m like the only thing I do in fashion really is the boutique. Cosmo does so much more than that and so I am always like, it’s not a fashion magazine because there’s so much more stuff that we are doing on top of the fashion stuff. For me it's always just been an interest and not really an education and I think it's just as valuable to like get educated on your own time then it is to like take a course in school because of course the courses you take in school are going to be important for technical stuff like marketing but I don't think that you can learn taste from school and I don’t think you get your eye from school. I think you either have it or you don’t and there are ways in the real world to go and curate that and make it something that’s your own and elevate it. So for me it's never been anything more than like I care about it so I'm going to go get as involved as I can and I think that for me has been the education I’ve needed.

Where do you get your inspiration from in terms of designers or just individuals that you look up to?

All kinds of things. First of all, I am so lucky because at Cosmo I am surrounded by the smartest and most talented and most creative people I’ve ever met. We truly are so lucky to have the best of the best working in our office on a day-to-day basis so I get tons of inspiration just from being around great brains and for me it’s really important to be around other people to feel motivated and feel creative, so obviously a time like this when we're all isolated has been hard for me because you have to really be proactive about reaching out to people, whereas in my normal day-to-day life I'm just surrounded by hundreds of people every day. So a lot of it is just people I'm lucky enough to be around. It's really important to me to set aside time on the computer for just myself to analyze my own habits like the Instagram data tracker. I spend a few minutes giving myself a little bit of leeway to go on Pinterest and pin a couple things that make me feel something or that just sparked my interest and then I go back and I'm like, okay what out of that image that I saw made me pin it? Was it that it was a creative recipe and I want to try it or was it that it was just a pretty picture that reminded me of something else, and that for me, like going back and basically creating data around my own actions, is how I get inspiration because if I pin a recipe because I want to try that later I’m like, ok so the way my brain is working right now is I want to try new things and I want guidance on how to do that. So then when I go to create content I keep that in mind and I'm like okay if I want that, I'm just a normal 20 something year old girl, so any other normal 20 something year old girl is probably having the same thing like especially while we are all in quarantine it’s important to know what people care about because there’s no one around you telling you what to make. So this morning I was online and I was like, I am really craving sushi right now and like I can't go to sushi restaurant, which is what I normally do and takeout is just not the same, so I was like, maybe I’ll learn how to make sushi and I was like everyone's trying to make things right now. So paying attention to my own habits is really indicative for me of my demographics habits because I’m just one of you and one of everybody else, so I figure if it’s something I’m interested in, there’s got to be at least one other person that cares about it. So monitoring my own habits and my friends' habits is really helpful for me in finding inspiration. One thing I've always had and I always have cared about is it can't just be me talking to my audience, it has to be a two-way conversation. If you guys don't tell me what you want or I don't listen to you tell me what you want then I can't give you what you want, so for me it’s always been important that it goes two ways and that I listen to you guys and I put out the content you ask for.

So going back to your boutique, how do you find the brands that you want to sell?

Yeah so what we do at our boutique is I don't design any of the clothes. It's all wholesale clothing, with the exception of sometimes I'll take an existing wholesale piece and then tie dye or cut it up and sell it that way. But there are three ways we get our clothes. One is they have these giant conventions where all the wholesalers get a booth and you literally show up at the convention and walk around in these mini like pop-up versions of their stores and you can touch the product. There’s usually one or two of each item that they are offering, so you can touch it and you can try it on. I’m always the crazy girl who goes and I wear a sports bra and shorts under my clothes so I can try them on because it’s so important to me that like, yeah it looks nice but I want to know what it feels like and I want to know what it looks like on a body, not just on a hanger. So we go to those conventions, there’s one in New York twice a year that we go to and like I said now that the boutique has grown enough, the really really big one is in Las Vegas every year and so I think next year we're going to go to that for the first time, which is really exciting and there's a big one in Texas so that convention is really great because, like I said, you can touch an you can try on the clothes and that is really important to me as a buyer. But then there are two other ways we do it. One of them is, all of the wholesalers have websites that you can go on and it’s basically like online shopping, but instead of buying one item for yourself you're buying 20 for a group of girls in whatever demographic. So again, you need to trust your judgment the same way you would if you were online shopping for yourself where it's like you can't touch it and a lot of times they have really strict return policies because you are spending a lot of money with them, so if everyone was always returning clothes, they wouldn’t make any money. So it really is a little bit of a gamble but once you find a brand that you know you like, you can order from them again and it’s a trustworthy company to go back to so we are definitely repeat customers for a lot of our wholesalers that we work with. The last way we do it, this is like secret hack that I don't tell a lot of people just because it doesn't come up often, but when I go shopping for clothes or like if I'm wearing something out of my own closet that I love and I’m like, I love this like I could live in this, I go and look at the label and a lot of times instead of saying like whatever store you bought it from, it says the company that made it and then you can go online and look them up. The way a lot of these work is you send an application. Most wholesalers don’t just send orders out till like every single boutique who places one, you have to apply to work with them because a lot of these brands have aesthetics that they want to promote and they are like, we sell to this kind of boutique like it has to be a young women's clothing boutique, versus like they don't want their stuff sold at like a sporting goods store.You have to send an application, but usually the stuff we are trying to buy fits right into our demographic and our aesthetic so if your shopping for your own aesthetic it's not super hard to get accepted. But that is my favorite little hack because most people when they buy something, for example Aritizia, they are like, oh cute Aritzia top like that’s great, but no one thinks about the company that made the clothes like the wholesaler that made the clothes. One of my favorite brands that works with Aritzia is Babaton and they make amazing stuff and Aritzia is like one of the only places I have ever seen that sells it. But everyone just says, oh I got it at Aritzia, they don’t say it’s made by Baboton. It’s kind of a learning curve because I never used to do that like I never used to care about the label inside of clothes but now as a small business owner and as someone who buys from these wholesalers, it has become a habit. If one of my friends is wearing something cute I’m like, omg where did you get that and she says Aritizia and I’m like, can I look at the label inside and then I go check out that wholesaler online.

What are some examples of the brands that you sell?

Most of them, no one has ever heard of them but one of the ones we sell if you have seen any items from the boutique, there is this sweatshirt that is black and I’m currently dying it with bleach and on the front of it, it says “Sweatshirt” and then on the bottom, c/o Alphia Los Angeles, and that's the name of the wholesaler. Obviously, it’s kind of like a Pari of the brand, Off White but Alphia is the name of that wholesaler. I really like their stuff but they have like thousands of products so it really takes a lot of like you have to know what you're looking for and you have to think about searching for keywords and you have to think about like what kind of product is going to be trendy because they don’t all come right away either. So sometimes when you're placing orders on the wholesalers pages, items are like we will ship this to you in August, but the way this kind of works is you buy at least one season ahead of the season you’re in so like right now we are buying our summer collection. We just dropped a spring collection a week or two ago and now we are buying for the summer collection so it can be kind of hard in transitional months because in December I was trying to buy stuff for people to wear in April and it’s just like your head is not in that space and I was on the internet trying to buy a million sweaters and my mom was like, you’re not going to want to wear those four months from now so we had to shift and really force ourselves to be like, ok t shirts, bodysuits, skirts, dresses, so it is a little bit of a learning curve and you know sometimes the wholesalers are tough to work with. Like sometimes we order however many packs, so like the packs come in two small, two medium, two large, so you get like however many packs of that like if you get six packs and it comes with 12 of each size whatever, so sometimes you will order six packs and they will call you the next day and be like, oh sorry that was wrong we only had three, and you're like, okay well crap, like you get really dead set on this one thing and then they're like, you actually can’t get that and so it's always just been a little bit of you need to have a backup in mind and one thing that's really helped me on a lot of the websites is they have like a favorites section where you can heart an item and save it for later like while you're like browsing. So if I find something I really like, just in case the wholesaler calls me the next day and says you can’t get it, I favorite a bunch of items that are similar that I also like and then I will order my favorite one but I'll save a couple of like alternative options in my cart for later in case something goes wrong and I need to kind of shift my trajectory a little.

Since you don't have a store, how do you most effectively connect with your customers online?

So I actually think it's one of the best things about our boutique, that there is no brick in mortar store for a couple reasons. One, when you have a store you have to pay rent and that’s so expensive and we don’t have that, we just make money from clothes and that’s kind of it. The only expenses we had to pay was for a lawyer to do like trademark investigation and we have to pay taxes and that kind of stuff but besides that, the only real expense is buying inventory and then we make money back, so it’s more of an investment than an expense. But I think one of the best ways nowadays to connect with customers is by just trying to get to know them on a personal level and for me, that has always been a part of my brand and my own personal Instagram like I respond to as many DM’s as I can all the time. This has been a policy of mine since I started my Instagram. Just because I have however many followers on Instagram doesn’t mean I’m too busy to talk to another kid my age about starting a business so I try to respond to as many as possible and because that was a mission of mine on my personal Instagram, and that’s where we are kind of advertising the clothes, a lot of my customers are people who have followed me on Instagram for a long time so I think a lot of times my customers feel connected to us because they know me. Like I am not shy about talking about my life and myself and my work on Instagram. It’s about connecting with people but it has turned out to be really effective for business because now I have customers who are loyal to me, which like I’ve never met them but they care about supporting my business because they care about me because we talk on Instagram once a week and like we have never met and maybe they live like across the country or the world but we talk so like we know each other. So it has actually turned out to be a policy that works for business like it’s a big thing for most businesses to build relationships with their customers and I was just lucky that I had a head start on that.

Where do you do most of your advertising, I'm assuming probably through Instagram, but are there any other social media platforms that use?

So right now we're really just on Instagram. I don't have accounts anywhere else for the boutique yet just because I’m trying to balance and I have so many things going on in my day-to-day life and this is working for us right now, so I don't feel this necessity to move it elsewhere. Another thing is, I think it’s actually smart to have one thing that you go really hard on instead of like five things that you do half-ass, so like if I have five other platforms I probably won't even post on Instagram as much because I'll be trying to manage five other platforms, so I would be less concentrated on one, whereas if I just have Instagram where all my content goes, I can always direct people to the one place and they will always land there. On top of that, it’s just where the most content will be, so we don’t feel any necessary pull to go anywhere else right now but besides the Instagram for the actual boutique, it's been really important for us to use my personal Instagram to sell stuff because like I said, a lot of my followers just follow me because they like my clothes so if they like my clothes, the stuff at the boutique is stuff I wear all the time like I wear this stuff everyday, so if they like my clothes, I’m like yeah I will tell you where to get it, it’s my bedroom in New Jersey.

Are you looking beyond Instagram?

So those two Instagram accounts have obviously been vital to the success of the business but we’re just now getting our toes in the water with other influencers. So one of my really good friends has a small fashion account and we sent her a pair of leggings a couple days ago to post on her page and then I used to work at an internship at an influencer agency so I know a lot of the backend stuff that goes into creating influencer collaborations. The biggest thing for us is just raising awareness about it like even if people aren’t buying clothes the first time they land on our Instagram page, if we get a follow that’s just as important because if they don’t like the current collection, that's fine because another collection is coming out in a month. So it’s more about the long game for us rather than the short game. So now we are in a space where influencers are going to be really valuable because we can afford to send a couple items of clothing to an influencer for free. So that is kind of where we're at now with our marketing strategy and like one of our influencers, we gave a discount code and the other one we decided not to just to test. Like a lot of what I do, which I learned from Cosmo, is very data based, so I test a lot of different things and then I see what works and try to figure out why it works and try to replicate it. So one of the influencers we gave a code to give to her followers and the other one we decided not to and just have her advertise it and one of them has posted already and one has not yet, so we are going to wait to get those results back. It’s valuable information on both sides because some people respond better when there’s no discount code because it feels less of like an advertisement versus like, hey my name is Sam and use my discount code SAM10 to get 10 percent off, like then it feels like an ad and that turns some people off. But then other times, people see a discount code and they are like, oh I can get clothes for cheaper like I want to use that, so it kind of goes both ways and it’s very experimental because it’s in the early stages but it’s really fun to dip our toes in that area of our business because it’s something I have been doing on my personal account for so long and I love to do it from the backend too, so it has been really exciting to get to a place where we can do that.

How has your boutique evolved since you started it?

It has evolved in so many ways! For starters, everything just looks a little bit more professional now. When this all started I was taking photos against like a bed sheet hanging up on a wall and I was like that's going to just have to do for now because how much money can you really invest before you’re making it so we started doing that. I used a free template from the Shopify website and I didn’t spend like any money on marketing and that kind of stuff just because we were doing what we could do and it was working so we were like, we don't need to go that much farther with it, so that’s kind of where we started with it. Now, I have a different website template, which I think is cuter but it's still not quite where I want it to be in terms of professionalism. I’m very much like, I want to try things myself before I outsource it to someone who I can pay to do it like before I spend $1,000 to get someone to revamp my website, I want to mess around with it and see what I can do for $100.

So you create your own websites?

Yes so I do that right now and I’m lucky because a website like Shopify has templates that make it easier and I have a little bit of coding experience that I learned in college too, which helps but I think eventually we will need to pay someone to make us a really legit and professional website. But for now, like what I said, what we have now works and I would rather make an investment of $100 for the next year, rather than pay $1000 right off the bat, so we are just testing that. But everything looks a little more professional now. We have a real photo studio that we shoot in instead of a sheet in my bedroom. Basically since the day we found out this was going to work, we started creating this little warehouse where we have like shelving and like organizational tools to keep track of inventory. The clothes have evolved because my style has evolved and like I said, the majority of the way I shop for this is, would I wear this? Is this special? If I went to a store and picked it up in a pile of five other things would it be the one I would be unable to walk away without? So as my style changes, so does the items in the boutique and that goes for everyone elses style too like right now, tie dye is really trendy so we bought a lot of tie dye and a year ago we did not buy any tie dye because it wasn’t really a thing. So a lot of it is evolving and like I said, we are moving into a place where we are working with influencers and we are making money and a lot of things have changed since the start of it but it's all been positive, which is really exciting because it's so easy to start a small business and just kind of hit a plateau and not know how to get out of it and I just feel really lucky that I had this audience to begin with because I really think it helped jumpstart the whole process.

What do you think the future holds for your boutique and your career?

My career goals change all the time. When I was a kid, my dream was to work at Cosmo and it was always kind of like, I’m going to be the editor in chief of Cosmo and I don't think that's not my dream like my direct boss is the editor-in-chief and I’m obsessed with her and I’m obsessed with the work she does but when you learn more about a job, it turns out to not be exactly what you thought it was. Not that it's any worse, it's just different than I expected. There are a lot of things that I had expectations for that are completely opposite of what they are in real life and I have also always loved working and social media like on my personal Instagram and stuff so there was always a time when I was like, I’m going to be a writer and then I'm going to be an editor and then I’m going to be the editor-in-chief and now I am kind of exploring the digital landscape in a way that I never used to look at it before, partly because careers in digital media didn't really exist until the last couple years. I have this sneaking suspicion that my end game career doesn't even really exist yet. I kind of have always been someone who takes one thing and makes it into something bigger like that's always just been me. Like I said before, I’m a chronic overduer like I look at something and I will turn it into a much more difficult, complex thing and it's just who I am. So I can see myself moving into a social media role, I can see myself moving into like a digital marketing role or starting a company for influencers, like that kind of stuff it’s something I’m really passionate about, especially in a time like this when we are all isolated, the internet and connecting with people through social media is more important than ever and I actually think this is going to start to grow that industry even more. I don't know what the future holds for the technology industry as a whole, but I could totally see myself moving into that space a little bit more. As for the boutique, ideally it will grow and it will continue to move at the pace it’s going or even faster in terms of growth and in terms of income and revenue and in terms of awareness and I can see that happening and if it does happen and everything works out and we really keep giving it our all, I think the team will grow, I think we will be able to invest in a really legit website and expand our shipping to worldwide instead of just in the United States and I think there's a lot of opportunity here. For me, as someone who has always been looking for a career where I can combine writing and content creation with business and making money and revenue, like I've always kind of been in the middle of those Industries and so it's really hard to just be in editorial or just doing business like I've always wanted to kind of exist at the intersection of those two spaces. So I do think as the boutique expands, it’s a really great business opportunity and I think as my career at Cosmo moves forward, that’s a really great content creation avenue and that is always where I have been and I think that’s always where I’ll be is at the intersection of those two industries, so I could totally see them overlapping, I could totally see myself kind of creating a job for myself that is in the middle of those industries without having to pick one or the other and that would be my ultimate goal.

What would be your biggest piece of advice that you would give to someone who wants to create their own clothing business?

The truth is for me, I’m just figuring it out as I go and I’ve had no education in this so it’s really been like just go for it. But I think if it boiled down to one thing, it would be you just cannot be afraid to try new things and to experiment with it. Like I said, if I wasn't experimental about all of this, I wouldn’t even have the boutique because that’s not what I’m educated to do and it was not my dream career situation. It was just like, I think I would be good at this so let’s give it a shot and even what I said before, when everyone else is wearing riding boots, like wear combat boots and if you’re not willing to to try all of those different things, you’re never going to know if something works better than what you are doing now. It kind of goes back to the point I made earlier about being data driven, like if you try three different things you will probably find that two of them don't work and one of them does work, but maybe you were doing option A the whole time and if you never tried B and C, you would never know that something better was out there. I mean you do what you can with the resources you have, obviously there are limitations to how much money you can spend and to invest in clothes but I think there is so much room for experimenting and creativity within whatever limitations you have and there are so many ways to push the boundaries that don't require a lot of money, a lot of time, and a lot of other people and that’s kind of how I’ve been doing it. It has been a two women show really, just me and my mom, for all this time and I really think the one thing that both of us have been the best at is adapting to the environment we’re in and adapting to our customers needs and not being afraid to try new things.

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